Riding a wave of indie success, Chicago's Friko — led by singer/guitarist and main lyricist Nikos Kapetan and drummer Bailey Minzenberger — will embark on a 40-date headlining tour starting Nov. 2 in Amsterdam (with dates starting Dec. 27) and release an expanded version of their 2024 debut album on Nov. 22. where we were Where do we go from here? — featuring 11 bonus studio and live tracks and a cover of My Bloody Valentine's “When You Sleep.”
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The first track from the expanded album, “If I Am” — which Kapetan says was one of the first songs the band played at its initial Windy City club shows — will be released Oct. 23.
This past summer, Friko brought their fiery full sound—fueled by Kapetan's turbo guitar and throbbing emo vocals, and Minzenberger's high-energy drums—to their first festival appearances at Lollapalooza, the Newport Folk Festival and Fuji Rock, and recently completed a tour opening for Royel Otis. The group's European dates in November will be their first and include an appearance at Pitchfork Festival London. Tickets go on sale this Friday at 10am local time.
Before one of Friko's last summer dates, as the band's van chased Royel Otis' buses and halves. Kapetan spoke to Billboard about the evolution of the group, his album where we were Where do we go from here?the hardships of touring and plans for the future.
For a band that released their debut album in February, Friko has really exploded onto the indie scene. How did you get to this point?
I had a cover band with friends starting in sixth grade and we'd play at local stores or block parties or whatever. Friko started in 2019 and then we just started making lives. We played a lot of shows in Chicago and Milwaukee, Minneapolis. By the time we got around to making this debut record, we had a lot of live time in our back pocket. We've been releasing stuff independently and in the Chicago scene, but releasing with ATO introduced us to most of the people who know us now. We've been counting down our live show exponentially, especially now that we've been on a huge, sold out tour with Royel Otis for the past two weeks. Even now, it's the first time we feel like we're a real band, a band. We felt it with the record as well, and we continue to push it.
You said that where we were Where do we go from here? completed before you sign with the ATO.
Yeah, pretty much, because we recorded it – Scott Tallarida, a friend who has a venue in Chicago with a studio in the back, let us record there for free since we couldn't do events. It could be booked at any time so it took a while but we were able to do it basically for free.
Is that what you hear when you play the album now, or did you sweeten it after signing to ATO?
After recording at Scott's place and then Palisade Studios in Chicago, we basically mixed it ourselves for months as well. We mixed it with our friend Jack Henry and it was a learning process for us. That whole first record was just us pretty much doing everything ourselves and learning how to do it. It's been a good learning experience, but we're excited to expand from it. We were probably done in late 2023 — maybe as late as November. We signed to ATO before we finished mixing, but it was all recorded and half mixed.
Has the ATO come to you?
We were playing clubs in Chicago, and Erik Salz from Arrival Artists — who is now our booking agent — came to a few of them. Then, once we got a small group together, they would label. He reached out to a few record labels and ATO was very passionate about working with us, not just for a record, but to launch our career. It seemed like the right choice.
Were you able to hold off your bosses?
We sure did.
The album has a kind of do-or-die urgency. It almost demands you hear it. Where does this come from?
It's just a natural thing. Every show is like that for us and we play it like that. When you're opening for another band and everyone is there to see them, you have to give them a reason to listen. You have to have the songs, but then you also have to have something for people to see. I think Mitsky said that people pay to see people go out there and believe in themselves. There are a bunch of bands coming up now — bands that we grew up loving — that are just giving it their all, and when that happens, I feel like I can get lost in the music.
I read that you love “All Alogies” by Nirvana. What other artists do you like?
I didn't listen to The Beatles growing up, but they definitely informed my melodic and chord progressions and learning the basics. I love The Replacements. I like a lot of the more melodic punk stuff that just has all the attitude but also the melody. There are a lot of cool, new bands that I love. Black Country, New Road definitely blew my mind in 2020. We just hung out with the English teacher in New York. It's super cool. We want shows with them. Them and Stellar, East. I love the local scene in Chicago and I love Horsegirl, Genome. There are a lot of exciting new bands out there.
