Rising songwriter Pedro Santos returns with his heartfelt new single “Lady In Red”, a tender tribute to his mum. Written alongside producer Jordan Cosmo and mixed by Cenzo Townshend (The Rolling Stones, Snow Patrol, Kaiser Chiefs), the track sees Santos channel his emotion into a soaring, cinematic ballad that showcases both his vocal power and his vulnerability.

The release follows his debut solo single “Someone I Don’t Know”, which has already amassed over 240,000 streams in just a few weeks. While Santos may be stepping into the spotlight as a solo artist, his journey began with the boyband Here At Last—a group that earned over 3 million TikTok followers, hit #1 on the UK iTunes charts with their debut EP, and sold out tours across the UK, including headline shows at Shepherd’s Bush Empire and O2 Indigo.

The Portuguese-born, UK-based artist has spent the past year making his mark, from a three-week European tour supporting alt-rock band Only The Poets—meeting thousands of fans at every stop—to his upcoming performance at London’s All Points East Festival alongside Raye, Tyla, Doechii and Jade.

1883 Magazine sits down with Pedro Santos to talk about “Lady In Red”, his creative inspirations, life off-stage, and what’s next.

Hello, how are you? It’s nice to meet you, I’m Maja. 

Likewise, I’m Pedro. I’ve heard that you are in Europe somewhere. Whereabouts?

I’m in France right now. I’m from Germany, but I’ve been in France for the last seven months, and I live in London. I’m going back to London in September.

Oh, wow. Okay, very nice. And where are you in France?

I’m in South West France, near Toulouse.

And do you prefer that to Germany?

Yeah, because it’s much warmer. It’s already hot here in, like, March, April. [laughs] And do you live in London?

Just outside of London, in Caversham, we’re about 20 minutes from Paddington, so it’s not too far. The weather’s just as bad, so it doesn’t change much.

I’m not so much looking forward to the London weather, but I’ve heard it hasn’t been that bad in the summer; it could be worse.

No, I think we’re about to have another heat wave, which I think we’re all very, very grateful for.

I haven’t been in the area where you live!

There’s nothing here. [laughs]

Why don’t we start talking a little bit about the beginning of you making music? Where did it all start? 

So it was never really on the cards from the get-go. My sister bought me my first-ever guitar when I was about 12 for Christmas. I’m pretty sure I circled it in the Argos catalogue at the time, and so that was a nice Christmas present, but I never really took up the guitar too much.

I went to this Portuguese Academy called LUSO in London, and every week, pretty much, we had rehearsals, and then we’d play shows for our parents. There were probably 40 or 50 of us. I then got into music through social media covers on TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube.

I’ve only actually released my own music this year, which is crazy to think about. I was in a band for a very long time, and we had that project going. Recently, we stopped that project, and then I began Pedro Santos as a solo artist.

What’s the story of “Lady in Red”?

It was really about this encounter with my mother. So all my family lived in Portugal, and I’m living just outside London by myself. When the band had split up, the other project I was in, it felt like that’s all that I’d known. It felt very vulnerable coming out of it. All the relationships I had were because of the band. So coming out of it felt like I was coming out of my comfort zone times ten; it felt scary. I felt extremely vulnerable; I felt like I had to learn brand new things, even though I was still in the same industry.

With that comes a knock back, like not knowing where to go, what the right path was. Not knowing if I could do it on my own. Now, the best treatment for me is always to go back to my mum. I would go back to mum and everything will be fixed. I booked my flight probably two weeks later, and I spent about a week with them. My family is quite an emotional family. We’re all quite sensitive.

The song was just basically about that encounter. She already knew that the band had split up, and what I was going through at the time, which to me was my rock bottom. And it was just about the encounter, of seeing her for the first time in about a year, and kind of having that comfort of going and feeling like no matter what, there’s no words that need to be said but I will be just fine. I think that’s what a mother or a father can do for pretty much most people.

