Taran discuss their new EP and how their music, just like Cymraeg, is for everyone

Stephen Price

It’s hard to believe how much Taran have achieved in the year since their formation, and on the release of their first EP, we sat down with the bright young things to discuss their meteoric rise to the top and the inclusivity of their music and the Welsh language.

Taran have been gigging relentlessly, released two singles, ‘Pan Ddaw’r Nos’ and ‘Barod i Fynd’, appeared on the front cover of Golwg’s magazine, and today sees the release their first EP, ‘Dyweda, Wyt Ti….’.

When Rose, Zelda, Rhys, Nat and Steff come together to compose, they clearly pull in the same direction, creating energetic, catchy and fresh songs, and they have a very bright future ahead of them if what we’ve heard (and seen) so far is anything to go by.

Debut EP

The talented group from Cardiff release their first EP today, which was recorded and mixed by Mei Gwynedd at JigCal’s studio.

Congratulations on the success of your first two singles – has it been a surprise to you all to see just how well they’ve done?

Thank you, the reaction has been brilliant and we’ve managed to engage with people across Wales.

It’s been a pleasant surprise seeing stations such as Môn FM giving us plenty of airtime as we’ve not had the opportunity to play in north Wales yet. Fingers crossed for next year!

The video was a great accompaniment to the first single – did you enjoy that process?

It was great fun making the video and we can’t thank PYSTxLWP enough for enabling us to create it.

We had great help from young director Cai Thomas, who was enthusiastic about making his first video and was buzzing with good ideas. 

We learned a lot during the process about how to combine visuals with our music and how to edit it all together. We loved Cai’s quirky visual sequences which fitted in with the vibe of the song.

So you’re all friends from school, but how did the band form?

It’s true that we were all at Ysgol Glantaf when we got together but as we span three school years we didn’t know each other very well.

We have our music teacher, Mrs Amanda Williams, to thank for bringing us together. Menter Caerdydd were looking for young people to form bands to play at Tafwyl 2023 as part of the Yn Cyflwyno project. Our names were put forward and we were paired with our mentor Mei Gwynedd.

It couldn’t have worked out better. We gelled immediately and inspired by Mei, we somehow managed to write three songs and perform our first gig in a fortnight.

Is singing in Welsh important to you and why?

Singing in our native language is very important to us and that isn’t going to change. Being bilingual is part of who we are and something to celebrate. 

We’ve been astonished by the amount of opportunities we’ve had because we’re singing in Welsh. As well as local gigs, we’ve been fortunate to benefit from the amazing array of Welsh-language music festivals taking place over the summer months. Next year we hope to be taking our music to more festivals, all over Wales.

Bands like Catatonia have hit the big time in the UK charts in the past singing in English, but there seems to be a change in the air with more artists using Welsh such as Gwenno and Adwaith but still finding an audience outside of Wales – and it’s this uniqueness that really sets them apart on the world stage – has this inspired you at all?

It’s great to see Adwaith achieving success singing in Welsh in the Netherlands, but of course there should be nothing unusual about that. It’s important for us in Wales to accept music sung in other languages, otherwise we’d cut ourselves off from a range of influences. Good music is good music; whatever the language.

Taran are nowhere near being ready to take on a foreign tour, but, if and when we do, you can be sure that we will be flying the Red Dragon! Adwaith and Gwenno have proved that it can be done so who knows, perhaps in the future, we can follow in their footsteps.  

Everything we’ve heard so far has received critical acclaim and found itself listeners from all over the world – can we expect the same kind of flavour for your first EP?

Yes, the EP keeps the rock feel throughout even when we slow it down. Every song has its hook and standout moments, and together the songs create, what we feel, is a well-rounded EP.

We venture into sonically heavier territories with ‘Anghofio’ but rein it back with our second single, ‘Barod i Fynd’, where we try to find a balance between mellow ballad and overdriven rock. 

What’s next for you all? Will you continue studying or is this now the full time job?

Two of us are back in school next year, and three are going to be anxiously awaiting the A-level results in August!

We’ll have to do some juggling to make sure we all have enough time for practising and gigging, but we’ll definitely block off a chunk of next summer for a series of festival appearances.

We’ll keep writing new material and performing all we can and take it from there.

Do you listen to much Welsh language music yourselves? If so, who are your favourites?

We’ve all grown up on Candelas and the Welsh classics of yesteryear such as Bryn Fôn.

We’re all fans of Fleur de Lys and we sometimes include a cover of Sbectol in our set.

We played a tremendous gig with The Night School, a bilingual band from Swansea, and since then we all spin their new EP regularly. 

Tell us about any upcoming tours you have

We have a busy summer ahead with two performances in Tafwyl on 13 July and a packed week at the National Eisteddfod.

We’re playing the Cymdeithas gig on the first Saturday and have a few sets lined up on the Maes during the week.

We have Crug Mawr near Cardigan in August and Gŵyl Newydd in Newport and a freshers’ week gig at Trinity-St David’s in Carmarthen in September. 

As a young band you really reflect modern Cardiff – any thoughts on that and representation for younger people in Wales? And indeed representation for modern Wales on the world stage.

We may appear a diverse bunch but in truth we just reflect the reality in every school, college and workplace in Wales.

We’re all proud of our roots and proud of our Welshness.

The main thing we want to stress is that just as music is for everyone, wherever they live, whatever their backgrounds, so too is the Welsh language. 

On that note to a degree… There’s an aim for 1 million Welsh speakers, and as someone who learned Welsh at school, music and the arts and cinema was a driving factor in that – how do you feel about any role you might have in encouraging others to learn the language or send their kids to Welsh language schools?

It’s very important for Welsh to be culturally relevant to youngsters in Wales and perhaps the best way to ensure this is through music.

Songs have a universal appeal as you can engage and appreciate a good tune even if you can’t understand all the words. This became clear to us when we played a gig at Bishop of Llandaff School where the reception from second language Welsh learners was great!

It’s important to create opportunities for learners to access Welsh-language gigs. We need to break down the barriers and prevent any feelings of ‘exclusivity’.

We’d love to think that bands like us can play some role in inspiring others to engage with the Welsh language and feel a part of Welsh culture. 

Any advice for others hoping to get their music out there?

It’s crucial for a band to perfect their live set as this will be the groundwork for any performer releasing music on all platforms.

If you can channel the energy of your songs into a vibrant live performance, you’re bound to impress and grow a following.

As you work on being as tight as possible musically, you’ll find a side benefit is subtle changes to the songs which make them even better.

The reaction to our music so far has been brilliant and we’ve managed to engage with people across

Wales. It’s been great to have the opportunities and we hope we will continue to take them.

But we won’t take anything for granted – in Welsh there is a saying ‘dyfal donc a dyr y garreg’, which you could translate as perseverance pays off!

We look forward to the hard work ahead…

Taran’s debut EP – ‘Dyweda Wyt Ti…?’ is released today (Friday, 12 July). Stream from your preferred platform here.