Plan B | Half Of A Double Album What is now the control room at The Sanctuary was set up as the live room during the recording of The Defamation Of Strickland Banks. Concerned about moving to a new musical style without alienating his existing fans, Ben Drew hit upon an ambitious solution. "I always said I wanted to do what I call a film for the blind, which is taking what I do in hip‑hop with storytelling, but making a whole album about one story, where all the songs are different scenes. And I figured if I tell a story about a soul singer, and devise this concept, it means I can do it 50 percent soul, which will be his story through his eyes, and 50 percent hip‑hop, which will be Plan B narrating what's happening to him. "So we set out to make a soul record and a hip‑hop record. The hip‑hop was very reminiscent of the first record: very dark, almost sample‑based — except that we would create the samples and then resample them and make them sound like we'd lifted them from somewhere.

So the way we made the hip‑hop record was very much one way, and the soul record was very much another way, and the reason I felt comfortable making the soul record was that I knew that this hip‑hop record, in my head, was going to come out at the same time. I was going to release them as a double‑disc CD.” At this point, however, Drew's record label, 679 Recordings, threw a spanner in the works. "Sometimes the label have come to me with ideas and I've told them to fuck off because they weren't right. Sometimes they have been right, and one of the things they wanted to do was split the record and just promote The Defamation Of Strickland Banks, and leave [the hip‑hop album] The Ballad Of Belmarsh for me. They said 'You can take full ownership of it and do what you want with it, we can't market this record. We can't do the best job with the hip‑hop record.

You saw how the way you make hip‑hop on your first record is not suited to the way we do things.' And I just thought 'Cool, if you're saying I can take full ownership of that record, then let's do this.' And in hindsight, the amount of work we had to put in to make The Defamation... as good as it is — mixing, getting the look right, the suits, doing the videos, all that shit — it was the best decision to make.” The Long & The Short The bulk of the material on The Defamation Of Strickland Banks was recorded by David McEwan and Eric Appapoulay (who also played bass on the album) at their own studio in South London, The Sanctuary. Partly because they were simultaneously working on its hip‑hop counterpart, the production process took more than two years. However, the 'sound' of the album was defined in a day thanks to producer Paul Epworth, who had worked on the first Plan B record. His knowledge of retro production techniques yielded a demo recording of 'Writing On The Wall' that made it to the album almost unaltered. "Paul gave us the sound really, for this record,” acknowledges Ben Drew.

"When I gave him 'Writing On The Wall' it was a lot slower in tempo, and had a kind of reggae beat to it, and it was in a lower key. The first time I played it to him I didn't have the track with me, so I just played it to him in his studio on a guitar. And straight away he said 'That needs to be in a higher key, you need to speed it up.' So I went back, recorded the guitar in here, sped it up, and sung the vocal, sent him the parts, and then he sat in the studio with Jodi [Milliner, Plan B's live bassist] and Tom, our guitarist, and he had a little drum kit in there. I left them all day, and I came back six hours later, and the way 'Writing On The Wall' sounds like now is basically how it sounded when I walked in there.” Epworth takes up the story: Paul Epworth's work on 'Writing On The Wall' gave the team a sonic template to work towards in later sessions. "'Writing On The Wall' came about after Ben told me he had 'this song' and he didn't know what to do with it.

The strength of Ben's songwriting was the big surprise for me. When we worked on the last record, it was clear what an amazing voice he had, but the major difference was he'd sung a lot of other people's hooks. The moment he played me the song I knew it was a killer track, but needed a dirty authenticity to it to stop it coming off as a straight pastiche. "Ben came to my little studio in West London and we figured out a tempo and a groove with which to do the track justice. Ben went away and recorded some parts in an effort to provide parts with which we could easily work, but when he returned I decided it was important to record the track mostly from scratch. "Bearing in mind that this was just a demo intended for record company ears only, I played drums on the track. We used a [AKG] 414 on the kick drum, an AKG D19 overhead, a Rode Classic on the snare and a cheap Chinese U47 copy as an ambient mic hanging from my ceiling. The Rode Classic was patched into a Universal Audio 6176 with a bit of compression and the rest used the mic amps on my Apogee Ensemble.

