Select Captain - I Want You

Oh Captain! My Captain! The ship has weather'd every rack, the prize we sought is won; The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting

And just as the disciples in the Dead Poets Society stand on their tables to bid their master farewell in all reverence, so do I stand on the tables to dance. The new single I Want You by Select Captain has no less an effect on me. Oh Captain! My Captain!

But in order. For all those of us, for whom the music of Select Captain is still a white spot on the map, I asked frontman Kristian for a little introduction. The beginnings of the band are about ten years ago. “We’re a duo from Denmark consisting of Kristian Brokær Gaarskjær on vocals, guitars and a few other things, and Søren Vestergaard on guitar, producing, bass, synths and everything else. Originally Select Captain started out as Kristians solo-project, but Søren has been along on the ride all the way from the first album in 2014. With our latest album Comes in Waves from 2020 we just officially made it a duo. The music is our take on indie-folk, dark-folk, nordicana, whatever genre you’d like to call it. With a focus on strong melodies and blending acoustic instruments and electronic lush soundscapes with personal and reflective lyrics.” The likeable Dane, who would describe himself as passionate, emotional, and fun, describes music, family, and friends as the scaffolding that holds him. He lives from: “Being able to do things that make me feel happy and make me feel like I’m doing something meaningful. And guitars.” Of course, he also needs them for his music, the guitars. He finds inspiration for it in his music (Mind Crashing is his most personal song so far), in music by other artists (The National, Sufjan Stevens, Father John Misty), favorite songs (Manchester Orchestra -The Silence, Sunday Drive - Ásgeir), books and nature. And in relationships with people.

“A good friend of mine always jokingly calls me a sad f***. I really don’t think I am (I definitely hope not), but I do really like sad music. It’s comforting and makes me happy in some strange way. ” Kristian

There are two special relationships in his life that we need to highlight. One, of course, is with his bandmate. “We both have the same kind of taste in music. We write songs together very easily. A lot of it is a joint effort. Melody, chord-progression, etc. I might write a bit more of the lyrics as I’m the one singing them and Søren is doing the production making everything work and sound good. We work together in the studio, and we work together online, sending songs and ideas back an forth.”

He is an artist's soul, as it is written in the book. Too anxious about many things, full of self-doubt and the feeling of not being good enough.

“When it comes to the music I can be a bit impatient.”

But where there is doubt, there is also room for development. Who knows what lies in the future? He could definitely imagine a collaboration with greats like Aaron Dessner, Phoebe Bridgers and Andy Hull. But even as a duo, the two prove that they are constantly evolving. Because the sound of the two has changed a lot since their first album.

“A lot of things have changed from the first album and until today. It was a lot more folksy and country in the beginning. But we’ve incorporated more electronics, tried to make our sound a bit more modern without letting go of our heritage and where our music comes from. I’m not sure if there’s anything I dare to do now that I didn’t do before. To me it‘s just important that each of our albums are different than the one before. That we keep on evolving and try to take it in new directions whilst still being true to ourselves. Hopefully you evolve just a bit every day.”

If he could, he'd also upend the music industry, from a more equitable distribution of streaming revenue to greater ignorance of age and gender.

Amen to that. Music is not a dating app, after all. Speaking of which.

Let's move on to the second relationship we need to talk about. And...

Oh! My! God! Get out your handkerchiefs!

The backstory to I Want You reads like it was directed by Hollywood: “I recently got married to my high-school girlfriend. We had been apart for 20 years and lived completely separate lives, both of us married to other people, and without any contact for years. We then met again almost 20 years later and fell in love almost immediately. Everything was just like it used to be. I Want You is a song about meeting her again.”

O M G ( please fill in now your heart emojis…)

I also fell in love and immediately and with this single.

Just the first notes of this sound pearl create tension. A bit cowboy, a bit mysterious. But Tha! you think so. Then the gentle voice of Kristian comes around the corner and tells you that he wants you - again. It just floats above the sea of guitars without taking off (I do that I listen). The chorus pays homage to any mellow indie rock as the tempo picks up to dance like the gas pedal on a freeway on-ramp. A melodic guitar banter adorns the second part to the vibrating bass and the hopeful vocals lure us back to the tables in victory - to dance. Indie rock kisses singer songwriter.

If this is to be my poem for the club of dead indie singers, so be it!

O Captain! My Captain! I want you!

Listen and Repeat (and Dance)