Ben Myers
Encyclopedia
Ben Myers is an English
writer.
His first novel The Book Of Fuck, a fictionalised account about a hapless music journalist, was published to underground acclaim in 2004 through Wrecking Ball Press
. Myers claimed it was written in six days "as a joke". It was published in Italian in 2005.
Myers' second novel, Richard: A Novel
, was published by Picador
in October 2010. He recently announced the publication of a new novel Pig Iron
in 2012. His short stories and poems have appeared in numerous anthologies since 1999.
As a teenager Myers began writing for British weekly Melody Maker
. In 1997 he became their staff writer. As of 2009 he has written about literature, music and the arts for a number of publications including Mojo
, The Guardian
, NME
, Alternative Press, Kerrang!
, Plan B
, Arena
, Bizarre
, The Quietus
, Vice
, Shortlist
, Caught By The River
, Classic Rock
, 3:AM Magazine
, Mineshaft and Time Out. In 2011 he published an article about his brief time as an intern at News Of The World
Myers has also written a number of music biographies which have been widely translated. In the US he is published by Disinformation
.
He is a founding member of the Brutalists
, a literary collective including authors Adelle Stripe
and Tony O'Neill
and widely acknowledged as the first literary movement to be launched by social networking sites. From 2003 to 2008 Ben Myers also ran the independently-funded record label collective Captains of Industry
.
He currently lives in Calderdale
, West Yorkshire, England.
Poetry
Non-Fiction / Essays
Music Biography
Anthologies
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
writer.
His first novel The Book Of Fuck, a fictionalised account about a hapless music journalist, was published to underground acclaim in 2004 through Wrecking Ball Press
Wrecking Ball Press
Wrecking Ball Press is a small press poetry & prose publishing company, based in Hull, East Riding of Yorkshire, UK. Wrecking Ball Press was established and is edited by Shane Rhodes; it was born in the back of a café....
. Myers claimed it was written in six days "as a joke". It was published in Italian in 2005.
Myers' second novel, Richard: A Novel
Richard: A Novel
Richard: A Novel is a book by English author and journalist Ben Myers about Richey Edwards, the former rhythm guitarist and co-lyricist of the Welsh alternative rock band Manic Street Preachers. Edwards - who suffered from depression, alcoholism, anorexia and self-harm - disappeared on 1 February...
, was published by Picador
Picador
A picador is one of the pair of horsemen in a Spanish bullfight that jab the bull with a lance. They perform in the tercio de varas which is the first of the three stages in a Spanish bullfight.The picador has three main functions:...
in October 2010. He recently announced the publication of a new novel Pig Iron
Pig iron
Pig iron is the intermediate product of smelting iron ore with a high-carbon fuel such as coke, usually with limestone as a flux. Charcoal and anthracite have also been used as fuel...
in 2012. His short stories and poems have appeared in numerous anthologies since 1999.
As a teenager Myers began writing for British weekly Melody Maker
Melody Maker
Melody Maker, published in the United Kingdom, was, according to its publisher IPC Media, the world's oldest weekly music newspaper. It was founded in 1926 as a magazine targeted at musicians; in 2000 it was merged into "long-standing rival" New Musical Express.-1950s–1960s:Originally the Melody...
. In 1997 he became their staff writer. As of 2009 he has written about literature, music and the arts for a number of publications including Mojo
Mojo (magazine)
MOJO is a popular music magazine published initially by Emap, and since January 2008 by Bauer, monthly in the United Kingdom. Following the success of the magazine Q, publishers Emap were looking for a title which would cater for the burgeoning interest in classic rock music...
, The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
, NME
NME
The New Musical Express is a popular music publication in the United Kingdom, published weekly since March 1952. It started as a music newspaper, and gradually moved toward a magazine format during the 1980s, changing from newsprint in 1998. It was the first British paper to include a singles...
, Alternative Press, Kerrang!
Kerrang!
Kerrang! is a UK-based magazine devoted to rock music published by Bauer Media Group. It was first published on June 6, 1981 as a one-off supplement in the Sounds newspaper...
