Grimes

Early life and education

Claire Elise Boucher was born on March 17, 1988, in Vancouver, British Columbia, to Sandy Garossino, a former Crown prosecutor and arts advocate, and Maurice Boucher, a former banker working in biotechnology. Her heritage includes French Canadian and Italian ancestry, with a great-grandmother who immigrated to Canada from Ukraine. Boucher and her younger brother, Mac, were raised in a Roman Catholic household and attended Catholic school in Vancouver, an upbringing she later cited as a significant influence on her work and stated gave her serious latent Catholic guilt issues. Her parents divorced when she was 11 years old, after which her mother remarried Ravi Sidhoo, an Indo-Canadian man whose culture Boucher also credits as an important part of her formative years. Through this marriage, she gained two stepbrothers, one of whom is the hip hop artist Jay Worthy, a member of the duo LNDN DRGS. Boucher graduated from Lord Byng Secondary School in 2006 and subsequently moved to Montreal to attend McGill University. She initially enrolled in a joint Bachelor of Arts and Science program, stating in early interviews she was in the electro-acoustics program, though she later said she studied neuroscience. Her university career ended in December 2010 when she was expelled for skipping classes, a development that redirected her focus fully to music and her burgeoning artistic career.

Career beginnings and early albums (2007 to 2011)

Grimes began her music career in 2007, self-releasing tracks on MySpace under her chosen stage name. The name originated from her misunderstanding of the grime music genre, which she listed three times in the platform's genre selection fields without knowing what it was. Entirely self-taught in music and visual art, she developed her sound independently from her base in Montreal. Her debut album, Geidi Primes, a concept work inspired by Frank Herbert's Dune series, was released independently in January 2010. This was followed just nine months later by her second album, Halfaxa, in October 2010, both on the Montreal-based Arbutus Records label. These early works established her ethereal, lo-fi electronic style and a dedicated following within the city's music scene. After the release of Halfaxa, she began to publicly promote her music and tour beyond Montreal. In 2011, her profile expanded with the release of five songs on her side of the split 12-inch record Darkbloom with d'Eon, released through Arbutus and Hippos in Tanks. That same year, she began touring more extensively, including opening for Swedish artist Lykke Li on a North American tour starting in May, which helped build her audience. In August 2011, her debut album Geidi Primes was re-released on CD and vinyl for the first time by No Pain in Pop Records. She also collaborated with the DJ and producer Blood Diamonds in 2011, beginning a working relationship that would continue for several years.

Breakthrough with Visions (2012 to 2014)

The critical and commercial breakthrough for Grimes arrived with her third studio album, Visions, released on February 21, 2012, in Canada through Arbutus Records and in the United States through 4AD after she signed with the influential independent label in January 2012. The album was recorded intensively over three consecutive weeks in near isolation in her Montreal apartment in the Mile End neighbourhood, a process she described as involving a period of nine days without sleep or food with blacked-out windows and doing tons of amphetamines, finding it equally enjoyable and tortuous. Visions was met with widespread acclaim, praised for its inventive synth-pop and ethereal vocals, and appeared on numerous publications' year-end lists, with NME including it on their 500 Greatest Albums of All Time list in 2013. It won the Juno Award for Electronic Album of the Year in 2013, and Grimes was nominated for Breakthrough Artist of the Year at the same ceremony. She also won the Artist of the Year Award at the 2013 Webby Awards. The single "Oblivion" was particularly celebrated, named the best song of 2012 by Pitchfork and later ranked number one on their list of the 200 Best Tracks of the Decade So Far in 2014. Its music video was co-directed by Emily Kai Bock and Grimes. The success of Visions propelled Grimes onto a global stage, leading to the Visions Tour from 2012 to 2014 with supporting acts like Born Gold and Ami Dang. She performed on the Full Flex Express Canadian Train Tour with Skrillex and Diplo in July 2012 and made her American television debut on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon in August 2012. During this period, she also staged an art show and charity auction at the Audio Visual Arts gallery in New York City in March 2012 and began collaborating with Roc Nation management in December 2013. In April 2013, she posted a statement addressing sexism in the music industry and her desire to be the one who built her music, not just the face of it.

