When Chordblossom came into existence, it was always our aim to shine a spotlight on the artists and bands that make up the music scene in Northern Ireland. We’ve been doing it for over ten years now and one of our favourite methods is our Introducing feature.
Put the kettle on, curl up on your sofa and and join us for a quickfire Q&A with some of our favourite new musicians. Who knows, maybe you’ll even discover your new favourite artists.
This iteration of Introducing features the musical talents of The Capris who just released their new single ‘No Valve’.
What was the inspiration behind your artist name?
So, when we first started out, we would practice in an old shed at Odhran’s (Lead singer) house. We had done a few practices by this stage and we started discussing what we might call ourselves. We had heard stories about how bands found their name by just looking around them and naming things they see there and then, and sitting in the corner of this old shed that had become our rehearsal space -amongst many, many other objects- was a vintage Ford Capri!
We always wanted to be “The” something – Ergo “The Capris”. It just felt like a very fitting indie band name so we decided to roll with it. However, we very easily could have called ourselves “The Mouldy Windows” so thank God Odhran’s brother likes old cars…
You’ve just released a new single. How did it come about and what does it mean to you?
‘No Valve’ was written over two years ago, it was just another song I (Padraic, lead guitar) had been writing. It didn’t find its feet until I brought it to the band, and even then it was still missing a shoe. We had a version, but it wasn’t fully formed yet. Some time passed and eventually, we were clutching at straws in our rehearsal space trying to figure the song out, until Jonny started with this heavy bass progression that got us inspired. Bit by bit, we got it to the version you hear now.
When I wrote the song, I was trying to get in the headspace of my younger self. I had a lot going on and no way to let it out, I was thinking about all those flashbacks I get when I go back home, all those corners of the town I got myself into trouble in. Objectively, it speaks about a lot of those feelings that young men go through and bottle up, and how that can follow you into adulthood.
Have you any more releases or studio time lined up for later in the year?
Yes, absolutely! We aren’t going to give too much away right now but we can guarantee that we will be releasing more new music throughout the year on top of this new single. We’ve been to a few different studios and producers in our music making careers but right now we’re working at Start Together studios in Belfast with Michael Bell and he’s great.
We love getting into the studio and recording the songs we’ve put hours of work into creating. We think this is going to be a huge year for us in terms of our original releases.
Tell us about your song writing process.
I (Padraic, Lead Guitar) write the lyrics. I never sit down and write a song from start to finish. I’m always trying to catch any inspiration that floats by me, the notes app on my phone is as unorganised as it is stuffed with ideas. Little poems, diary entries, titles. When I’m writing a song I’ll take bits that fit what I’m trying to do and glue them together. Sometimes it comes out looking more like a ransom letter than a hit single but that’s just how it is sometimes.
Once the lyrics are done I’ll bring it to practice and hand Odhran the lyrics – then we just start jamming and see what direction we go in. Sometimes it can be pretty gruelling and feel like we’re going nowhere, then someone just plays a riff that sounds sick or Dee (drums) suggests changing the tempo and the song just blossoms from there. It’s definitely our favourite thing about being in a band – being at the centre of the creative process and making music that we love.
Who were your favourite artists/bands growing up? Have your influences changed over time?
There is a VERY wide spectrum of music that shapes our creative process. We all grew up around different genres of music and artists, anything from Oasis to Creedence Clearwater Revival, Coldplay to Blink-182, The Eagles to Fleetwood Mac! The list is pretty endless to be honest.
If we had to pick one band that we all admire equally, it would have to be Kings of Leon. They are probably the band that is mentioned the most whenever we reference other songs during our songwriting. Odhran’s voice was actually likened to that of Caleb Followill’s in a recent review we had for our last release ‘Melancholy Blues’ so that was really cool for us.
What’s been your favourite local (NI Based) release from the last twelve months?
The amount of musical quality we have in this tiny area of this tiny island is truly unfathomable – it’s endless! There are so many amazing songs/albums being released by NI artists every single week, and from all kinds of genres too, it’s incredible!
