Entertainment, Music - Army Times

‘Birthday Sex’ is having itself a party

“Birthday Sex” is proving to be a gift that keeps on giving for R&B newcomer Jeremih, whose salacious first single is one of summer’s hottest.

It’s the No. 1 urban song on USA Today’s airplay charts and No. 3 on the rhythmic chart, and it’s No. 4 on Mediabase’s combined-formats The Big Picture chart. “Birthday Sex” has sold 414,000 downloads, according to Nielsen SoundScan. The song has racked up almost 62 million plays on Jeremih’s MySpace page and even inspired a Chipmunks spoof on YouTube.

“I had no clue that it would ever get this big,” says Jeremih (Felton), 21, a multi-instrumentalist whose self-titled debut album arrives June 30.

“I wish I had a clever story to tell about it, but we just came up with it in the studio one day.”

With lyrics like “You say you want passion/I think you found it/Get ready for action/Don’t be astounded,” the Chicago performer’s ballad has drawn comparisons to “Bed,” J. Holiday’s tune by Terius “The Dream” Nash that dominated in September 2007.

The title, more than the timing, boosted this song, says Sean Ross of Edison Media Research.

“(Marvin Gaye’s) ‘Sexual Healing,’ which this reminds me of by its provocative nature, was a fall/winter song,” Ross says. “I think it would have been a hit at any time. If you’re the program director of a radio station, no matter how busy you are, no matter how many new releases there are, you make time to listen to a song called ‘Birthday Sex.’”

That’s pretty much how the song caught fire. Jeremih and his manager were actually pitching a different song, “My Ride,” to Barbara McDowell, music director at Chicago R&B station WPWX, because it had some local success. She thought “Birthday Sex” had more mass appeal.

The song later attracted the attention of the major record labels. By the time Jeremih signed with Def Jam in March, “Birthday Sex” had scored more than 1,900 radio spins.

Not bad for a self-taught musician. Jeremih plays keyboards, drums and saxophone, and he added singing just three years ago. When he did a Stevie Wonder tribute for a talent show at the University of Illinois, friends told him he could be the next John Legend. He transferred to Chicago’s Columbia College, where he met Mick Schultz, who produced “Jeremih,” and the singer handled the writing.

Other tracks include “Runway,” sparked by Tyra Banks’ “America’s Next Top Model;” and his favorite, the Wonder-inspired “Starting All Over.”

The CD “is really versatile,” Jeremih says. “I don’t want people to think that ‘Birthday Sex’ defines the album.”