Art Angels and mainstream recognition (2015 to 2017)

Grimes' fourth studio album, Art Angels, marked a significant evolution in her sound, incorporating more traditional pop structures and live instrumentation alongside her electronic foundations, which she described as a departure from her prior synth and sampler driven composing. Released in November 2015 after a surprise announcement, the album was preceded by the singles "Flesh Without Blood" and a two-act music video that also included "Life in the Vivid Dream." A demo version of the song "Realiti," released in March 2015 from an abandoned album, received Pitchfork's Best New Music designation, with critic Jenn Pelly calling it the best new Grimes song since Visions. Art Angels was met with near-universal critical praise, garnering an 88 out of 100 rating on Metacritic and the Best New Music designation from Pitchfork, with critic Jessica Hopper describing it as an epic holiday buffet of tendentious feminist fuck-off. The album was named the best of 2015 by publications including NME, Exclaim!, and Stereogum. It achieved commercial success by peaking at number one on the Billboard US Top Alternative Albums chart and number two on the Top Independent Albums chart. Grimes won the 2016 International award at the Socan Annual Awards and the 2016 Harper's Bazaar Musician of the Year Award. The album's detailed, self-directed music videos, including "Kill V. Maim" and "Venus Fly" featuring Janelle Monáe, became central to its presentation, with the latter winning Best Dance Video at the 2017 Much Music Video Awards. Grimes also won the Juno Award for Video of the Year in 2017 for "Kill V. Maim." Her touring expanded to include the Ac!d Reign Tour in Asia and Europe with Hana in spring 2016, opening for Florence and the Machine on select dates, and headlining her own Rhinestone Cowgirls Tour in fall 2015 with opener Nicole Dollanganger. She also toured with Lana Del Rey for several dates on the Endless Summer Tour in the summer of 2015. Key collaborations and releases from this era include a series of distinct projects that demonstrated her range.

• She co-wrote the song "Heaven" for Troye Sivan's album Blue Neighbourhood in 2016.
• She released the lo-fi iPhone-shot video series "The Ac!d Reign Chronicles" with collaborator Hana in October 2016, featuring songs like "Butterfly" and "Scream" with Aristophanes, filmed by her brother Mac Boucher.
• She contributed "Medieval Warfare" to the Suicide Squad film soundtrack in August 2016.
• She released a cover of Tegan and Sara's "Dark Come Soon" with Hana in October 2017 as part of a covers album.
• She premiered the track "Go," produced with Blood Diamonds, in June 2014 on Zane Lowe's radio show, a song originally written for and rejected by Rihanna that Rolling Stone ranked number fourteen on their Best Songs of 2014 list.
• She was featured on Bleachers' song "Take Me Away" in July 2014 and collaborated with them on "Entropy" for the HBO show Girls in March 2015.
• She was featured in a remix of Haim's "My Song 5" in August 2014.

Miss Anthropocene and expanded projects (2018 to 2021)

The release of Grimes' fifth studio album, Miss Anthropocene, was preceded by a period of public conflict with her label, 4AD, which she said in a February 2018 Instagram post delayed new music. She later revealed plans for two albums, the first characterized by glorious light and high collaboration and a second of pure darkness and chaos. She featured on several high-profile tracks such as Janelle Monáe's "Pynk" in April 2018 and Bring Me the Horizon's "Nihilist Blues" in January 2019, and composed the theme music for the Netflix animated series Hilda in 2018. The industrial rock and nu metal single "We Appreciate Power," featuring Hana and released in November 2018, signalled a heavier direction, and she performed it on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon in December. Miss Anthropocene was finally released on February 21, 2020, exploring themes of a dystopian persona. The album's rollout included singles like "Violence" with i_o in September 2019, "So Heavy I Fell Through the Earth" in November 2019, and "Delete Forever" in February 2020, the latter partly inspired by the death of Lil Peep and the ongoing opioid crisis. The song "4ÆM" was promoted through her role as the voice of Lizzy Wizzy in the video game Cyberpunk 2077, which she announced at The Game Awards in December 2019. She released music videos for "Idoru" in February 2020 and "You'll Miss Me When I'm Not Around" in April 2020, asking fans to finish the green screen video. In December 2020, she changed the album's cover art on streaming platforms to a painting by Rupid Leejm that she had originally wanted to use. In 2021, she released Miss Anthropocene: Rave Edition, a remix album featuring work by BloodPop, Channel Tres, and Richie Hawtin. During this time, she also expanded her presence into new media, launching a podcast called "Homo Techno" with Liv Boeree and a partnered Discord server to tease new music like "Shinigami Eyes." A public dispute with artist Poppy occurred in late 2018 after the release of their collaboration "Play Destroy," with Poppy accusing Grimes of bullying her and songwriters into signing NDAs, which Grimes denied, stating Poppy had dragged her into a disgusting situation.

Between 2018 and 2021, Grimes was featured on several notable singles and collaborations. In April 2018, she was featured on Janelle Monáe's single "Pynk." She collaborated with South Korean girl group Loona on the single "Love4Eva" in May 2018. In 2018, she also composed the theme music for the Netflix animated series Hilda. In November 2018, Grimes released the industrial rock and nu metal single "We Appreciate Power," which featured Hana. She appeared on Bring Me the Horizon's song "Nihilist Blues" in January 2019. Later in 2020, she was featured on Ashnikko's song "Cry" and collaborated with Benee on the track "Sheesh."

