Part of the plan: Calgary's Devon Cole is moving beyond her 'TikTok Girly' fame
Devon Cole sat down recently and drew up a game plan for her career.
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It's a testament to her focus, ambition and confidence that she would not only engage in such an activity but be willing to share it openly when asked for details by a journalist.
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Perhaps it's a way of spurring herself on. But she is very specific about where she sees her music career going in the near and somewhat distant future.
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'I made a six-month plan, a one-year plan and a five-year plan,' says Cole, in a Zoom interview from her home in Los Angeles. 'I think it's important to know where I'm going and what I really want.'
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Her timeline is as follows: 'I'm going to release my album next year,' she says. 'I'm going to be a festival princess in 2027. I'm going to do the festival circuit for the first time. I'm going to do Coachella for the first time and Osheaga and whatnot and hopefully be Grammy-winning in five years. It's so interesting to manifest five years from now. Because, five years from now, all my dreams will come true and hopefully I'll be arena-playing. That's where I see myself.'
Cole, who was born and raised in Calgary, did not initially see music as a career option. In 2020, she was a psychology major at Queens University in Kingston and attended open-mic nights at local bars. But within a few years, she became a self-described 'TikTok girly' who went viral with the poppy feminist anthem W.I.T.C.H (Woman In Total Control of Herself), one of the tracks from her 2021 debut EP, Party for One. By 2023, she was a social media star, racking up millions of likes and hits on TikTok and other platforms. She was nominated for the Breakthrough Artist of the Year Juno in 2023 and eventually signed a major deal with Arista Records/Sony Music. After several singles, she released her second EP, Two Shades Blonder, in October 2024. Last summer, she moved to Los Angeles.
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Earlier this week, it was announced that she would be opening for her musical hero, Shania Twain, at the superstar's July 5 Stampede concert.
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She is currently writing songs for her debut full-length album. All in all, it seems as if things are well in hand. But while Cole's rapid ascension may seem overnight, she says there were bumps in the road.
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'My favourite quote is that it takes 10 years to become an overnight success,' she says. 'I think in the first five years that I've been doing this – I started releasing music in 2020 – the biggest learning has been this sense of confidence I have now and to trust my gut. Because I was trusting it in the beginning and I kind of fell out of touch with my gut, and I'm rebuilding that relationship.'
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Like many artists, it was a jarring transformation to go from penning songs by herself in her bedroom to being thrust into high-profile sessions after being signed. In between getting signed to Arista and recording her second EP, the company released several singles that Cole is not particularly enthusiastic about. While she doesn't want to single out which ones she is referring to – 'They are still my babies,' she says – the process of reclaiming her vision from the too-many-cooks-in-the-kitchen world of major labels has been part of her learning curve.
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Winnipeg Free Press
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Unlimited online access to articles from across Canada with one account. Get exclusive access to the Toronto Sun ePaper, an electronic replica of the print edition that you can share, download and comment on. Enjoy insights and behind-the-scenes analysis from our award-winning journalists. Support local journalists and the next generation of journalists. Daily puzzles including the New York Times Crossword. REGISTER / SIGN IN TO UNLOCK MORE ARTICLES Create an account or sign in to continue with your reading experience. Access articles from across Canada with one account. Share your thoughts and join the conversation in the comments. Enjoy additional articles per month. Get email updates from your favourite authors. THIS ARTICLE IS FREE TO READ REGISTER TO UNLOCK. Create an account or sign in to continue with your reading experience. Access articles from across Canada with one account Share your thoughts and join the conversation in the comments Enjoy additional articles per month Get email updates from your favourite authors Don't have an account? Create Account Adele Romanski and her producing partner Mark Ceryak were 'kind of obsessed' with the short, comedic videos Victor was putting out on various social media platforms. Titles of some that still exist online include 'when I definitely did not murder my husband' and a series called 'Eva vs. Anxiety.' Romanski and Ceryak started bugging their Pastel productions partner Barry Jenkins, certainly the most well-known name of the bunch, to make the first move and send Victor a direct message. But they had to ask themselves a big question first: Would that be weird? 'We had to negotiate whether or not that was appropriate for Barry, a married man, to send Eva a DM,' Romanski said. 'We were like 'yessss, do it!'' 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Winnipeg Free Press
18 hours ago
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The Associated Press does not typically name people who say they have been sexually abused unless they come forward publicly, as Cassie, born Casandra Ventura, has. The revelation last year of a major federal sex trafficking investigation on the day of a bicoastal raid of Combs' houses took the allegations to another level of seriousness and public knowledge. The later revelation that feds had seized 1,000 bottles of baby oil and other lubricant entered the popular culture immediately. Fellow celebrities were called out for past Diddy associations — though no others were implicated in the criminal allegations. The May 2024 leak of a video of Combs beating Cassie in a Los Angeles hotel hallway eight years earlier was arguably just as damaging, if not more, than the initial wave of allegations. It brought a rare public apology, in an earnestly presented Instagram video two days later. Nierman called the video, shown at trial, 'something people aren't just going to forget.' Shortly after Combs' apology, New York City Mayor Eric Adams requested he return a key to the city he'd gotten at a ceremony in 2023. Howard University rescinded an honorary degree it had awarded him and ended a scholarship program in his name. He sold off his stake in Revolt, the media company he'd founded more than a decade earlier. Combs is not about to get the key, or the degree, back. But he could pick up the pieces of his reputation to salvage something from it. Deraney said it may require 'some kind of come-to-Jesus moment where he owns up to it.' 'Really what it's going to come down to is if he goes to prison, will it change him?' Deraney said. 'Has he changed at all during this whole processes? I don't know.'
