Victor Davies

Victor Davies came into the world and spent his early years in East London, the child of a West African father and a British mother. Early on he absorbed the music of Stevie Wonder and Curtis Mayfield, yet the decisive spark arrived when he observed a friend of his older brother—an alumnus of the 1980s soul outfit Central Line—handling a guitar. At fourteen he acquired his own instrument and enrolled in classical lessons, only to abandon them roughly twelve months later because he found reading notation intolerable. He then immersed himself in London’s expanding soul and funk circuit while performing with an assortment of local groups.

In the early 1990s Virgin and Chrysalis, both subsequently absorbed by EMI, offered him publishing agreements, yet the arrangements collapsed when the companies insisted he adopt a brighter pop orientation rather than the soul- and funk-infused approach he favored. Unwilling to conform, Davies ceased composing for other artists and supported himself by teaching Thai kickboxing, a discipline he had pursued since childhood. With that income he launched his own enterprise, Afro Gigolo, and began producing unadorned acoustic demos that he dispatched to independent labels. People Records responded by placing one such recording, “Runaway Train,” on a 1998 sampler. Additional singles appeared, and in 2001 Compost Records in Germany issued his self-titled debut album. Three years afterward SPV Audiopharm released Hoxton Popstars.

Davies’s blend of acoustic instruments, string and brass sections, and Latin, soul, jazz, and house elements attracted listeners across Europe and Japan, where the single “Fire” held the top chart position for two weeks, though comparable recognition in Britain remained elusive. After signing with V2 Records he issued Hear the Sound, which met with a warmer reception when it reached the United Kingdom in 2006.