Pascal Michel Obispo (born 8 January 1965) is a French singer-songwriter. Pascal Obispo, son of Max Obispo (a former Bordeaux Girondins football player of Basque origin) and Nicole Guérin (originally from Angers), was born on 8 January 1965 in Bergerac. After the divorce of his parents in 1978 he was raised by his mother, who decided to settle in Rennes. His father Max gained some notoriety by publishing two books, one on football, and Le Sable d’Ararat in 2010, a novel born from a meeting with the Armenian Minister of Culture Hasmik Boghossian when he discovers the similarities between the Armenian and Basque languages.

Pascal Obispo started singing in 1980. He got his first record deal in 1990. The record deal was Le long du fleuve. Some of his most famous songs are “Plus que tout au monde”, “Laurelenn”, “Tombé pour elle”, “L’important c’est d’aimer”, “Personne” and “Fan”.

With his 2007 release of Les Fleurs du Bien (a play on Baudelaire’s Les Fleurs du mal) he makes allusions to Rosa Parks, Pablo Picasso and others. He is also well known for his various escapades, his unconservative behavior, his haircut, etc. His name is an anagram of painter Pablo Picasso’s name.

Obispo used his popularity to help with charity work and particularly for fighting the spread of HIV/AIDS. He has worked with many other well-known artists such as Jean-Jacques Goldman, Florent Pagny, Johnny Hallyday, Patricia Kaas, Amel Bent, and Natasha St-Pier.

In the beginning of the 1980s Rennes was one of the cities of rock in France. While studying at the Lycée Émile-Zola, Pascal found his passion for music, after discovering the group The Cure in rehearsal next to the basketball court where he was playing. He also fell in love with the Rennes rock group Marquis de Sade.

In 1983, while he was in Terminale interne at the free institution of Combrée, he created the group Words Of Goethe with friends from his former high school in Rennes (notably the lyricist Alain Gaudiche). After his military service, between January and August 1986, he was the bassist of the new wave group Evening Legions.

In 1988, he joined the new wave group Senso, which consisted of the members Frank Darcel (a former member of the Marquis de Sade group) and Frédéric Renaud. Originally a bass player, Pascal later became the singer of the project.

At the turn of the 1990s, the Senso group prepared a first album but, after discussion, decided to make it Pascal Obispo’s first solo album. The disc, entitled Le Long du Fleuve, was released in 1990 by EMI with songs written by Franck Darcel, and supported by the single Les avions se souvenir. The album went unnoticed.

In 1991, Pascal Obispo signed his first artist contract with Epic and published his second album (Plus que tout au monde) in 1992, which met with real success thanks to the single of the same name and the title Tu vas me manquer, which placed 16th in the Top 50. At the end of 1994, he released the album Un jour comme today, confirming his success with titles like Tombé pour elle and Tu compliques tout, and revealing the influence of Michel Polnareff (from whom he took over Holidays) and the Beatles. The album sold over 500,000 copies.

In 1995, he met Lionel Florence, with whom he wrote the credits for the TF1 series Sous le soleil. The same year, he took advantage of his growing fame to get involved in the fight against AIDS, around the album Entre sourires et larmes, with six titles signed by Lionel Florence. In early 1996, he opened for Celine Dion for 13 dates, including four at Bercy. He then released his 4th album, Superflu. Thanks to the titles Il faut du temps, Lucie, Où et avec qui tu m’aimes? and the duo Les Meilleurs Enemies with Zazie, he reached a very large audience, allowing the album to exceed one million sales.

In 1997 he began collaborating with other artists. In November, he worked with Florent Pagny on his album Savoir aimer, which reached 2 million sales. The following year, he produced Johnny Hallyday’s album, Ce que je sais (including the song Allumer le feu). Then, with Lionel Florence, he wrote Sa raison d’être, a song bringing together 42 artists on the same song for the benefit of the fight against AIDS. This compilation reaches 700,000 sales and brings in more than 45 million francs to ECS, of which he is an honorary member of the board of directors.

On July 28, 1997, during an outdoor concert in Ajaccio, a 19-year-old man shot him with a pellet gun and injured him in the face (he left a scar on his left eyebrow). After publishing the album Live 98, from his Superflu tour, he produced the album Le mot de passe by Patricia Kaas in 1999, and participated in the production of several titles for Florent Pagny’s new album, RéCréation. In December, he released his 5th studio album, Soledad, which totaled 700,000 sales, carried by the titles Soledad, L’important c’est d’aimer, Tue par amour, Pas besoin de regrets and Ce qu’on voit Allée Rimbaud.