Getting to Know: Tugboat Captain

As David Byrne once put it, “Home, that’s where I want to be.” It’s a sentiment that lingers at the heart of Dog Tale, the new album from London’s Tugboat Captain—a baroque indie-pop outfit whose scrappy beginnings have blossomed into something far more expansive, but no less heartfelt. Recorded in a whirlwind week at their DIY South London studio, Ctrl P, Dog Tale captures the fleeting, often fragile idea of home—both physical and emotional—through wry lyricism, orchestral flourishes, and a ragtag family-band spirit. We sat down with chief songwriter Sox and bassist/producer Josh Cobb to talk rats, dogs, divine comedy, and the beautiful chaos of making music fast, loose, and from the gut.

1. “Dog Tale” explores the idea of home in both physical and emotional terms — how did the studio, Ctrl P, shape the way this album came together, both sonically and personally?

Having a home base for the band definitely made an enormous difference to the way we made this album. We’ve been honing our craft in a professional capacity in this space as producers so blocking out a week to really prove we’d cut our teeth and were able to enact it on our own art felt special. Working with a set of tools that we’re so intimately familiar with and spending time in a space where we feel so comfortable definitely streamlined the process. The sound of the record is definitely warm, homely and homogenous and I think that comes as part of being in a recording space we consider home. 

2. You wrote and recorded the entire album in just one week — what was it like working under that kind of creative pressure, and how did that spontaneity influence the final sound?

Ctrl P studio has an ethos, ‘Print It’, which is about making work at speed and learning to be happy with your work. It’s about embracing happy accidents and putting a real emphasis on the magic of live performance - warts and all. Embodying this mind set definitely meant that we could work at speed without feeling like we were making compromises, in fact it feels like that it’s a key, positive facet of the making process! Everything feels so in the moment, from the genesis of an idea right up to final vocal takes everything felt so fresh and exciting while we were making it and I think that energy still translates when you listen to the record now. The whole process feels like such a snapshot of time and place and I think that makes the record feel so real and alive.

3. The evolution from lo-fi beginnings to full “baroque pop” orchestration is huge — what’s been the biggest lesson or shift in mindset along that journey?

From the very beginning of this band the project has been really about recording ourselves. Those lo-fi beginnings were really out of necessity, lack of equipment and lack of money. The evolution has felt natural as we’ve developed into full time musicians, engineers and producers and seems somewhat inevitable as we get better at what we do. There’s always been this desire to make music that felt expansive and I think you can definitely hear hints of it in early records where unlikely instruments or choirs of voices pop up - however badly captured the audio is! We’re very blessed as a group to have an abundance of playing and arranging talent both within the group and amongst our close circle of friends. That’s what has made it possible for us to become the band we are, with all the ambition and none of the budget.

4. There are some very personal (and occasionally furry) characters woven into this record — from Rufus the dog to literal rats in the basement. How do these everyday details help you tell broader stories in your songwriting?

Notions of the everyday have always been present in our songs and are really vital in creating a snapshot of the world we inhabit. We’ve always been fascinated by kitchen sink stories and I think that it can be a really grounding, vivid lyrical device especially in the contextual grandeur of ‘baroque-pop’. More than anything we want to make records that feel totally real and are an expression of an existence that is relatable. This is the story of our lives in our mid/late twenties, living in a city where we can only just scratch a living but also have our friends, family and pets.

5. With such a varied lineup of instruments and players, your live shows must be pretty special — how do you translate something so rich and layered from studio to stage, and what can audiences expect on the upcoming tour?

The live show has always been a very different thing to how we present ourselves on record. In the past we’ve blown up the often small and quiet productions of our more lo-fi records. Now we’re trying to keep up with some of the bombast on record. Over the past few years we’ve become a much more dynamic and thoughtful live act and this will our first time doing any extended touring as this lineup. We’ve dropped all the guitars from the live show and we’re really thinking about how to put on more of a ‘show’ than a ‘gig’. It’s a real opportunity to immerse people in the story telling of the album and we want that to be intimate and intense with the way that we perform it. We’re leaning heavily on the new material for the live show and can’t wait for people to hear what we do with it - so far, at the few occasions where we’ve taken this material out of the studio, we’ve found people have been really blown away. Apparently the show makes people cry which I think is good!