Interview By Smudge Smith
There is a beautiful, deeply endearing kind of madness that follows Pryma around. To sit with the rising metal-rock outfit in 2026 is less like conducting a standard rock interview and more like getting trapped inside a fast-moving, laugh-out-loud episode of a chaotic British comedy. One minute you are discussing the fine mechanics of quad-tracking heavy guitar riffs; the next, you are hearing a detailed account of how their drummer sleepwalks into midnight plumbing projects or attempts to relieve himself on his bandmates in the dark.
Yet, beneath the relentless banter, the piss-buckets, and the stories of giant pet cane toads, lies one of the most exciting, uncompromising bands breaking through the UK heavy music scene today. 2026 has already been, as guitarist Max puts it, “a bit mental so far.”
Landing the Big One: From Uprising to Download
The big news in the Pryma camp is their confirmation for Download Festival. Plucked as one of just six bands from hundreds of applications through the Download Takeover scheme, the band were genuinely stunned.
“We applied for Download Takeover,” Max explains. “We actually had applied for it before and unfortunately never got in, but this year we applied… I had an email and I was at work and I was just like, ‘You’re joking.’ I banged on the phone. I was like, ‘We’ve got Download!’ Mad. We were just gobsmacked.”
Pryma will be taking over the Doghouse stage on Wednesday afternoon, a prime slot as festival-goers settle into the campgrounds. “People got settled, had a few bevvies down them. Bang. Get in. Perfect for Pryma,” laughs vocalist Gabby. Out of the six selected bands across various genres, Pryma proudly claims the heaviest crown. “We’re going to be the heaviest ones out of the six because we’re kind of like the metal-rock category,” Max notes. “I’m terrified, but really excited.”
This massive festival slot follows on the heels of some grueling, sweat-soaked road testing, including a recent, blistering appearance on the second stage at Uprising at the O2 Academy in Leicester. “The hottest show I’ve ever played in my life,” Dom recalls, shivering at the memory of the 30-degree external heat combining with indoor lights and body heat. “The drummer passed out… I sweat so much when I play drums. We came off into the hallway and it was hotter than playing drums on the stage.”
Despite the sweltering conditions, the crowd voted with their feet, swelling in size as the band’s deafening riffs echoed through the venue, culminating in a massive line at the merchandise tent afterwards. “It does feel good to see the physical representation of your hard work paying off,” Gabby says thoughtfully.
Streamlining the Riffs: Less is More
Pryma’s current sonic identity is a lean, mean machine that is gradually morphing from traditional hard rock and metal into something far more aggressive. “I’d say now we’re almost morphing into a hardcore direction because there’s less solos in it, there’s more riffs,” Max explains.
When asked why a highly capable guitarist would actively abandon guitar solos, Max laughs: “Pretty much, truthfully, I just can’t be arsed.” But the real credit for this stylistic shift goes to their producer, Dave Boothroyd.
“When we first started getting produced properly by him, I was all about solos,” Max says. “I love Schenker, I love Zakk Wylde, all that lot. But it got to a point where it was almost like I was putting them in for the sake of it. Did it add anything to the song? Not really. Dave was saying, ‘I only put a solo in if it’s going to accentuate the vocal melody or actually add a next level.’ If a song doesn’t need a solo, I won’t put one in. If you can say more with less, you’re a better musician.”
The band’s writing efficiency skyrocketed last July with the arrival of their new bassist, Kieran, who stepped into the fold not just as a fan of the band, but as an experienced producer coming from a surprising background in a rap collective.
“My production background helped with workflow in terms of writing and recording demos,” Kieran says. Despite only listening to rap since moving to London in 2020, a sudden “heavy phase” involving deathcore and hardcore bands like Kublai Khan perfectly coincided with an out-of-the-blue message from Max and Gabby asking him to play bass. He was dropped straight into the deep end, learning an intricate 11-song headline set in just two weeks.
