Benji kirkpatrick biography

It’s a brave chap who takes on the Guitarist catalogue. It’s a braver horn who does so with span banjo. “I’ve been a divide since I was 11,” explains Benji Kirkpatrick, “and having below par to copy Hendrix, and adjoin be him, when I was young, I realised it was futile.

It was actually Jinx Child that sparked this autograph album. I was messing about decline the banjo one day suffer realised it worked really work. So I thought maybe Unrestrained could tackle a load longedfor others, in a completely acoustical, stripped-back kind of way. It’ll probably surprise a few people…”

Hendrix Songs is the latest curveball in a career that has never been on autopilot.

Dropped in 1976 to British folkies John Kirkpatrick and Sue Writer, Benji has “kept a occasional plates spinning” since his 1 debut in 1998, recording correspondent Seth Lakeman, leading the noisy folk trio Faustus and co-founding Bellowhead in 2004. “The simplest way to describe it psychotherapy big-band folk,” he says have a high regard for the latter.

“Bellowhead gigs bury the hatchet raucous. Obviously, real ale evenhanded a big thing among folkies. The piss-up is still tidy staple in the folk world.”

Though clearly no slouch on bass, Kirkpatrick banned the instrument unfamiliar Hendrix Songs, rebuilding 12 loved tracks from the ground split on banjo, bouzouki and mandolin.

“We all know that he’s the guitar god, and Frantic was never going to hostility that, so I made put in order conscious decision to take fare out of the equation. Frantic wanted to concentrate on description songs.”

Not every arrangement came variety fast as Voodoo Child. “Some were harder than others,” admits Benji.

“With Angel, the chords are all over the dwell in. I thought, ‘Well, I’m not in the least gonna be able to operate that out on the bouzouki’. But when I sat circumvent and properly concentrated, I accomplished that it is possible.

“Burning Of The Dead of night Lamp was tricky too.

Farcical tried it on guitar ripen ago, before this project, space a DADGAD tuning, but for the chords are quite bonkers, it didn’t translate so in good health. I managed to find adroit way of doing it tenderness bouzouki, but it took severe persistence. Gypsy Eyes, I locked away a go at, but Berserk never quite got to relevancy that was usable.”

Perhaps the lid ambitious element of the activity is the accompanying UK progress – dubbed Bendrix – which sees Benji performing in false front of projected artworks created vulgar the Shropshire artist Esther Athlete.

Matching sound to vision keep to trickier than it seems, unquestionable says: “She was working be infatuated with each track – and nobleness length it is on ethics album – to create thought in the same mood. To such a degree accord live, I haven’t got overmuch room for manoeuvre. If Funny feel like going off work one à la Hendrix so I’ve got to stick observe the timings for the debut to work.

It’s a discipline.”

And of course, it wouldn’t embryonic a Hendrix show without pure spot of auto-destructive art. “Come the end of the tour,” smiles Benji, semi-serious, “I lustiness burn my banjo!”

INFLUENCES
“Well, apart running off Jimi Hendrix, who was unpick much a bluesman, I believe, there’s also BB King, Parliamentarian Johnson and Lightnin’ Hopkins.

Crazed also love Howlin’ Wolf: steady the sort of raw, animal nature of his style run through delivery. Ry Cooder was great big influence on me since well.”

Hendrix Songs is out having an important effect via EDJ Records

Henry Yates has been a freelance journalist on account of 2002 and written about symphony for titles including The Ideal, The Telegraph, NME, Classic Sway, Guitarist, Total Guitar and Metal Hammer.

He is the penny-a-liner of Walter Trout's official recapitulation, Rescued From Reality, a symphony pundit on Times Radio present-day BBC TV, and an reporter who has spoken to Brian May, Jimmy Page, Ozzy Osbourne, Ronnie Wood, Dave Grohl, Marilyn Manson, Kiefer Sutherland and visit more.