Damiano David on his first solo album, his famous girlfriend and that Springsteen moment
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Rock-star conspicuous in a brown leather bomber jacket, Damiano David struts into a hotel bar in downtown Los Angeles, finds a table near the back and orders an orange juice in his suave Italian accent.
The 26-year-old singer from Rome broke out in 2021 when his band Måneskin scored a global smash with its cover of the Four Seasons’ “Beggin’”; by then the quartet had already won the Eurovision Song Contest with “Zitti e Buoni” and crashed the top 10 of the U.K.’s singles chart with “I Wanna Be Your Slave.” (If the latter calls to mind the Stooges’ “I Wanna Be Your Dog,” consider that Iggy Pop teamed with Måneskin for an alternate version of the song.)
Yet David is here on this April afternoon to talk about “Funny Little Fears,” his debut album as a solo act. Written and produced with a squad of industry pros including Jason Evigan, Sarah Hudson and Amy Allen, the LP moves away from Måneskin’s glammy rock toward a more synthed-up pop sound somewhere between Harry Styles and Benson Boone. Among the highlights are the swooning “Born With a Broken Heart,” which has more than 100 million streams on Spotify, and “Sick of Myself,” a dreamy ballad David wrote about his girlfriend, the singer and actor Dove Cameron; “Zombie Lady” features a vocal turn by Cameron herself, with whom David is in the middle of moving into a new place when we meet up.
The British rock star on his complicated relationship with the press and his latest album, “People Watching,” which he made in L.A. with Adam Granduciel of the War on Drugs.
“We’re getting furniture and all that bull—,” he says, his hair still shower-wet (or coiffed to look like it). David, who still spends half his time in Rome, will tour this summer with stops at Bonnaroo and Lollapalooza before a show at the Wiltern in November. These are edited excerpts from our conversation.
You’re living in L.A. part time because of work?
It’s mainly for my partner. But also because for this project, I started everything here, so it made sense to have a life here.
You like L.A.?
It’s cool — sunny and everything. What really matters is the people, and I built a very nice community.
Songwriters and producers and the like.
Basically, I speed-dated every songwriter in L.A. for two months, then I made my selections based on guts and personal feeling and how much we would click with each other. I found my people, and now we go for dinners and we text.
In an interview with Zach Sang, you referred to experiences with a couple of songwriters that didn’t work out well.
Really didn’t.
What happened?
Sometimes it was nobody’s fault — we just didn’t click. What happened once was with a very big name — a big, big, big one — and he was basically never in the room. So it felt like a waste of time. They were like, “This big name wants to do a session,” and I was like, “F— yeah.” Then I went there and it was me and his sound engineer.
Fair to say that with Måneskin you were operating in a rock space, and on your own you’re operating in a pop space?
I think it’s fair to say if you’re strictly talking about genres. But I don’t think it’s 100% correct because even with the band — what we did, of course, had distortion and everything, but I think it has a pop scheme.
That’s a good term for it.
Me being the songwriter in both scenarios, I have a pop soul. I’m truly into my generation’s sound, rather than an older sound, which is more what [the other members of Måneskin] are into. I think the connection between these two things made us work. On my own, not having the power trio — that’s basically what we are — the sound is going to be more pop because it’s cleaner.
The New York Times said Måneskin “play rock music, but operate according to the logic of pop.”
I was born in 1999, so I started listening to music with a conscience in 2010. I’m born and raised with pop, and that’s what I was always mainly interested in.
What was the first band rock band that spoke to you?
My first music memories in general are R.E.M., Red Hot Chili Peppers and Soundgarden, because that’s what my dad would listen to.
I’m trying to think how old you would’ve been when Chris Cornell put out the record he made with Timbaland.
Sick. I don’t know about it.
Some people were like, “This is insane,” and some people were like, “He’s such a good singer that he can do anything.”
For me it would probably be the second one. Not everything is done to be extremely successful — some things are done really just for the sake of it.
The male pop star has sometimes seemed like an endangered species over the last decade or so. Did you sense a vacuum that you thought you might step into?
I really don’t think that way — I’m not that industrialized, OK? But it’s true: Girls are taking over, and it’s not necessarily a bad thing. Honestly, it gives a lot of hope to see that the five biggest people in music right now are girls in their 20s to 30s. There’s still men — there’s Benson, who’s doing amazing. And he’s actually good. It’s not something put-together that feels weird and made-up. I hear he’s the nicest and most normal guy.
You clearly put a lot of thought into your visual presentation. Is this solo record giving you an opportunity to try looks that wouldn’t work with the band?
