Hamilton is home for this hardcore alt-rock trio.
The members of Captain WildChild are not only lifelong musicians, but lifelong buddies.
"Chad and I met a long time ago," said Nigel Stewart, WildChild's drummer. "I think we met when we were 18 or 19. We both grew up in the Belleville area."
"Nigel and I had a band before called Carpenteers, we played a lot here in Hamilton," said Chad Chartrand, vocalist and guitarist. "That band split, and although we were still playing music, we missed playing rock- more hardcore, aggressive stuff."
"Sam and I met through a house gig I was playing," said Stewart. "We ended up chatting and later jamming together, and it just blossomed from there."
Sam Tomlinson is the band's bassist, and has been playing music since he was eight. "I've always liked older rock music. I grew up listening to a lot of Yes, Zeppelin, stuff like that. I pulled from John Paul Jones a lot."
The boys have eclectic music taste, but found common ground with their love for hard rock.
"I like very noisey bands, grunge, punk, stuff like that," said Chartrand. "But my taste is all over the place. Whenever I try to write a song, I try to write something I've never heard before. I pick a certain genre or style, and try to to create something new."
"Growing up, I liked a lot of alt-rock and punk-y style," said Stewart. "Which feeds into a lot of the high-energy part of my performance. Nirvana, NOFX, stuff like that. Then I ended up going to school for jazz. So a lot of that stuff fed in."
'Captain WildChild' was born when Chartrand was looking for a name that reflected the band's hardcore sound, as well as its members' lighthearted personalities.
"I came up with the name," said Chartrand. "I wanted something masculine, yet playful. I didn't want to take it too seriously. I wanted it to have a cartoon mascot, which might still develop, but that was the original idea."
The boys released their first single in November of 2018.
"Sam joined around late spring of 2019," said Stewart. "Before, when we were in bands, we recorded in other people's studios. But this was done ourselves. We have a studio in our basement, so we recorded it and mixed it one-hundred percent ourselves. It was really satisfying."
"I feel like we have so many great things down the road, we've only just started," said Chartrand.
The band is working on promoting their work, recording new music, and expanding their connections.
"We released our newest music on Spotify, which was a cool step," said Stewart. "Along with that, we released some new music videos, which were recorded at B-town Sound in Burlington. Great studio, Mickey Ellsworth mixed and mastered it too, a good friend of ours. Another buddy of ours, Chris Plumb, he did all the videography stuff, super awesome to work with."
"There are things coming out in the near future, shows that will be announced, more videos to be released. People got to stay tuned," said Tomlinson.
"More stuff on Spotify to release, more live videos, more shows.. lots of good shit," said Chartrand.
Captain WildChild would love to take their next tour across Canada.
"We wanna tour more," said Stewart. "I would love to hit Halifax."
"Montreal was a pretty sweet gig, probably my favourite we've done," said Tomlinson. "It's such a beautiful city. It's the only city I've ever been in where I didn't feel obligated to do anything else, I can just sit and enjoy myself. It's very laid back, everybody just sitting in the parks and reading books."
"We're definitely a Hamilton band. This is my home, same with Nige, and Sam's been here his whole life," said Chartrand. "I feel like we're writing better songs, we're having a lot of fun, meeting a lot more people, opening more doors, it can only go up from here."
Upcoming gigs:
Feb. 22nd 2020 @ Corktown Pub, 175 Young St. Hamilton, ON