But it wasn't until he was seven-and-a-half, when he shocked onlookers with a perfect rendition of Bridge Over Troubled Water at the International Stoke on Trent Folk Festival, that his fate as a performing artist was sealed. Prizes soon flooded in from such far-reaching institutions as the Aural Intercourse Research Laboratory and the Deaf-Blind Philanthropists League, and audiences packed out small venues to hear him weave sweet sonorities from a range of light industrial equipment.

But the Gods had more in store for young Ben, and while walking in the woods one afternoon he came across a mystical spirit who gave him the guidance he dearly needed. The spirit usually shared its wisdom through the medium of mime, but in this rare instance it extended its generosity and presented Ben with a pair of enchanted golden cufflinks. Wearing these cufflinks, Ben discovered that he could harness his previously uncontrollable powers, channelling them through the intensity of the power chord, the fuzz pedal and the lazily performed riff. "Finally the world will be mine, all mine," he laughed, but in a caring, altruistic kind of a way.

Today Ben has little time for so-called popular music — industrial or otherwise — resorting instead to the works of the German modernists to find inspiration for his 'street' compositions. However, he cares wholeheartedly for his audience, whatever route they have taken to find themselves at the doors to his harmonious kingdom.