Hayley Sales

In the mid-2000s, teenage singer/songwriter/producer and actor Hayley Sales stepped onto the music scene with an easygoing blend of jazz-inflected adult alternative, vintage pop, sun-warmed acoustic material, and pop-soul. Her first major-label album, Sunseed, arrived in 2007; from it the single "What You Want" entered Canada's Top 50 and climbed to number 11 in Japan. Three years afterward, "Just Pretend" from the 2010 release When the Bird Became a Book drew millions of online plays, after which she secured acting parts on television series such as Supergirl and The Good Doctor as well as in the 2018 blockbuster Deadpool 2. Sales resurfaced in the 2020s via singles that included the original Christmas track "It Can't Be Christmas Without You Here" and 2021's "Never Before," a song she co-wrote with Sharon Stone.

Born in Washington, D.C., the daughter of musician and sound engineer Richard Sales, Hayley grew up near Portland, Oregon. She became self-taught on piano and guitar during grade school, then enrolled at a performing-arts institution in Portland with acting ambitions and graduated with honors at 16. After gaining experience in local and regional theater plus roles in shorts and features that included the teen horror film Sleepover Nightmare, she rejoined her parents, who were then running an organic blueberry farm on Vancouver Island. There she assisted her father in his recording studio, acquiring fundamentals of engineering and studio operations while composing her own material, and she honed her voice through study of techniques associated with Judy Garland and Nina Simone. Following a self-released demo, The Drifter, that caught the interest of a management company, Sales signed with Universal Music Canada.

Sunseed, her debut album for the label and a project that featured production and instrumental contributions from her father, appeared in June 2007. The song "What You Want" reached number 49 on the Billboard Canadian Hot 100, and Sales received the Best Mainstream Artist honor at the Canadian Radio Music Awards. She spent the ensuing years touring in support of the record with artists including Jason Mraz, Amos Lee, and INXS. In June 2010 she delivered her second long-player, When the Bird Became a Book; its lead single "Just Pretend" saw its official video accumulate more than five million views within weeks.

Returning to Los Angeles to advance her acting career, Sales landed a recurring part on the series Cedar Cove (2013-2015) along with guest appearances on additional programs. She kept developing songs intended for a third album, yet staff changes at the label in 2016 caused that project to be shelved. That same year she starred in the independent film Generation Wolf.

While independently assembling a new collection of songs, Sales took on roles in series such as The Good Doctor and Supernatural and played a supporting part in the Marvel franchise film Deadpool 2 (2018) as the wife of Josh Brolin's Cable. After another major-label deal, further personnel shifts, and resulting legal disputes, she issued the original tracks "All This Love" and "It Can't Be Christmas Without You Here" in 2020. In 2021 Sales released "Never Before," her first co-write with Oscar nominee Sharon Stone and the lead single from the forthcoming album Ricochet. The track opened the door to a U.K. and European tour with Rufus Wainwright, and ASCAP selected Sales as one of its featured artists at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival.