photos : Ambigram
THE FRENCHY CAPTAINS
Duo, group and collective formed by Simon Carrière, THE FRENCHY CAPTAINS is first of all covers but not just any covers...
From Bohemian Rhapsody to Seven Nation Army via Wake Me Up, they revisit, they pirate and really appropriate these covers.
It is also original compositions: an Irish intro "Welcome", an acoustic reggae song that makes you smile "Come On! Get Out of your Box", another folk "Hey Love, Stay for a While" or even a soul ballad with "Oriental Angel"...
The styles mix around the trumpet and the acoustic violin supported by a beautiful bass-drums rhythm section. On top of all this are the guitar and the singular, inhabited and powerful voice of Simon Carrière.
It all started in 2014, when Simon Carrière, a metro musician, met Sophie Chrisment while he was singing "Nothing Else Matters" by Metallica.
Simon had already made some progress in solo music, particularly in French songs, and for about ten years he started singing in English and touring English-speaking countries. . .
This meeting led them to start playing as a duo, with a first participation in the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, one of the largest street music festivals in the world, which allowed them to make their debut together.
From 2015, the group project The Captains began to take shape with other musicians joining the group.
Between 2016 and 2018, numerous concert dates, particularly at the Ministry of Justice in 2016, and above all the preparation of an EP to present the group by mixing original covers and compositions.
In 2019, the band found its style, refined its arrangements by merging trumpet and violin but also by giving pride of place to choirs that are very present on the tracks.
Then in June 2019, The Frenchy Captains played for the first time at a big festival in Brittany, the Art Rock Festival of St Brieuc. They took the opportunity to finally release their new 6-track EP at Café Oz Châtelet on June 10, 2019.
The dynamic was put on hold by force of circumstances due to Covid in 2020/2021, but the band is back in force with a new trumpeter in 2022. Many dates follow . . .
In 2023, The Frenchy Captains presents a new series of duo videos of their best covers on Youtube and with a new, unprecedented format on TikTok. In a few months, their videos have accumulated several hundred thousand views on the platform! A single "Sweet Dreams (live version) is released on Spotify and is selected on international playlists.
2024 is a turning point for The Frenchy Captains with a live recording with video capture and live recording in February at the Pan Piper (Paris) which will be released in March 2025 but also with beautiful scenes like for the Paris 2024 Olympic Games on the Parvis de l'Hôtel de Ville, or the first part of the biggest French Celtic rock music group known at the European level: Celkilt.
From the end of 2024, new horizons will open up. With the departure of Sophie Chrisment, the project becomes a collective with variable geometry. Simon regularly plays as a duo with different musicians from the collective "The Frenchy Captains" every Monday evening in residence at the Café Oz Châtelet in Paris. A "Big Band" version with around ten talented musicians is in preparation for the rest of the adventure. . .
The first single "Welcome On Board" has just been released on December 7, 2024 and many other tracks will follow until March 2025!