Music: Ben Ottewell
Brighton resident and armed with a fantastic new album
Back in 1997, after just one gig apparently, a bidding war erupted, with Gomez at the epicentre of it all. After playing to 25 labels, they settled on Hut Records, who then released the debut album, Bring It On. Not only did it go platinum (300,000+ copies in the UK alone), it won the Mercury Music Prize the following year. Such were the beginnings for Gomez and Ben Ottewell, one of three singers and four songwriters in the band. “It was very unexpected, and there was no time to catch your breath,” says Ben, who has lived in Brighton for ten years. “It’s getting a bit tiresome, the curse of the Mercury… But, I don’t think we would still be doing it if it wasn’t for that, it put us somewhere where we never would have been.”
Describing the band’s music as ‘this psych, blues, pop weirdness’, Ben is currently developing a solo career (while Gomez remain on indefinite hiatus) which started with Shapes & Shadows in 2011, with the follow-up Rattlebag currently only available via gigs. “I did one of these Kickstarter campaigns (crowd funding) things to get it done,” says Ben.
“So I got it made, and I’ve spent the last month mailing the CDs and vinyl to all the people who donated. I’m in the process of getting it out for general release. People enjoy getting involved with it; it’s quite transparent, getting updates, little videos from the studio…”
Music has been so de-mythologised anyway, and people appreciate that transparency. At first it feels like you’re begging, but it was the really the only way I could get it together, without going through a record company.
Keeping very much with the Gomez way of writing, Ben teamed up with old friend Sam Genders of Diagrams, and formerly of Tunng. “We grew up together in a small village; for me he’s one of the best lyricists around.
I come up with the guitar parts and we basically bounce ideas around.”
And what of the future? “I’ll just keep on playing, with or without Gomez. I’m pretty much unemployable!”
Komedia, Wedsnesday 23 April, 7.30pm, £12.50
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