Ben Mandelson (born 6 October 1953, in
Everton, Liverpool
Everton is a district in Liverpool, in Merseyside, England, in the Liverpool City Council ward of Everton. It is part of the Liverpool Walton Parliamentary constituency. Historically in Lancashire, at the 2001 Census the population was record ...
, England) is an English
world musician, and also manager and producer.
Punk and new wave years
In the mid-1970s, Mandelson was a student at Bolton Institute of Technology (now
Bolton University
, established = 2004 – gained University Status 1982 – Bolton Institute of Higher Education
, type = Public
, endowment = £160,000 (2009)
, administrative_staff = 700+
, chancellor ...
), where he met
Howard Devoto
Howard Devoto (born Howard Andrew Trafford, 15 March 1952) is a retired English singer and songwriter, who began his career as the frontman for punk rock band Buzzcocks, but then left to form Magazine, one of the first post-punk bands. After M ...
, future
Buzzcocks
Buzzcocks are an English punk rock band formed in Bolton, England in 1976 by singer-songwriter-guitarist Pete Shelley and singer-songwriter Howard Devoto. They are regarded as a seminal influence on the Manchester music scene, the independen ...
and
Magazine
A magazine is a periodical publication, generally published on a regular schedule (often weekly or monthly), containing a variety of content. They are generally financed by advertising, purchase price, prepaid subscriptions, or by a combinatio ...
frontman. When punk emerged, he formed a band called
Amazorblades
Amazorblades were one of the early British punk rock groups, as chronicled in Henrik Poulsen's book '' 77: The Year of Punk and New Wave'', from Brighton, England. They released a single, "Common Truth" c/w "Mess Around" on Chiswick Records. ...
, being the group's guitarist.
In 1981, he joined Howard Devoto's band Magazine, replacing
Robin Simon
Robin Simon (born 12 July 1956) is a British guitarist who was a member of Ultravox, Magazine and Visage.
Biography
Early career
Robin Simon played guitar in a number of local Halifax based bands in the early to mid-1970s. The bands include ...
(who previously replaced a solid member of that band,
John McGeoch
John Alexander McGeoch (25 August 1955 – 4 March 2004) was a Scottish musician and songwriter. He is best known as the guitarist of the rock bands Magazine (1977-1980) and Siouxsie and the Banshees (1980-1982).
He has been described as one o ...
) and playing on their last album ''
Magic, Murder and the Weather''. He is
Jewish
Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...
.
World music years
In 1982 as Hijaz Mustapha, he started playing with
Lu Edmonds
Robert David "Lu" Edmonds (born 9 September 1957) is an English rock and folk musician. He is currently, as of 2018, a vocalist and saz and cümbüş player in the Mekons and the lead guitarist for Public Image Limited. Edmonds reportedly pla ...
a.k.a. Uncle Patrel Mustapha Bin Mustapha, which led to the formation of
3 Mustaphas 3, a band that was active throughout the 1980s and into the 1990s.
He was founding director, in 1994, of the
world music fair
WOMEX
WOMEX (short for Worldwide Music Expo) is an international world music support and development project based in Berlin, whose main event is an exposition held annually in different locations throughout Europe. It integrates a trade fair, showca ...
.
In 2009, together with
Justin Adams
Justin Alexander Adams (born 22 July 1961) is an English guitarist and composer who works in blues and African styles.
Biography
Born in London, the son of a diplomat, Adams spent some of his early childhood growing up in Egypt, before return ...
and, again, Lu Edmonds, Mandelson formed the band Les Triaboliques and released the debut album ''Rivermudtwilight''.
References
External links
Information about Ben Mandelson Ian A. Anderson
Ian A. Anderson (born 26 July 1947, in Weston-super-Mare, England) is an English people, English magazine editor, folk musician and Radio presenter, broadcaster.
Country blues, The Village Thing and "psych folk"
Anderson first performed in h ...
, ''
Folk Roots
''fRoots'' (pronounced "eff-Roots", originally ''Folk Roots'') was a specialist music magazine published in the UK between 1979 and 2019. It specialised in folk and world music, and featured regular compilation downloadable albums, with occa ...
'' No. 213 (Vol. 22 No. 9) March 2001, pp. 44–45, 47, 49.
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mandelson, Ben
1953 births
English male guitarists
Alumni of the University of Bolton
Living people
Magazine (band) members
Musicians from Liverpool
British post-punk musicians
British world music musicians
English record producers
The Mekons members