It’s a different aesthetic. With the band, we started very, very young. You know how in school there’s the football guys, there’s the basketball guys, there’s the art-project guys? We were the art-project guys. So we made that our strength, and we started playing with makeup and nakedness and weird clothing because it made us feel special. In this [solo] scenario — well, first of all, I’m not 15 anymore. With the band, we were kids in an industry of adults, so we needed this armor or shield. Now I’m 26 and I don’t need it.
To my eye there’s a bit of classic Hollywood to the styling with your record.
If I have to imagine how I would look my best, I would think it’s in a nice suit with an open-collar shirt.
The director always wanted a Flea bobblehead, which led to the creation of a music video for ‘Can’t Stop,’ where the band performs as string puppets for Vol. 4 of Netflix’s ‘Love, Death + Robots.’
Did you care about clothes even before you began performing?
Always. Not about brands — just about having something that felt personal to me. Both my parents are very well-put-together people.
Stylish.
My mom is very stylish. My dad dresses as a man of his age.
In terms of appearance, one difference between Europeans and Americans, broadly speaking, is that Americans —
You’re for comfort.
That’s a nice way to put it. What’s it like for you to walk through an airport in the U.S. and take in the view?
In an airport, I’m a fan of looking like trash. These people in the industry who come off a plane and get papped in a full outfit — like, what the f—? You’re on a metal tube with 20 centimeters for your legs. Why are you wearing a dress?
Where did the idea for “Zombie Lady” come from?
I’m a big fan of [Tim Burton’s movie] “Corpse Bride,” and I always rooted for the zombie lady somehow. I was watching it with my girlfriend, and I thought: What would happen if I was with another girl and she popped out from a grave?
“The First Time” has a big sax solo.
I think it beats a guitar solo. We were doing a writing camp in Malibu, and we were listening to Bruce Springsteen. We were like, “Let’s do something like him,” basically. I think we nailed it. It’s very driving-on-Route-66 type of s—.
Was Springsteen someone you cared about when you were young?
I was never a huge fan, but he definitely mattered for my dad. I mean, when it was full activity [for Springsteen], I was like 2.
Did you go to concerts as a kid?
I’m not a big concert person.
Even now?
I have a hard time finding someone that I think the whole project is fire. It’s always four or five good songs, then the others, I’m like, “Why?” But also I’m not a big crowd person — it kind of overwhelms me.
You said another thing to Zach Sang that I wanted to hear more about, which is that you’re determined to make beautiful art even when the art is about something ugly.
I have a hard time finding a piece of art that talks about a negative matter that stays negative. There’s paintings of assassinations and war, but we consider them masterpieces because of the ability to take something that on its own would be bad, horrible, painful and somehow reshape it and make it into something beautiful.
Ugliness can’t be an artistic virtue? I’m thinking about a band like the Sex Pistols, for instance.
To go to a concert of the Sex Pistols was probably the most fun thing you could do in that decade. They were about freedom and f— the rules. How can we consider that ugly?
You sing in English on this album. What’s Italian about the music?
The level of drama. I’m extremely feeling — up and down — and I manifest it in a very express-ful way. That’s very Italian about me. I’m very passionate and easy to read — I don’t have many masks.
Though I do think you’ve got a bit of rock-star mystique about you.
That’s because there’s a complexity. I’m the Måneskin singer and everything that comes along with it, and I’m also what I am in this record. I’m an extremely positive person, and I’m also a person that went through stages of depression. This complexity is something that cannot be expressed fully in even 10 records.
Which song on this album would surprise the you of five years ago?
“Sick of Myself.” I would never have declared so openly that I’m in love with this person. She’s the major inspiration for this album — what she makes me feel. It’s a level of directness that I would never have had. Even in interviews, I would’ve been more circling around the point: “If there’s a person…” Now I’m like, “This song is for my girlfriend, 100%.”
Sometimes you wear a mustache, but not today. What shapes that decision?
How I feel in that moment. It’s not strategic.
Walking around Coachella last month, I think I saw more guys with mustaches than without.
Maybe that’s why I don’t. Since everyone started having a mustache, I stopped.
You told Vogue you listen to podcasts in the shower. Which ones?
European football podcasts. Comedy stuff.
Which comedians do you like?
I don’t think I can say the ones — I like the harsh ones.
Are you interested in marriage and children?
Marriage, yes — I want to get married at one point in my life. I don’t see me in the future with kids, but I’m 26, so what the f— do I know?
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