Il Divo are back and better than ever, sweeping the nation off their feet with new album, The Promise. We spoke to the Spanish charmer, Carlos Marin, baritone of the hugely successful group about his favourite tracks off the album, his new fan base and just why he's crazy about Tom Jones!
How are you?
I'm good, really good!
What have you been up to recently?
So, we just finished the album, we're just bringing that out. We had one year off, I wasn't resting, I was producing another for my wife and everything and after that we just started with the new recording, and at the minute we're just doing all the promotion for that. We've been to Mexico, Spain and we just did a launch in Barcelona and that was amazing, fantastic! we sang five songs off the new album and got a great reception for doing that.
Tell me about your new album, The Promise?
It's basically the same sound as Il divo, but we're tried to make it so that it wasn't just the typical Il Divo formula, we wanted to shake it up a little bit and we were choosing songs like, for example Hallelujah. It's a very initmate song and we sing it really intimately, we have also added Amazing Grace. That we start off A Cappella with no music and that leads to a big number, so we have also The Winner Takes It All, we have The Power Of Love and the good thing about this is that we are the only group in the world that the original writer gave permission to, to do another version apart from the english one, because we're singing in Spanish. We're really happy with this new album, because I think it's one of the most mature albums that we have right now out on the market.
What's your favourite track from the album?
Power of Love, without a doubt. The other guys like it too, and it is the most classical piece of the album too because we have a string quartet and an organ, so then someone did a version of that in Italian and when we listened to it and thought we should do our own version of it too. So we just made it ours really, so that was really nice.
Who is your new album most likely to appeal too?
I think people love it really, I mean we've just come from Mexico and it was really surprising by how many kid fans we have over there. I mean we had kids as young as five, six years old who were coming to our signing! The parents said they are really big fans, which is surprising that we have such a range of people, from kids to people who are 90-100 years old, liking us. The good thing about Il divo is that we combine some opera with some pop songs. People leave messages on our website saying thank you, you opened the door for people to listen to opera.
If you were to cover a song in the charts right now, what would it be?
Erm... I must say that I'm not aware of anything right now! We're so busy with the promotion right now, we just started a few weeks ago and we are going to go on until 22nd Decemeber. I must say that the only moment I looked at the charts was when it was the first week of the release of our album! That's not to say I don't love other music, I love Tom Jones for example, I think he's made a fantastic new album.
What's your favourite track off the album to sing live?
Ooo, we just sang five songs and they were all amazing. Each song has something new and I just love when we go to the high notes, it's really powerful and when we sing together, I think that's our power, so I wouldn't say I'd only pick one song because they are all amazing and powerful.
What music are you listening to at the moment?
Tom Jones! I'm really into him at the minute.
What's the most embarrassing CD in your collection?
Erm... I don't have any! When I listen to music I just love the music, not necessarily the person who sings it. On my ipod I have such a mixture, Tom Jones, Il Divo. I have so many things you know, I have Aerosmith, Duran Duran for example and Spandau Ballet, oooh and Queen too, they were one of my favourite groups ever.
Il Divo is Italian for "divine male performer" who came up with that name?
So this was right at the beginning, remember we were all sitting around a table having dinner the first time we met, and we were searching for a name that would be you know, the musketeers or something, and then we came up with the Divos and then added 'Il' for Il Divo. We were looking for a word that would describe us singing altogether, because when we bring the harmonies together at the end it sounds like one guy, a very powerful guy so therefore we just called ourselves Il Divo.
Are you appearing on the X Factor this year?
Yes, we are appearing on the final, we're very excited, it will be in December. We haven't been watching it yet though, Simon has been telling us there are really amazing singers this year.
Finally, we ask everyone we interview to come up with a question for the next person we interview and Snow Patrol asked you if you could meet anyone in the world dead or alive who would it be and what would say to them?
Ooo, well I love an actress called Monica Bellucci. She's Italian and I would just go up to her and tell her how beautiful she is!
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