Dean Ray

Early life

Dean Ray (born Dean Pritchard) is originally from Narromine, New South Wales. At the age of six, Ray and his family moved to Meandarra, Queensland. Ray comes from a musical family; his parents Chris and Angie had their own country band called Itchy Feet. Ray grew up travelling around Australia with his parents, and he would often sleep in guitar cases backstage at venues when his parents were on stage performing. Ray learnt how to play the drums when he was nine years old. At the age of 13, he learnt how to play the guitar and started writing his own songs. Ray and his brother, who played piano, were then recruited into their parents' band.

Ray was a student at Chinchilla State High School in Chinchilla, Queensland. He left school at the age of 16 to pursue a music career. During this time, Ray also moved out of his family home and went travelling. He later moved to Kensington, Victoria and worked as a busker around the streets of Melbourne.

2014: The X Factor Australia

In 2014, Ray successfully auditioned for the sixth season of The X Factor Australia, singing "Bette Davis Eyes" by Kim Carnes. He received four yeses from the judges and progressed to the super bootcamp round of the competition. For the first bootcamp challenge, Ray was placed into a group with three other contestants from the Under 25 Boys category to perform a song together for the judges. Ray made it to the second bootcamp challenge, where he performed "Yellow" by Coldplay to the judges and a live audience of one thousand. He then progressed to the home visits round in New York City and performed "Dancing Queen" by ABBA in front of his mentor Natalie Bassingthwaighte and guest mentor Jennifer Lopez. Bassingthwaighte later selected Ray, along with Adrien Nookadu and Tee, for the live finals—a series of eleven weekly live shows in which contestants are progressively eliminated by public vote.

After the eliminations of Nookadu in week three and Tee in week seven, Ray became the last remaining contestant in Bassingthwaighte's category. In week nine, he was in the bottom two for the first time with Caitlyn Shadbolt and performed Johnny Cash's version of Nine Inch Nails' "Hurt" in the final showdown. Ray was saved after Bassingthwaighte, Dannii Minogue and Redfoo chose to eliminate Shadbolt. During the grand final decider show on 20 October 2014, it was announced that Ray was runner-up to Marlisa Punzalan.

Performances on The X Factor

     denotes a performance that entered the ARIA Singles Chart.
     denotes week in the bottom two.
     denotes runner-up.

2014–present: Dean Ray

On 24 October 2014, it was announced that Ray had received a recording contract with Sony Music Australia. His debut single "Coming Back", which would have been his winner's single if he had won The X Factor, was released on the iTunes Store that same day. It debuted at number five on the ARIA Singles Chart. Ray's self-titled debut album was released on 21 November 2014 and features studio recordings of selected songs he performed on The X Factor. It debuted at number five on the ARIA Albums Chart and number 21 on the New Zealand Albums Chart. The album was certified gold by the Australian Recording Industry Association for shipments of 35,000 copies. The album was the 75th best-selling album of 2014 in Australia. Ray was the supporting act for The Veronicas' Sanctified Tour in February 2015. On 17 March 2015, Ray released an acoustic cover of Jake Bugg's "Me and You" as his second single. His third single "I O U (A Heartache)" was released on 31 July 2015. In March 2016, it was speculated that Ray had been dropped by record company Sony Music, along with other X Factor finalists Reigan Derry, Marlisa Punzalan and Nathaniel Willemse.

Artistry

Ray's musical style is rock. Aside from singing, he also plays the guitar and drums and writes his own songs. Ray cites Airbourne, The Beatles, Bob Dylan, Elvis Presley, First Aid Kit, Joss Stone, Phil & Tommy Emmanuel, Son House and Stevie Ray Vaughan as his musical influences.

Personal life

In October 2014, Ray confirmed that he was dating fellow Australian singer Bonnie Anderson. The pair ended their relationship two months later. On 31 July 2015, Ray's house in Melbourne was burgled and seven of his parents guitars were stolen.

Concert tours