New album Hear the first single

Glasgow, since 2017

About the band

Four friends from the Southside who met at a ceilidh, started rehearsing above a launderette on Allison Street and never really stopped.

Illustrated group portrait of Marigold Static: Fenna, Isla, Reuben and Callum in front of a yellow sun

Left to right: Fenna, Isla, Reuben, Callum

The story so far

Shows played

312

Cities

48

Records

8

Night buses

∞

Marigold Static started in the winter of 2017, when Isla Carrick and Reuben Oyelaran ended up on the same night bus home from a ceilidh in the West End and spent the whole of the N44 arguing about whether synthesizers count as folk instruments. By spring they had a drummer, Callum Shiach, who answered a handwritten note in a Victoria Road record shop, and a bassist, Fenna de Wit, who had moved from Utrecht for a sound engineering course and stayed for the weather.

They rehearsed in a room above a launderette on Allison Street, which is why the early recordings hum faintly in B flat. The debut single Overpass came out in 2019 as 300 lathe-cut 7-inches and sold out at the launch show. The Sodium Light EP was finished in lockdown with every part recorded in a different flat, and Night Bus Hymns followed in 2022.

Their debut album, Lowland Signal (Lantern House Records, 2024), was shortlisted for Scottish Independent Album of the Year and took them across the UK, Europe and, for the first time, North America. The new album, Weather for Two, was written through one long, wet Glasgow winter and recorded live to tape in nine days. It’s the band’s warmest and biggest-sounding record yet, and the first with Callum on lead vocals.

They still live within a mile of the launderette.

The band

Everyone writes, everyone sings, and nobody is allowed to bring a tambourine to rehearsal.

  • Illustrated portrait of Isla Carrick

    Isla Carrick

    Vocals, synths, guitar

    Writes most of the words on the back of bus tickets. Owns eleven keyboards and one working kettle.

  • Illustrated portrait of Reuben Oyelaran

    Reuben Oyelaran

    Guitar, vocals, production

    Produced the early EPs in his bedroom and still mixes everything on headphones first. Collects broken effects pedals.

  • Illustrated portrait of Fenna de Wit

    Fenna de Wit

    Bass, keys, string arrangements

    Moved from Utrecht in 2016. Arranged the strings on Weather for Two and keeps the tour spreadsheet.

  • Illustrated portrait of Callum Shiach

    Callum Shiach

    Drums, samplers, vocals

    Answered a note in a record shop window in 2017. Sings lead for the first time on “Second Summer”.

Timeline

  1. 2017

    Isla and Reuben meet on the N44. Callum answers a note in a record shop; Fenna joins after one rehearsal above the Allison Street launderette.

  2. 2019

    Debut single Overpass: 300 lathe-cut 7-inches, sold out on the night. First gig outside Scotland, in Newcastle, to 23 people.

  3. 2020–22

    The Sodium Light EP, recorded in four different flats, then Night Bus Hymns. First national radio session.

  4. 2023

    “Paper Moons” gets them signed to Lantern House Records, the Glasgow label run out of a former piano showroom.

  5. 2024

    Debut album Lowland Signal, shortlisted for Scottish Independent Album of the Year. 74 shows, including a first North American tour.

  6. 2026

    Weather for Two is out 13 November, followed by the biggest tour yet: 21 nights, three continents, two hometown shows.

What people say

“The most quietly enormous record to come out of Glasgow in years.”

The Northern Review

“Songs that sound like the walk home after the best night out of your life.”

Loud Quiet Weekly

“A band that makes synthesizers sound like weather and weather sound like hope.”

Port Light Radio