Peter Capaldi’s latest role isn’t to fuck the fuck in (or indeed fuck the fuck off) like The Thick Of It’s Malcolm Tucker, or nail an outfit inspired by David Lynch and David Bowie as he travels through time as the Twelfth Doctor. It’s to sit on a tour bus from Newcastle to Edinburgh, Cardiff to Brighton, get behind a microphone, and sing. “I’m not trying to be a pop star or anything,” he says, Zooming me from the London studio where he’s also been supervising the mix of his hit Apple TV detective series, Criminal Record, before getting into rehearsals. “Oasis don’t have to worry. It’s a very humble little tour.”
Capaldi’s arrival as a solo artist in his sixties comes with a history. At the turn of the 1980s, when he was a student at the Glasgow School Of Art, he was the frontman of the Dreamboys, not a bunch of Chippendale-lite entertainers, but a jangly gang of Glaswegian post punks. They had another nascent star in their lineup (drummer-turned-comedian Craig Ferguson, who later hosted The Late Late Show in the US), released a single, ‘Bela Lugosi’s Birthday’, and toured lots, albeit with minimal success.
They even once ran away from a venue because they didn’t have enough money to pay their support act. “I’m not the kind of guy who would be trying to get one over on someone, and it was so embarrassing,” Capaldi says, a chirpy, spirited presence on the screen. “But we sort of had no choice.” The band they’d left behind, Cocteau Twins, did alright though, I say. “Yes, they did! The gods of rock & roll sorted that out.”
Capaldi went on to bag roles in enduring films like Bill Forsyth’s Local Hero and Dangerous Liaisons, and even won an Oscar in 1993 for a live short film he wrote and directed starring Richard E. Grant, Franz Kafka’s It’s A Wonderful Life. Work was bitty after that, until he turned up, in a foul mood, for an audition for a new BBC political comedy series, The Thick Of It, in 2004. Malcolm Tucker wasn’t meant to be Scottish or terrifying, but Armando Iannucci was sold.
Twenty years and a turn as the Time Lord later, Capaldi is 67, but today is an excitable fanboy, armed with notes: “I wrote down some clever things to say!” His own return to music was inspired by a friend, Robert Howard, aka Dr Robert from the Blow Monkeys, with whom he’d play guitar. “And he was always pushing me to get more involved, saying you’ve got to write a song, so I caved in and wrote a song, and it was fun.” 2021’s St Christopher and 2025’s Sweet Illusions brim with songs referencing streets and alleyways, humming street lamps and antique thrills – Capaldi’s own brand of noirish Scottish cinema in sound, in which his voice, switching between doomy sprechgesang and twisted crooner, beckons you in.
As part of a band that includes Altered Images’ guitarist Andrew Cowan and Glasvegas drummer Chris Dickey, his first tour starts in Newcastle on 24 February, and ends with his second date at London’s 100 Club since 1982. “It only took me 44 years!” Capaldi’s raring to go. “I’m doing this just for the fun of it, you know. It’s not part of building an empire. These days it’s simply for the joy of playing music, and keeping things interesting.”
Peter Capaldi tours the UK from 24 February to 8 March. For tickets, dates, and more information click here
To begin reading his Baker’s Dozen, click ‘First Selection’ below
