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Tory Lanez: Rare Footage As Young Teen — Self-Taught Vocals [Video]

By Antonio J. Newell
Published on: 12:04 PST, Aug 2, 2016

Tory Lanez has been taking “new Toronto” by storm. However, if you think he was an overnight success, you’re wrong. Check out this rare footage.

If you research long enough, you’re bound to find something historically significant. This time, it’s the missing piece in Tory Lanez’s backstory.

Now, it all makes sense.

Although you’ve heard several of Tory’s mixtapes, you probably haven’t witnessed him like this. Lanez is certainly in raw form, even as a young teen.

After watching this rare footage, you might fully understand why Tory Lanez released “Flex.”

Disclaimer: The following video contains explicit language. Viewer discretion is advised.

If you watch the video, you see that Tory Lanez taught himself how to sing.

Since his early teen years, he has put together his own harmonies. You can hear his vocal mastery today, even in “Flex.”

As Lanez’s “Flex” begins, he applies some of the basics and breakdowns depicted at the rare video’s starting marker.

“Singing is one of the most important components to me,” says Tory during the interview portion of the video. “That’s kinda how it all started.”

Lanez mentions that he’s “versatile at singing” because he’s self-taught. When Tory was teaching himself how to sing, in his mind, he wanted to sound like “everything.”

In an interview with Respect, Lanez mentioned that — at age 16 — he was actually inspired to sing by John Legend.

It’s wasn’t a personal account. However, when Tory Lanez would ride the bus, he used to sing along to Legend’s tracks.

“I started singing to this one John Legend record; it was called ‘Each Day Gets Better’, or something like that,” notes Tory. “I started to realize, ‘Wow, I really sound like this dude. If I keep doing this, maybe I can sound dope like John Legend and still rap.'”

During the interview, Tory admits that he was shy when he first started out — “very shy.” However, his confidence kicked in through public repetition.

“The way that I learned to be confident was I would ride the back of the city bus and sing very low. Eventually, I would be singing loud as f**k and the whole bus would be like, ‘What the hell?…But you can sing.'”

Essentially, Tory Lanez would practice multiple methods and approach the act of singing from different angles.

Eventually, as muscles develop, vocal ranges, control, and precision also develops.

However, don’t think that Tory Lanez is only “singing vocals” and punchlines. This “new Toronto” advocate has an incredible rap flow as well.

Even years ago, Lanez’s lyrics caught Justin Bieber’s attention, and he used them in a freestyle or two. This was back in 2010.

In an interview with MTV, Tory Lanez recalled Bieber using his lyrics over “Speaking in Tungs.”

“I heard [the song] on Worldstar, and I have such a fanbase in Canada that people were hitting me and asking ‘Did you know that Justin Bieber took your line?’ I kinda laughed and smirked at it. It’s funny to hear someone else using my lyrics, but I didn’t think it was crooked or anything.”

Recently, he remixed one of Future’s tracks called “I Got the Keys.” Yet, instead of traditional song format, Tory rapped verses throughout the entire song.

Disclaimer: The following video contains explicit lyrics. Viewer discretion is advised.

Tory Lanez – I Got the Keys

There’s no confusion. Tory Lanez definitely has the vocal keys. And he doesn’t plan on stopping his music any time soon.

During the Respect interview, Lanez said that if he stopped making music, he’d be doing a disservice to his generation.

Do you agree with Tory? Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments section below.

[Photo by John Salangsang/AP Images]

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