Words by Art Jefferson
Photos courtesy of Benin City
These days, eclecticism will either be joyously celebrated or unsparingly bashed, depending on the presenter. It takes a certain level of courage to create art from the heart and not by hopeful acceptability, or fear of critique. Through honesty and a strong love of music, Benin City has been able to incorporate a wide array of sounds without being unnecessarily cavalier but based more on purpose.
Named after the Edo State capitol in Nigeria, and consisting of vocalist Joshua Idehen, saxophone/synth player Tom Leaper and drummer Theo Buckingham, Benin City’s multifariousness extends to each member’s individual contribution to the music scene around London. Idehen has been a fixture on the UK spoken word circuit since the mid-2000s, creating the group A Poem Inbetween People, as well as the popular poetry night and brand Poejazzi. He has recorded with producer LV, not to mention his work has been published in an anthology collection with the legendary Linton Kwesi Johnson. Teacher and performer Theo Buckingham has played with different acts including Groove Warriors and IOTA Group. Having studied at the Belfast School of Music and the prestigious Brit School, the drummer is also endorsed by the Sonor Drums. Multi-instrumentalist and composer Tom Leaper has planted his seeds in the London jazz scene, as well as worked with various Hip-Hop artists in the city. The musician’s forté also includes flute and samples. All three continue to remain active – working on multiple music projects throughout England.
Having captivated listeners and critics in 2012 with their single “Accelerate” and the experimental electronica track “Baby”, Benin City went no holds barred with their 2013 kwaito fused tune “Faithless”. The impressive and detailed narrative of a man’s conflict with his own insanity, opened the door for their debut album “Fires In The Park” – released on Audio Doughnuts. The record was their personal space, thoroughly displaying the musicality of the band as jazz, funk, indie, dub, Hip-Hop and more, were carefully composed and arranged – capturing particular moods of each topic. Benin City has been critically praised and supported by the likes of The Huffington Post and Q Magazine, just to name a few.
Just like the city of London itself, Benin City’s beauty lie in the band’s diversity and their constant expansion of that very manifoldness.
AJ-To start, you have strong ties to the London spoken word scene going back with A Poem Inbetween People and promoting various events. Do you remember the first piece that you wrote and at what point did you know that you were going to be a performer using the medium of poetry.
Joshua-The first piece I wrote was a rip off of Dizzee Rascal’s vexed; I’d seen it at the end of the “I Love You” video on Channel U. It was my entry to grime.
And as for the second question, “This is London, Part 1”, with Musa Okwonga. We’d started A Poem Inbetween People with several people. Our first rehearsal was an alley cat party: very disorganized, not very rehearsal-ly. The second, only Musa turned up. At the time I was seriously inspired by dan le sac Vs Scroobius Pip’s “Thou Shalt Always Kill”. I got my brother to sample “African Payback” for an instrumental and, poor Musa; I made him write a verse that day to go with mine. Our first gig was supporting Razorlight. We weren’t very good, but it was very, very fun.
AJ-With the name Benin City, I would imagine that your roots are in Edo State. Is that the case? Also talk about the cultural significance of Nigeria that you include when creating music with the band.
Joshua-My parents are from Benin City, yes. In terms of creating music, nothing conscious I have to say. I may be from Nigeria, but 2/3rds of the band (Theo Buckingham and Tom Leaper) are Brit-born and raised, as is the producer (Marc Pell) and we are all pretty much engrained in London and absorb music from wherever excites us. “Faithless” started out from too much kwaito, “This is London Part 2” wears it’s acid jazz beginnings on its sleeve and “Baby” was us waving at James Blake/Grizzly Bear.
AJ-While all three of you in the group are accomplished artists in your own right, when did you decide to come together to form Benin City?
Joshua-Around 2010, I met Theo in a squat party. He was playing his drums. I ran in front of him and spat some bars on the spur of the moment. We got talking; a week later we were in a studio planning to become the first London drum/rap band. Theo suggested it may be a better idea if we got someone who could, you know, arrange songs beyond ‘Yo that’s a good drum beat, yo,’ and I was obsessed with sax. A phone call later and Tom’s been following us around for close to three years.
Tom-Before Benin City I was predominantly a jazz player but enjoyed playing all kinds of music – soul, funk, contemporary, classical, etc. When I joined the band I was really excited to work with the guys on something new. I’d worked with live hip-hop acts before but nothing where I got creative input. Since then our sound has developed and focused although we’re still pretty eclectic. Our record is a real melding of all our influences. It’s a true reflection of all of us.
AJ-One of the things that I truly love about the new album “Fires in the Park” is that, while the sound isn’t subjected to any particular genre, the arrangements and compositions are extremely well fitting without being cluttered or overly experimental without purpose. You all have executed the music beautifully. How easy or difficult is it to try to remain musically boundless without going too far off of the deep end?
