The Perfect Storm

The Perfect Storm is the debut studio album by urban/soul singer L.E.X. The album was released on May 3rd, 2010. The first single lifted off the album, "Sabotage, Inc." was released May 10th, a week after the album was launched. The album debuted on May 9th at #2 and was certified silver in its second week. The album has spent over a year on the UK chart, and is certified diamond with over 1.15 million sales. The album peaked at #3 in the US with over 2.5 million copies sold and spawning two #1 hits. A Russian-language version was released in Russia in 2011, hitting #1 and spawning three #1 hits.

Background & Recording
Lionell had been writing and recording demos through a large portion of 2009, self-funding the sessions and shopping the resultant demo CD's to various record companies looking for someone to sign him, with little success; until finally an A&R representative of Interscope Records gave a listen to one of his demo discs, and agreed to negotiate a record deal with him. Lionell was signed to Interscope in March, when he started work on the album. During this time he attempted to participate in the 2010 Tango Challenge in the UK, but was unsuccessful, being one of three artists who failed to make it through the heats that would determine the partnerships. As a direct result of this, Lionell wrote the song 'Sabotage, Inc.' which was released as the first single in direct competition with Lionell's quickly-turned-rival Kirby L. Avalon. With his first batch of tracks for the album ('Sabotage, Inc.', 'Miss Fortune' and 'Molotov Cocktail') Lionell was initially attempting a far more urban-leaning record but realised quickly that this wasn't working out too well for him, so as he developed further material, he found himself singing more, and delving into soul territory. With this in mind, Lionell's urban/soul direction steered him toward the sound he created with the album. An early version of 'Miss Fortune' was performed at the Tango Challenge heat; the demo featured a rougher production which was cleaned up in the final studio version, which included an altered chorus and a new verse to better tell the story of the song.

Lionell worked with a diverse list of high-profile urban producers when working on the record, infusing elements of jazz and funk into his work with Rich Harrison, dance and electro elements for his work with Timbaland, and creating 90's throwback sounds for his work with Jim Beanz. For more urban-leaning material he worked with Nate "Danja" Hills, Swizz Beatz and Polow da Don. Lionell also worked with Timbaland, Swizz and Polow on remixes of 'Twelve Times' for Danelle Becker (produced by Swizz Beatz), 'Dirty Dirty' by Moodring (produced by Polow) and 'Worlds Collide' by Kazimiera and Tiffany Amber (produced by Timbaland). The strength of his material convinced UK label X (sub-division of now-defunct label Elite Records) to sign Lionell prior to the album's release.

Collaborations
Lionell collaborated with a number of other acts when creating the album, on top of the long list of producers. For 'Sabotage, Inc.' Lionell wrote sections specifially for Cassie Fox and Butterscotch to sing on the track, and they both agreed to appear. The song was released as the first single in place of originally-planned lead-off track 'Molotov Cocktail', and with moderately positive response went on to be a top 10 hit for Lionell, achieving a high level of airplay and reaching silver certification. Lionell enlisted Paulo Araujo to appear on the Brazilian-flavoured 'Drummer Boy' which Lionell again wrote with the collaboration in mind. During this time Paulo acted as a mentor to Lionell, and the collaborators made friends with each other. The song was highly received, and is being considered as a possible single release for the future.

Lionell worked extensively with close friend Danelle Becker across various projects; on top of his own album, Lionell worked with Danelle on material for her own album and for Cassie Fox's album. Danelle wrote the songs 'Fool' and 'Welcome To The Underground', which Lionell appeared on. 'Fool' was for Danelle's album, and features a rap battle between Lionell, Danelle and other guest vocalist Flaming SteffY while 'Welcome To The Underground' was included on Cassie's album and features a rap by Lionell. These two songs were re-worked, remixed and re-recorded for Lionell's album. Danelle is featured on 'Fool Is You', as it was partially a response song to the song from Danelle's own album, although the version from Lionell's album does not feature Flaming SteffY. 'Underground' was slightly tweaked and remixed, with extra lyrics and more vocals by Lionell being added to the version which appeared on his album.