Kieran brought digital audio workstation savvy to the band, teaching Max about panning and quad-tracking. The current writing routine is a well-oiled machine: Max floshes out entire song structures as riff parts in Logic, Kieran adds solid framework and MIDI drums, Dom (affectionately dubbed “The Labrador” for his insanely happy, energetic drumming style) smashes the skins in reality, and Gabby overlays the vocal hooks and lyrics.
“John Doe”: Turning Industry Misogyny into Pure Rage
While tracks like “Freaky Fright Night” handle lighter themes like sex, and “Mind Cold Shadow” tackles Gabby’s personal battles with depression, their newest, heaviest track, “John Doe,” targets an entirely different beast. Born out of pure anger, the song is a direct, savage musical response to a toxic industry encounter.
About a year and a half ago, a record label executive/PR representative approached the band expressing immense interest. When the band asked if there was more balance to the contract offered, the executive abruptly pulled the deal via third parties with a string of highly personal insults aimed directly at Gabby.
“He turns around and says he’s not interested anymore because the singer can’t sing, he hates my screaming vocals, and she’s overweight,” Gabby reveals, entirely unfazed.
“When ‘John Doe’ is complete and done, we’re going to send it to his record label,” Gabby says with a fierce grin. “The concept isn’t that I’m offended. I genuinely don’t give a shit if someone calls me fat. The issue is that there are younger bands that would be affected by that stuff. People who actually take that to heart. He didn’t give us constructive criticism; it was just a direct attack for no reason.”
The track has been heavily road-tested and has quickly become the absolute highlight of their live set, serving as an empowering anthem. “I get quite a lot of women come up to the merch stand and say, ‘I love the fact that you just don’t care. I felt really empowered watching you guys,'” Gabby shares. “It makes all the hard work feel so good. You’re doing it for the right reason.”
Gabby has continually rejected industry pressure to conform to a hyper-sexualized image. “I’ve had a few people who manage other bands come up and say, ‘Oh, you do know your band would be massive if you sexed it up a bit?'” she says. “Sex sells, it does. However, I like to be comfortable. We look a bit metal, we’re an aggressive band, so a little bit of masculinity is cool. You should just be able to wear what you want.”
Toads, Tents, and Tour Bus Realities
To understand Pryma’s survival mechanism through the financial grind of DIY touring—where they purposefully choose to “trick-feed” singles to put maximum love and budget into individual tracks rather than sinking £40,000 into an independent album—you have to look at their off-stage lives.
Max is the self-confessed, regimented “stress head” of the group who craves absolute structure. He lives with his partner Heather and a giant, rapidly growing pet cane toad named Kevin (who famously has a little door sign in his tank reading Kevin Lives Here).
Then there is Dom, the resident “piss head” and plumber, whose alcohol-induced antics are the stuff of band legend. Dom’s partner, Harley, willingly steps up to share the details of their disastrous first date, where she challenged the heavy metal drummer to shots of tequila. “He’s a lightweight when it comes to drinking,” she laughs, describing how she later found him completely broken, sitting across the road on a beach, before having to walk him home as he giggled like a schoolgirl.
Dom’s real superpower, however, is his sleepwalking. “I get to a stage where it’s like I’m sleepwalking, doing midnight plumbing,” Dom admits. Harley recalls a night waking up to find him sleep-walking, attempting to leave the house, and eventually relieving himself right on the bedroom floor, entirely unaware.
Family Ties and the Road Ahead
Ultimately, Pryma operates like a fiercely loyal, slightly unhinged family. They play quiz nights with their parents, their partners scream the lyrics from the barrier, and Max’s proud mum once famously stood at the barrier of a 100-capacity venue with her camera, blissfully smiling while a dirty mosh pit threatened to wipe her out.
With the Bloodstock finals on the horizon—where they will compete a second time against fierce local acts like Vampira and Tides of Aya—and a massive, sold-out crowd of 10,000 waiting for them in the Download tent, Pryma are poised for a massive explosion. They are loud, they are angry in the music, but off-stage, they are simply too happy to be here[cite: 2]. Just keep an eye on your shoes if Dom has had a few tequilas.