, Plan B
Plan B (magazine)
Plan B was a monthly music magazine based in London, England. It catered mainly towards independent music but did not discriminate between the relative popularity of the bands it features. Plan B also documented alternative culture such as film, comics, video games, visual art and books. The...
, Arena
Arena (magazine)
Arena was a British monthly men's magazine. The magazine was created in 1986 by Nick Logan, who had started The Face in 1980, to focus on trends in fashion and entertainment. British graphic designer Neville Brody, who had designed The Face, designed Arena's launch appearance.The magazine featured...
, Bizarre
Bizarre (magazine)
Bizarre is a British alternative magazine published from 1997 to the present. It is currently published by Dennis Publishing; it is a sister publication to the Fortean Times.-Content:...
, The Quietus
The Quietus
The Quietus is a British online rock music and pop culture magazine, focusing on arts news, reviews, and features. The site is an editorially independent publication led by John Doran and a group of freelance journalists and critics, some of whom have worked for other media outlets...
, Vice
Vice (magazine)
VICE is a free magazine and media conglomerate founded in Montreal, Quebec and currently based in New York City.Vice is available in 27 countries...
, Shortlist
Shortlist (magazine)
ShortList is a free weekly magazine published in the United Kingdom which launched on 20 September 2007. The magazine has the biggest circulation of any men's lifestyle magazine in Britain with Martin Robinson as its Editor. Mike Soutar, former editorial director of IPC Media, editor of FHM in the...
, Caught By The River
Caught by the River
"Caught by the River" is the third single from Doves' number 1 charting album The Last Broadcast. The single was released on 14 October 2002 in the UK on limited edition CD, CD and 10" vinyl, and charted at #29 on the UK Singles Chart...
, Classic Rock
Classic Rock (magazine)
Classic Rock is a British magazine dedicated to the radio format of classic rock, published by Future Publishing, who are also responsible for its "sister" publication Metal Hammer. Although firmly focusing on key bands from the 1960s through early 1990s, it also includes articles and reviews of...
, 3:AM Magazine
3:AM Magazine
3:AM Magazine is a literary magazine, which was set up as 3ammagazine.com in April 2000 and is edited from Paris. Its editor-in-chief since inception has been Andrew Gallix, a lecturer at the Sorbonne ....
, Mineshaft and Time Out. In 2011 he published an article about his brief time as an intern at News Of The World
News of the World
The News of the World was a national red top newspaper published in the United Kingdom from 1843 to 2011. It was at one time the biggest selling English language newspaper in the world, and at closure still had one of the highest English language circulations...
Myers has also written a number of music biographies which have been widely translated. In the US he is published by Disinformation
Disinfo
The Disinformation Company is a privately held, limited American publishing company that focuses in current affairs titles and seeks to expose disinformation. It is headquartered in New York City, New York...
.
He is a founding member of the Brutalists
Brutalists
Brutalism is a literary movement formed in 2006 by three writers from the north of England , and may have been the first literary movement to be launched via the social networking site Myspace where it announced itself with the following manifesto:"Brutalism calls for writing that touches upon...
, a literary collective including authors Adelle Stripe
Adelle Stripe
Adelle Stripe is a poet from Tadcaster, North Yorkshire. In 2006, alongside Tony O'Neill and Ben Myers she formed possibly the first literary movement spawned via a social networking site, The Brutalists, who the BBC described as a 'group of young writers with a back-to-basics approach to...
and Tony O'Neill
Tony O'Neill
Tony O'Neill is a New York-based author. A one time musician with Kenickie , Marc Almond , The Brian Jonestown Massacre and Kelli Ali , O'Neill is also the author of several books including Digging The Vein 2006, Down and Out on Murder Mile 2008 and Sick City 2010.Digging the Vein was a novel...
and widely acknowledged as the first literary movement to be launched by social networking sites. From 2003 to 2008 Ben Myers also ran the independently-funded record label collective Captains of Industry
Captains of Industry (record label)
The Captains of Industry were an independent record label based in London and Durham, UK. They announced their launch in 2003 "as a self-funded experiment in art and commerce" with a plan to exist for 5 years, and as a result ceased trading while in profit in 2008.They released material by artists...