Tracklisting

 * 1) Lionell Edward Xavier (prod. by Nate "Danja" Hills)
 * 2) Molotov Cocktail (prod. by Polow da Don)
 * 3) Miss Fortune (prod. by Timbaland)
 * 4) Sabotage, Inc. (ft. Butterscotch & Cassie Fox) (prod. by Swizz Beatz)
 * 5) Chasing Ghosts (prod. by StarGate)
 * 6) Soul Suicide (prod. by Rich Harrison)
 * 7) Drummer Boy (ft. Paulo Araujo) (prod. by Nate "Danja" Hills)
 * 8) Nothing Of Me (prod. by Jim Beanz)
 * 9) Fool Is You (ft. Danelle Becker) (prod. by Swizz Beatz)
 * 10) Unmake My Promises (prod. by Timbaland)
 * 11) Underground (ft. Cassie Fox) (prod. by Dre & Vidal)
 * 12) The Perfect Storm (prod. by The-Dream)

Chart Performance
The album debuted on the UK albums chart at #2 with sales of 69,117 copies; far exceeding the expectations of Lionell and his then-record company X. The album has continued to sell moderately in the UK, having seen steady chart presence due to Lionell's success on the singles chart and on airplay with the domination of his single 'Nothing Of Me'. The album was certified silver in its second week of release, and reached gold status after six weeks. The album was certified diamond with sales over 1.15 million copies, after over a year on chart. In the US, the album saw a top 5 opening and a #3 peak. It has currently been certified double platinum off the back of four hit singles - 'Sabotage, Inc.', 'Nothing Of Me', 'Soul Suicide' and 'Chasing Ghosts', each released in the US simultaneously to their UK releases.

Chart Run

 * Week 1: #2 - 69,117
 * Week 2: #9 - 55,871
 * Week 3: #13 - 37,901
 * Week 4: #19 - 17,459
 * Week 5: #21 - 15,759
 * Week 6: #24 - 13,307
 * Week 7: #24 - 13,522
 * Week 8: #14 - 27,217
 * Week 9: #3 - 63,778
 * Week 10: #8 - 32,636
 * Week 11: #12 - 27,217
 * Week 12: #18 - 14,349
 * Week 13: #25 - 12,303
 * Week 14: #29 - 10,534
 * Week 15: #37 - 4,398
 * Week 16: #37 - 5,553
 * Week 17: #40 - 3,983
 * Week 18: #31 - 9,588
 * Week 19: #28 - 10,366
 * Week 20: #27 - 11,332
 * Week 21: #23 - 13,522
 * Week 22: #17 - 14,784
 * Week 23: #12 - 29,972
 * Week 24: #4 - 59,994
 * Week 25: #5 - 51,889
 * Week 26: #15 - 19,361
 * Week 27: #19 - 17,889
 * Week 28: #25 - 12,009
 * Week 29: #33 - 8,029
 * Week 30: #35 - 5,553
 * Week 31: #39 - 4,398 (RE-ENTRY)
 * Week 32: #34 – 7,239
 * Week 33: #31 – 11,366
 * Week 34: #24 – 13,700
 * Week 35: #17 – 22,100
 * Week 36: #15 – 24,912
 * Week 37: #3 – 62,573
 * Week 38: #7 – 36,184
 * Week 39: 16 – 14,784
 * Week 40: #21 – 15,993
 * Week 41: #30 – 8,756
 * Week 42: #36 – 3,781
 * Week 43: #40 – 3,172
 * Week 44: #37 – 3,521
 * Week 45: #33 – 5,235
 * Week 46: #33 – 8,029
 * Week 47: #30 – 8,492
 * Week 48: #29 – 8,883
 * Week 49: #24 – 13,293
 * Week 50: #13 – 21,184
 * Week 51: #4 – 70,113
 * Week 52: #5 – 39,755
 * Week 53: #9 – 29,034
 * Week 54: #18 – 16,667
 * Week 55: #32 – 8,756

TOTAL: 1,151,112