You have a lot of followers on TikTok and on Instagram. So, how would you say TikTok helped you get that song out? and what’s your relationship with social media like?

Love, hate, I’d say. I think social media is a great thing. I guess you could call it an ecosystem that has a lot of good but also a lot of bad. But for me, [the song] was blowing up already on social media [because of the band]. It was nice to be able to start fresh without it being from level zero [for my solo career]. So I had a little bit of a foundation, you know. people who have supported the band and have then come over and supported us individually.

When I do Portuguese covers, you get the Brazilian market, and they love it. It’s quite nice to have [different groups] come together, all on social media. The lyrics are pretty simple and relatable to a lot of people, so I think the lyrics probably have helped, but the spark would have been from the fan base that’s already there.

Would you say it was really difficult to transition from being in a band to being a solo artist?

I think mentally, yes, physically, it’s the same thing. You wake up, make videos, do some promo, and then you do it again. It’s a lot more vulnerable now. Back in the day, you could hide behind the other members. Whereas now you’ve got no one to hide behind, and you’ve got to be as honest and as vulnerable as possible.

I think that’s where a lot of artists might sometimes go wrong, by not being honest. At the end of the day, if you want something to be relatable, you have to speak through your fans, which tends to be about the simple things. As soon as I realised that, I kind of adapted to it quite quickly. But to be honest, the fanbase is so lovely, and they’ve always got my back. So, it doesn’t matter how I do or how I do things; they’re always there to support.

And talking about fans, can you think of something that a fan said to you that has always stuck with you?

Yeah, a lady, someone’s mother, had come up to us, and she had gone or was going through chemotherapy, and she said she had a bucket list of things to do, and one of them was to meet me and the band. The fact that she was there with her kids as well was such a surreal moment because I don’t think as an artist you recognise everyone’s day-to-day lives.

I think the bigger you get, the more fans you have. It’s impossible to recognise everyone’s day-to-day life. How lucky am I to be able to be on a list for somebody who’s going through such a tough time and their kids are very aware of it. Unfortunately, that’s what life is. For me, I’m a very lucky person as I don’t have to think about that. So I think that’s probably it, it wasn’t just what she said, but it’s also recognising the differences in life.

It’s beautiful that music can do so much for people and give them so much hope and strength in those moments. So, especially as a starting upcoming musician, that must have meant so much to you.

Oh yes.

I saw you supported Only the Poets for a three-week tour. What was that experience like for you to go on tour with them?

It was my first ever time going out on tour, and I had the best time – to the point where I said to them, if I go out on another support tour, and it isn’t like this, I’m going to want to quit music. The lads are incredibly lovely. The whole team was incredibly welcoming, and the fan base was as well. On top of that, I couldn’t have been more grateful or luckier to be able to experience what I did. I went from not having any music out to then also being on a tour bus and travelling around Europe with this whole team that was just so loving.

Tommy, the main singer of Only the Poets, is just one of the most down-to-earth people. So are the rest of the lads. But it was so nice that I’d be sound checking, and he’d come into the room and be like, ‘Hey, dude, I think you sound great’. [He also offered] constructive criticism. I was able to ask them about their fanbase, what’s good, what’s bad, what I can do, and what I can’t do. And they very much understood the assignment of I’m there to support them, and they gave me the best platform to do that. It was an unbelievable experience.

You’re playing All Points East festival at the end of August, in a few weeks. What are you most excited about?

Probably watching Raye. I’m very excited because it’s my first ever festival. I’m also doing it with a new band, which is exciting. I’m currently rehearsing, and we’re all getting on amazingly, and we’ve only met once. So it’s quite refreshing to know that in a couple of weeks, I can be on a stage and not have to worry about anyone not doing something that isn’t supposed to be done, and everyone’s having fun.

My parents can’t fly over but I have my friends there, have my team there, and we’ve put so much work into it. Even friends have all kept me on track. I’m excited to spend time with my friends. I’m excited to meet new people. I’m excited to play for the fans, but I’m also really excited to watch the headliner, Raye.