Recently I've been using Apulsoft's Aptrigga on all my drums. It's genius and means you can get some interesting grooves from old loops using new sounds. In this case I used it to augment the drum sounds, using a kick and snare from my sample library, giving the kick and snare extra punch and weight. "I'm in love with the [Universal Audio] UAD2 cards, and I've used the RE201 and SPL Transient Designer on most of my drums for ages. I love the Logic Overdrive [plug‑in] on most everything, as it adds a tape‑like distortion to sounds and you can EQ into it for coloration and use the tone as a 'bias' control. I bussed up the drums through Izotope Vinyl for a bit of degradation and then compressed through a UA 1176 plug‑in, leaving the Aptrigga sounds out of the bus so as not to flatten the overall mix out. "Ben called in his band, starting with bass, and we laid down very specific parts in an real old‑school fashion, using 'C' shapes on the rhythm guitar and high stabs to back the snare.

I've studied over the years how these older musical arrangements were put together, and it's as key to the authenticity as not double‑tracking. To double‑track would mean it dated the record to the availability of the available equipment, just as a digital reverb or sampler dates something as post-1980 (ish). "It was mixed in Logic on a Macbook Pro — always the way these days. I balanced the original lead vocal through a [UAD] Pultec Pro and Fairchild into yet another UAD EMT 140 plate, using a little 60ms tape delay with no feedback to give it some space off the vocal, and put varying amounts of everything else into the RE201 plug-in, including bass guitar. We added some MIDI strings and brass and used one of my string samples played in on the [Akai] MPC2500 to lift the chorus, put an SSL bus compressor over the master, a Logic Adaptive limiter, and bounced it. "All in all, it took about five hours. Little did we realise the final version would hardly deviate...” Painstaking The studio's TL Audio M4 Tubetracker is the main route by which signals arrive in Logic.

Compression and gating is often applied at source using the SSL X‑Rack. Budgets and schedules meant that there was limited scope for Paul Epworth to work on other tracks, so using 'Writing On The Wall' as their touchstone, Drew, McEwan and Appapoulay began work on the rest of the material. Problem was, much of the material was unfinished, as David McEwan explains. "We'd get the band in and Ben would almost narrate it. He'd go 'Right, chorus now. This has to happen here,' and then we'd get a take that was the structure of the tune. And then he'd do a horn line and go 'Ba da da daa' or whatever, and that was how we chopped everything together.” "I was forever saying 'This needs to be sped up, we need to change the key of this,'” adds Ben Drew. "We'd put down a whole backing track and then I'd realise it wasn't in a comfortable key, but I'd love the way the parts were recorded, so I'd try to make them slow the track down or speed it up, or change the key, which was a bit of a nightmare.

But there's something to be said about demo‑itis — a lot of what we did was done by feeling. When we first started we were just working with Eric, and I loved the mixes. Obviously, I'm sure they were still 40 percent away from being finished, but nothing was jumping out, everything was at a nice level and coherent, and you could really hear the vibe. It was less about hearing than about feeling, and that's why I used to get very attached to the demos. And that's why a lot of the stuff that we've done was straight from the demos: it was the first version we'd done, and we just added on top. "I get pretty 'German' about things. If one EQ changes on one vocal, it knocks everything out of balance for me. I don't know what to do with the buttons, so it must be a nightmare for him, because sometimes I'm explaining things to him with weird sign language, and he has to try and work out that means.

"The songs were written on my acoustic guitar without being influenced by any other artist — it was naturally what was coming out from me when I was writing the songs — but once we'd recorded a vocal and a guitar, then we'd look back at older records. 'Hard Times' we thought sounded a bit like Marvin Gaye, so when it came to putting a string arrangement on, we'd go and listen to old Marvin Gaye records, or Al Green, and just listen to the ingredients and find out what the tracks needed.” Multi‑tasking Laying down the basic tracks posed stiff demands of Eric Appapoulay, who was simultaneously engineering, playing bass, and trying to make sense of Ben's instructions. "It was just Ben and myself and Richard and Tom. We would be in the room together, Ben'd be on his acoustic guitar in that little doorway bit with his mic, setting down the guides. I had guitar in the Fender Twin, drums just clean, and then the bass I put through the LA2A, because I love the way it warms it up.

