New Single ‘Allegations’. Out Now
Instagram : @mantarrayofficial
1.Who is ‘ Mantarray ’
We are an alternative/indie rock band from the West Midlands, UK, consisting of frontman and rhythm guitar Tommy Reading, on lead guitar Kieran Beech, on Bass guitar Mads Holtby and our newest member and drummer Matt Hall.
2. For someone that is yet to discover you, how would you describe your music?
High energy and huge riffs that are fast paced and in your face.
3. What inspired you as an artist?
Playing live to people who really enjoy our music, nothing beats seeing people dancing, moshing hard and being captivated by our performance. We just want to play big riffs and go crazy on stage for people who love living in the moment.
4. What is your process for preparing to perform live? Do you have any diva demands?
Our pre gig ritual is a good ol’ fashioned pint and cigarette to get us ready to perform.
5. Where do you feel you fit into the music?
We know our key roles in the band and each of us fits together like a puzzle piece to create our sound and music.
6: What are your favourite musical genres, and are there any you dislike?
As a band, we listen to a diverse range between us, however some of our favourites are rock, metal and funk.
7. Is there a story behind the band’s name?
We were watching ‘Blue Planet’ after a night out and just fell in love with the manta ray jumping out the water at great heights and thought this can represent our sound and identity. They are massive creatures and yet can shoot themselves so high out of the water just for fun.
8. What would you say is your greatest strength as an artist?
Performing live 100%. It really shows who we are as a band and what we represent with our high energy and attitude.
9. What would you say is your greatest weakness as an artist?
Dietary requirements! As rock n roll as dietary requirements can get, Matt is diabetic, and Kieran is Coeliac.
10. What can fans expect from your new single ‘Allegations’ ?
A huge, distorted sound, angry guitars and a badass half time section… Find out for yourselves 😉
11. What music artist would you say have influenced your work?
3 bands have heavily influenced our sound: Royal Blood, Psychedelic Porn Crumpets and Arctic Monkeys. The energy these 3 bands have on stage, ‘don’t give a f*ck attitude’ and huge guitar riffs hit the nail on the head for us.
12. Who would you most like to collaborate with artistically?
A band called ‘Foals’ and a band called ‘High Fade’. Two quite different bands but both carry such contagious, high energy when performing live that we would love to be up on stage with them performing alongside.
13. What was your worst performance?
When we were starting out, we played a show, at the time, was the roughest pub in our hometown. We played a two-hour set to 2 very dodgy looking blokes who didn’t really care for what we were doing and the 1 bar staff behind the bar on a Friday night and then got paid in pork sandwiches.
14: What was the most difficult obstacle you have ever faced and how did you overcome it?
We played the Isle of Wight New Blood Competition in 2023 where if you win you get to play at Isle of Wight Festival in the UK. We made it through to the quarter finals in Birmingham and then to the semi finals down in London. At this point we didn’t have any fans in London and we were so stumped as to what we would do. So we decided to hire a 50 person coach to take some of our fans, friends and family down to London. It then worked and we were lucky enough to do it twice when we made the finals too which were down in London also. It was just one big party each time. It was great!
15: What is your creative process when making music. Do you work with others or is there just you?
For songs in the past, we have just written amongst ourselves in the band. Usually, the songs start as a riff and develop from there into full songs. However, we are open to collaboration and would love working with people with new ideas and growing the ‘manta family’.
16: Where do you see your musical career in 10 years?
We would love to say that we have built a huge Mantarray community where we get to travel, meet new people and bring our music live to as many people as possible with a whole catalogue of music.
17:Your Top 3 Overrated Musicians, who when you hear them you think ‘ How The Fk………….. ?
Wet Leg, Sabrina Carpenter and Charli XCX
