Manning ‘Sleep Without You’ Interview

Written by Robert Hume

Having only been on the scene for the last year, Sydney singer-songwriter Manning has already released 3 singles and with more on the way. I caught up with him over zoom to chat about the journey and what’s to come.

Rob: Hey Manning, thanks for taking time out of your day to speak with us, especially off the back of 9 consecutive gig days!

Yeah, it’s been a busy time. A couple of wedding performances, gigs with the band as well as some solo stuff at the pub. It’s nice to take a break and have a day off.

Rob: I guess it’s been quite a big year for you with releases as well. What’s it been like?

I’ve been a muso for a lot longer than this new project and I’ve put out songs, but it wasn’t really at a professional level, or a level that I was happy with, like I wasn’t working with real producers and stuff like that. It was all kind of just homegrown, which was great, but then it all changed when I was gigging at Glebe markets and I met a proper producer who just happened to be in the crowd and then it was like you know, hey let’s work together.

From there we just wrote a crap ton of songs and the ones that I've put out this year are kind of the strongest from that crop. I was expecting them to do better than my older stuff, but I wasn't expecting to be doing what I'm doing at the moment, so very thankful and blessed for that, yeah.

Rob: Have there been any big memorable moments over the last year?

I really enjoy working with the producer that I mentioned before. His name is Paul Aiden. In working with him I heard my vocals, like properly mixed and I remember listening back and I was like “oh my goodness” so this is what it's meant to sound like.

Because, you know, going from like a Shure SM 58 into a Focusrite to using a proper microphone and then hearing it produced properly was like a slap in the face and I was like, “oh, this is awesome.” Before meeting Paul, I had only ever written by myself so just having someone to chase hooks with and challenging each other to write in different ways has been the biggest change from my older work.  

Rob: You mentioned that you've done a lot of solo wedding gigs in the past and I was wondering what it’s been like doing from that to being more of a professional musician with a band?

Yeah, you're right that I do a lot of events and stuff like that, but I try and keep that separate from, you know, playing with my band performing originals, 'cause it's a totally different experience.

It’s always a great time but it doesn't give you the same fire and passion that performing originals does to people that actually want to come and see you perform and you're not just you know, background noise to an extent.

It was very makeshift before and now we're using proper equipment and you know and if in the songwriting process, I have an idea to add some sort of effect or add some keys or glockenspiel or wedding bells, or something crazy we can make it happen, which is something that I couldn't before. So yeah, just having more freedom or to let ideas surface has been amazing.

Rob: This year you've put out three different singles back-to-back. ‘Locked Out’, ‘Get Gone’, and ‘Sleep Without You’. Is there a connection between them all?

Good question. The environment and the way they were written are all pretty much the same, but they are all different stories about different experiences that I've had. They're all going to be on the same EP, which is why I've kind of gone with the same artwork style throughout. You know each different era of music will have a different set of artworks. I want to keep it simple and clean.

I'm working with a lovely artist, Elise Abotomey. She just does really simple line drawings that I really like, so I just hit her up and you know, we talk about the lyrics of the songs and come to an idea.

Rob: There have been a couple music videos too! Can you tell us about those?

Yeah, sure, that was an entirely new experience.Film clips had never been done for my older stuff, so it took a little while to warm up to the camera and you can probably see that in the ‘Sleep Without You’ video, I'm a bit more comfortable in in front of the camera then maybe I was in the ‘Get Gone’ video.

But yeah, initially they were all just pretty unplanned in the sense that we’d just bring the gear to my house and see what we make. ‘Get Gone’ is meant to be a fun liberating song and I didn't really have any grand narrative for visual format, so yeah, we just filmed bits and pieces around my room and then we just walked outside and just had a bit of fun with it and seeing my sing the lyrics to the camera my roommate was like I was, you should dance a little bit and then we tried that just to give it a bit of fun energy.

And then ‘Sleep Without You’ was a lot more planned. I worked with the director Harry Corcoran to create a storyboard together and I wanted to kind of convey going crazy in your own bedroom over the passing of time. You know when you overthink something and before you know it you've been sitting in the same spot for way too long, that's kind of what the music video tried to do in the first half, and then the second half was meant to be a fever dream where I was searching for the person that I was singing about.

Rob: You mentioned the EP. What should we be expecting from it next?The next song Is kinda gonna be the moodiest. I feel like it’s a little weird to say this, but it’s got a little bit of a trap influence, just in the rhythm section. I'm still singing - I'm definitely not rapping. I just wanted to create something that you know you could hear in the club, and it would kind of fit in that zone. I’m really looking forward to this next single. It is darker and moodier but also full throttle in the melodies and I’m looking forward to dancing to it

Rob: Are we expecting that this year?

I think it will be early next year.

Rob: Who inspires you in your creative process?

To be honest, a lot of my influences are kind of back in the past. I look back to people like Paul Simon, Bob Dylan, and Joni Mitchell and I try to take those nice melodies and folk sounds and just recontextualize them into more of a modern context. In terms of current artists that really strike a chord with me, I’d say Mallrat, Harry Styles, Soccer Mommy and Courtney Barnett.

Rob: You’ve been on the ball with social media, especially with TikTok and Instagram Reels. Has there been a favoritefavourite challenge that you’ve taken part in?

Honestly, for the longest time, social media has been something really scary for me and I didn’t enjoy putting myself out there. I felt like I was just being annoying but then once you start getting into the rhythm of it, you just learn to just enjoy the experience and not care as much what other people think 'cause you know, it's such an important tool for building and reaching an audience.

So in regards to the question, I guess I've just come to enjoy it and just make some things that people might enjoy. I recently collaborated with a DJ friend that I met in Byron called PARTIGIRL, I did Australian music halloween costume videos with her and yeah, it's so much fun doing stuff with people you know.

Rob: Is there any ritual that you like to do  pre-gig to get in the mindset?
Oh, that's fun. For cover gigs and event gigs I never get nervous but when it's originals with the band, if you talk to me it'll go in one ear and out the other, like I'm so just rattled, I'm a mess and I'm very lucky that my band are all quite chill, so  they're all just chillin’ like 10 minutes before the gig and I'm like racing back and forth through the venue, so I think my ritual is to kind of go crazy for half an hour and run through that adrenaline.

Rob: Thanks so much again for chatting, I’ve got one final question! What is in the future for Manning?

I'm looking forward to gigging more, I've got some coming up in Sydney to close out the year that I'm excited for.

And then after that, just getting these songs out and getting back in the studio to work on the next batch of music. I've already written all the songs for the EP obviously, but I'm already thinking about the next crop because that's probably my favorite part of the creative process. Right at the start when you've got nothing, and you can put ideas to paper. So yeah, looking forward to doing that again.