Lead singer of the post-punk band Virgin Prunes from 1977 to 1986, Gavin Friday then turned to a solo career that included composing for film. Born Fionán Martin Hanvey in Dublin on October 8, 1959, he met Bono, who was about to form U2, and Guggi (Derek Rowne), with whom he formed The Virgin Prunes, at a party. After the group split up, he devoted himself to painting, exhibiting his work in galleries before returning to music. In 1989, he formed a duo with multi-instrumentalist Maurice Roycroft, alias The Man Seezer, for the album Each Man Kills the Things He Loves, before going solo in 1992 with Adam'n'Eve. Always close to Bono, he collaborated on the soundtrack to the film In the Name of the Father (1994), for which they sang the title track as a duet. Following his solo album Shag Tobacco (1995), his song "Angel" was featured in the film Romeo & Juliet (1996), and he composed the soundtracks for the feature films The Boxer (1997) and In America (with The Man Seezer, 2003), including songs nominated for Golden Globe Awards and Ivor Novello Awards. He also collaborated with Quincy Jones on the music for the 50 Cent biopic Get Rich or Die Tryin' (2005), and reunited with Seezer and Bono to record Peter & the Wolf, based on Prokofiev's fairy tale, for a charity show. Gavin Friday then worked on several projects with Hal Willner, then Gavin Bryars, before producing the albums Catholic (2011) and Ecce Homo (2024).