Then we were using the bass amp as well, because we had the whole band in one room — the control room was in the drum room that you see now — so we were jamming like in a rehearsal. It had a band feeling, like Motown, where they just used to sit in one room and record together. That was the idea with this place, I wanted the whole band to feel like it was a gig scenario, playing as a band. "So [it was] kind of pretty much natural. Ben would come in with an idea, we'd put about three songs down a day, and I was engineering, I was in the control room with the bass. We pretty much leave the drums ready to go, so if an idea's ready, we just hit record and the mics are ready to go. The kit doesn't move, the mics don't move. So he'd be 'I've got three ideas.' I was breaking a sweat — what are the notes? 'Don't worry about that, we'll do it later!' — and jam it through once. I'd always record everything, because sometimes when you're searching for the notes you get the best ideas.

So it was a really quick turnaround on recording the songs.” Because The Sanctuary's kit is set up to be ready for any eventuality, it's surrounded by no fewer than 16 microphones. The Sanctuary drum kit is permanently set up with 16 mics ready to go. All of these were recorded, on the basis that they didn't have to be used at the mix, where a more retro sound was preferred. David McEwan describes the setup: "There's a toughness in the snare that you can only really get with close‑miking. We'll always try and make the snare as fat as possible, because it's easier to add ambience than take it away. We've got four toms, we've got kick, snare top/bottom, snare two, hi‑hats, stereo room mics, not that it's a very big room. We have an NS10 [woofer] set up [to mic the bass drum]; that was always combined with a dynamic. We've got the Audio‑Technica now but I think we were using the D112.” "I got that from Jack Joseph Puig,” adds Eric Appapoulay.

"I worked with him five years ago on a Daniel Bedingfield album and he had more mics than we've got, and I was like 'What's all this?' He showed me the combinations, and when I got home I found this studio space and thought 'I want to try that.' So we went nuts and put mics everywhere. We haven't got as nice mics as he has, but you know...” The bulk of Ben's vocals, meanwhile, were recorded using an Audio‑Technica stage condenser, which seemed to provide an appropriately edgy sound. A humble Audio‑Technica Artist Series stage mic provided the ideal vocal sound. "I'm sure we had spoken about getting a really old‑school mic, but I don't think we needed to,” says Ben Drew. "It was hot, but not too hot when I'd hear it back. It felt like it had that tiniest little bit of distortion in it as soon as you'd record, or you could bring that out in it with EQ.

Once you'd added the EQ and put those UAD plug‑ins on it, there was something about it: it sounded kinda warm and old.” "A lot of the time that went straight into the TL [Audio M4 mixer],” adds David. "Sometimes I'd use the Chandler Germanium pre. I'd use the Germanium when he was rapping. I don't know why: it sounded right once and then I just kept on going back to the Germanium for that, it's got attitude.” Box Clever "This album was predominantly done in the box,” explains David McEwan. "We had all these big ideas about going back out to the desk, but just time and the fact that we were moving from track to track quite a lot didn't really allow that process. But we were getting the sound that was wanted out of output one and two, you know.” Impressed with the results that Paul Epworth was getting from his UAD plug‑ins, David and Eric quickly decided that what their particular box needed was its own UAD card. "UAD was a big step,” says David.

"I kind of went 'All right, we need to get a UAD and check it out.' And there it was, with the Roland Space Echo and the plates and the 1176s, there was the sound we were after. And then it was just trying to get the best out of them. But the UAD was definitely a giant step.” Other plug‑ins that saw a lot of use included the Wave Arts Multiband ("I use it mainly on the drum busses but I also like to use it on anything that gets too harsh — the odd skank guitar line or crunchy room mics.It keeps things warm and doesn't use loads of processing”) and Trackplug ("A brilliant quick hit on the kick, snares and toms as it has an EQ, gate and two compressors ready to roll and it sounds great to me”), and Izotope's Ozone: "I know it was designed as a mastering tool, but I just love being able to solo the area of EQ you're trying to find by holding Alt and clicking. It's just a fantastic surgical EQ, I bypass all the other stuff and just use the EQ.