Joshua-Firstly thanks. Secondly, I think it’s one part hard work, one part all of us coming from different musical spheres, one part honing down influences as best as we could into one single list of ‘songs we are inspired by’ and it as a foundation, to build our album on. It’s also one part trying everything, every idea, no matter how stupid it sounds, one part Marc Pell. That’s a lot of parts! Oh shit, there’s one more. One part accepting we could not stick to a genre/tone no matter how hard we tried.
Tom-The “list” was really important. Musically, if you pick the right notes, you can really say a lot with very little. We used to be a very rootsy sounding outfit of live horns, bass and drums where we needed to describe sometimes complex harmony with just 3 pitches. Although we’ve ramped up the arrangements since then with synths, on a lot of the tunes, that thinking still remains. “This Is London, Pt. 2” is an exception though!
AJ-Talk about the lyrics to your single “Faithless” because it can be interpreted as a person beginning to slowly lose his mind to the point of insanity. What was the inspiration behind the story of the song?
Joshua-Sugar Ray Robinson (always get him confused with Leonard). I’d seen a documentary about him and his life after boxing, which was really saddening at the time – seeing a man work through such a brutal sport to the top and come out damaged and empty handed at the end. The line “a man and his madness go toe to toe” caught me while I was watching one of his ill-fated comebacks. I tied it in to my own fears and frustrations and built a narrative out.
AJ-In the past, I’ve felt that in the UK, emcees were somewhat put into a tricky situation because, they were either placed in the “UK Hip-Hop” category that was then measured against US standards or they were in UK genres such as jungle, garage and then grime, which for the longest, were strictly subjected to a UK market – with a few exceptions such as those in the Bristol scene. With everyone around the world now open to a melting pot of sounds, do you think it is easier nowadays for a group like Benin City to reach the masses now because of the changes of public acceptability, irrelevant of genre?
Joshua-Easier? I wouldn’t know what it was like in the past. It’s never easy when you are trying to do something new on a shoelace budget. I’m pretty certain Dizzee, Ghostpoet, Roots Manuva and even The Streets all faced some sort of difficulty because they made something apart from the crowd in their own way; something that until enough people said was an advantage, everyone had suggested was a flaw. I’m not comparing myself to that lot (though if you could do the comparing then it would seem genuine and we’d love you ta J) but living in this post-everything day and age has its perks and cons. We’re privileged for every fan we got and smiled with every person who didn’t get us and we’re still trying to get ourselves out there at the moment. Long story short: can’t really tell.
Tom-If you can’t slap a label on the music, that scares people. They need a genre associated with it to form their expectations. You need a label to get it on radio, to get a review, to get it in stores. I think people are coming around though. What was once our greatest weakness is slowly becoming a strength. People are learning to open their ears first and not worry about what box they can put us in.
AJ-There is a great piece on the new album that paints a personal picture of London. With all the ups and downs, good and bad, beautiful and ugly aspects of the city, how does the environment of London play a factor in your creativity?
Joshua-Well, I’ve written about London city a few times now. Plus, Tom lived in Brixton, where we did most of the production. The travel every morning from Camden to Brixton by bus – with Theo coming in from Morden (we call it ‘Mordor’ ‘cause we are bare creative like that)- is a buffet of inspiration. Not only do you get to see the landscape morph before your very eyes from the comfort of your window seat, but something about early morning/late night London brings out the odd in people. By the time I got to Brixton, I had a mouthful of ideas. One time I got an idea for a melody from hearing a ringtone go off on the top 135.
Tom-We all live in different parts of London and rehearsed all over: Hackney, Old Street, Brixton, Croydon, London Bridge, New Cross. We all know what it is to be creative people living and working in London. It’s the vibrancy of the culture here; the different scenes. Also, the hardship that comes from making a living from doing what you love. I think a lot of people can relate to the duality of London in their own way; socially, culturally, financially…
AJ-Finally, you have been championed by the likes of influential people such XFM’s John Kennedy down to media outlets like the Huffington Post and Q Magazine. What’s coming up next for the group?
Joshua-Ah, there’s this amazing interview with a top online mag called Reflections of Light on an Object going Up and Up coming out soon that we are really looking forward to. Well safe, them folks!
Tom-We’re excited about gigging the album some more. Bringing it to the people! I think the album has some steam left in it yet.
Benin City ‘Fires In The Park’ is out now on Audio Doughnuts.
http://www.wearebenincity.com/
https://twitter.com/wearebenincity
https://www.facebook.com/BeninCity
http://soundcloud.com/benin-city
http://audiodoughnuts.com/