What was the beginning point for your music career? How did it all start?
40,000 Leagues was formed in latter part of 2016 after a chance meeting between vocalist Nathan
Crossdale and guitarist Andrew Davidson, who met each other at a gig. From there, they decided to put
together a metal band. Nathan had previously been in a band with drummer, Paul Beesley, and invited
him to join the newly formed outfit. Andrew also knew another guitarist, Joe Leonard and invited him to
join the band as the lead guitarist. Joe took over the duties as the main songwriter for the band shortly
after that.
Nathan also knew Rick Wiltshire from during college and invited him be the bassist. Harry Hulme joined
the band in 2019, after the departure of Andrew, and that is how the line-up of 40,000 Leagues came to
be.
Were there any bumps on the road? What kind of challenges did you have to deal with?
I suppose any band has bumps in the road early in their career – I think an early challenge for us was
finding a place for our music. As our earlier stuff was more akin to hard rock and progressive rock, but
we were on line-ups with lots of metal bands. As we have progressed as a band, our music has evolved
and is now more of a melodic metalcore sound.
Another obstacle was getting our music noticed, which is something many smaller bands struggle with.
In the age of Spotify, there is so much music out there that is can feel difficult to stand out and be heard.
Similarly, would love to be play at incredible festivals like Bloodstock and Download, who must get
hundreds if not thousands of band applications each year, so it can be quite challenging to make
ourselves stand out from the crowd.
What was the most fulfilling and satisfying moment so far?
Probably the most fulfilling moment so far for us was when we got to play a show at the Manchester
Academy, supporting RED, Keith Wallen (of Breaking Benjamin) and The Fallen State. We all have grown
up in or near to Manchester, and Manchester Academy has been one of the dream venues to play since
childhood – getting to play on the stage alongside a band we grew up listening to was an absolute treat.
How would you describe the music that you typically create?
Our music combines elements of melodic metal, metalcore and progressive metal, with a big focus on
guitar solos and harmonies.
What is your creative process like?
Joe is the brains behind our music. He takes his inspirations from music such as Dream Theater and
Trivium. He’ll often come to band with an idea fully formed in his head and show us how he wants it to
sound. Him and Nathan will then work on melodies and harmonies to go with the lyrics that Nathan has
written.
If you could change anything about the industry, what would it be?
We get to share the stage with so many incredibly talented bands and there are even more out there,
but a lot of them unfortunately just seem to fly under the radar without much recognition. We would
love to see more recognition for all those talented bands and musicians out there.
Many grassroots venues are closing throughout the country. More must be done to protect these
venues, who provide such an important service for smaller bands and keeping the underground scene
alive in music.
If you were asked to give a piece of advice to upcoming bands, what would that be?
If we were to give a piece of advice to a band that was just starting out, it would be to get out there
playing gigs and networking. Word of mouth from live shows is such a powerful tool, and all it takes is
the right person seeing the right band at a show to land them a booking on a big festival or tour.
What has been the best performance of your career so far?
Our best performance so far of our music career would probably be our show at the Manchester M2TM
finals 2023 – we properly put everything into that show! We had a room full of 400+ people jumping
around and moshing to our music, as well as a stream of stage divers and hearing our 4TK chant echoing
out both before and after we played our set. A big shout out to James and Jayne Bennett who run the
Manchester M2TM shows and to Simon Hall who coordinates the M2TM shows around the country.
While we didn’t win the finals, it was still an incredible show to be part of and opened so many doors for
us as a band.
If you didn’t become a musician, what would you be doing now?
We all do have jobs outside of 40,000 Leagues, as well as many passions and interests outside of music.
Nathan works as a personal trainer and is often at the gym. Rick works as an actor and is always working
on some kind of film project. Joe has a good job within the NHS. Harry runs his own props business,
making props and costumes for film which he is turning into a career, and Paul is a fulltime father to his
young daughter, along with his partner Sarah.
What is new with the band at the moment? What are you currently working on and would like to
share with the world?
We recently released our latest single, The Dragon Will Rise, along with a music video that combines
metal and badminton in a way that hasn’t been seen before. The video is a comedy that takes some
inspiration from the film Dodgeball, and features a whole load of cameos from some of Manchester’s
finest metal bands. If you haven’t seen it already, please do go and give it a watch. The link is below:
We are also getting ready to release our next single, The Architect, and we’ll be filming the music video
for it later on this month. We will also be releasing a further single later in the year.
In terms of shows, we have a slot coming up at Rabidfest in November – which is an amazing metal
festival held in Oxford. We also have a Halloween show alongside our good friends in Karma’s Puppet –
at The Swan in Macclesfield, which is the first place we ever played a show as a band.
