Friko on “Something Worth Waiting For”
Finding Momentum in Motion
Jul 14, 2026 Web Exclusive Photography by Saverio Truglia (for Under the Radar)
The sophomore album by Chicago indie rockers Friko, Something Worth Waiting For, lives up to its name with youthful anticipation.
With the opening track “Guess,” the listener is greeted by Niko Kapetan’s wistful vocals (“Don’t make me guess / If that’s a cry or laugh / A sink or a swim / A lie or a gaffe”) and a lone driving guitar for a few verses and choruses before transitioning into a full burst of frenetic energy that comes barreling through the speakers.
The song mirrors the band’s own trajectory as they were metaphorically shot from a cannon following the release of their first album, Where we’ve been, Where we go from here, on ATO Records in 2024. The last two years have been a whirlwind of activity, including a sold-out show at the Metro in Chicago, high praise from critics, college radio airplay, and plenty of touring to back it up, including several stops at South by Southwest. With that roller coaster ride, some bands might not have held on long enough for a second record, but Friko only came out stronger.
“We’re all great friends and love each other,” says Kapetan. “And if we didn’t have that on the road, it’d be tough because it’s just so much work, especially at the level where we’re at. We’ve had amazing opportunities to do all these crazy things, but we still don’t have that much money behind it, relatively. So, it’s a lot of work to make everything work.”
“At the end of the day, some of the best work—whether it’s music, film, books—all comes from life experience,” adds bassist David Fuller. “And you have to continue experiencing life as much as you can to continue to make great things and to continue to make things that are relevant and that are important to you.”
While on paper, Friko were a duo for the first album (Kapetan and drummer Bailey Minzenberger), Fuller and second guitarist Korgan Robb joined to form the foursome that went on the road. However, both Fuller and Robb had already played with Friko in some capacity throughout the band’s early days, making the logistics a lot smoother once they took the stage.
“We’ve had a long time to be able to transition,” Fuller notes. “And I think that that’s why it feels so natural, and why it doesn’t sound like oil and water on the record just because we’ve gotten to know each other over a really long period of time.”
Though their first album was produced with a few friends, for Something Worth Waiting For, the band recruited veteran musician and producer John Congleton, who fronted The Paper Chase and has helped shape hundreds of recordings by artists such as St. Vincent, Brian Wilson, and the last two Death Cab for Cutie records, including this year’s I Built You a Tower.
“He was a guiding figure for us in all of this and has been a producer for so long,” Kapetan says. “The wisdom he offered in the studio is unparalleled for us. And he’s also just so funny.”
Time in the studio also allowed the band to explore new possibilities with several of the songs, including the title track.
“That song went through a bunch of different arrangements and keys, even,” says Robb. “Eventually, it ended up in two keys on the record.”
The first taste of the new album came in the form of the breezy single, “Seven Degrees,” and its remote-controlled car-obsessed music video produced by Infinite Dog Productions and starring Addison Schuster.
“They were amazing,” says Fuller of Infinite Dog. “That group has a lot of heart, and you can really see it and feel it in the video a hundred percent.”
After years of touring and traveling, transportation references are all over the album, with titles like “Choo Choo,” “Hot Air Balloon,” and “Dear Bicycle.” Naturally, the conversation turned into the band’s favorite (and least favorite) ways to get around.
“I’ve been seeing these really cool ads for these shoes called Moonwalkers,” Fuller says. “They look terrible, but they look so sick. And my least favorite way would be pogostick.”
Kapetan and Robb both agreed on trains as their favorite mode and cited planes as the transportation method they’d rather avoid.
“The more that I fly, the more I don’t want to be in the air,” Robb explains.
The recent Chicago indie rock scene has been both fertile and diverse, with artists such as Ratboys, Horsegirl, Lifeguard, Dehd, and Slow Pulp. Friko are proud of their Windy City roots.
“So me and Bailey are from Evanston, which is the first suburb north of Chicago,” Kapetan explains. “So we would be in Chicago growing up a lot, but Evanston felt very separate. So I never really felt part of any music scene before high school. But once we graduated, we moved to Chicago in 2018 or 2019, and it was just so welcoming. There are so many different areas of the scene, you don’t need to make a certain type of music to get a show because everybody’s getting different genres on every show.”
With Something Worth Waiting For, Friko have cemented themselves as one of indie rock’s most exciting young bands, balancing ambition and uncertainty while continuing to grow without losing the restless energy that brought them here. As they take the album around the world and begin work on new material, their journey feels like it’s only beginning.
Or as Fuller puts it: “The open road, baby.”
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