Marié Digby, I Love U!

Marié Christina Digby (pronounced /mæɹi'eɪ 'dɪgbi/ Ma-ree-AY Dig-Bee) (born April 16, 1983) is an American singer-songwriter, guitarist and pianist. She is best known for her acoustic cover version of Rihanna's No. 1 hit "Umbrella", which attracted attention on YouTube in 2007. The song was subsequently played on the radio station STAR 98.7, was featured on the third season opening episode of the MTV show The Hills,^[1] and peaked at #10 on the Bubbling Under Hot 100 Singles chart.

Marie performed the song on the late night talk show Last Call with Carson Daly on August 2, 2007.

Marie's first official single, "Say It Again", was released to radio stations on January 18, 2008. Her debut album, Unfold, was released on April 8, 2008.

Biography
Marié Digby, whose father is Irish American and whose mother is Japanese is the eldest of three siblings. Her two sisters are Naomi (born December 12, 1985) and Erina (born August 8, 1987). She began writing songs during high school in Los Angeles, California. After completing her sophomore year as a philosophy major at the University of California, Berkeley, she came out into the public eye when she won the 2004 Pantene Pro-Voice competition with her song Miss Invisible. The grand prize for the concert included working with a professional producer on an album, $5,000 and performing on stage with other top performers.

Career
After performing at numerous night clubs, Digby signed a publishing deal with Rondor Music, a subsidiary of Vivendi SA's Universal Music Group in early 2005. By the end of 2005, Digby had signed with Disney's Hollywood Records and her first album of original songs was completed by the end of 2006. Also in 2006, her song "Fool" was included on the Disney compilation album Girl Next. In early 2007, she began to post simple videos of herself singing cover songs of other artists on YouTube in order to gain visibility for herself. Hollywood Records then released a high-quality studio recording of her rendition of "Umbrella" to iTunes and radio stations. She is often seen performing using a Gibson Hummingbird acoustic guitar.

Controversy
There has been controversy over Digby's YouTube popularity. As of July 2008, her homemade music videos have been viewed over 8.2 million times on the video sharing website. It has been suggested by The Wall Street Journal that she feigned a grassroots effort and amateur status in order to generate buzz as part of an online marketing campaign created by Hollywood Records, a strategy sometimes labeled "astroturfing". She has responded, writing on her blog that she never lied about being signed to Hollywood Records and has stated that her videos were her own "desperate" response to a lack of promotion.