One album that we’ve all been talking about recently is ‘Grandstand’ by Brand New Friend. We didn’t really know anything about this band until this album came out to be completely honest but we’re so happy that we found them. They are SO good, everything about their music is so impressive, from the harmonies to the instrumentation to the lyrics, you can really tell that they have honed their craft to perfection and know exactly what kind of music they want to make. The fact that this is their THIRD album too, it’s just nuts – they are true standard-setters for the NI music scene, especially for indie bands anyways.
As for singles, The Florentinas are KILLING it – they’re a major inspiration for us. ‘Weatherman’ was an exemplary indie guitar song – this is the exact type of sound we love. Honourable mention too for The Marra’s latest release – ‘Masterpiece’. It’s a great track. Honestly we could go on and on about the music scene here – it’s just too stacked with talent.
If you weren’t musicians, what line of work would we find you in?
It’s hard to imagine what path our lives would have taken if none of us had EVER become musicians. We all started playing music from a very young age, so we all knew pretty early on that music is what we wanted to do with our lives. However, the majority of us did study Business after school so it’s probably safe enough to say we’d be working 9-5s in an office somewhere… yeah, something really exciting like that!
If you could collaborate with one artist or band from NI, who would it be and why?
We would love to have female vocals on a song some time. We supported Lucy Bell at her EP launch last year and her voice is just amazing, it’s like Holly Humberstone meets Olivia Rodrigo meets Billie Eilish.
We think it’d be really cool to do a more chilled song with the main focus being Odhran and Lucy showcasing their vocal talents together. She also just released another great single recently – again, the talent here is INSANE. Lucy Gaffney is another female artist who would be cool to work with. Her songwriting is great.
It is intensely difficult to be successful in the music industry. What does NI need to do to invest in/develop to boost your chances?
Tell us about it… I mean, we’ve already talked about the overwhelming talent in this area which makes it extremely competitive already, but it definitely feels like we could have more outlets to help everyone achieve their goals. I know there are some grants that allow musicians to get some money but the application forms take forever and a day to complete and get very confusing – all for a couple hundred quid (if you’re successful) which realistically doesn’t go very far.
Festivals like Dalfest and Stendhal are great but they’re also very difficult to get a slot at. There should be a full weekend long music festival in the city purely dedicated to up and coming talent – Only unsigned artists. This would really help put deserving artists’ names on the map and help them grow a following. They should also work on creating a culture where it’s more about “going to a gig” instead of just going out drinking and having someone play guitar in the background.
What does success look like for you?
We’re on a tour bus, somewhere in the middle of Europe getting ready for our headline show – that’s the dream, that’s when we can die happy. If we ever got to go on tour with a band like Kings of Leon we would probably just die, like in general.
We’re progressing more and more each year but we’re still working 9-5s and doing the band thing with the little free time we have together – it can be quite exhausting at times. Perhaps just being able to be a band full time while living comfortably is what we would consider ‘Successful’.
That being said, the most important thing in all of this is to enjoy ourselves. If we aren’t having fun then what’s the point? If we create a couple of songs that people love, play some shows we’ll never forget and have fun while doing it, then who cares if that’s where the road ends – at least we can say we did it.
You’re going out on tour and can have anything you want on your rider, what would we find on yours?
Alright well top of the list would be beer – boring but essential. I (Jonny, Bass) would personally need a surplus of Nomadic granola pots – I have one every single day. Monster for Odhran, Kombucha for Padraic, Fanta/Coke for Dee. Those are the things that fuel us everyday I guess… oh and an abundance of punjana tea bags.
Where and when can we next catch you live?
You’re just going to have to make sure you follow us on all of our socials to keep up with that end of things. As we said before, we can’t give too much away right now but we’re working hard behind the scenes to bring you more exciting news very soon.
If you enjoyed this feature and fancy discovering some more new artists, we suggest you jump on over to our archive of Introducing pieces.
If you are a band or musician based in Northern Ireland interested in taking part in our Introducing feature, we recommend submitting new music to us via our Contact page and if we enjoy it, you’ll no doubt hear from us.
