about Plastic Ray Gun
The Beginning…
Based in Lawrence, Kansas, Plastic Ray Gun are a blues-rock band built around feel and storytelling with a sound that evokes the classic blues while injecting influences from a wide range of backgrounds.
The band came together in 2023 after frontman Michael Leos put a series of Reddit posts out in search of musicians. The band’s early shows at venues like the Replay Lounge helped define their identity. Playing late sets, sharing bills with friends, and learning how songs land in a room shaped both their sound and their confidence.
about Plastic Ray GUn
How Plastic Ray Gun Got Its Name
The band spent its early years performing as The Newlyweds, a name inspired by the fact that the members of the original lineup had recently gotten married. It fit the group at the beginning, capturing the sense that they were newly committed to building something together.
As the band’s sound grew louder, stranger, and more defined, the name began to feel less connected to the music they were making. The blues was still at the foundation, but their identity had expanded into heavier rock, retro futurism, and the emerging space-cowboy world surrounding the band.
The answer came from lead guitarist Ben Bloch, who had been holding onto the name Plastic Ray Gun since college. When he brought it to the group, it clicked. The name felt playful but dangerous, vintage but futuristic, and much closer to the band’s rock-and-roll edge.
The name changed, but the band did not. Plastic Ray Gun carries forward everything built during The Newlyweds era while giving the group more room to explore what comes next: bigger sounds, stranger ideas, and blues-rock aimed somewhere beyond the horizon.
about Plastic Ray gun
Who Are
Plastic Ray Gun?
Michael Leos
Frontman Michael Leos comes from a deep love of the blues — the grit, the storytelling, and the emotional weight that comes from letting songs breathe.
Ben Bloch
Guitarist Ben Bloch brings a strong country background, grounding the band with an instinct for melody and phrasing that keeps the songs rooted.
Matthew Woodward
Joining the band in 2024, bassist Matthew Woodward pulls from heavier influences, adding weight, drive, and tension beneath the groove.
Halen Higgins
Drummer Halen Higgins sits at the center of it all, blending those influences into a dynamic, responsive backbone that lets the songs move naturally.
about Plastic Ray GUn
Looking Ahead
That mix of backgrounds shapes how Plastic Ray Gun write. Songs often begin simply — a riff, a groove, a lyric — and grow through collaboration. Arrangements are shaped together, with an emphasis on dynamics and space rather than excess. Some tracks settle into slow-burning grooves, others stretch out and break loose, but all of them are built with the live stage in mind.