The Beautiful Chaos of Pryma: Mosh Pits, Midnight Kidnappings, and Defying the Metal Uniform
There is a distinct, vibrating hum that follows a band off stage when they know they’ve just laid waste to a venue. For the British heavy rock outfit Pryma, that post-gig adrenaline manifests not in aggressive posturing, but in a chaotic, beaming collective joy. They have just stepped off stage, leaving behind a sweltering crowd and a massive queue at the merchandise stand—always the truest barometer of a gig’s success.
“We had a fairly decent long queue at the merch afterwards and people were buying stuff, so that’s always good,” the band reflects, still riding the high of a blistering set. They even hosted their first-ever signing tent, an experience that immediately went slightly awry. “Usually we do merch and people ask us to sign stuff when we’re there. We got told off because we were holding the queue up, because there’s a separate table to do the signing. We didn’t realise that!”
Despite playing ferociously heavy music, Pryma is notoriously, unapologetically happy. Drummer Dom has earned the moniker “The Labrador” for his relentless enthusiasm. “He’s the happiest metal drummer in the world,” the band jokes.
“So many people come up to me after the shows like, ‘You’re supposed to be like a metal drummer, and really angry,'” Dom laughs. “I think the anger comes out in the music, but afterwards we’re buzzing. It’s like all the hard work goes into the shows, and when you get to do the shows, it’s like the enjoyment of all your hard work.”
The Download Horizon and the Reality of Stage Fright
The payoff for that hard work is arriving in a massive way: Pryma has been confirmed for a highly coveted slot at the Download Festival. The gravity of the booking is finally setting in, especially since their manager, Dave, confirmed that the tent they are playing is completely sold out with a staggering 10,000-person capacity.
For frontwoman Gabby, the thrill of these escalating gigs is occasionally shadowed by a very real, surprisingly recent struggle with severe stage fright.
“I’ve been having this thing at the moment,” Gabby confesses candidly. “Basically, last year, we went on a tour with Blaze Bayley. We’d played about four shows by then, and on about our fifth show, I had a panic attack on stage. It’s actually breathtaking. To the point where you feel like you might be having a heart attack.”
For a frontwoman known for her commanding, aggressive stage presence, the sudden onset of these attacks was baffling. “I’m not a panicker. I’m not a stressor. It’s totally irrational,” she explains. “Since then, every show we do, I go into a bit of a, ‘Oh my God, it’s going to happen, it’s going to ruin the set’. I have to have this ten minutes of being by myself before we go on, and I’ve now learnt to be able to just calm myself down and get back into reality.”
Once she hits the stage, however, the anxiety evaporates into the roar of the crowd. “With that many people, you’re going to feed off the energy,” Gabby says of the impending Download show. “The crowd never really know how much of a big part they play in a show. If the audience are moshing and doing circle pits, it’s only going to make us get more rowdy.”
Mosh Pits and Mothers
That rowdiness is a hallmark of Pryma’s live reputation. They play to the energy of the room, adapting their intensity whether it’s an older crowd or a younger, feral audience ready to tear the place apart. They even had a venue briefly shut down for ten minutes due to a circle pit resulting in smashed glasses.
However, the band’s most iconic mosh pit story involves entirely the wrong demographic: Max’s mother.
After recovering from a bad back, Max’s mum finally came out to support the band at the 100-capacity Penny Theatre in Canterbury. Unfamiliar with the absolute carnage of a Pryma gig, she stationed herself at the very front of the stage, camera in hand, smiling proudly.
“We play a song called ‘My Bastard Gods’,” Max recalls. “When it kicks in, my mum’s at the front, camera in hand… The song kicks in, and behind her is the biggest fucking mosh pit and I’ve just gone, ‘Oh my God, Mum! I’m going to watch my mum get wiped out.’ I turn around to Gabby and I’m like, ‘Sort this out.'”
Gabby’s solution was to haul Max’s mum onto the stage to save her from the wall of death forming behind her. “She’s got up, she thinks Gab’s brought my mum up for a fucking dance,” Max laughs. “So mum’s got up on the stage and started giving it some of this. It was the best sight I’ve ever seen: a really proud mum in the front with her little camera and a dirty mosh pit.”
