Mantis Music

Okay, another tweak to the website and some new photos! I was reminded whilst at the pub the other day with a couple of mates that I've not updated the site for ages. I was quite alarmed to see that it's actually been pretty much 8 months! So, for all of you guys out there waiting for the next exciting installment, here it is!

I suppose I should explain where the whole mantis thing came from anyway. So, here you go... Whilst at university in Leeds, I responded to an ad from a couple of guys (one Mr Tim Ramsbottom, and the other a Mr Rob Gould) who were looking for a 'wacka-wacka style guitarist'. Well, the funk flows in my very veins, so I gave them a call. We got together, had a play and realised that we definitely were all singing from the same sheet, so to speak. Eventually, a keyboard player going by the name of Bill Laurance joined the party, and we became the Yellow Funk Road.

We gained a two-part horn section, with Miss Catherine Sewell on alto sax and a Mr James Cruickshanks on tenor and spent the year playing some grinding cop-show inspired funk, culminating in our first (and, alas, only) CD.

The next year, we tried adding a trumpet, and unfortunately those oh-so-common musical rifts began to rear their particularly unsightly heads. Or was it unfortunate? The core of the band (with no brass) became Mantis, and somehow the music we made was more pure, raw and, goddammit, funky.

So, anyway. As a 4-piece, we were called Mantis, and I'm appalled to say that we didn't make any recordings of this line up. Gah, blast and the like!

Anyhoo, when we all finished our degrees it all came to an end... I'd bought the domain whilst it was all still happening, and it's just stuck. I ain't about to stop using it now :)