Musician Fantastic Negrito wants to spread the light. He first had to face his past.
Fantastic Negrito’s latest album is about his experience running away from home. He was 12 years old. The year prior, his father had stopped talking to him.
“Every time one of us hit puberty, he would disown you,” says the Grammy-winning musician, raised with 13 siblings.
Why We Wrote This
A story focused onWith “Son of a Broken Man,” Grammy winner Fantastic Negrito tackles his relationship with his father, and considers how to overcome the darkness in our lives.
Music saved him, he has said many times. Upon discovering that his pop hero, Prince, was self-taught, the teen picked up a guitar. Then he started sneaking into music classes at the University of California, Berkeley, and signed with Interscope Records.
After a serious car accident damaged his strumming hand, he left music. Then, after learning to play guitar in a different style, he dropped his given name and reinvented himself as Fantastic Negrito.
His new album, “Son of a Broken Man,” is an open letter to his long-deceased father. In it, the rock-, funk-, and R&B-influenced artist chronicles his search for identity and belonging.
“If I’m better, the world’s better,” he says. “If I’m a better dad, the world’s better. If I’m a better husband. If I’m a better friend. Better uncle. I really feel like that’s the meaning of life. We’re supposed to improve, be creative, and help each other.”
Fantastic Negrito’s new album is about his experience running away from home to live on the streets. He was 12 years old. The year prior, his father had stopped talking to him.
“Every time one of us hit puberty, he would disown you,” the musician, raised with 13 siblings, says during a video call.
Music saved him, he has said many times in the past. Upon discovering that his pop star hero, Prince, was self-taught, the teen picked up a guitar. Then he started sneaking into music classes at the University of California, Berkeley, and signed with Interscope Records in the 1990s.
Why We Wrote This
A story focused onWith “Son of a Broken Man,” Grammy winner Fantastic Negrito tackles his relationship with his father, and considers how to overcome the darkness in our lives.
After a serious car accident damaged his strumming hand, he left music for a time. Then, after learning to play guitar in a different style, he reinvented himself as Fantastic Negrito.
The rock star was born Xavier Dphrepaulezz. Except that name isn’t entirely real, either. His well-educated father, born in 1905, fabricated the family’s last name. Also puzzling: Why did his dad fake a Somalian accent and claim he was of royal heritage?
His just-released sixth album, “Son of a Broken Man,” is an open letter to his long-deceased father. The rock-, funk-, and R&B-influenced artist’s previous albums focused on social commentary. (Fans include Bernie Sanders, Barack Obama, and Sting, who duetted with the musician on this summer’s single “Undefeated Eyes.”) This time, he’s chronicling his search for identity and belonging. The Monitor spoke with the three-time Grammy Award winner in a conversation edited for length and clarity.
You began to explore your heritage on your 2022 album, “White Jesus Black Problems.” ... How did the revelation that you’re a seventh-generation descendent of a Scottish grandmother make you think about race and identity?
To me, it’s all a construct that’s made up. Five hundred years ago, a Black person didn’t exist. You were a Nigerian, Bantu, or Yoruba, or you were an Englishman or you were a Scotsman. [Race] didn’t exist. It’s a construct, and we’re obsessed with it. We’re mostly all alike and the same, probably in more ways than we think. I didn’t know I was 28% European. Go figure. And then on my dad’s side, this guy lied about everything. We were raised to think he was from Somalia. That was a lie.
When you were a teenager in foster homes, which you describe in the new song “Living With Strangers,” how did that impact how you thought about your own self-worth?
Some of it turned to anger. That’s what made me compelled to write the album, to just try to lay it on the line [for people who know me]. I’m really sorry for how I’ve treated some of you. A lot of my behavior is so toxic and so bad and so destructive because I just don’t feel that good. I started to call myself a recovering narcissist. “Son of a Broken Man” made me comfortable being unsure, not knowing what this album is going to be. I’m sitting there writing this thing, and I’m crying my eyes out. And maybe that’s OK.
You started dealing drugs and burglarizing homes. But as you sing in “California Loner,” “If you could only see me now / I’m not so bad.” You wish that your dad, who died while you were still in foster care, could have witnessed that. But you have a son now. Is this album a message to him?
Absolutely. Everything I write, I write for my son. I try to stop my dad every day. The bad guy who lives inside of me. I haven’t been great all the time. But that’s my fight. And I think if I’m more transparent, I become stronger at my fight. So I can tell my son, “Man, I’m sorry. I didn’t know what I was doing.” I’m continuing on this generational trauma thing. But I’m going to stop, and I’m going to hug you and tell you, “I love you.” I’m going to kiss you every day. And I do it.
How old is your son?
Fifteen. We’re in a good space because I’m trying to be vulnerable. I was raised with this tough-guy [attitude]. But it’s more tough to show vulnerability and love. I’m learning that. If I seem a little bit corny, that’s what I’m going to do because I believe it’s my salvation. I keep on writing this stuff, and it’s helping me do better. If I’m better, the world’s better. If I’m a better dad, the world’s better. If I’m a better husband. If I’m a better friend. Better uncle. I really feel like that’s the meaning of life. We’re supposed to improve, be creative, and help each other. Repeat. Repeat.
On Instagram, you posted a note about living on the streets from age 12 and you wrote, “Only the dreamers survive,” which echoes a lyric in the title track. How did discovering music like Prince and Led Zeppelin and Funkadelic show you that you could take this whole different path in life?
All of those people you named were just titanic visionaries. They envisioned a world probably that we all couldn’t quite see. They were brave and they did what they believed. Those are dreamers. And all that music still enriches our lives. I remember writing that lyric, writing that song like, “I want to be on the side of the dreamers. ... Everything is infinitely possible.” I love that.
The penultimate track is a cover of the gospel standard “This Little Light of Mine.” Tell me what that song means to you.
My grandmother and her affinity and love of spirituals really heavily influenced me. She was the person that could drag me to church. I remember going on social media and just feeling that it’s just dark all the time. Everybody’s screaming at the top of their lungs. The left is screaming. The right is screaming. Nobody’s talking to each other in a way that’s civil or [engaging in] any discourse that can actually be productive. I wanted to do a song where I wanted to say to the world ... “How do we paint this place a new face? How do we step up to the next level here in life?” I’m going to let it shine. I know that comes from a very old tradition in church. A salvation. It’s a little light, but, man, I’m going to shine it all around the world.
