Czech indie band Ida the Young heads to UK for eight-date tour
Unusually for a Czech band, Ida the Young are just about to begin an eight-date tour of England. The group this year won an Anděl national music award in the electronic and alternative category – and made headlines for supporting Palestine in their acceptance speech. Just before they left on tour, I caught up with Ida the Young members Iris Hobson-Mazur, Marek Koliha and Pavel Kielberger. Hobson-Mazur is from the UK but has a Czech mother – and only started living in Czechia during her studies.
Iris, is it the case, as I have read, that you used to watch Czech animation, like Večerníček, and then you came here to study animation? Are the two things connected?
Hobson-Mazur: “Yeah, they are quite connected. My mum used to buy these DVDs that you’d get in the Czech Republic, in corner shops and in, like cardboard covers [laughs].”
For, like, 50 crowns? The really cheapo ones?
Hobson-Mazur: “Exactly. Even less probably. We had a big box of them at home. And I knew I wanted to study something. First I thought film, but then I thought that animation really joined everything together that I was interested in – music and illustration and everything.”
And financially it was more doable here than in the UK?
Hobson-Mazur: “Yeah, it’s free here because I have Czech citizenship. Which was very lucky during Brexit [laughs]. That meant that I could live here and study here.”
How is your Czech? Guys, how is her Czech?
“I don’t know if I could sing in Czech. I don’t know what the lyrics would be like.”
Koliha: “I think it’s pretty perfect now.”
Hobson-Mazur: “My writing is really bad. But with my spoken Czech, it depends. Sometimes, if I’m nervous, it gets gradually worse.”
Koliha: “But it’s gotten a lot better.”
The band has been together since 2021. How did you start up, Marek?
Koliha: “Me and Iris met in Plzeň, where I was living at the time, and the band started as a duo – just the two of us. So we played a gig or two like that, but right after that our drummer Filip [Simon] joined. So we were playing for a couple of years as an acoustic trio, with just acoustic guitar, a minimalist drum kit and vocals.”
When did you come on board, Pavel?
Kielberger: “It started with me recording the first EP, but I knew the guys from Plzeň, just from around town.
“So I recorded the first EP and that evolved into me joining them, firstly for another EP which was more electronic, which is more my thing; we did electronic versions of songs we already had and some new songs as well, and that eventually led to me joining the full band.”
Typically how do you go about writing songs?
Hobson-Mazur: “It usually starts with the music side of things.
“Sometimes it’s through playing in the studio. Or Mara and Paja will send me something, or they have a Google Drive folder called Songs for Iris, which will be, like, demos that Paja has recorded, or ideas that Mara has recorded.
“Then I usually write over that. But with this new album it was a bit different; usually we’d write together, almost in the rehearsal room, but this time it was more done in the studio.”
So less jamming?
Hobson-Mazur: “Yeah, a bit less.”
Kielberger: “The ideas were more bare bones when they started. A couple of songs Mara and I just did in a bedroom.
“It was just the two of us with an acoustic guitar. We started with that and it helped us to not get caught up in the way things sound.
“If we had started performing these songs live, I think we would have been more tied to the constraints of live performance.
“But now we just had the bare bones, the skeleton, of the songs – and then we went into the studio and did more stuff there.”
What would you say were your biggest inspirations? I was reading that you’re a fan of Fleet Foxes, Iris.
“Yeah.”
But maybe because of your voice, you guys remind me of Wye Oak.
Hobson-Mazur: “I don’t know Wye Oak.”
Check them out – they’re really in a similar ballpark to you. But what are your influences, would you say?
“Having a complete knowledge of a language isn’t going to make you have great lyrics – having a great mind will make you have great lyrics”
Hobson-Mazur: “I can say some bands that we all like. We all like Television, we all like Elliot Smith…”
Kielberger: “Stereolab.”
Hobson-Mazur: “Stereolab, and Broadcast. Then there are some other ones that you guys have more in common. Probably Radiohead.”
Kielberger: “Some more krautrock stuff. That’s where we overlap.”
Hobson-Mazur: “Fugazi.”
Koliha: “Can.”
Kielberger: “I like Neu, and Michael Rutter.”
Hobson-Mazur: “I also like some more folky or singer-songwriter stuff, like Aldous Harding, Lankum.”
Let’s say 20 years ago, I often heard that Czech bands who sang in English were very limited in their opportunities here. There were some exceptions, but not many. Now how is it for you as a group who performs in English? Do you feel any restrictions? Or even any benefit?
Hobson-Mazur: “Maybe there’s a restriction in terms of who might listen to you.
“I think some people want to listen to music that’s in their language, which I completely understand.
“But in lots of ways I don’t really think that we’ve felt that limited, in the places that we’ve wanted to play and the shows that we’ve wanted to play.
“We haven’t felt limited, or that someone would turn us away or something [laughs].”
“Last year we played 90 shows, and I would say half of them were abroad.”
Koliha: “Also with us I think it’s more of a special example, because you are part British – it just makes sense that you sing in your native language.”
Hobson-Mazur: “Yeah. I don’t know if I could sing in Czech. Maybe now that my Czech’s better, but I don’t know what the lyrics would be like [laughs].”
Also sometimes when Czechs sing in English, it doesn’t sound quite right – but you don’t have that problem.
Hobson-Mazur: “But we have lots of friends who do. There are loads of bands that sing [in English] and have amazing lyrics.
“I also think having a complete knowledge of a language isn’t going to make you have great lyrics – having a great mind will make you have great lyrics [laughs].
Koliha: “I think when you listen to a lot of sung in English it makes sense that it has an influence on you.”
And you guys play abroad relatively often, it seems.
Kielberger: “Last year we played 90 shows, and I would say half of them were abroad – so we split it in half [laughs].”
