Nabil Ayers

Biography

Nabil Ayers is an American music industry entrepreneur, author, musician and podcast host. Ayers' debut memoir, My Life in the Sunshine, was published by Viking Press on June 7, 2022. The book focuses on Ayers' relationship with his father, the jazz musician Roy Ayers, growing up as a mixed-race person in America, and Ayers' life in the music industry. The title, My Life in the Sunshine, is a reference to the Roy Ayers song, "Everybody Loves the Sunshine." In a June 4, 2022 CBS Saturday Morning segment, Ayers, when asked about how the memoir portrays his father, stated, "In the end, it's positive. It's about all the great things he's given me, even though he hasn't been part of my life." As a writer, Ayers has contributed to The New York Times, NPR, Pitchfork, Rolling Stone, People, GQ, Huffington Post, and The Root. His writing is often autobiographical, and touches on topics of music and race. In June 2024, Ayers launched a podcast called Identified, which focuses on family and identity. Some of the musicians, authors, comedians, and actors Ayers has interviewed on Identified include Dawn Richard, Hrishikesh Hirway, Ione Skye, Geoff Rickly, Reggie Watts, and Nate Mendel. In the podcast trailer, Ayers states his reason for starting the podcast toward the end of his eighteen-month-long book tour: "I felt a persistent desire to continue exploring stories of family, shifting the focus from my own experiences to those of others. On "Identified, we'll engage with authors, musicians, and people from a diversity of backgrounds to unravel what family means to them." Ayers is the current U.S. President of the UK-based Beggars Group of record labels, assuming the role in early 2022 after his work for 4AD where he had served as the label's U.S. General Manager since 2009. While with 4AD, he led album campaigns for Grimes, Big Thief, St. Vincent, Purity Ring, Deerhunter, Tune-Yards, Future Islands, The Breeders, and The National, whose album Sleep Well Beast won the 2018 Gram

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