Daniel Powter

Daniel Richard Powter (born February 25, 1971) is a Canadian musician.

The song reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100, Adult Top 40 and Adult Contemporary charts, making Powter the first solo Canadian male artist to top the Hot 100 since Bryan Adams in 1995 (with "Have You Ever Really Loved a Woman?").

The song also reached number one in Powter's homeland, Canada.

Powter moved to Vancouver at the age of 22 and met producer Jeff Dawson in 1997, releasing his debut studio album, I'm Your Betty, on June 21, 2000.

The album, limited to a very small print, contains ten songs, two of which—"More Than I" and "Negative Fashion"—were both featured on the television show Higher Ground in the episode "Wherefore Art Thou".

The magazine describes one-hit wonders as acts whose second hit did not reach the top 25; they only included acts from 2000 to 2007.

In Powter's case, "Bad Day" is his only Hot 100 hit.

He is best known for his self-penned hit song "Bad Day" (2005), which was at the top of the Billboard Hot 100 for five weeks.

Powter grew up in Vernon, in the Okanagan-Shuswap region of British Columbia, alongside 2 brothers and a sister.

As a child, Powter played the violin at the age of 4.

He changed to piano at 16 years old after a group of children bullied him in the schoolyard, trashed and destroyed his violin.

Due to dyslexia, Powter had trouble in university reading music, and dropped out at the age of 20 in order to pursue his own musical career, learning all songs by ear and recording new melodies that he created.

He started writing songs when he was 13 years old.

Powter's first single, "Bad Day", was first released in Europe in mid-2005, in advance of his second album, Daniel Powter.

Warner Bros. Records submitted the single for commercials, and it was subsequently chosen by Coca-Cola as the theme song for an ad campaign in Europe.

The song achieved heavy airplay in most European countries, peaking at number three on the overall European airplay chart.

It reached number one on national airplay in Germany, number one on the singles charts in the Republic of Ireland and Italy, number two in the United Kingdom—where it stayed in the top ten for thirteen weeks—and number three in Australia.

In the United States, "Bad Day" was used extensively on the television series American Idol in its fifth season.

On May 31, 2005, Powter released his first extended play known as "Free Loop."

On July 2, 2005, Powter performed at the Berlin installment of Live 8, a simultaneous group of concerts in nine countries intended to raise awareness of poverty in Africa and put pressure on world leaders for aid.

"Bad Day" came in fifth in the British Record of the Year 2005.

Powter sang the song live at the end of the final show of that season on May 23, 2006.

In 2006, Powter won in the New Artist of the Year category at the Canadian Juno Awards, and was nominated for Best International Breakthrough Act at the BRIT Awards.

"Bad Day" was nominated at the 2006 Billboard Music Awards for Hot 100 Single of the Year, and was named Billboard magazine's song of the year in 2006.

At the 2007 Grammy Awards, Powter received a Best Male Pop Vocal Performance nomination for the song.

The subsequent singles from Daniel Powter – "Jimmy Gets High", "Free Loop", and "Lie to Me" – were released in different parts of the world, each failing to match the success of "Bad Day".

"Free Loop" was deemed chart ineligible in the UK (as the release included a version of "Bad Day" as a B-side whilst "Bad Day" was still in the chart, hence breaking chart rules) and failed to chart in the U.S., though it reached the top forty on the Adult Contemporary chart.

Following the release of "Lie to Me", "Jimmy Gets High" was to be the fourth single from the album in the UK, but its release was cancelled.

A new track called "Love You Lately" was released as the next U.S. single, preceding a re-release of the album Daniel Powter that was also cancelled.

Powter was never able to have another major hit after "Bad Day" and never cracked the U.S. Hot 100 again.

In March 2008, a song by Japanese singer Haru featuring Powter, "Find My Way", was released.

In September, Powter released his third album, Under the Radar.

Love you Lately was also rerecorded and released on December 9, 2008 as a new single.

This was the same year in which he embarked on the Wolfbaggin' Tour, joining the likes of Alphabeat and Lil Chris.

Powter also performed piano on tracks for what was scheduled to be Marcy Playground frontman John Wozniak's solo album, Leaving Wonderland... in a Fit of Rage, but the album was released under the band's name.

Powter was still given credit for his contributions to the song "Gin and Money".

Under The Radar was also given an exclusive CD and DVD release for the Asia Market known as the Asia Tour Edition.

It was released on February 14, 2009.

On March 16, 2009, Powter performed at the Montreux Jazz Festival then in December 2009, Powter was named as the decade's top One-Hit Wonder by Billboard.

On January 1, 2010, he performed O Canada at the NHL Winter Classic.