# Clarence Jey

Clarence Ranjith Jeyaretnam, known professionally as Clarence Jey, is a Sri Lankan born American record producer and songwriter. He co-founded ARK Music Factory with record producer Patrice Wilson in 2010. The label signed American singer Rebecca Black; Jey and Wilson wrote and produced her 2011 single "Friday", which peaked at number 58 on the Billboard Hot 100.

## Life and career

Jey spent some of his childhood in Australia, performing with local bands and composing and producing music at his studio in Melbourne where he wrote and produced the theme song and additional music for the 2007 US Emmy-nominated Discovery Kids animation television show, Growing Up Creepie. He then relocated to Los Angeles, California. Upon his relocation, he produced music for guitarist Richie Kotzen. He has since composed music and written songs for television shows including Lego City Adventures, Common Law, America's Got Talent, Randy Jackson Presents America's Best Dance Crew and The Newsroom. Jey's songs and music have been used on commercials including the US retailer Kohls and in Vodafone ads. Jey oversaw a contestant on the 2015 reality show Famous in 12 for The CW.
Jey has also worked in film. In 2014, he produced and composed songs, and was music supervisor for the film Full Love, directed by Jean-Claude Van Damme, which premiered at the Shanghai International Film Festival.
In 2015, Clarence Jey produced for R&B group All-4-One on their eighth studio album, Twenty+, which was released in July 2015. In 2016, Jey composed music and wrote lyrics for the musical theater show "Jambalaya The Musical", along with his production partner, American songwriter Jeff Barry. Clarence Jey was involved in part of the music in the Hallmark Channel movie titled My Christmas Love, as well as Australian TV comedy series Please Like Me.
In 2018, Jey produced a song titled "Wasted" on New Zealand roots reggae band Katchafire's album Legacy, which debuted at number 3 on US Billboard Reggae Album Chart.
In 2019, Jey and his writing partner Jeff Barry composed and wrote a song for Lego City Adventures, an animated television series, produced by The Lego Group, for Nickelodeon television.
In 2023, Jey worked and produced with Canadian Idol Finalist Oliver Pigott's debut American Single, "Eyes My Daddy Gave Me", and co-wrote Noah Floersh second single, "Thompson's Station"
In 2024, Jey co-wrote American Rapper and Youtuber NLE Choppa’s Holiday single “What A Christmas”, which was released via Warner Records.

### "Friday"

In 2011, Jey was part of ARK Music Factory and was involved in the creation of the song "Friday", by Rebecca Black, which had over 750 million YouTube views and, on March 29, 2011, surpassed Justin Bieber's "Baby" as the most disliked YouTube video, with 1.17 million dislikes. Jey co-wrote and produced the controversial song, which reached the Billboard Hot 100 and iTunes Top 20 in March 2011.
The song has received almost universally negative reviews from music critics, for its songwriting, instrumentation, Black's vocals, and the video choreography, while being referred to as 'genius' by media executive, Simon Cowell. "Friday" was covered by the cast of Fox network's show Glee, as well as by comedians Jimmy Fallon and Stephen Colbert on Fallon's album Blow Your Pants Off.

## Other ventures
### Pop-U-Lar

In 2011, he established Pop-U-Lar. On September 16, 2011, they released Kenny James' "Party Like the Rich Kids", even though Jey had left Ark the trailer for the song was still uploaded to Ark's YouTube channel. Pop-U-Lar's YouTube channel "PopUraZZi" only had videos of former artist Kenny James who is most likely their first artist. Pop-U-Lar was still used as a label by Jey until 2014. For a small period in 2014 Pop-U-Lar and Music Intersection co-existed, for example the copyright of Jey's song "Way Up" is owned by Music Intersection but says to visit Pop-U-Lar's website for more information and for "a chance to be the next Pop-U-Lar artist!". Pop-U-Lar's legal company CT Enterprises International, LLC shut down in November 2012 even though Music Intersection's legal company Music Intersection, Inc. wasn't started until March 2014. Their artist Kenny James seems to be a former Ark artist as he is seen in their "Welcome to Ark" video as he is seen 1 minute and 44 seconds into the video, which may be why his video trailer is on Ark's channel, James never released any music with Ark. Pop-U-Lar's first artist was much different than Ark's music, it contained profanity, alcoholism and cheating on his significant other. As seen on Pop-U-Lar's Twitter they had signed rock band Breaking Arrows. Kenny James was with Pop-U-Lar until it shutdown as seen on their Twitter where they were tweeting about him until July 2014. Pop-U-Lar's website shutdown in early 2014 which is when it was assumed to be shutdown and replaced with Music Intersection.

### Music Intersection

Music Intersection, Inc. is an American record label founded on March 17, 2014 by Clarence Jey. It is distributed by CD Baby. Music Intersection's longest artist is Josef Gordod, his first release with them "Put It On" was featured in a Jeep commercial in 2014. The "featured video" of the now inactive MusicIntersection.com is Kenny James' "Party Like the Rich Kids" even though it was released via Jey's first attempt at a label "Pop-U-Lar". Music Intersection also has a in-house songwriter Jeff Barry, who was featured alongside Jey in Josef Gordon's "What a Christmas this Is".

## Awards

In 2017, Clarence Jey won the "Tamil American Pioneer" award, an award which recognizes North American Tamil Pioneers in certain fields by the Federation of Tamil Sangams of North America, an organization of the North American Tamil community.