Defying the “Uniform”: Cut-offs, Comfort, and Crocs
Off-stage and on, Pryma adamantly refuses to play the traditional heavy metal game. This independence is most fiercely guarded by Gabby, who regularly faces unsolicited industry advice about her image.
“I’ve had quite a few people come up… a few punters, and also a few people who manage other bands, who have come up and said, ‘Oh, you do know your band would be massive if you sexed it up a bit?'” Gabby reveals. “My answer’s usually, ‘Okay, thank you.’ It’s so unfortunate because they’re right, sex sells. However, I like to be comfortable.”
Rejecting the pressure to present a hyper-feminine image, Gabby embraces the aggressive nature of their music with her stage wear. She frequently opts for t-shirts with the sleeves cut off—a trend she credits Max for starting—and prioritizes moving freely over looking conventionally glamorous.
“I don’t like being so feminine on stage because we’re quite an aggressive band when we play, so a little bit of masculinity is cool,” she says. “I’ve tried to explain to kids, teenagers, that even when you’re not in your school uniform, you’re still wearing a uniform. You’re all wearing the same style of tops and shirts. Don’t you want to be different? And also, don’t you want to be comfortable? If I could play a set in my pyjamas that have chickens all over it, I would.”
This absolute commitment to comfort led to one of the band’s most infamous stylistic offenses. During a recent set, Gabby took the stage wearing black Crocs. “It was socks and Crocs,” one of her bandmates groans. “Fucking illegal.”
Gabby remains completely unrepentant. “If I’m not comfortable, I don’t give a hundred percent,” she argues. Her nieces even suggested she customize them with decorative charms. “My niece went, ‘You know you can get the fucking little things that go in them… She got a toe, a hairy toe. I was like, ‘What is there to like? It’s so gross.'”
Van Antics, Missing Licenses, and Kidnappings
Behind the scenes, Pryma’s interpersonal dynamics are a hilarious mix of regimented discipline and utter chaos. Guitarist Max is the self-proclaimed anchor of the group. “He plans his life out,” the band notes. “He doesn’t like unexpected things; he doesn’t like things that might go wrong.”
“I need structure. I crave structure in everything that I do,” Max admits, acknowledging that he is entirely devoid of the embarrassing, drunken lore that plagues the rest of the band.
While Max keeps his nose clean, Gabby provides more than enough rock-and-roll chaos for the entire outfit. One of the most legendary Pryma stories took place at Margate Rocks a couple of years ago, following a phenomenal show with Florence Black. As the band was attempting to pack the van and head home, they realized their frontwoman was missing.
“We find her fucking gallivanting off in Florence Black’s dressing room, actually, and hanging out with them,” her bandmates recall. When they finally managed to corral a highly intoxicated Gabby and physically guide her toward their transport, she decided to make a scene.
“What does she shout in the middle of a crowded venue?” the band laughs. “She’s shouting out, ‘I’m being kidnapped!'”
Gabby remembers it vividly: “I remember them trying to put me in the van. They’re kidnapping me!”
The chaos didn’t end there. Upon being dropped off, Gabby drunkenly wandered up to the neighbour’s house, demanding to see drummer Dom’s mother, nearly resulting in a public order offense. “I could have been arrested,” she admits cheerfully. “I’m quite annoying when I’m drunk, but I want to do everything… I will literally go and ride a horse.”
“It’s never normal with Pryma,” they admit.
Yet, beneath the jokes, the Crocs, and the stolen dressing room moments, there is an undeniable, lethal musical ambition. Their unreleased track “John Doe” is already becoming a staple of their set, empowering fans and moving massive amounts of merchandise before its official release. They are a band that refuses to compromise their comfort, their sound, or their joy. As they gear up to face 10,000 screaming fans at Download Festival, Pryma proves that you can conquer the heavy metal world without ever having to wipe the smile off your face.
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