Colbie Marie Caillat ( KOHL-bee kal-AY; born May 28, 1985) is an American singer-songwriter. She rose to fame on the social networking website Myspace in 2005.
She signed with Universal Republic Records to release her debut studio album, Coco (2007), which was supported by the singles "Bubbly" and "Realize", peaked at number five on the Billboard 200, and received double platinum certification by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). At the 52nd Annual Grammy Awards, her 2008 duet with Jason Mraz, "Lucky", won Best Pop Collaboration with Vocals, her second album, Breakthrough (2009), received a nomination for Best Pop Vocal Album, and she won Album of the Year for her contributions to Taylor Swift's Fearless (2008). Furthermore, Breakthrough debuted atop the Billboard 200 and spawned the single "Fallin' for You". Her third album, All of You (2011), was supported by the single "Brighter Than the Sun", and her fourth album, Christmas in the Sand (2012), was a Christmas album. Her fifth, Gypsy Heart (2014), was supported by the single "Try". From 2018 to 2020, she was part of country music quartet Gone West.
Caillat has sold over six million albums worldwide and over 10 million singles. In 2009, she was named Billboard magazine's 94th-best-selling music artist of the 2000s.
Caillat was born in Malibu, California, and grew up in Newbury Park, California. Her father, Ken Caillat, co-produced Fleetwood Mac's Rumours (1977), Tusk (1979), and Mirage (1982) albums. When she was an infant, her parents gave her the nickname "Coco", which she would later name her debut album.
Caillat took piano lessons as a child, but lacked significant inspiration until she turned 11 years old, when she became enthralled with Lauryn Hill's performance in Sister Act 2. She realized that she wanted to be a singer, and began taking vocal lessons, performing onstage for the first time in sixth grade. Since then she has covered the Roberta Flack song "Killing Me Softly", which had previously been covered by Lauryn Hill, and Hill's own "Tell Him".
Caillat soon met producer Mikal Blue, who hired her to sing on techno songs used at fashion shows. Caillat began playing the acoustic guitar at age 19, and Blue helped her record her first song.
She auditioned for American Idol in an early season (one of the first four seasons before Bubbly was released), but was rejected at the pre-audition stage and was unable to sing for the judges. The second time she auditioned for the show, she sang her own original song, "Bubbly", and was rejected once again. However, Caillat expressed gratitude at the judges' decision, saying "I was shy. I was nervous. I didn't look the greatest. I wasn't ready for it yet. I was glad, when I auditioned, that they said no."
The popularity of Caillat's MySpace profile led her to become the number-one unsigned singer in her genre for four consecutive months.
Caillat's debut album, Coco, was released on July 10, 2007, in Australia and Asia and a week later in North America. Its deluxe edition was released on September 3, 2008, in Japan and November 11, 2008, worldwide. The album was certified 2× Platinum by the RIAA with shipments to U.S. retailers of 2,000,000 units. The album's first single, "Bubbly", peaked at number five on the US Billboard Hot 100 and number two on the Pop 100. It also topped the Hot Adult Contemporary Tracks and Hot Adult Top 40 Tracks charts for 19 and 14 weeks, respectively. The single was certified platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America on December 13, 2007, with sales of more than 2.6 million downloads in the US. On November, 20, she released the Christmas song "Mistletoe" and peaked at number 75 at Billboard Hot 100. The song was the most downloaded holiday song of 2007. It was also featured in the film Baby Mama. The second single from Coco, "Realize", was released on January 23, 2008, peaking at number 20 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, becoming her second Top 20 hit in the United States.
"The Little Things", was released as the third single in Germany on March 7, 2008, and in United States in October 2008. The single did not chart well in the US, and was her weakest charting single from the album, peaking at number seven on US Billboard Bubbling Under Hot 100. She also recorded a French translated version of this song. The original music video was released only in Europe and was shot in San Francisco. Another music video for the song was shot in Hawaii and was a prequel to "Bubbly". The fourth and final single from the album in the United States was, "Somethin' Special (Beijing Olympic Mix)", released on July 29, 2008. The song was included only in the deluxe edition. It was released to give support to the American athletes participating in the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics, in China, and also was included on the AT&T Team USA Soundtrack. Caillat also sings on "You" by Schiller and appears in the music video. She has been involved in the soundtrack of the movie Imagine That; she and Mikal Blue cover the Beatles song "Here Comes the Sun". She is also featured in Colombian singer Juanes' album La vida... es un ratico (en vivo) in the song "Hoy Me Voy". In October, the song "Midnight Bottle" was included in the soundtrack of Brazilian soap opera Três Irmãs. She also played herself in this soap opera and performed the song. Caillat provided background vocals for and co-wrote Taylor Swift's song "Breathe", on her album, Fearless.
2009–2012: Breakthrough and All of You
On January 13, 2009, Caillat also released a duet with Jason Mraz, called "Lucky", on his album, We Sing, We Dance, We Steal Things. Caillat's second album, Breakthrough, was released in August 2009. Most of the album was co-written by Jason Reeves and features guitarist David Becker on two tracks. Becker has worked with Caillat's father Ken. Caillat had writer's block during the recording sessions, so she enlisted her friends Kara DioGuardi and Jason Reeves, and they went to Hawaii for three weeks, rented a beach house and wrote songs. Breakthrough debuted at number-one on the US Billboard 200 chart, with first-week sales of 106,000 copies, becoming her first album to debut at the top and an improvement of the first week sales of her debut album Coco (2007), which started at number five with only 51,000 copies. It was also Universal Music Group's sixth consecutive number-one album to debut at the top. It was later certified Platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). The first single, "Fallin' for You", was released on June 29, 2009. The "lilting" mid-tempo ballad "features an instantly catchy chorus and toe tapping melody," as defined by Melinda Newman of HitFix. It achieved chart success in the United States, reaching number twelve on the Billboard Hot 100, her second highest-charting single and her highest debut with 118,000 first-week downloads, spending fourteen weeks at number two on the Adult Pop Songs and topping the Adult Contemporary chart. Elsewhere, it reached the top-twenty in four other countries and top-forty in the remaining territories.
Initially "Begin Again" and "You Got Me" were under consideration to be the album's second single, however "I Never Told You" was released instead on February 16, 2010. It reached number forty-eight on the Billboard Hot 100 and was more successful on the Adult Pop Songs, where it peaked at number three, and on the Adult Contemporary, reaching number eleven. Caillat was recognized as BMI's songwriter of the year. In July 2010, Caillat performed "God Bless America" during the seventh inning stretch at the 2010 Major League Baseball All-Star Game. In September 2010, Caillat performed the national anthem in the season opener game of the National Football League in New Orleans and a Monday Night Football game in Chicago. In December 2010, Caillat performed at the Nobel Peace Prize Concert in Oslo, Norway. In 2010, Caillat visited the Watkins Glen, New York shelter of Farm Sanctuary, an organization she supports. Caillat's third album, All of You, was released on July 6, 2011. The set, largely produced by Greg Wells, features one guest appearance by rapper/actor Common, who graces "Favorite Song", while her songwriting collaborators include Ryan Tedder, Toby Gad, Jason Reeves and Rick Nowels. All of You debuted at number six on the US Billboard 200 with first week sales of 70,000 copies. However, it managed to top the Digital Albums Chart. As of June 2014 the album has sold 331,000 copies according to Nielsen SoundScan.