Hobson-Mazur: “Also Germany’s great in terms of the fact there’s loads of clubs there.
“And loads of bigger cities that I’d never heard of before – you arrive and they have a huge music scene and everyone’s really nice and you get treated really nicely. It’s great.”
I’ve heard a lot in the last couple of years about bands finding it financially difficult to tour. Is that the case for you too?
Koliha: “I don’t think so. I think there’s a misconception about that.
“I think it would be more difficult when you’re kind of a level up – some mid-tier band, when you have a bigger production, your own sound guy, lights, or more people on the theme.
“I think then it gets more difficult. But when you do DIY tours, like we do, we’ve never struggled financially.”
Hobson-Mazur: “But we’re not living off of it. It’s more like we want to be able to support the band so we don’t have to put any money of our own into it.
“So then we have some money left over to make an album, or to do other stuff around the band.”
This year you won the Anděl music award for alternative and electronic act of the year, and when you were making your acceptance speech you said, Free Palestine. What was the response when you did that?
Hobson-Mazur: “Well, there was a mixed response, I’ll say.
“Of course it’s OK to criticise any government, it’s OK to criticise any institution, any business, any person.”
“I had a lot of hate online, but it was hate in places where I always knew there would be hate, whatever I had said and however I had said it.
“So I wasn’t really surprised by that.”
What kind of places?
Hobson-Mazur: “Like Facebook [laughs].”
So social media.
Hobson-Mazur: “Social media, exactly.
“But it was from people who I knew I wouldn’t have agreed with on this and I would’ve never convinced.
“So I was just happy I was able to say it and that it gave me the opportunity to say it on a wider stage.
“That was the main thing that I was actually happy about, coming out of that award – that we were able to say that.”
There was an article in Respekt that referred to you and this moment – and the headline was “Is it OK to criticise Israel?” This was in April 2026. How do you think it’s possible that a liberal publication in this country might say something like that in April 2026?
Koliha: “It was just really bizarre. It’s kind of like a centrist view of this issue. Because for us it’s really clear what’s going on there, that there is a genocide.”
Hobson-Mazur: “Also, exactly as you say, at this stage… It’s like, come on, guys – we need to move on.
“It’s also often from people who you’re really surprised to hear it from. People who are otherwise quite left-leaning in their views, and the suddenly they’ll say something like this.
“And of course it’s OK to criticise any government, it’s OK to criticise any institution, any business, any person.”
Do you think it’s generational here? Maybe younger people think more like you do?
Hobson-Mazur: “Yes. What helped me to make that decision was people around me who have the same views and who are really doing a lot to raise money, and activists and musicians who are trying to raise awareness for this.
“In our circles I received only support, but I think it’s generational.
“I think it’s also the Czech Republic – it has strong ties to Israel.”
Koliha: “Yes, that’s true. A lot of the Czech government are pretty happy working with Israel. Members of some political parties go there on trips when there’s a genocide happening a few kilometres away.It’s weird.”
Soon you’re going on tour to England. How did this tour come about?
Kielberger: “It started as just a trip to the UK. When we first talked about it was just to visit Iris’s parents. Just to go there and have a nice week in London.
“I’ve never been there and Mara’s been there once or twice.
“But then we were like, What if we try to organise concerts?
“At first we thought we might do a gig or two, just for fun, but then we started sending these emails, as we often do when we book these tours, and we didn’t expect the response to sending a bunch of emails to be that positive.
“But suddenly, a week later, we had an eight- or nine- show tour schedule.”
Are there any challenges to touring in England, with Brexit and everything? Is it relatively complicated?
Koliha: “[Laughs] That’s kind of… On this tour we are going as an electronic trio, in a more minimalist set-up – just two guitars and a few synthesizers.
“That’s kind of because of Brexit, because it’s much more difficult going there in a full band with a van, because then you have to pay a lot of fees, and customs.
“And in this set-up we’ll just go there by bus and hide our guitars [Hobson-Mazur laughs].
“And if somebody asks, we are not a band.
“We did a couple of tours like that, just the three of us, in the Czech Republic, and took a train or bus.
“That’s a really nice way to go from show to show, so we’re going to do it the Czech way in England.”
There are some interesting names on your itinerary, including Cleethorpes. How did you choose these cities or towns? Or how did they come to be on the list?
Kielberger: “They chose us [laughs].”
Koliha: “Yeah. Usually when we are booking a tour we send, I don’t know, 1,000 emails and then just wait to see if anybody will respond.
“It’s not like we choose the places – we just send emails everywhere and hopefully somebody will want to book us.”
Hobson-Mazur: “I was in London almost all of the time and I’ve been to maybe Nottingham and Ipswich, cause my aunts live there.
“But I haven’t seen that much of other places in the UK, because travel can be so expensive.
“But I’m really excited to visit Sheffield and all of these places that I’ve heard so many great things about.”
Also I presume you must have a lot of friends in London, or England, who haven’t seen you performing?
Hobson-Mazur: “Yeah, but lots of them have moved away as well.
“Cause when you grow up in London the thing to do is to move somewhere else for uni, so lots of them did.
“But maybe we’ll meet some of them along the way.”
Your second album, Seeing in Reverse, is coming out at the end of October. What are your hopes for the album? And in general?
Hobson-Mazur: “Definitely I think travelling to new places, or getting to play in new places, is a huge priority.
“And I think we’re going to take a bit of a break as well – we’ve played a lot of shows – to give ourselves time to relax, so then we can be ready to keep making music and travelling.”
Kielberger: “We also have some other shows planned for the rest of the year.
“And then I personally would like to finish some of the songs that didn’t fit on the album.
“I’d like to do that before the break.”
Ida the Young’s tour of England begins in London on September 30.
