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"Billy Bragg meets Bob Dylan in a south coast highrise." Ben earned his stripes playing bass in two moderately successful bands on the London circuit, The Big Striptease and The 4.45s. It was the enforced split from The 4.45s, when he moved from London to the south coast, that proved a turning point. Dusting off the acoustic guitar he had bought himself but never learnt to play he set about the daunting task of putting aside the closet poet approach. "At first I only set myself the target of actually finishing writing one song (The Gentle Inarticulate Me) without much thought to what came next. This released a flood of writing and within 6 months I had 21 songs, and just had to get them heard by an audience." This was the next hurdle for Ben to overcome, as Ben's London experience hadn't involved opening his mouth in front of an audience. Like many other singer songwriters, Ben is diffident about his voice, claiming it is best described as workable – on a good day. Meeting the challenge head on, he opened the door to the Swan public house, Worthing, in January 2005 to deliver a first set he describes as "disastrous". Since then he has been honing his songs playing in various open mic sessions in and around Worthing. Audiences don't appear to share Ben's assessment of his vocal capabilities, and generally agree he has forged a style all of his own, leading to his being described as 'Billy Bragg meets Bob Dylan in a south coast high-rise'. |
