Captain Tom & The Hooligans to Play at Distilled & Chilled

Captain Tom & The Hooligans will take the stage at 8:00pm on Saturday, August 17th and close out the 5th annual Distilled & Chilled Music Festival at the Ellicottville Distillery in Ellicottville, NY.

The festival, which focuses on original music from the Western New York area, will showcase multiple bands and artists from 12:00-9:00pm along with craft beer, food trucks and craft vendors.

I caught up with Captain Tom (Tom Sieracki) recently to talk about the band’s history and the type of music they play. Our conversation started out very different from most bands and artists I’ve interviewed because the debut of this band in 2019 came to a complete halt, shattering the excitement and dreams by an unforeseen event… the Covid-19 pandemic, that shut the whole world down.

With no real end in sight, the pandemic rearranged all that had been set in motion. Sieracki spent the time writing songs and finding the camaraderie among the band members and learning an instrument that was not what he played in the band, which you will read about in the following conversation.

Now in full swing and playing shows all over Buffalo, Western New York and Pennsylvania, adding Cleveland and Boston last year, they’ve become one of the most sought after acts out there.

With a set list of cover songs that have their own spin put on them, and original music written by Captain Tom himself, they cover any genre you can think of including Celtic Punk, Folk Rock, Americana, Eastern European Folk and Ska, with an emphasis on Polka, you can pretty much find them at any kind of festival or venue.

I asked Sieracki how he would describe the band and the music they play, to which he answered in the interview, but I like how it is summed up on their website, “Drinking songs and dance music… what else could you want?”

Indeed! Get your tickets and let the Captain Tom & The Hooligans get your body moving while experiencing the wild and fun atmosphere from a band that I’m sure you will want to see again and again.

For more information on Captain Tom & The Hooligans visit: captaintomandthehooligans.com

For tickets and a schedule of events for the festival visit: ellicottvilledistillery.com

A Conversation With Captain Tom

HULICK: We’re looking forward to seeing you at the Distilled & Chilled Music Festival, August 17th in Ellicottville. When and how did the band start?

CAPTAIN: The band was formed by myself, Captain Tom, with several of my high school friends around late 2019. We had played a Christmas party and one public gig, and then everything was quickly shut down due to Covid.

HULICK: How did you handle it? I know a lot of artists were devastated for themselves but also for their band members who needed to support their families, both local artists and world wide artists. I can’t imagine how tough it was on you. As a fan of music I seriously felt lost with no concerts to go to. I mean you could listen to music but there was that huge void of being present in the moment with artists and the audience.

CAPTAIN: Well, obviously, Covid was not a great time and it did prevent us from playing shows. It did allow us to work on ourselves and practice to develop sound and camaraderie among the band members. I wrote a lot of music, but couldn’t perform. I took a lot of time to develop my accordion playing. Before Covid, I was not the accordion player in the band and could hardly play at the time, which is obviously not the case now!

HULICK: How would you describe your band to a newbie like me?

CAPTAIN: Captain Tom & The Hooligans is what we like to call “a modern rendition of old world tradition,” but really we just like to have fun. We like to mix in elements such as electric guitars, which are not traditional in genres like polka, to really drive the energy into the music! On top of this, we play a great variety of music such as Celtic Rock, Americana, Ska and of course Polka.

HULICK: You play so many different genres from A to Z. I don’t know much about Ska.

CAPTAIN: Ska is a genre that originated in Jamaican dance halls, and over time made its way to Britain and the United States where it combined with punk rock and became the genre it is today. I’d say two of the most important arts of Ska are its use of horns and its danceable beats.

HULICK: How many members do you have and what are their names?

CAPTAIN: We have a rotating cast of characters, however at Distilled & Chilled we will consist of: Captain Tom - Accordion, Commodore Dave - Saxophone & Clarinet, Mike Bryzski - Electric Guitar, Trevor Jennings - Drums, Shavonne Pucula - Upright Bass, Karl Zielezinski - Trumpet, Ray Skalski - Trombone, Dom Testino - Trumpet... and everyone sings!

HULICK: You put your own vibe on songs that are popular, but you have your own original music as well. Who writes in the band and how does the process go… like do you write whenever you have an idea or do you consciously set time aside.

CAPTAIN: We do like to put a twist on the covers we do, but on top of that we have a whole bunch of original songs. We actually just released a full length album in April consisting of 18 songs, most of them original. We also have an EP we released about half a year ago which has six songs, half of which were originals we had that we haven’t recorded yet to perform live. As far as writing goes I write most of the songs, both the lyrics and the music. I’m inspired all the time and I am constantly writing down ideas. Also my father, Commodore Dave, writes out a lot of the sheet music for the band and our arrangements, which is a huge help.

HULICK: I’m guessing “Lockport Ladies” is an original. What are a couple others that are fan favorites?

CAPTAIN: “Lockport Ladies” is an original tune. We like to write a lot about our local surroundings. We have found our fans really like the song “If I Had $100” that we wrote and they’re big fans of our cover of “Living Next Door to Alice,” which we just call “Alice” on our album.

HULICK: Do you take requests at your shows?

CAPTAIN: At most of our shows, we are always open to taking requests, however, once we are up on stage I like to engage the crowd and just play what I feel the crowd will like in that moment.

HULICK: Do you do any songs from Bobby Vinton? When he first started out he played local proms and events in Pennsylvania where he was from. One of them was for my husband’s mother’s prom. It really is a small world.

CAPTAIN: That’s awesome! We do actually play some Bobby Vinton, most notably we cover his song, “My Melody of Love.” It’s become a favorite in the Polish American community.

HULICK: You play all over Buffalo and Western New York. Where else do you play?

CAPTAIN: In the last year, we played both Cleveland and Boston, and have now played Pennsylvania a couple times. I have been playing more in Pennsylvania. Even though we mostly played in Buffalo and Western New York and love playing in this area, we have been expanding more to the surrounding areas.

HULICK: What is the song you would say is the most fun to do live?

CAPTAIN: Picking out a favorite song is tricky, especially live because it changes from show to show, but lately, one of our favorites has been our original song “Dyngus Daze” on our new album Proud. It’s a lively song about the Polish American holiday Dyngus Day.

HULICK: You won the “Best Other Band/Act” award from All for WNY Awards for 2020- 2021. Tell us a little about that.

CAPTAIN: From what I understand, there’s a local collective musicians in Western New York that run a best contest in the music scene every year. Notably one of them has an online show called the Think So Joe Show which features local music, and we have been featured on it many times. We just happen to be lucky enough that people thought about us to select that year, and I’ve said before “other” is a great way to describe us since we don’t fit into a box of categories.

HULICK: I’m sure you have many fans. Do they call themselves a special name, like fans of the late Jimmy Buffet are called Parrotheads?

CAPTAIN: Our fans actually came up with the name. They call themselves “Cooligans”.

HULICK: Do you have a message for your fans coming out to see you in Ellicottville?

CAPTAIN: We are really looking forward to coming out to Ellicottville and playing for everyone at such a great event. There is also so much other wonderful music happening that day and we are very excited to join in the fun!