American singer-songwriter Colbie Caillat was born on May 28, 1985 in Malibu, California to parents Diane and Ken Caillat, Ken being a music producer and engineer known for his work on several Fleetwood Mac albums.

Growing up in a musical environment, she learned how to play instruments from a very young age, but her inspiration to become a singer came from seeing Lauryn Hill in her as role as Rita Watson in the 1993 film Sister Act 2: Back in the Habit. After she started taking vocals lessons, she met musicians Mikal Blue, and later Jason Reeves, who helped her become a songwriter.

To achieve her dream, she tried to audition for American Idol twice, but was rejected both times. Resilient to give up, she started uploading her songs to social network platform MySpace. When one of her songs, “Bubbly,” started to gain traction to the point of making her one of the most popular unsigned artists on the website, she caught the attention of Republic Records and signed her to their label. With a record deal, she released her debut album, Coco, in July 2007. The album, along with “Bubbly,” earned her great commercial success. The single entered and climbed the charts all over the world, reaching the top five in the U.S. and number one in several countries.

The success of “Bubbly” allowed her to collaborate with other rising stars, including Jason Mraz and Taylor Swift, and release a sophomore album, Breakthrough, in 2009. At the 52nd GRAMMY Awards, she received four nominations, winning two of them: Album of the Year for being featured on Taylor Swift’s Fearless on the track “Breathe,” and Best Pop Collaboration with Vocals for “Lucky”. Since then, she continued releasing studio albums that met high-to-moderate success, including All of You (2011), Christmas in the Sand (2012), and Gypsy Heart (2014).

Gypsy Heart marked her last release with Republic Records. When she presented them her album The Malibu Sessions, it wasn’t well-received by the label, so Caillat decided to part ways from it and release it independently in 2016. Ever since, her musical endeavors have slowed down over the years, and mainly consist of forming Gone West, a band comprising her and her fiancé, and Jason Reeves and his wife. They only released one studio album in 2020, the same year they disbanded.