Biography
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Born
1 February 1946
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Born In
Camarines Sur, Bicol (Region V), Philippines
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Died
23 April 2021 (aged 75)
Victor Nobleza Wood (February 1, 1946 – April 23, 2021) was a Filipino singer, actor and politician. His voice earned him various titles, including "Jukebox King" and "Plaka King".
In 1972, Wood released his third album In Despair. He became a very popular singer of that era and recorded many albums for Vicor Records. In Despair is an album of cover versions of popular English songs from the 1950s and 1960s. Three songs on the album, namely "Jenny Jenny", "Rip It Up" and "Good Golly Miss Molly", were originally hits for Little Richard in the 1950s. The album has a combination of slow and fast songs, and the slow ballads include "In Despair", "Vaya Con Dios", "Have a Good Time", "Hurt" and "Return to Me". The album's ballads are highly favorable to karaoke singing, and a number of them are still heard in karaoke nightspots. Among the album's upbeat songs are versions of Roy Orbison's "Pretty Woman", Gene Vincent's "Be-Bop-a-Lula" and Del Shannon's "Runaway".
In 1974, Wood released his eleventh album, Ihilak. Eleven of the album's 12 songs are Philippine folk love songs sung in the Visayan language. The remaining song, "Gugma Ko", uses the melody of Neil Diamond's "Song Sung Blue" and replaces the original English lyrics with Visayan-language ones.
In 1979, Wood covered the Indonesian version of "Anak" from the fellow Filipino original artist Freddie Aguilar.
Wood and his family migrated to the United States in the late 1970s.
Before becoming a singer, Wood starred in some productions of Sampaguita Pictures. He was a member of Iglesia ni Cristo. He previously hosted the show Beautiful Sunday every Sunday on the Iglesia ni Cristo-owned Net25.
Wood died on April 23, 2021, due to COVID-19 complications.
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