"We did spend a lot of time making things sound old, and so did Mark [Rankin, who mixed most of the album] and Paul. Like, we used Izotope Vinyl on subgroups of strings, or guitars, or brass. We'd insert it on anything that needed to sound a bit decrepit.” "You have to be careful with it,” warns Ben. "Because when you distort something and then put reverb on it, you get this really high EQ. You had to be careful with that. Even some of the stuff that Paul's mixed, on the record it sounds perfect, but when we were putting the parts through a PA at live gigs, we'd get this really weird top‑end that was not very nice, so we've had to go back to these guys and to Paul and get parts clean.” Mixing Mark Rankin mixed the bulk of the album, mostly within his Pro Tools system. After much overdubbing, reworking and agonising, the songs were eventually handed over to Mark Rankin to mix. Rankin had engineered the three Paul Epworth‑produced tracks on the album, so was the obvious choice.

"Motown was the brief, really,” begins Mark, "but not in the conventional, obvious sense. It was more the recognition that those mixes are really powerful, and that that power is achieved by a very particular balance. The bass really drives the tracks, and of course, trying to get a similar vibe to their echo chambers was quite important. A lot of it was actually achieved using the reverb from a Roland Chorus Echo, which has such a great character. "They had been recorded in Logic, so all the files were bounced from there. We had the Logic sessions to refer back to, but it was a case of importing the files into Pro Tools and starting from scratch — which I kind of prefer, as it's like working from a clean slate. "After owning my own MCI desk for some years, I find I'm mixing in the box most of the time now, often in conjunction with a Neve sidecar that I have. My training was analogue‑based, so I always gravitate toward that sort of vintage sound. In practice, this means that when I'm mixing just in Tools, I use quite a lot of distortion to give things guts.

"I have EAR 660 limiters which I use for vocals and bass, and a pair of old Pye limiters, which are really vibey when you need that punch. Although, alongside that I'll use Sugar Bytes' Vogue, which is an amazing channel strip — the plate is second to none — and also the Massey Limiters, which are really good. "From a practical point of view, the first thing I do is get all the faders up and see what everything is doing. I'll then basically start submixing groups like drums, bass and so on, and treating those while still having everything else in to keep an eye on the bigger picture. I'll usually have a mult of the drum bus, heavily compressed and EQ'ed, tucked in there for a bit of excitement, and then a couple of delays and a short and a long plate. "The album was recorded over quite a long period and in different studios, so naturally all the tracks differed to some degree. There was a general consistency with regards to the quantity of tracks for instruments when they had been recorded at David and Eric's studio, but we did have some songs with 40 channels of strings and similar numbers of BVs.

They were all really layered, so I would spend a while listening through everything and submixing down into key stems. The strings would then have gone through something like Izotope Vinyl (I can see the colour draining from the string arranger's face!) to give them an older sound.” A sonic highlight of the album is the bass sound. "As I mentioned previously, trying to emulate the Motown sound meant that a lot of time was spent trying to get the bass sound just right. I pretty much just used the DIs, re‑amping them through an old Vortexian PA head that I have running into a vintage Wharfedale 12‑inch bass cab. It's such a unique sound, which I've probably used on 90 percent of the recordings I've done. That was miked with an Altec 639 ribbon mic through a Telefunken V76 preamp, then into the EAR 660 limiter and then Pro Tools' Lo‑Fi distortion. Sometimes bringing the sample rate down really gives the bass nice presence, so I also used that to achieve what I wanted.” Unsurprisingly, Rankin chose to prune the selection of drum mics to a more manageable quotient at the mix.

"There were quite a few options, but I gravitated toward using as few as possible. When we recorded 'Stay Too Long' [one of the other Epworth/Rankin tracks on the album], we had the overheads in the Glyn Johns position — one over the snare, panned right, and one equidistant by the floor tom, panned left, plus kick, snare, a mic in front of the kit smashed through a compressor and one distant ambient mic. When it came to mixing the other tracks I was looking for a similar vibe, so I'd use the kick and snare, both augmented with a choice sample, but then probably no other close mics, just an overhead or two and maybe an ambient mic. These would have gone through the Pye, and then the whole kit bussed and compressed and then distorted using Lo‑Fi or Izotope Vinyl, and there would maybe be a mult compressed and EQ'ed heavily. "Bus compression was a major factor in the overall sound.

