At the age of 36, David Fonseca is the most popular pop-rock alternative singer in Portugal. He is a writer, composer, performer and plays several musical instruments, like acoustic guitar and organ. He is the author of almost all of his lyrics and also the graphic designs on his album covers.
At the age of 36, David Fonseca is the most popular pop-rock alternative singer in Portugal. He is a writer, composer, performer and plays several musical instruments, like acoustic guitar and organ. He is the author of almost all of his lyrics and also the graphic designs on his album covers. Fonseca has been influenced by musicians such as Jeff Buckley, Roy Orbison, Ryan Adams, Sérgio Godinho, Pixies or The B-52´s. In one of his interviews he mentioned that he has an addiction to the group Yeah Yeah Yeahs. Although he began his professional life as a photographer working for various fashion catalogues and later worked in a radio station for some time, he finally decided to dedicate his life to music.
Fonseca’s first band called “Silence 4” imposed itself as the biggest phenomenon of the Portuguese music scene in recent years. The debut album entitled “Silence Becomes It” was a huge success (more than 240,000 copies were sold, which is the equivalent to six platinum records), leading to a long tour that lasted two years. There are only two songs written in Portuguese in this album, one of them being “Sexto Sentido”, featuring the popular Portuguese singer, Sérgio Godinho. Two years later they released their second album called Only Pain Is Real. During 2000, Silence 4 went on their last tour. Since 2001 the band has “frozen” its activities, which was a shock to its fans. On the other hand it was a chance for Fonseca to start his solo career, work with different musicians, and try new sounds. With longtime Silence 4 producer Mário Barreiros, Fonseca recorded his debut solo album, Sing Me Something New, where he played nearly all instruments and explored his composing and performing abilities. Released in 2003, the album included the single "Someone That Cannot Love". The second album Our Hearts Will Beat As One is said, by David himself, to be “scarily personal”. It was only released in the fall of 2005, because of the other projects that David was involved in between his two solo works. The album includes Who Are U? as the first single, described by David as “the song I always wanted to write”. David´s latest album Dreams in Colour released in October, 2007, has established him as one of the most successful Portuguese artists of all time. The video to the first single “Superstar” was directed by David himself. The second single “Rocket Man” was his own version of Elton John’s classic song from 1972 and is considered a ground-breaking video and performance.
In 2004, Fonseca joined a new project called “Humanos,” where he sang alongside famous musicians such as Manuela Azevedo or Camané. Seven members of the group decided to re-record new versions of some unpublished songs by legend Portuguese singer-songwriter Antonio Variações. This tribute album became a huge success, something unseen in the Portuguese music scene before.
David Fonseca: Our Hearts Will Beat As One
From the interview with David Fonseca:
Interviewer: You clearly have influences from the 80s era. What are some of the bands that inspired you? David Fonseca: There are a lot of them, but back in the 80’s I would focus more on the songs, than on the bands itself. I started listening to real music (opposite to fake music that played constantly on the radio) with an album called “From Langley Park To Memphis” by Prefab Sprout. That was probably the first album I heard from start to finish… The greatest influence I had came in the early 90’s with the most amazing band of all times: The Pixies. You have a film degree and you were a professional photographer working in fashion. Does this explain why you are fully involved in making your own videos, designing album covers, and more? What are the advantages of doing this yourself? As I said, I really enjoy doing it. The great advantage is that I know EXACTLY what I’m looking for. I’m working on something that came a long way to get here, all I have to do is to put the right frame on it. I’d like to have more time to do these things, so I could get more out of it, but I put music in first place. At a concert in Caldas da Rainha, you did a cover of “Radio Killed the Video Star” by Buggles. What other covers have you done over the years? So many, I LOVE to play someone else’s song. “Spit on a Stranger” by Pavement, “Everyone Else In The World” by Stina Nordenstam, “All day and all of the night” by The Kinks, “Just What I Needed” by The Cars, “Debaser” by The Pixies, “Da-Da-Da” by Trio….and sometimes I just play bits and pieces of whatever comes to my mind, it depends on the mood of the show. I absolutely love your remake of the song “Rocket Man” by Elton John. It just sounds very different from the original and the video is simple and artistic. Please take us through the idea and making of this video? Also, what led you to choosing this song? I chose it (suddenly) while I was talking about the idea of including a version on my new album. It came to my mind while I was having this conversation and it made a lot of sense to me. The song talks about, among other things, the hidden part of your average day-to-day persona and what lies underneath, which was something that was clear about my new record. I ended up doing the video as a performance piece on that specific idea, trying to be very specific about it visually. I just wanted it to look under someone’s skin and see what’s going on inside… it ended up being me in the video, a wild and amazing shoot. I actually had that idea while I was having lunch, so it was quite spontaneous the way I ended up taking 5 KG of strawberry syrup on me. Getting people to watch videos sometimes requires taking risks and doing things in new ways. In “Rocket Man,” you ended the clip dressed as a woman—some people liked it and others didn’t get it. I read online that some viewers were confused with your sexuality as a result of this video. Are you ever bothered with what people say on the Internet? Not at all, the video was all about raising ideas and different interpretations, so I guess it worked. I really don’t see it as a sexually inclined video, I look at it as a piece that talks about difference and some kind of inner power. The idea that something beautiful and unexpected can happen after so many accidents was the main key of the video and I tried to do it the most specific I could. It’s a metaphoric video, I guess. You were part of a special music group called “Humanos,” which joined various well-known Portuguese singers and gave tribute to brilliant singer-songwriter Antonio Variações. What was the goal of this project, and what was it like working with these other musicians from different backgrounds? We wanted to bring some of the lost tapes of Variações to life and to celebrate his talent and outstanding songwriting. It was such a thrill for me to work on this special project and to be able to stand side-by-side with some of the greatest singers and musicians in Portugal. I think there were no specific genres in this project, which led to some kind of weird mixture of influences and perspectives. If you could make a wish come true, which person would you like to do a duet with? That’s too hard, there are so many that I admire… but I would go for Roisin Murphy right now, she’s absolutely amazing.
At the age of 36, David Fonseca is the most popular pop-rock alternative singer in Portugal. He is a writer, composer, performer and plays several musical instruments, like acoustic guitar and organ. He is the author of almost all of his lyrics and also the graphic designs on his album covers.