HERBERT GUDMUNDSSON
Herbert Guðmundsson born 1953 is an Icelandic singer, songwriter and producer.
He is best known for his songs “Svaraðu”, “Time”, “Hollywood” and “Can‘t Walk Away”, which reached No. 1 on the Icelandic listings chart in 1985.
His Early life
Herbert was born December 15, 1953 in Reykjavík, Iceland. When he was 12 years old he began his music career by joining the band “Raflost”. Only 17 years old he became the singer of “Tilvera”, one of the most famous bands in Iceland in the 1970s. Herbert was a lead singer with many bands over the next years for example; “Stofnþel”, “Eik”,”Dínamit”, “Pelican”, “Sólskin” and “Kan”. Herbert also took part in the first staging of Jesus Christ Superstar, in Iceland 1972, and later on his band “Tilvera” performed in the staging of Faust at the National Theatre of Iceland.
With the band “Eik” he performed on an Icelandic television show for the state channel RÚV. There “Eik” played some popular songs like “Kung Fu Fighting” and original songs written by Herbert such as the song “Twenty One”. This footage was shown again in 2003 when a TV show about Herbert’s life was broadcast in RÚV.
Herbert left the music scene for a while and began working as a chef on an Icelandic fishing vessel and did well. He worked at the sea for 8 years. He had his guitar onboard and wrote some songs while sailing such as “Hollywood”.
KAN in Bolungarvík
When he finished working at the sea he moved to Bolungarvík in Vestfirðir and joined the band “KAN”.
With “KAN” Herbert made the album “Í ræktinni” (In The Gym) which included the hit “Megi Sá Draumur” and “Vestfjarðaóður”.
The band was very successful in Iceland, performing mostly around “Vestfirðir”; “Bolungarvík”, “Ísafirði”, “Suðureyri” and “Patreksfirði”.
Solo career
Herbert left “KAN” in the autom 1984 and moved to Reykjavík (capital of Iceland). There he began his solo career with the album “Dawn Of The Human Revolotion”,released in 1985, on which He sang all the songs in English. The song “Can’t Walk Away” became a huge hit.
Can’t Walk Away success
The success of “Can’t Walk Away” was amazing and Herbert became well known. Later the song was included in a Superhits of the 80’s record. The song tells the story of how we shouldn’t just walk away from the world’s problems. We should face them and solve them. The lyrics are quite deep, especially for a pop song. This song has been re-released many times over the years in various versions and has lived throughout the years in the hearts of Icelanders.
Let’s Help Them
In 1986 after Herbert had released his major solo-title, “The Dawn Of The Human Revolution”, he took part in a recording session for a song released in an effort to create publicity for alleviating poverty and starvation in Africa. All the biggest stars in Icelandic music at that time helped and made the song Hjálpum Þeim (Let’s Help Them). Herbert sang both as a lead singer and as a backing singer in the song. It became very popular in Iceland.
Hollywood
Herbert kept on going and made some new songs after the major success of “Can’t Walk Away”, as “Hollywood”.
The song “Hollywood” tells the story of how hard it is to become a success in the big world when you come from a small country like Iceland.
“Hollywood” was released on the album “Being Human” in 1993. Herbert shot two music videos for the album, “Hollywood” the video on youtube and the song “The Night Of The Show”
The 1990s
In 1997 Herbert became again a very popular singer in Iceland when a new radio station FM957 began playing “Can’t Walk Away”. Herbert decided to came back to Iceland to follow up on this success and again became very well known as an artist. He decided to release all his biggest hits on a Best Of CD which he called “Faith”. “Faith” was released in 1998 and contained “Can’t Walk Away”, “Hollywood”, “I Believe In Love” and many other hits. “I Believe In Love” was a new song from Herbert and it was clear that Herbert had left the 1980s feeling and moved on into a techno feel. The song became very popular and Glitnir (a big Icelandic bank at the time) used the song in its commercials. Herbert also included two remixes of “Can’t Walk Away” on the “Faith” album.
He made his first solo-album singin in Icelandic in 1977 “Á Ströndinn” and decided to do this again after having sung mostly in English through his career by releasing the record “Ný Spor Á Íslenskri Tungu” (New Steps In Icelandic). The song “Svaraðu” of that album became a big hit. The music video for “Svaraðu” was shot in Algarve – Portugal.The video on youtube.
Herbert held a big concert in Iceland to celebrate the release of “Ný Spor Á Íslenskri Tungu”. This concert was recorded, filmed and released on a DVD in December 2010 – “Herbert Guðmundsson í Íslensku Óperunni” (English: Herbert Guðmundsson at the Icelandic Opera).
