Ne-Yo
Ne-Yo was born born on October 18, 1979 in Camden, Arkansas, and baptized as Shaffer Chimere Smith. His father is African American and his mother is of mixed African American and Chinese American descent; both were musicians.
As a young child, he was raised by his mother alone after she separated from his father. In hopes of better opportunity, his mother relocated the family to Las Vegas, Nevada.
Ne-Yo emerged into the recording industry as member of the Las Vegas-based quartet Envy. After the group disbanded in 2000, Ne-Yo was signed to Columbia Records, but, after recording his first album, was dropped from the label before he could even release it. American singer Marques Houston happened to hear one of Ne-Yo’s tracks, “That Girl”, which was supposed to be the latter’s debut single off his then-unreleased album. Houston rerecorded “That Girl” and released it as a single to his 2003 album MH. The release of the song led to Ne-Yo being recognized as a top songwriter. 
For the next two years, Ne-Yo continued writing songs, some of which have not been officially released. He contributed songs to American singer Teedra Moses’s 2004 album Complex Simplicity, Christina Milian’s It’s About Time, and the American boy band Youngstown, though all of which failed to give Ne-Yo much attention from the mainstream. Ne-Yo has also contributed songs to American singer Mary J. Blige, B2K, Faith Evans and Musiq, among others.
Ne-Yo broke into the industry after “Let Me Love You”, a song he wrote for American singer Mario, reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100, and later stayed on the top spot for nine weeks. After the successful release, Tina Davis, former A&R representative for Def Jam Recordings, arranged an informal meeting with label head L.A. Reid. Originally, Ne-Yo was not seeking a new contract, but, after he had performed to them, he was signed by American hip hop artist Jay-Z, then-CEO of Def Jam.
“Ne-Yo” was coined by a producer Ne-Yo once worked with, Big D Evans, because Evans claimed that Ne-Yo sees music as Neo sees the matrix. As a joke, Evans started calling him Ne-Yo until everybody was accustomed to it.
Ne-Yo’s then-girlfriend had a son in 2005, naming him Chimere after Ne-Yo’s middle name. Though Ne-Yo believed he was the father, he later discovered the child was not his. He is now in litigation with the child’s mother.
Ne-Yo was arrested for reckless driving on February 19, 2008, while driving through Cobb County, Georgia. He was driving at over 100 mph in his 2006 Range Rover and did not have a valid license. It was reported that he was doing about 105 mph, 50 mph over the speed limit. According to the Atlanta-Journal Constitution, Ne-Yo was sentenced to 24 hours community service by a judge on June 2, 2008, after he pleaded guilty to driving without a license and pleaded no contest to the reckless driving charge.