I alternated between the SSL, the Chandler Zener and a Manley Vari‑Mu — and then the Massey L2007 [limiter plug‑in].” As Ben had become so attached to many of the demo mixes, the final mixing process involved a fair amount of recalls. "A lot of the sounds we wanted [Mark] to mix were based on the plug‑ins we were using throughout the process, so we made stems, and sometimes we did them without effects, sometimes with,” says David McEwan. "We gave him as many options as we thought we might like, but quite often Ben would say 'Listen, I need the sound of that kit, or that guitar — can you do me that again?' We ended up mixing five of the tracks back at The Sanctuary anyway.” In the end, though, the persistence of everyone involved paid off, with the delivery of an album that both struck a chord with the public and realised Ben Drew's vision. "We wanted to have a nod to the old school,” he concludes, "but it had to have my sound, which sounded like nothing else. Yeah, it's soul. Soul's been done before.

In interviews people go 'Don't you think you're jumping on the Amy Winehouse bandwagon?' and I have to stop and go 'What, did she invent soul music?' Bollocks! She reinvented it in her own way. And that's what I'm doing.” Plan B artist page Plan B Benjamin Paul Ballance-Drew (born 22 October 1983), primarily known as Plan B or Ben Drew is an English rapper, singer-songwriter, actor and film director from London. Plan B first emerged as a hip hop artist releasing his critically acclaimed debut album Who Needs Actions When You Got Words in 2006. His second studio album, The Defamation of Strickland Banks (2010), was a soul record and went straight to number one on the UK Albums Chart. He has also collaborated with other artists such as Chase & Status most notably on the top ten single "End Credits" (2009). Drew has also had a successful film career as an actor, with roles in Adulthood (2008), Harry Brown (2009), 4.3.2.1 (2010) and The Sweeney (2012).

In 2012, Drew released the film Ill Manors, which he had written and directed, and Plan B also released an accompanying soundtrack album which became his second number one album. Early life edit: Drew was born and brought up in London. His mother worked for a local authority and his father, Paul Ballance, played in a punk band, the Warm Jets, in the 1970s. Drew was five months old when his father walked out and six years old when he "disappeared completely". Growing up, he felt outcast from much of society: We weren't working class but we weren't middle class, we were in the void in-between. I've always felt like a social outcast. --Plan B, The Telegraph (15 June 2006) From 11, Drew attended Anglo European School in Ingatestone, Essex, was later transferred to Tom Hood Schoolwhich is now Buxton all through learning community, a specialist Science College in Leytonstone, before being expelled and sent to Tunmarsh Pupil Referral Unit in Newham, for children unable to attend mainstream school. He finally left school with three GCSEs.

He taught himself how to play guitar at 14, first playing Blur and Oasis with friends, then going on to write his own R&B love songs. At 18, feeling uncomfortable with R&B, he turned towards rap and hip hop music and wrote "Kidz", inspired by the murder of Damilola Taylor The whole reason for calling myself Plan B was that I was doing this sweet-boy Justin Timberlake shit, but I never felt comfortable... When I started rapping, it was easier for me to feel comfortable. --Plan B, USA Today (15 March 2007) Music career edit: 2005-2009: Early career and debut album edit: Plan B first appeared with the track "Cap Back", produced by DJ Wonder (formerly of Roll Deep), on the grime compilation album Run the Road (2005). Also in 2005, he released his first single "Kidz"/"Dead and Buried" as a limited edition 7" vinyl on his own label Pet Cemetery Records.

