CAPTAIN MANTELL – HUMAN OR NOT promo
CAPTAIN MANTELL – HUMAN OR NOT PRESS KIT
CAPTAIN MANTELL is a project that has been exploring the boundary between rock and electronic music for nearly twenty years,
blending rock’n’roll attitude, science-fiction imagery and a constant tension towards the future.
Founded in 2006, the project has performed at national and international club and festivals, making cross-genre contamination its defining trait.
With its eighth album, HUMAN OR NOT, Captain Mantell pushes this research into a more radical and contemporary direction.
The record takes shape as a vinyl conceived as a conceptual object, where the two sides mirror and distort the same musical material.
Side A features songs performed and produced by human musicians, rooted in the project’s established language: a balance between rock and electronics, physical energy and melodic focus.
Side B uses the same tracks as raw material, reworked through artificial intelligence tools and transformed into experimental electronic remixes — more unstable, nocturnal and club-oriented.
Artificial intelligence is not used as a replacement tool, but as a distorting lens: a presence that observes human music from a non-human point of view and recomposes it according to different, sometimes coherent, sometimes unpredictable logics. Not a competition between human and machine, but a dialogue that questions form, control and authorship.
The lyrics of HUMAN OR NOT explore unstable identities, screen-mediated realities, non-human presences, technology, alienation, and the desire for connection. Balancing irony and unease, the songs portray a present in which the boundary between what is human and what is not becomes increasingly thin.
This dualism is also reflected in the project’s visual identity, curated by eeviac. Two colors — red and blue — represent the human and artificial components respectively. The images overlap but can only be read separately through red/blue 3D glasses, included inside the vinyl package, suggesting a double reality in which the two dimensions coexist without ever fully merging.
Live, HUMAN OR NOT can take two complementary forms: a full band concert or an electronic live set, adapting to different contexts while maintaining strong conceptual coherence.
HUMAN OR NOT is both a record and an experiment on the present, using the language of rock and electronic music to question how music is created, transformed and perceived today.
The album will be released in vinyl format in spring 2026, via Overdrive Records and Go Down Records.
BIOGRAPHY
Founded in 2006, Captain Mantell is a musical project exploring the boundary between rock and electronic music through sci-fi imagery and an experimental pop attitude. The name comes from the coincidence between Tommaso Mantelli, the project’s voice and creative force, and Captain Thomas F. Mantell Jr., the first pilot to lose his life while chasing a UFO — an episode that immediately became the conceptual core of the project’s discography.
Over the years, Captain Mantell has released six albums on labels such as Irma Records, Kiver, Record Kicks, Dischi Bervisti and Overdrive, Go Down Records, developing a distinctive sound shaped by an unconventional recording approach and a personal fusion of pop, rock and electronic music. After many years as a trio, HUMAN OR NOT marks the return of the project in a new four-piece lineup, enriched by the addition of a violin.
Captain Mantell has shared stages with artists including The Chemical Brothers, Mouse On Mars and The Klaxons, performing at major Italian festivals and across several European cities. The project’s music is a constantly evolving sonic journey, suspended between rock energy, experimentation and a persistent drive toward the unknown.
CAPTAIN MANTELL crew
Tommaso Mantelli – aka Captain Mantell – guitar and vocals
Roberto Olivotto – aka Major BD – drums
Andrea Lombardini – aka Commodore Lo – bass
Sergio Orso – aka Starship Officer Ursus – violin
DISCOGRAPHY
Dirty White King – LP (2017)
Bliss – LP (2014)
7TIMES7 – Serial Video EP (2012)
Ground Lift – LP (2011)
Rest In Space – LP (2010)
Long Way Pursuit – LP (2007)
LINKS:
LABELS:
OVERDRIVE
GO DOWN RECORDSCONTACT:
info@over-drive.it
captainmantell@gmail.com
Cell. +39 3474754302