Siya

The California-born, Brooklyn-raised MC first drew wider notice in 2014 when T.I. executive-produced the Sisterhood of Hip Hop reality series placed her on screen.

Born Michele Andrea Sherman in 1987 in Barstow, California, she started rhyming at age seven under the influence of Bone Thugs-N-Harmony and Jay-Z. After shuttling between a mother struggling with addiction and a father serving a life sentence in a Bay Area facility, she relocated at eleven to her grandmother’s home inside Brooklyn’s Bedford-Stuyvesant Eleanor Roosevelt projects. One year later she was already pursuing a recording career with single-minded focus; she dropped out in her junior year of high school, began addressing her sexuality in her rhymes, and by her early twenties had settled in Atlanta.

Her first self-released project, the 2011 mixtape Elevator Dreams, contained the early tracks “I’m Gone” and “Smoke, Drink,” which prompted Tank to sign her to his R&B Money label in 2012. Footage of that signing appeared on Sisterhood of Hip Hop, whose three seasons ran from 2014 through 2016 and marked one of the first mainstream breakthroughs by an openly gay female rapper. By the time the series debuted she had moved to Los Angeles and issued the D. Y. K. E. (Damn You Killin’ Em) mixtape, which included Tank on the title cut. Two further tapes arrived the next year—Better Late Than Never and What Never Happened—the latter reflecting on her father’s absence throughout her upbringing.

Early 2016 found her featured on Tank’s driving single “#BDAY” alongside Chris Brown and Sage the Gemini. The year ended with the R&B Money-backed full-length SIYAvsSIYA, which showcased guest appearances by Lyric Wright, Ashley Rose, and Kreesha Turner. Tank rejoined her on “Don’t You (Say Yes),” the centerpiece of her February 2017 Commitment EP. Later that year, actor Larenz Tate recommended her—despite her lack of formal dramatic training—for a role in the Queen Latifah-produced crime film Deuces, which premiered in April. She also released the 2017 EP 383: For Roosevelt.

Her performance in Deuces generated additional screen opportunities. She appeared in James DeMonaco’s The First Purge prequel in July 2018 and starred in Jordan Cann’s Street Dreams: Los Angeles later the same year. After parting ways with R&B Money she confronted her mental-health and anxiety struggles on the independently issued 2018 mixtape Mad Energy. Collaborative singles with Knoxxy and Eric Bellinger arrived in 2019, followed by a mid-2020 cameo in Will Wernick’s horror thriller No Escape. January 2021’s “What You Deserve,” June’s joint release “Coupe” with Delaware’s $avay, and a brief appearance on the coda of Cordula Faye’s 2022 track “Risked It All” all demonstrated her facility with languid, classic R&B. In January 2023 she joined the BET+ limited series Angel while simultaneously issuing the Def Jam EP Mixed Emotions.