Mitch Benn

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Mitch Benn
Image:Mitch Benn.jpg
Born 20 January 1970 (1970-01-20) (age 38)
Liverpool, England
Medium Stand-up/singer
Nationality British
Genres Satire
Website http://www.mitchbenn.com

Mitch Benn (born Mitchell John Benn 20 January 1970) is a British musician of Liverpudlian/Scottish descent and stand-up comedian known for his satirical songs performed on BBC radio.

Mitch Benn was born in Liverpool, England. He was educated at the Dovedale County Primary School (the same primary school John Lennon and George Harrison attended), the Liverpool Blue Coat School and the University of Edinburgh, where he was a prominent member of the famous Bedlam Theatre company and performed in the Improverts improvised comedy troupe. He began his comedy career in Edinburgh in 1994, moved to London in 1996 and quickly established himself as a comedy club "headliner" as well as a favourite on the university circuit. He is married with two daughters (born in November 2005 and May 2008).

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[edit] Radio and television

He features on BBC Radio 4 where he has been a regular contributor to The Now Show since 1999, and BBC Radio 2's It's Been a Bad Week (since 2000). He is also an occasional contributor to "Jammin'" on BBC Radio 2. In 2004 he created his own series, Mitch Benn's Crimes Against Music on Radio 4, featuring Robin Ince and Alfie Joey; this has now run to three series. In 2005 he started a series for BBC7 called The Mitch Benn Music Show where he plays records of comic songs and invites musical comedians into the studio to perform. He took a small role as Pseudopodic Creature in the Quintessential Phase of Radio 4's The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy in 2005.

He regularly appears on BBC Radio 2's Steve Wright Show as the voice of Elvis in the "Ask Elvis" feature.

On television Mitch Benn is currently (October 2007) appearing on a semi-regular basis on BBC One's The One Show, as the composer of the choral protest songs performed by the "Complaints Choir."

Mitch has performed stand-up on Live At Jongleurs and The Comedy Store (twice) for the Paramount Comedy Channel, as well as two appearances with his band The Distractions (see below) for The World Stands Up (Paramount/Comedy Central). He appeared as "King Wonderful" in the CBBC comedy show Stupid! and has contributed to a couple of "talking head" nostalgia shows; X-Rated; The Videos They Tried To Ban (Channel 4) and Fifty Greatest Comedy Characters (Five).

He also contributes occasional songs to Channel 4's Bremner, Bird and Fortune.

Benn regularly plays live shows at clubs and festivals in the United Kingdom, and has toured extensively overseas, including South Africa, Hong Kong and Singapore. In August 2007 he completed a successful run at the Edinburgh Fringe, performing a two hour show, The Mitch Benn Music Club, with The Distractions. He completed his most recent national UK tour in December 2007.

[edit] Albums

Mitch has released five CDs to date: The Unnecessary Mitch Benn (1998), a collection of favourite live songs, recorded on a Walkman carried in his pocket at various gigs that year; Radio Face (2002), including material previously heard on Radio 2 and Radio 4; and, with The Distractions, Too Late To Cancel (2004), and Crimes Against Music (2005). The single "Everything Sounds Like Coldplay Now" was released in September 2005 as a taster for the album, hitting the lower regions of the UK chart, and, as of December 2005, the video (see external link) is still receiving heavy rotation on the Paramount Comedy Channel. The Distractions are Kirsty Newton (vocals, bass and keyboard) and (also of Weapons) Tash Baylis (drums). Mitch provides most of the vocals and plays the guitar. As well as releasing material, the band support Mitch Benn for some of his comedy programmes, such as Mitch Benn's Crimes Against Music.

In October 2007, a fifth album, The Official Edinburgh Bootleg 2007 (swiftly dubbed "The Brown Album" because of its mock brown paper cover art), recorded on the final night of his show at the Edinburgh Fringe, was made available exclusively to those who attended his Autumn 2007 tour.

In March 2008, Mitch Benn released the controversial single "Happy Birthday War", to commemorate the fifth anniversary of the Iraq War, with an accompanying video.

Mitch Benn uses and endorses Line 6 guitars and amplification. His current on-stage rig consists of a Variax 700 (replacing the Variax 500 as seen on the cover of Crimes Against Music) played through a PodxtLive.

[edit] Awards

In 1995 Mitch Benn won the Best New Comedian competition at the Glastonbury Festival, and has played there every year since.

In May 2007 he won BBC Radio Merseyside's "Scouseology" award for his work on radio.

In October 2007 he was awarded "Personality of the Year" at the final Cult TV convention

In January 2008, Mitch Benn was listed among the "Scouserati", a list of 365 culturally significant Liverpudlians published by the Liverpool Echo to commemorate the beginning of Liverpool's tenure as the European Capital Of Culture.

[edit] Religious views

Questioned on his religious beliefs, Mitch Benn called himself a "militant agnostic":

“ I'm what you might call a militant agnostic; Rule 1: I don't know if there's a God; Rule 2: Neither do you.

While the existence of a God is essentially imponderable (since he doesn't have to obey any laws of reason or science) it's impossible to 100% rule him out without taking a bit of a leap of faith... However the universe certainly doesn't need a God to function and even if I'm not 100% atheistic I'm increasingly anti-theistic... I think religion's responsible for more suffering than anything else in history and right now it's threatening to destroy us all and/or drag us back to the Dark Ages.

 ”

[edit] External links