Now, if you have heard a cover of Rihanna’s Umbrella, chances are that you listened to Marie’s interpretation of the “hit” song of summer 2007.
Marie (pronounced Mar-ee-AY), 26, a singer-songwriter living in L.A. posted a YouTube video of her acoustic version of Umbrella on May 31, 2007 and, in a jiffy, she racked up more than 500,000 views — and counting! — that landed her a national TV appearance on Last Call with Carson Daly and placement on the season premiere of The Hills. Marie didn’t stop there. With the release of her new Hollywood Records four-song digital EP (Extended Play), Marie instantly vaulted to the forefront of emerging young singer/songwriters.
“I never expected my version to be such a hit,” Marie was quoted as saying. “When I put up those YouTube videos I had no idea of how people would react to them. What’s working for me is the stance I put on my songs. People feel like they know me,” added Marie whose father is Japanese and mother is Irish-American. (She was a freshman at the University of California, Berkeley, who dropped out to pursue her dream of being a musician.)
It turned out that 20 minutes after first learning Rihanna’s hit single, Marie propped her MacBook in her living room, filmed herself performing the song and put it on the Web. That’s what Moymoy Palaboy also did, remember? The rest, as the cliché goes, is history.
The good news is that Marie and her producer Mike Daly have just recorded her cover of Umbrella and that of Linkin Park’s What I’ve Done, together with two of Marie’s originals (Stupid For You and Unfold, which is the title track of her upcoming debut CD).
Watch Marie Digby music video "Say It Again":