He soon gained a recording contract with 679 Recordings and released his second double A-side single "Sick 2 Def"/"No Good" with his début music video filmed for "No Good". In early 2006, Plan B released a video-only download single for "Missing Links", which had to be re-recorded because he did not gain sample permission from Radiohead for the use of "Pyramid Song", and also released his first mixtape It's Time 4 Plan B in the May 2006 issue of Hip Hop Connection magazine. On 23 June 2006 Plan B made his first television appearance on Later... with Jools Holland performing an acoustic version of "Mama (Loves a Crackhead)". His début album Who Needs Actions When You Got Words, recorded with producers such as Paul Epworth, Fraser T Smith and the Earlies, was released 26 June 2006 and charted the following week at number thirty on the UK Albums Chart. The album gained positive reviews from most critics, including a five-star review from The Guardian's Alex Petridis.

In July 2006, "Mama (Loves a Crackhead)" was released as a single which became the first Plan B song to appear on the UK Singles Chart, peaking at number forty one. In 2006, Paul Epworth and Plan B collaborated again on the track "More Is Enough" by Epic Man (Paul Epworth). After touring throughout 2006 and playing at festivals such as Reading and Leeds, a music video was filmed for "No More Eatin'" and Plan B released Live at The Pet Cemetery EP on 30 October 2006 (with a new version of "No More Eatin'" and two b-sides). On 11 December 2006 he released Remixes EP (which included the Hadouken! remix of "No More Eatin'").

During his January-February 2007 tour (which included support from Professor Green, Example, Killa Kela and Hadouken!), Plan B released his second mixtape Paint It Blacker containing bootleg recordings of songs by artists such as the Rolling Stones, Nirvana, Radiohead, Coldplay, Leonard Cohen and José González with producers Sem, Beni G from the Mixologists and Amir Amor. In 2007, Plan B re-released his song "No Good" with new remixes and a music video was filmed for the b-side "Bizness Woman" (featuring beatboxer Kila Kella). Also in 2007, Plan B featured on songs by other artists such as Professor Green, Killa Kela, Skrein, Shameless and the Mitchell Brothers. With a supporting role in the film Adulthood (2008), Plan B recorded three songs for the film's soundtrack - "End in the Streets", "On It 08" with Adam Deacon and "I Need Love" featuring Jacob Anderson.

Plan B also featured on the Chase & Status single "Pieces", which topped the UK Dance Chart in 2008 and peaked at number seventy on the UK Singles Chart. In 2009, Plan B recorded "Shifty" with Riz MC and Sway. The single was taken from the soundtrack to Eran Creevy's film Shifty (2009) starring Riz Ahmed (Riz MC) and Daniel Mays. Also in 2009, Plan B played Noel Winters in Harry Brown and achieved his first Top ten hit single with "End Credits", another collaboration with Chase & Status which was used in the soundtrack for Harry Brown. " 2009-present: Strickland Banks era and Ill Manors edit: Plan B's second album and film The Defamation of Strickland Banks was released on 12 April 2010. The lead single from the album, "Stay Too Long" reached number nine on the UK Singles Chart.

He supported Noel Gallagher at the second night of his solo gigs at the Royal Albert Hall on 26 March 2010, and played in Bangor at the Radio 1 Big Weekend on 23 May 2010 on the New Music We Trust stage. The new album, called The Ballad of Belmarsh, is a hip-hop laden "series of events" that depicts the story of Plan B's alter-ego, Strickland Banks. He has said that he recognises the fact that the upcoming hip-hop album will probably not have the same appeal or be as successful as his previous soul album, which has sold over 500,000 copies, which he is OK with. "I know The Ballad of Belmarsh is not going to work commercially, I know radio ain't going to play it but I'm still going to put it out there because I love it. It's a piece of art.", he said. "It's probably going to sell about 100,000 copies - no more.

But I'm cool with that." He performed a duet of "I Guess That's Why They Call It the Blues" with Elton John as part of Elton's BBC Electric Proms performance at the Roundhouse in London in October 2010. On 16 February 2011, Drew won Best British Male at the Brit Awards. The next single from The Defamation of Strickland Banks is "Love Goes Down". Official music video featuring Andy Crane, Paul Young, Abbey M. Butler, Vicky McClure and Kaya Scodelario had its own premiere on 16 November 2010. In March 2012, he released the single and video for "Ill Manors", a song (sampled from Peter Fox's "Alles Neu") which deals with the 2011 London Riots and which has been described by the Guardian as "the first great mainstream protest song in years". A soundtrack album and film of the same name (Drew's first as both writer and director) were released in June 2012. Since then, two more singles have been released, they are Lost My Way & Deepest Shame.

