Contrary to popular belief, being an international rockstar does have some notable downsides, and as Franz Ferdinand frontman Alex Kapranos learned on June 2, 2005, that includes being so ubiquitous that you’re accused of being a British spy. Ironically, the debacle happened because Kapranos was trying to be discreet, flying under his mother’s maiden name to avoid detection.
Unfortunately for Kapranos, his mother shared a last name with a notorious agent of MI6, the foreign intelligence service of the U.K.
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Franz Ferdinand Alex Kapranos Suspected Of Being British Spy
Franz Ferdinand was on the frontlines of the indie sleaze movement of the mid-2000s, scoring multiple Top 10 hits with songs like “Take Me Out” and “Do You Want To.” In the U.S., they achieved greater success on the genre-specific rock charts than the Billboard Hot 100. But nevertheless, their music videos and catchy riffs dominated the airwaves, particularly on VH1’s Top 20 Video Countdown. (If you know, you know.) Simply put, they were a big band if you liked indie rock. Even if you didn’t, you likely recognized their songs.
With that kind of international fame comes some notable downsides, like people recognizing you in public even if you’d rather be alone. But the band’s frontman, Alex Kapranos, had no way of expecting that this recognition would land him in a room with Russian authorities as they accused him of being a British spy. In early June, Franz Ferdinand had performed a string of shows in Russia and were headed back home via the Moscow airport. As the rest of his bandmates boarded the plane, authorities asked Kapranos to stay behind. They were detaining him “on suspicion of being a former MI6 agent who stole confidential missile info,” per Music News.
Kapranos was traveling under his mother’s maiden name, Huntley. This, of course, just so happened to be the last name of the MI6 agent the Russian police were accusing Kapranos of being. The musician noted that the Huntley they were looking for was over a decade older than he was, which finally led to his release. In the end, Kapranos was left with only a slight delay in his travel plans and an absolutely wild story to tell for the rest of his life.
It Wouldn’t Be The First Time He Went Incognito, Technically
Franz Ferdinand frontman Alex Kapranos might not have had a double life moonlighting as an MI6 agent, but he had dabbled in going incognito on occasion. Sometimes, that meant traveling under a different last name, like when the band went to Russia in 2005. Other times, Kapranos donned entire disguises—or so he thought—to avoid detection when his band was reaching their peak with their commercial breakthrough hit, “Take Me Out.” Proving even further that he didn’t have the right cut of jib to be a secret agent, Kapranos admitted he wasn’t very good at it.
“I remember coming back to Glasgow in 2004, and I wanted to do my Christmas shopping. I was trying to go into town, and it was a nightmare. The band was everywhere. So, people knew my face,” he recalled to Big Issue. “I remember trying to disguise myself, borrowing a pair of specs and sticking on a big blue puffer jacket and combing my hair back from my face. But it didn’t stop people coming up. They just came up and said, ‘You’re that guy from that band. Why are you wearing a big puffer jacket, why have you got specs on, why are you wearing your hair in that stupid way?’ So, that didn’t work.”
Then again, we suppose that if he had been better at disguising himself, he would’ve been even more suspicious to Russian authorities. You can’t be good at everything, right?
Photo by Domenech Castello/EPA/Shutterstock