Kodakid’s Anthony Browne

Kodakid’s Anthony Browne

AMIDST a flurry of festival gigs lined up for this summer, local fourpiece Kodakid will launch their debut album at Whelan’s in Dublin on 28th June.
Local fans won‘t be left out though, according to drummer Anthony Browne: “We’ll be running a bus from Waterford, leaving Murphy’s on the Quay at 6.30pm on 28th June. The price of the bus is €30 but this will include admission to the gig and a signed album. The bus is filling up pretty fast though, so people would want to get in touch if they’re interested in travelling up. But if you can’t make it, we will be back on home soil to play Daytripper in Bolton Street on 4th July. Or if people really want to push the boat out, we’re on the bills at Indiependence and the Light Colour Sound Festival in Kilkenny, amongst others, this summer.”
Kodakid (also made up of Kevin Power on lead vocals, Alex Soikans on guitar and John Duignan on bass and backing vocals) was formed in 2010 and has since played gigs and festivals all over Ireland and the UK, sharing the stage with acts like Bastille, The Noisettes and The Riptide Movement and building up an impressive fan base along the way.
They’ve also notched up accolades aplenty: to name but a few, MRU Single of the Year 2012 for their fourth single, Portis; stand out show at Indiependence – “no doubt the finest indie performance of the festival” – Fintan Walsh, State Magazine; main support to The Minutes and Delorentos (Manchester); BP Fallon’s Band of the Week (Nov 2012)…the list goes on.
The debut album is, in one sense, a documenting of this musical journey, according to Anthony: “The album’s been in the making for two years now, we’ve put an awful lot into it. We wanted to get it right, sure there’s no point half doing it. So there’s definitely no fluff on the album, every song is there on its own merit. We just got it back from the mastering studio in London and it’s sounding savage – if I do say so myself.”
“There’s ten tracks on the album and they kind of tell the story of the band, the life of Kodakid since we got together. Pray (for some luck), which was actually the first track we recorded, made it onto the album, which says a lot about how strong the song is. There’s good variation amongst the various tracks, although the music is very much recognisable as Kodakid at the same time. It’s definitely not your standard rock song after rock song. On my Own, the last track on the album, is an experimental track and it really shows the range of what we’re doing.”
With the various band members based across the country, Anthony (who’s dad, Ben Browne, is a well-known name on the local musical and showband scene) says Kodakid’s rehearsal schedule is strictly adhered to.
“We would have a very structured timetable in terms of rehearsals and recording; we have to. Alex is based in Dublin, Johnny in Cork, myself and Kevin in Waterford so it means we have to be selective about our gigs and we only choose the ones worth doing. We’ve managed to build up a fan base in Waterford, Dublin, Cork and Limerick and we would have a lot of younger people coming to the gigs who would hear about us and follow us on social media and through our website.”
No doubt it’s a far cry from the days of Cisco Pike, Anthony’s first band, with Tommy Farrell, Jamie O’Halloran and Billy Higgins: “Well, Cisco Pike were a supergroup in their own way, in fairness. But yeah, people hear about your music very differently these days. I took a break from music after Cisco Pike and then I got into digital music, which I did for a few years. I knew Alex from the various bands he was in, Deaf Animal Orchestra and Jay Jam Fly Jive and the band kind of started out with us jamming. The four of us have been playing together since the end of 2010, we had our first live gig the following year.”
Outta Sight, the lead single on the album, was released last April and that ‘went down well’, according to Anthony. Music blog The Sound Out was a little more flattering: ‘With a great degree of swagger blended with soulful vocals and heavy guitar, the hookladen new single from Kodakid ‘Outta Sight’ is an immense rock anthem that shows a band who have become intent on pushing their sound forward….’
“We’re after getting good reviews in Hot Press, on the local and national airwaves. We played on TV3, on The Apprentice and the band will soon be appearing on RTE2’s teen and young adult show Two Tube. We also did an acoustic session for Phil Cawley on Today FM recently as well and he had good things to say about the band afterwards. It’s all good. Fingers crossed. the reaction will be the same to the album.”
* To book your seat on the bus travelling from Waterford to Whelan’s on 28th June, contact Lenny Burns on 087-2605728 or email info@kodakid.com. Bus tickets can be collected from the Harley Davidson shop in Poleberry. Kodakid’s new album will be available on CD, download and a limited number of individually numbered vinyl pressings from 30th June. For more on the band, see https://www.facebook.com/kodakidofficial, www.kodakid.com.