Michael "Mike" Bishop (born September 7, 1968) is an American bassist and vocalist and a member of the heavy metal band

GWAR Gwar, often stylized as GWAR, is an American heavy metal band formed in Richmond, Virginia in 1984, composed of and operated by a frequently rotating line-up of musicians, artists and filmmakers collectively known as Slave Pit Inc. After th ...

Life and career

He attended Thomas Dale High School in

Chester, Virginia Chester is a census-designated place (CDP) in Chesterfield County, Virginia, United States. Per the 2020 census, the population was 23,414. History Chester's original "downtown" was a stop which was an intersection of the Richmond and Peters ...

. Most notably, he was the bass guitarist and, after a 20-year hiatus, is currently the lead vocalist for the American heavy metal band

Gwar Gwar, often stylized as GWAR, is an American heavy metal band formed in Richmond, Virginia in 1984, composed of and operated by a frequently rotating line-up of musicians, artists and filmmakers collectively known as Slave Pit Inc. After th ...

. Bishop's first band was the Hopewell, VA-based hardcore outfit The Guilty. As a member of Gwar, he was the first to play the role of "

Beefcake the Mighty Beefcake the Mighty is the bassist of the heavy metal band Gwar. He appears as a stout (hence his name) humanoid girded in Roman-style armor. He is usually portrayed wielding either an oversized Gladius sword or a large battle-axe. Background ...

". The name of Beefcake was taken from Bishop's nickname during his punk years. Bishop was the bassist and lead vocalist for

Kepone Chlordecone, better known in the United States under the brand name Kepone, is an organochlorine compound and a colourless solid. It is an obsolete insecticide, now prohibited in the western world, but only after many thousands of tonnes had be ...

from 1991 through the band's breakup in 1997. All three members of Kepone later performed together again as American Grizzly until that band's breakup in 2005. He played with the Misery Brothers, a country/soul band local to Charlottesville, Virginia from 2007 to 2009. Bishop earned a Ph.D. in music from UVA in 2012 and taught writing and topics in American music history at the university, specializing in popular music ethnography and performance studies. Since 2011, Kepone has reunited to play occasional shows, although it remains unknown if the band will create any new music. Outside of performing, Bishop: * teaches undergraduate courses in American music history and writing at the University of Virginia; * is the Learning Strategist and Lead Technical Writer at education technology company Interfolio In August 2014, Bishop, portraying the character,

Blothar Blöthar the Berserker is the current lead vocalist and occasional bassist in the heavy metal band Gwar. He appears as a stout, pigface, horned goblin. During Gwar's appearance at the 2014 Chicago Riot Fest, the character debuted udders that ...

, became the lead vocalist for Gwar, replacing

Dave Brockie David Murray Brockie (August 30, 1963 – March 23, 2014) was a Canadian-American musician, who was the lead vocalist of the heavy metal band Gwar, in which he performed as Oderus Urungus. He performed as a bassist and lead singer in the b ...

due to Brockie's death of a heroin overdose on March 23, 2014. Brockie had portrayed the role of Oderus Urungus since the band's 1984 inception.

Discography

;Gwar *''

Hell-O ''Hell-O!'' is the debut album by Gwar. The album was released on September 11, 1988, on Shimmy Disc Records. Gwar's angle on the album is that of a morbid punk band (a la The Mentors, The Misfits, Butthole Surfers) obsessed with debauche ...

'' (1988) *'' Scumdogs of the Universe'' (1990) *'' America Must Be Destroyed'' (1992) *'' This Toilet Earth'' (1994) *'' We Kill Everything'' (1999) * '' The Blood of Gods'' (2017) * '' The New Dark Ages'' (2022) ;Kepone *''Ugly Dance'' (1994) *'' Skin'' (1995) *''Kepone'' (1997)

References

1968 births American rock bass guitarists American male bass guitarists American rock singers American industrial musicians Living people Metal Blade Records artists Pigface members Quarterstick Records artists 20th-century American bass guitarists 20th-century American male musicians {{US-bass-guitarist-stub