Film career edit: Acting edit: After previously appearing in Iain Forsyth and Jane Pollard's short film Walking After Acconci (Redirected Approaches) in 2005, Ben Drew's first major film role was as a supporting character (Dabs) in Noel Clarke's Adulthood (2008). His song "Kidz" was previously included in the soundtrack to Kidulthood (2006) which led to Drew being cast in the sequel. In 2009, Drew had another supporting role as Noel Winters in the Daniel Barber film Harry Brown starring Michael Caine. In 2010, Drew appeared in Noel Clarke's film 4.3.2.1,. Drew's most recent acting actively has been co-starring in The Sweeney based on the '70s UK TV show of the same name alongside Ray Winstone, playing the role of George Carter. The film was released on 12 September 2012 and went straight in at number 1 in the box office charts. Directing edit: Earlier in his music career, Drew expressed an interest in working in film.

In an interview about Who Needs Actions When You Got Words, he said: "We're still promoting this album and I've started work on the next one, but I'm really getting into film at the moment. I'm writing this script, and I really want to find some time to focus on it, I really feel that's what I'm destined to be doing". In 2008, Ben Drew directed his first short film Michelle which starred Adam Deacon and Skrein and he also directed the music video for "Pieces" (his collaboration with Chase & Status). Drew began production on his first full-length feature film, Ill Manors in September 2010. Speaking in March 2010 to UK soul-writer Pete Lewis - Deputy Editor of the award-winning Blues & Soul - Drew expanded on his first full-length feature film 'Ill Manors': "It's a hip hop, music-based feature film which has six short stories that all kinda mix together to make one BIG story - and each mini-story will be represented by a different hip hop track.

It'll all be narrated by me, and it'll actually be the reverse of 'The Defamation Of Strickland Banks' - in that with 'Ill Manors', the film will come out first and the soundtrack will come afterwards. And again the soundtrack will be a film for the blind, in that you'll be able to listen to it and it'll tell you the story of the film." Advertising edit: In June 2011, Hewlett-Packard signed up Plan B as part of their advertising campaign for its laptops featuring Beats Audio, using a short film exclusive to UK cinemas, showing Plan B with his band in a recording studio de-constructing the song "She Said", which had been a UK chart success a year earlier. Subsequently, in its 24 June issue, the British satirical magazine Private Eye made reference to the ad in its Ad Nauseam column and voiced the magazine's view that Plan B's involvement in the commercial seemed to be at odds with his comments at the Ivor Novello Awards regarding music promotion and criticising what "...has to go on in order to get your music to get played to the masses." in reference to Plan B's own US stage tour just prior to the awards.

In July 2011 Bulmer's cider announced that they had signed up Plan B to help sell their product. An advertisement for the cider was later released depicting a live performance by him. She Said (16 Bit Remix) (4:33) She Said (Shy Fx Remix) (4:23) BBC - BBC Music Blog Post categories: Mercury Prize , album reviews Mike Diver | 14:38 UK time, Thursday, 15 July 2010 Yesterday I profiled six acts in with a good chance of featuring on this year's Mercury Prize shortlist - read about The xx, Dizzee Rascal, Laura Marling, Wild Beasts, Steve Mason and Four Tet here . The 12 artists competing for the award, now in its 19th year, will be revealed on Tuesday, 20 July. Here, I give you another six, plus alternatives. (I realise there's no classical pick amongst my 12, but there's not been one on the Mercury shortlist since 2002.

