Ben Ellis, aka Vanguarde, is a one-man band from Worthing who writes all of his music, plays guitars, sings, and occasionally, the keyboard. From writing full-fledged novels to releasing a full-length album, Vanguarde is the artist you need to listen to, today! In an exclusive interview with The Skadoosh, Ben Ellis shared his story.
Who/what inspired you to make music?
I’ve always been creative and had a creative project going on in the background, whether that’s writing or music. I was a bedroom guitarist from about 18 to 27, starting lots but finishing very few songs. Never played live or any open mic nights. I gave up when I moved to the US for work and took up prose writing before moving back to the UK about 3 and a half years later in 2007. I’ve written 3 novels and 3 screenplays. My third novel got published, but by 2019 I had already got my acoustic guitar out of the loft and was mucking around with it as my then 4-year-old son was in the bath. Then about 6 months later the pandemic happened and I saw an ad for The Songwriting Academy on Facebook. I did the 3-day course, then a few months later completed the week-long boot camp and it kicked me up the arse I needed to actually finish songs, and the confidence to share them with other people. I’ve been writing and recording ever since. Finishing a song in about a month is about as satisfying as completing a novel in 2 years, so there’s more frequent pleasure in songwriting!
Why the name Vanguarde?
I wanted ‘internet originality’ (I’ve just made that up by the way) which meant the domain name, social media handle, and Spotify name had to have none or virtually no competition.
I didn’t want to use my name, I wanted to hide behind a band name like Badly Drawn Boy.
I also wanted to go as short as possible, so I got a whole list on my phone and then went through them on a domain name website to see if the domain was available. Then, I searched social media sites and Spotify. Adding the ‘e’ on the end makes it sound kind of French, and it’s easier to find a domain name, there are some thoroughbred misspellings in the band name world; The Beatles, Led Zepplin, UNKLE, Gorillaz.
Here are some of my shortlisted names:
Subatomik
The Sleep
The Real
The Refrain
The Inhibitors
The Unreal
The Distanced
The Decimated
The Dissonance
Black Smoke
The Accelerants
Duplicitous
Death knell (nail)
The Disasters
The Duplicates
The Deceits
The Deterrents
Tell us about your latest album, All Worked Up.
It’s a list of things that have pissed me off, I find incredulous, disappoint me, and have annoyed me over the last few years. Work, government, billionaires complaining about minimum wage, the internet, misinformation, other people being stupid idiots. So all the songs address one of these issues building up to the penultimate song, All Worked Up, where it gets all too much. It’s not a concept album, but I like the way there are the thinnest of storylines if you look hard enough.
Your songwriting is deeply expressive. What themes do you find recurring in your songs?
Thanks. I guess you have to write and perform what you care about. I think ultimately it’s fairness for me. Governments watch nurses and teachers strike rather than pay them fairly, whilst school children and patients suffer for what, a few quid? Corporations will break the bank fighting against unionizing or pay rises, but chuck money away in bonuses and bullshit employee incentive schemes. Millionaires can easily pay way less tax than those on minimum wage. I’m getting all worked up again! The world is unfair so you have to suck it up most of the time, but sometimes there’s people taking the absolute piss.
You have a solid black-and-white theme going on for your artwork. What’s the story with that?
For my first EP, a good friend of mine who’s a graphic designer designed the cover art for all 4 singles, and those were black and white. For the subsequent ones, I stuck with it because I'm no designer so sticking to a simple color scheme meant I’d make fewer mistakes. Color theory is a step too far for me, I know my limits.
What’s one of the greatest challenges you face as an independent musician?
Marketing. I’m only interested in writing, recording, and releasing, and I don’t play live, so the main challenge for me is finding the money for production and marketing. Spending money on production is a pleasure because you get a vastly improved song at the end of it. Spending money on marketing is a bit of a punt because you could spend it on something and get very little in return. You have to keep marketing, whether it’s paid for or doing social media posts for free because there’s so much new music. I don’t break the bank or break my neck over it, as long as I’m trying something once per week, then I’m happy regardless of the results.
What do you really enjoy about being a musician?
The whole creative process is like therapy. Take something that’s bothering you, and work through it by writing a song. I love finding that first musical moment that hooks you in and invites you to think ‘This could be a whole song’. I love coming up with a good opening line. The title and chorus. The chorus melody. Working on guitar solos. For some reason, I absolutely love coming up with the vocal melody line in a bridge (or middle 8). But there’s nothing better than finishing a song, recording the last bit, and then listening to everything fade out. Although, when your producer is putting the finishing touches on it, and it sounds better than you could ever imagine, is pretty special too. I basically love all of it, except the marketing.
What message do you hope the listeners take away from your music?
I’d love for someone to think, “I liked that. I’ll save it and listen to it again."
What are your future plans?
Write, record, and release another album.
I’d also like to get into some co-writes too. I’ve done a couple and they’ve been good fun. They push you into directions you wouldn’t normally go by yourself.
Any word of advice for emerging musicians?
Finish the song you’re writing.
Work on one song at a time until it’s finished.
Don’t worry about trends, write and record whatever floats your boat.
Save some money every month.
Learn how to use a DAW, even just for the basics. I use Garageband, layer up tracks and that’s all. My producer does the rest in Logic. Recording bits on Garageband and then listening to it on a loop whilst trying to add a vocal melody or guitar solo on top was a game-changer for me. Having this control also allows you to experiment; try that weird chord, try that strange falsetto voice, try that bizarre ambient recording, go for it! The delete button cleanses all sins.
Find a good, friendly producer who can help you turn your basic song files into full-blown epics. I found mine on SoundBetter. Find someone local. Listen to other artists the producer has worked with, do you like the recordings? Get your ducks in a row and use a WFH (work for hire) agreement. The producer gets paid upfront for their work, you retain all copyright and songwriting credentials on the song. If you want the producer to do more because you can’t play an instrument, or because the song isn’t finished, then that’ll be different. The more YOU can do, the easier and cheaper it is. I go into a session with the song written and arranged, and all the vocals, keyboard, and guitar parts are recorded so I don’t have to record anything ‘live’ in the studio. It can take me a few hours to nail a guitar solo - I want to be doing that at home, not when I’m paying for a producer to just sit there. Occasionally I’ve done vocals in the studio, but that’s when I had a worse mic than I do now (Aston Origin).
Don’t be scared of putting yourself out there. Send a potential producer a demo and ask them if they can work with it. If they can, how long will it take, do they have their own studio, access to one, or a setup in their house? Can you be there? It’s fun being there, so be there if you can. If not, maybe choose someone else because you’ll learn so much about the post-recording process and little tips to make your next demo even better (and easier for the producer). What do you get (wavs, mp3s, instrumental version, etc), get it all sorted upfront so there are no surprises.
The producers are great. They’re actually musical too! I play and sing everything except bass and drums, my producer adds those. I put drum loops in the demo and my producer replaced it with an original, live-sounding replacement.
If you have a guitar and a laptop, all you really need to invest in is an audio interface and a good mic.
But first, actually finish that song you’re writing.
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