Mateo: R&B Singer with Soul

R&B singer Mateo didn’t always sing for a living. This Morehouse College graduate was a music and business major, but began his career as a consultant in New York City after attending college. After a year he couldn’t stand his job, and decided to quit and leave New York altogether to pursue his career in music and moved to Los Angeles.

Mateo got his start when he met some people that did music for the show Eve which starred rap artist Eve, and after working on the show and doing live music shows he ended up meeting Quddus Phillpe who use to be a VJ on MTV’s TRL, and that that time had been working over at Myspace Records. After hearing what Mateo had to offer Quddus bought him on, and according to Mateo The rest is history.

Mateo has grown up with music in his life. Music has always been in the family. When he was growing up, his mom put him in piano lessons at age five; playing classical piano. His grandfather was a really big blues guitarist, back in the day. He played at Kings Records where James Brown would come through. Also his grandmother was a singer and toured Canada and the Northeast.

Mateo stated in an interview with singersroom.com I had not really planned on doing music, like as a profession. I was going to do it on the side because I didn’t think it was something you could really make money off of. I was kind of like everybody else. You know, you go to college; then you think about getting that good job; get that paycheck every 2 weeks; and so you just push a lot of things to the side. So went to Morehouse, was a Business and Music major and I ended up actually just pursuing business

While on MySpace records, Mateo released a three part mixtape series entitled “Underneath the Sky”, which garnered critical acclaim. The mixtape series included features from Kardinal Offishall, Teairra Mari, Fashawn, and Shawn Chrystopher. In 2009, Mateo recorded a live EP entitled “Get To Know Me: Live at Swing House”. His video, “Get To Know Me”, from the live EP was featured by MTVU, Fuse, and Music Choice.

When Mateo signed to Krucial Noise Mateo released his fourth mixtape “Love & Stadiums” on March 30, 2011 to critical acclaim. The mixtape serves as his first release under Krucial Noise and includes features from Goapele, Pusha T, Ab Liva, Gilbere Forte, and Kardinal Offishall. Mateo released his debut studio single, “Say Its So”, on September 21, 2011. The single is produced by Kerry “Krucial” Brothers and features a special appearance from Alicia Keys and Swizz Beatz.