Fernando
Fernando Viciconte, the Portland, Oregon troubadour with twenty years of local and national acclaim under his belt including being a 2016 Oregon Music Hall of Fame inductee, crawls from the wreckage of the recent past unbowed. Bruised, but unbroken. The good news is that he has survived major surgery for a throat condition and what could have been existential silence for ‘that voice'. It's a voice that caused countless zines (Billboard, Magnet, Paste, The Oregonian, No Depression, etc) and fellow musicians (Peter Buck, Don Dixon, Steve Wynn) to rave about the feeling it evokes when Fernando sings his songs of dark despair and faint hope. These rock and roll laments, in both Spanish and English, have captivated an international audience for seven records, countless compilations, and memorable live sets. Fernando has emerged stronger than ever with a full-length LP entitled Leave the Radio On (August 2015, Fluff and Gravy Records), produced by Fernando with Luther Russell (Fever the Ghost, Richmond Fontaine) and Mike Coykendall (M.Ward, She and Him). Last fall, Fernando dropped an early 7" single as a preview of what is to come. The a-side ("The Dogs") is the second track on the record, and was featured by KEXP as their song of the day.
3 years in the making, due to the afore-mentioned health issues, the album itself features a virtual who's who of Portland's finest musicians, including Peter Buck and Scott McCaughey as well as members of M.Ward, Elliott Smith, Richmond Fontaine and The Delines. This is a new chapter in Viciconte's ever-evolving musical trajectory, a career marked by creative integrity and an almost painful honesty which attracts fans from high and low that still believe in the redemptive power of rock and roll. And ‘that voice'.
Argentina-born, Fernando came of age musically in L.A. fronting the popular hard rock band Monkey Paw. He moved to Portland, OR, in 1994 and released Season in Hell, a downbeat collection of country rock, in 1996. His sophomore effort, Widows, saw a harder-edged approach that at times recalled his Southern California days. The Spanish language album Pacoima (1998) represented an abrupt shift as Fernando explored his So Cal barrio roots, swinging from border rock to Tex-Mex to Mexican R&B. Sure enough, he changed gears yet again for Old Man Motel (1999), indulging in a powerful collection of relatively straight-ahead rock. 2001 found Fernando leaving Cravedog Records for his own label Domingo Records which released Dreams of the Sun and Sky, a startlingly gorgeous collection of gauzy, narcotic tracks with Latin and country-folk accents. The Oregonian named this album a top ten release of 2001. In 2006, Fernando returned from a hiatus from music and he delivered his most critically received record to date Enter to Exit. For this project, Fernando teamed up with long time friends from the Eels, Jeff "Chet" Lyster (Eels, Lucinda Williams, Love Gigantic) and Derek Brown with Paul Brainard from Richmond Fontaine, Lewi Longmire and John Amadon to make what many critics called one of the best pop rock records of 2006. Magnet Magazine went as far as naming Fernando one of the best new artists of 2006 in their year-end issue. The album also garnered glowing reviews from Billboard, Paste, Amplifier, No Depression, and MSNBC.com. Fast forward to 2010 and the release of True Instigator. This album sees Fernando exploring his Americana, Spanish and classic country roots to make what is soon to be a classic Northwest release. The album was recorded with famed producer Adam Selzer (Norfolk and Western, M. Ward) at Type Foundry Studio in Portland, Oregon. Fernando is now ready to dive in to the next phase of his career, with Leave The Radio On. He is healthy, re-energized, and touring internationally, virtually non-stop, in preparation for the record's September 2015 release. All signs, it seems, suggest that Fernando's best days are ahead of him.
- Website:
- http://www.fernandoviciconte.com
- Facebook:
- https://www.facebook.com/FernandoMusic?fref=ts