Who are some artists that you would love to collaborate with?

I’d say Tom Odell. He’s always been a massive inspiration. I wrote it in my journal the other day. I said, I am going to have a writing session with Tom Odell at some point. I would usually say Coldplay, I love listening to them and am inspired by them.

I think in terms of a duet, I’d say Hozier and Olivia Rodrigo. I love her recent stuff.

Can you share some advice that you’ve been given, career-wise, that you’re always going to remember, that can be from anyone?

It’s a marathon, not a sprint. My manager tells me this all the time. With such a fast-moving production at the moment, you have so many artists putting music out, so many videos on your phone, and it’s just swipe, swipe, swipe, swipe. Everyone has an attention span of around two seconds, when I mean everyone, I mean mainly my generation. You forget that actually, it’s not done overnight. A lot of the people who have this moment, it’s very quickly taken away because they don’t have the foundation.

So my plan is to build the foundation, create real fans around me. I call them ‘Santourage’ because my favourite series is Entourage. I want it to feel like we’re friends, and I think that’s the best way to do it, because at the same time, if it wasn’t for them, there’d be no Pedro. So I have to give them everything, because they’re giving me everything. They’re allowing me to do what I want to do in my life.

Yeah, it’s a marathon, not a sprint. Don’t just chase the high. Just make sure that you’re always connecting with the people that are already there. And obviously build, but you know, Queen wasn’t just Queen in one day. They went through many years of changing and branding. Same with David Bowie, he had different phases. Everyone’s chasing that instant gratification, whereas real music that makes you feel, takes time. It develops, takes wrong turns, and comes back to the right path, and then intoyou take another wrong turn. That’s the point, it tends to shape an artist into who they are in the future.

Speaking about fashion, what’s your style like?

So at the moment, it’s still a work in progress, which I think is the best part about it. Being in a band for so long, kind of stopped the whole personal development thing, whether it was style or personality-wise. So I’m getting back into that. And I think for me, I’m quite versatile, which seems to be a bit of a problem, because I’ll change from style to style all the time. At the moment, it’s all very simple.

It’s very like 2000s clothing, just being a bit cool, and I would say nonchalant, although I’m probably the least nonchalant person ever. And on stage, I think for me, it’s about confidence, because if I’m not confident on stage, then the fans aren’t going to be confident about me either.

How do you usually spend your days? So what’s a perfect day off for you?

I enjoy exercise, so I do a lot of running. I hate being indoors. I think it’s so bad for you. I like getting the sun. When it’s rainy and stuff, I tend to stay indoors. But when it’s sunny, I am never in the house, whether it’s going for a bike ride, running, or even just going with my mates outside for a little bit. I’ve been playing paddle recently, which has been a growing sport for me, mainly just because I might prefer it to tennis.

Apart from that, I am genuinely obsessed and addicted to self-development. So it would be mainly figuring out what I like, what I don’t like – both visually and audio-wise. I am constantly on my phone but not on social media. I’m on Vinted, Depop, Pinterest, all that kind of stuff. I also journal. So a lot of the stuff. So most of my time is spent writing, but time off for me is either running or music.

Yeah, I’m also very obsessed with Vinted.

It’s obsessive. It’s in my household. It’s one in, one out.

And what else can you tell us that’s next for you in the near future?

There will be a lot more releases. There are talks of a concert at some point. Now that I’ve had a bit of a trajectory boost with “Lady in Red”, and how well it’s done, it’s about starting to think about speeding things up a little bit, promoting more, and figuring out really who I am and how I want to portray myself.

To be honest, I want to go back to Portugal a little bit more so I can see my family but also market myself out there as a Portuguese, British-speaking person. From then on out, it’s pretty much meeting new people, giving back to the fans everything they deserve, and just putting more and more music out.

“Lady In Red” is out now.

Interview Maja Bebber