About Hoodie Allen
Steven Adam Markowitz , known professionally as Hoodie Allen, is an American rapper from Plainview, New York. After graduating from the University of Pennsylvania, he began working at Google before ultimately quitting to pursue a full-time career in hip hop music.
His debut extended play , All American , peaked at number ten on the Billboard 200. His debut studio album People Keep Talking , peaked at number eight and spawned the single "All About It" , his sole entry on the Billboard Hot 100. His second album, Happy Camper , peaked at number 26 on the Billboard 200, while his third, The Hype , narrowly entered the chart.
He is regarded as a preeminent artist in frat rap, a subgenre of hip hop lyrically centered around coming of age hedonism. Markowitz has notably remained an independent artist throughout his career.
Steven Markowitz was born on Long Island and raised in a Jewish household in Plainview along with his brother, Daniel. He started writing lyrics as a child, and would perform raps for his friends at house parties. Markowitz first attended the Long Island School for the Gifted in South Huntington, and later attended Plainview – Old Bethpage John F. Kennedy High School.
While attending the University of Pennsylvania, he pledged the Alpha Epsilon Pi fraternity. He also played as defensive back for Penn's sprint football team. After graduating in 2010 with a degree in marketing and finance, he worked at Google as an AdWords associate in their Standardized AdWords Reseller Training program. He would leave at 7:00 am for a bus ride to the Googleplex in Mountain View, work a full day at Google, return home at 6:00 pm, write songs, answer fan emails, and schedule concerts until 2:00 or 3:00 AM. Reflecting on this, Allen said, "I was moving so fast, and even while I was at Google there was so much going on that I felt like I was doing two full-time jobs." His dream and passion was music, so when he got opportunities to do live shows, he decided to leave Google.
Hoodie Allen originally was the duo of Steve Markowitz and Obey City on vocals and production, respectively. The group's name is combination of Markowitz's childhood nickname of "Hoodie" and filmmaker Woody Allen; Markowitz later said he wanted a name which "would stick in peoples' minds and be a little bit funny and representative of who I am". Steven and Obey's first two releases were the Bagels & Beats EP and Making Waves mixtape. These earned Hoodie a nomination for MTVU's Best Music on Campus Award in 2009. The single "UPENN Girls" also received notable attention. However, in 2010 Obey City ceased to produce in Hoodie for unknown reasons, and Steven continued making music with RJ Ferguson , giving himself the name Hoodie Allen. In June 2010, he released "You Are Not a Robot," which sampled "I Am Not a Robot" by Marina and the Diamonds and which hit No. 1 on Hype Machine, an aggregator that collects the most-blogged about music in the world. After seeing the response, he spent the summer working, and finished his mixtape Pep Rally by September. The album was largely produced by RJF, and sampled songs from Death Cab for Cutie, Flight Facilities, Marina and the Diamonds, Ellie Goulding, and Two Door Cinema Club. He picked the name "Pep Rally" because he said that it "captured the energy of the record" and something "new and exciting." He self-financed a video for the lead single "You Are Not A Robot," which helped the mixtape get downloaded over 200,000 times.
In July 2011, Hoodie released his third mixtape, Leap Year. It reached 250,000 SoundCloud plays in its first week of release. In support of the album, Hoodie headlined a 15-city tour across North America, including stops in San Francisco, New York City, and Montreal, with supporting act Fortune Family opening on several venues. Previously, he had toured with The Cataracs, Das Racist, Chiddy Bang, Mike Posner, and RJD2.
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