.
He currently lives in Calderdale
Calderdale
The Metropolitan Borough of Calderdale is a metropolitan borough of West Yorkshire, England, through which the upper part of the River Calder flows, and from which it takes its name...
, West Yorkshire, England.
Works
Fiction- Pig Iron (2012)
- Richard (Picador, late 2010)
- The Book Of Fuck (Wrecking Ball PressWrecking Ball PressWrecking Ball Press is a small press poetry & prose publishing company, based in Hull, East Riding of Yorkshire, UK. Wrecking Ball Press was established and is edited by Shane Rhodes; it was born in the back of a café....
, 2004)
Poetry
- Nowhere Fast (co-written with Tony O'Neill and Adelle Stripe (COI, 2008)
- Spam: Email Inspired Poems (Blackheath, 2008)
- I, Axl: An American Dream (online only, 2008–2009)
Non-Fiction / Essays
- American Heretics: Rebel Voices In Music (Codex, 2002)
Music Biography
- MuseMuse (band)Muse are an English alternative rock band from Teignmouth, Devon, formed in 1994. The band consists of school friends Matthew Bellamy , Christopher Wolstenholme and Dominic Howard...
: Inside the Muscle Museum (IMP 2004 and 2007) - Green DayGreen DayGreen Day is an American punk rock band formed in 1987. The band consists of lead vocalist and guitarist Billie Joe Armstrong, bassist and backing vocalist Mike Dirnt, and drummer Tre Cool...
: American Idiots and the New Punk Explosion (IMP / Disinformation, 2005) - John LydonJohn LydonJohn Joseph Lydon , also known by the former stage name Johnny Rotten, is a singer-songwriter and television presenter, best known as the lead singer of punk rock band the Sex Pistols from 1975 until 1978, and again for various revivals during the 1990s and 2000s...
: The Sex Pistols, Pil and Anti-Celebrity (IMP 2005) - System of a DownSystem of a DownSystem of a Down, also known by the acronym SOAD and often shortened to System, is a rock band from Southern California. The band was formed in 1994. It consists of Serj Tankian , Daron Malakian , Shavo Odadjian and John Dolmayan...
: Right Here In Hollywood (IMP / Disinformation, 2006) - The ClashThe ClashThe Clash were an English punk rock band that formed in 1976 as part of the original wave of British punk. Along with punk, their music incorporated elements of reggae, ska, dub, funk, rap, dance, and rockabilly...
: Rock Retrospectives (2007, with Ray Lowry)
Anthologies
- The Rue Bella (Rue Bella, 1999–2002)
- The Reater #3 Wrecking Ball Press, 1999
- The Reater #4 Wrecking Ball Press, 2000
- The Edgier Waters: Five Years of 3:AM (Snow Books, 2006)
- The Flash (Social Disease, 2007)
- Spam Poetry Anthology (Vertice 1925, 2007)
- 3:AM: London, New York, Paris (Social Disease, 2007)
- Love Hotel City, Edited by Andrew Stevens (Future Fiction, 2009).
- Caught By The River: An Anthology Of Writing About British Rivers (Cassell, 2009)
- Dwang Issue #1 (Tangerine, 2009)
- Dwang Issue #2 (Tangerine, 2009)
- The Beat Anthology, Edited by Sean McGahey, (Blackheath Books, 2010).
External links
- Myers' blog
- Myers, Ben. Green Day : American Idiots & The New Punk Explosion. 1st American ed. New York, NY : Disinformation Co., 2006. ISBN 1-932857-32-X
- Ben Myers' Guardian articles and profile
- Captains Of Industry record label.
- Ben Myers' DrownedinSound articles and profile
- 3:AM magazine: Interview with Ben Myers, August 2004
- Caught in the Crossfire: Interview with Ben Myers
- Scarecrow: Interview with Ben Myers
- Ben Myers on Travis Jeppesen
- Ben Myers and The Brutalist poets, article in The Guardian, 2007
- An interview with Ben Myers (www.everydayyeah.com)
- Ben Myers interview with The Guardian