Recent endeavours and upcoming work (2021 to present)

In March 2021, Grimes signed a new record deal with Columbia Records, marking a new chapter after her tenure with 4AD. She ventured into television as a judge on the Fox music competition series Alter Ego in 2021, where contestants performed using motion-capture digital avatars, alongside judges will.i.am, Alanis Morissette, and Nick Lachey. That same year, she announced her sixth studio album, initially titled Book 1, and released the single "Player of Games." She has since described the project to Billboard in July 2021 as a space opera and retitled it Psy Opera, with a scheduled release date in 2027. Her activity has remained wide-ranging, including a cameo in the short film Discord: The Movie with Awkwafina and Danny DeVito and an appearance in Doja Cat's "Need to Know" music video in June 2021. She frequently teased new music like "Shinigami Eyes" and a collaboration with DJ Chris Lake through her Discord server and social media. In May 2021, she appeared in a Saturday Night Live sketch as Princess Peach alongside host Elon Musk as Wario. Grimes continues to balance her music production with forays into digital art and community building, maintaining her position as an artist who consistently operates at the intersection of technology, music, and visual culture. Her work on the Alter Ego television show and her ongoing use of Discord to connect with fans reflect this sustained engagement with new platforms for performance and interaction.

Artistry and public persona

Grimes' artistry is defined by a do-it-yourself ethos, encompassing songwriting, production, and often the direction of her elaborate music videos. Her music synthesizes a wide range of influences, from electronic pop and industrial rock to ethereal wave, frequently layered with lyrical themes drawn from science fiction and mythology. She has been an outspoken advocate for female producers in the music industry, publicly criticising the sexism she has encountered and insisting on her role as the primary architect of her work, stating she did not want to be just the face of the thing she built. This feminist perspective is a consistent thread in her interviews and lyrical content. Her visual aesthetic is equally curated, featuring colourful, often anime-inspired imagery that complements her sonic world, as seen in the detailed acts of videos for Art Angels. Grimes' engagement with her audience has evolved from early online platforms like MySpace to contemporary spaces like Discord, where she shares works-in-progress and fosters a community around her futuristic artistic vision. Her public statements often address the intersection of technology and humanity, and her work in video games and digital avatars on Alter Ego reflects this ongoing interest. The process behind her albums, from the isolated creation of Visions to the more instrument-based Art Angels, details a relentless drive to reinvent her sound while maintaining core thematic preoccupations with identity, power, and speculative futures.

Questions about Grimes

What is Grimes' real name and where is she from?

Grimes' real name is Claire Elise Boucher. She was born on March 17, 1988, in Vancouver, British Columbia, and was raised there. She moved to Montreal, Quebec, in 2006 to attend McGill University. Her heritage includes French Canadian and Italian ancestry.

How many Juno Awards has Grimes won?

Grimes has won two Juno Awards. She won the first in 2013 for Electronic Album of the Year for Visions. She won her second Juno in 2017 for Video of the Year for the music video for "Kill V. Maim" from her album Art Angels. She was also nominated for Breakthrough Artist of the Year in 2013.

What was Grimes' breakout album?

Grimes' breakout album was her third studio album, Visions, released in 2012. This album marked her rise to prominence after signing with the record label 4AD. Visions received the Juno Award for Electronic Album of the Year in 2013 and yielded the singles "Genesis" and "Oblivion". The track "Oblivion" was named the best song of 2012 by Pitchfork. The album was recorded during an intensive three week period of isolation in her Montreal apartment, a process Grimes described as both enjoyable and tortuous.

What video game did Grimes provide a voice for?

Grimes provided a voice role for the character Lizzy Wizzy in the 2020 action role playing video game Cyberpunk 2077. She introduced this role by performing the song "4ÆM" at The Game Awards in 2019. For the game's release, she also contributed to a themed DJ mix album on Apple Music, which included two new songs titled "Samana" and "Delicate Weapon". This venture represents one of her notable activities outside of her primary music career.

When is Grimes' next album coming out?

Grimes' next studio album, titled Psy Opera, is scheduled for release in 2027. This will be her sixth studio album, following her previous releases which include Geidi Primes, Halfaxa, Visions, Art Angels, and Miss Anthropocene. The album was previously referred to as Book 1 when she announced a single for it in December 2021. Grimes has described this upcoming project in interviews as a concept album resembling a "space opera".

Was Grimes a judge on a TV show?

Yes, Grimes was a judge on the music competition game show Alter Ego. She served alongside judges will.i.am, Alanis Morissette, Nick Lachey, and Rocsi Diaz. The show, which premiered in 2021, features contestants who use motion capture technology to perform as digital avatars. This role is another example of her work extending beyond recording and performing her own music into other areas of the entertainment industry.

Sources and further reading

• Grimes (Wikipedia)
• Breaking up with Grimes (themanitoban.com)

Checked by the Yadude Books desk. Last updated 2026-10-19.