Aiden Scott Browne and El Capitan launch new ‘Passion Project’

There is no shortage of talent tumbling around the pubs and bars of west Tyrone – and that will be evident when Aiden Scott Browne and El Capitan release their new EP, ‘Passion Project’, in McCann’s pub in Omagh this Saturday night.

When Friday rolls around and the nine-to-fivers are freed from their workplace prisons, those who go in earnest chase good tunes are almost certain to find some.

Conversely, however, the more lax listener – one whose higher concern is quenching their thirst rather than nourishing their musical soul – is quite likely to stumble upon an evening of fairly forgettable entertainment.

Because, while their is no scarcity of quality music for those who go in honest pursuit of it, there is also a towering heap of muck just waiting to be piped into the ears of the undiscriminating masses.

Fortunately, the man at the heart of this week’s story, Aiden Scott-Browne, belongs squarely in the former camp – the one containing true quality. As does, for that matter, his new band; El Capitan.

ASB (as will be his occasional acronymic moniker for the next few hundred words) and El Capitan are part of a relatively small legion of local musicians doing it right.

Having chiefly made a name for himself playing the guitar, piano, and signing on his tod, he has recently assembled a band of mighty musicians, and with this four piece he has produced an EP that is truly impressive.

“The EP is called ‘Passion Project’, which is pretty apt because everyone involved is doing it because they are genuinely excited about the music we are making,” began Aiden, when I spoke with him earlier this week.

The EP is comprised of three tracks.

“The first is called ‘Talk Too Much’ and is an amalgamation of two separate songs that I wrote when I was about 14,” said Aiden.

The world in which the song plays out was one built from the golden bricks of an Edgar Allan Poe poem.

“My dad taught me ‘El Dorado’ when I was young and I loved the imagery; the city of gold, the desert landscape, the mirages and vistas. I ended up combining these two songs into one and ‘Talk Too Much’ was the result,” said Aiden.

‘Talk Too Much’ sets the tone for the rest of the EP. It is trumpet-centric with a Latin swing. A cool breeze on warm, close day.

“The second tune is ‘The Apple’,” said Aiden.

It is the freshest tune on the EP, explained Aiden, having been written about five months ago.

“Sound-wise, as a band we were starting to find our groove. A particular sound had started to develop, pretty organically and without much direction of choreography,” said Aiden, “so I wrote ‘The Apple’ to fit our burgeoning style.”

Lyrically, Aiden said that the tune was a kind of meditation on a feeling of shame and guilt that had began to creep over him since moving out of his home-house.

“I had moved out, and, though, I was not far away, I was seeing very little of my family.

“The apple concept came from the idea of family connotations of ‘the apple not falling far from the tree’, and a person being a ‘rotten apple’,” explained Aiden.

And, finally, the third and final track on the EP – and what might be my favourite – is titled ‘Beyond the Power of Words’. And it is a peach.

“You may not be surprised to find that I did not actually come up with the title of the song,” said Aiden, which, to his surprise, was to my surprise.

“I stole it from a book called ‘Vengeance’.”

After coming home from a particularly lovely day with his other half, Aiden said that he felt compelled to try to capture the peace, tranquility and love of the day.

“I wrote it a while ago, played it a few times, rewrote it, and then took it into the studio,” said Aiden. “Once we go in there though, we realised we needed a focal point for a musical break in the middle.

“We ended up getting Niall to reluctantly agree to putting down a trumpet solo for it… And he nailed it in one take!”

The EP is excellent and is a must listen for any local music fans!

Get into McCann’s ion Saturday night and hear ASB and El Capitan launch ‘Passion Project’. Music gets underway around 10pm!