You put on a riveting live show and I think that's extremely important to a band's longevity. Some bedroom acts signed during the pandemic have faded because they aren't exciting on stage.
I don't want to talk on TikTok groups. We just want to do the real thing and we want to feel like we're doing that every night. The goal is to make the show feel as cathartic as possible. The other day, at one of our gigs, I accidentally broke my guitar from being too loud. My head was bleeding. There is a beauty in that.
What was the inspiration for 'Get Numb to It'?
During the pandemic, I dropped out after a year of studying and started working in a warehouse. I did this for a few years, and after a particularly bad day there, I was in the car listening to a song. I started singing along to the song with lyrics that ended up being “Get Numb to It”. The demo came together through it, but then the band started playing it and got even more energy.
Is it true that you self-released “Get Numb to It” before it became a Friko song?
I started Friko as a solo at the beginning of the pandemic. I was just making demos and this was one of them. I remember showing it to everyone in the band one day on my laptop and then it came together. It was the first song that people started singing along to at the Chicago shows, so it took on a real life with the fans.
How do you and Bailey work together? Now it's just you two or more band members?
We would probably be considered a four piece now. Especially with the live show, we've been writing new stuff and it's been much more of a band effort from the beginning of the writing process. Also, Bailey plays guitar, so there are a lot of guitar parts. All four of us are the best at guitar in a way, so that was a really helpful thing.
I love “Crimson to Chrome,” especially the line, “Caught on the wrong side of the shoe” — nice turn of phrase. What are your favorite lyrics on the album?
“Where We've Been,” the first song on the record, is definitely one of them. This song came in about an hour. All the lyrics flowed and felt so natural. It's what you want to do with songwriting – where something pours out and there's no thought to it. This is like its magic.
Now that you're about to embark on a headlining tour, will your live show change?
It will be something like what we did on the last tour, although we will be playing our new music. We play bigger venues – sweet spots that we're excited to play. On the last tour, we started thinking more about set design and lighting. For Thalia Hall, which will be a homecoming show at the end of the year, we are definitely going all out. We only tour with five people – the band and our tour manager – so there's only so much we can do on the road, in the evening with a headlining tour. We will give it our all until we have more people together.
When you say you play new songs at your concerts, are they planned for the next album?
Yeah, we're talking about whatever's next, whether it's an EP or an album. For us, an album should be a complete statement. We like the classic album format. Well, we'll see, but at this point we're just trying to keep writing and see what comes.
Have you started talking about when this new release will be released?
We want it to be in the fall of 2025.
You are also releasing a deluxe edition of the current album. What's new in this?
There are five songs that we were working on right before the album songs started coming out, and then we kind of rotated. We were like that's what we have to work on right now. We've always been fans of B-sides, so we're excited for them to see the light of day. We also include some demos we released before Friko played and some live mixes from our album release show.
What are the best and worst parts of the tour?
The best is definitely when the shows are great and then you can — in New York, we went out with friends both nights. You feel like the adventurous part when you're younger and dream of going on tour. But sometimes this results in not getting much sleep and, like today, chasing Royel Otis by bus for the first time. They have like a group of 20 people—very good, good people—two buses and a semi. We are in a truck and a trailer. just the band and two managers. So we all drive, set everything up and sell merchandise. So it's just a different group, the number of people on the street. It's a lot of driving, which isn't the worst thing, but when it's two 10-hour drives alone, you're brain dead.
Yes. Do you have any advice for emerging artists? Any survival tips?
Yeah, you gotta love the people you tour with. Especially when it's small scale. This is the biggest thing by far, and the same ton of caffeine. They're plant-based lattes without sugar because they're the healthiest thing you can do. There is no other way.
