The Captain & Me

You may never have wondered what you get if you mix folk music from the Balkans, american country music, african rhythms with rich vocal harmonies, a vast array of acoustic instruments and unlikely stories. The answer is, of course, you get The Captain & Me.

The Captain & Me are Even Vaa and Morten Krane, who write, produce, sing and play everything in the studio. Live, however, the band grows to 9 people, bent on making everybody drink vodka, dance and sing along. They have a reputation as one of the best and most joyous live bands to see in Norway, and sad faces are a rare sight after a show with The Captain & Me.

Their second album, Leave Your Friends And Family, was released in Norway in February 2009, and saw the band take everything a bit further. This time, everything is bigger, stranger, and simply more.

The record is filled with handclaps, woodblocks, lonely countryside rhythms and grand, soaring, melancholy trumpets. There are the characteristically strong vocal harmonies of Vaa and Krane that sometimes border on the Beatlesque and always carry the songs into a realm beyond the here and now.

The Captain & Me name as their influences Crosby Stills and Nash (and Young), early Elton John, Goran Bregovic, Thomas Pynchon, Allesandro Baricco, crazy rhythms, Cabo Verde, and “music you can smile and maybe dance to.” In making Leave Your Friends and Family they have succeeded in doing just that – and more. A rare blast of gypsy joy created by two Norwegians with a vivid imagination and great musical talent – with, of course, a little help from their friends.

On Leave Your Friends and Family Vaa and Krane have created a pleasantly powerful flood of instruments that rolls by like a train, and, once on this rambling vehicle, it is impossible to get off. They take us far away from the mundane and the familiar by means of colourful invocations of a profound elsewhere, unknown worlds where you drink potent liquids with strangers around nightly bonfires and dwell in strange lands populated by such unlikely characters as William Mason and Franz Mesmer.

Their first album, Automata, was released in 2006. It was released on norwegian lo-fi artist Saint Thomas’ label Cornerman Record, and following the release, the band was Saint Thomas’ opening act and backing band on a european tour. The album was home recorded, catchy, eclectic and took everybody by surprise. Sadly, Automata was the last album to be released on Cornerman. Thomas died in September 2007.

The Captain & Me have recovered from the loss of a good friend and would like to make you raise your glass and shout ”nazdorovje” at a concert venue in the near future.