British-American trio Raynes have wasted no time making themselves heard. Signing with Sony Music Publishing less than a year after their inception, the group has since released six singles and two EPs and have performed across the US and the UK. Their singular blend of pop, folk, and world music is being featured on television shows, commercials, and tastemakers’ playlists, earning them hundreds of thousands of monthly listeners and millions of streams.
Mat Charley and Joe Berger, both born and raised in North Dakota, met in college, where Mat––the band’s producer and multi-instrumentalist––was usually skipping class to write songs. Knowing that they would need a strong vocalist, they took to the internet to find the missing piece of their project. After months of searching, they came across a video of Mark Race, a native of Durham, UK. Ten days later, after a Facebook message and a few phone calls, Mark was on a flight to LA to meet Mat and Joe and never looked back. In fact, Mark’s only tattoo is one of two letters and four numbers: his flight number from that first meeting.
As Raynes, they combine their diverse influences to form a group whose taste spans the globe, incorporating elements of folk, Americana, and baroque pop with Celtic and world music to create a wholly original sound.
Raynes’ most recent project, a five-song EP entitled ’49, is titled after the American gold rush of 1849, but mirrors a band’s journey to leave their hometowns and their loved ones to try to stake their own claim and “strike gold.”