Don't hold your breath for one this year.) - - - Album: Waiting for You Why: 2010 is a big year for dubstep, with the ever-evolving genre taking significant steps into the mainstream - Rusko has already broken cover with his patchy O.M.G.! album, and there are high-profile long-players on the horizon from Skream and his collaborative project with Benga and Artwork, Magnetic Man. But my pick from this broad musical arena is a rather less busy affair. King Midas Sound is Kevin Martin, Kiki Hitomi and Roger Robinson; their music is an intoxicating mix of doom-edged slow-mo mechanics and dubbed-out beats, ethereal vocals and woozy atmospherics. The Hyperdub-released Waiting for You is a wonderful record that infects the listener with a feeling of uneasy calm, chill-out vibes tempered by an inherent paranoia. Martin should have earned a nomination for his last record as The Bug, London Zoo, in 2009; the judging panel can do the right thing in 2010 and give him the wider exposure his latest work deserves.

If the Mercury was the Word Cup they'd be: Ivory Coast Watch on YouTube: Goodbye Girl , Earth a Killya , Meltdown And if not them: Sticking to the Hyperdub label, which received a nomination in 2008 for Burial's Untrue, Ikonika 's superb Contact, Love, Want, Have album is a treat of chiptune tangents and sink-into synths. Or, on a more playful tip, Hudson Mohawke 's aquacrunk adventure Butter would be a worthy shortlist inclusion. - - - Album: Here's the Tender Coming Why: Every year the Mercury selects a 'traditional' folk act as one of its shortlisted 12, and with a nomination already under their belts (albeit as Rachel Unthank and the Winterset, for their The Bairns album of 2007) this Northumberland group stand a good chance of being 2010's fairly token inclusion from their field.

The Mercury has never shied away from nominating the same artist for consecutive albums - Bat for Lashes and Arctic Monkeys are two examples - so Here's the Tender Coming could well be amongst the far-from-dirty dozen come Tuesday's announcement. Nominations at the BBC's Folk Awards have been plentiful, and there's no reason why The Unthanks won't enjoy similar recognition from the Mercury's judging panel. If the Mercury was the World Cup they'd be: Mexico And if not them: Take your pick from The Imagined Village 's Empire & Love , Damien O'Kane 's Summer Hill , and Kris Drever 's Mark the Hard Earth . All are worthy, but not one actually stands a chance of winning the thing. - - - Album: Peepers Why: Much like the above reasoning for The Unthanks - Polar Bear have been previously nominated, in 2005 for Held on the Tips of Fingers, and play a style of jazz that lends itself to crossover circles. It's hardly easy on the ear, but features as many parallels with rock outfits as it does anyone from the jazz community.

Drummer Seb Rochford is a master of his art, and capable of earning awards entirely on his own - factor saxophonist Pete Wareham, ex-Loose Tubes man Mark Lockheart, electronics wizard Leafcutter John and bassist Tom Herbert, also of The Invisible, into the equation and you've the sort of ensemble that dreams are surely made of. Strange, surreal, jazz dreams, anyway. Peepers would be considered among the favourites, if only a jazz album had previously won the Mercury. It's hard to see the panel taking such a plunge this year. If the Mercury was the World Cup they'd be: Argentina And if not them: Strong albums from previous nominees Portico Quartet ( Isla ), bonkers relative newcomers trioVD ( Fill It Up With Ghosts ), and acclaimed pianist Django Bates (Charlie Parker tribute Beloved Bird ) are all good shouts. - - - Album: Wake Up the Nation Why: The BRIT-winning Modfather's tenth studio album is his best since 1993's Wild Wood, shortlisted for the 1994 Mercury (his only appearance to date, surprisingly).

Containing substantial soul alongside a hefty dose of grittiness, Wake Up the Nation is a strikingly varied solo record from a man who had previously seemed content to be pigeonholed as a rather past-it creative force. While it runs to 16 tracks it never once drags its heels, songs spat forth with alarming speed, and the album's slower moments are truly touching. Some would see a victory as overdue, but in truth Weller has never been more worthy of the Mercury than he is this time out. If the Mercury was the World Cup he'd be: England Watch on YouTube: Wake Up the Nation , No Tears to Cry , Find the Torch, Burn the Plans And if not him: Sticking to oldies whose time might well be now, why not Teenage Fanclub ? Their new album Shadows , released 20 years after their debut, has attracted universal acclaim. Amazingly, they've never been shortlisted before (no Bandwagonesque in 1992, no Grand Prix in 1995). Maybe, just maybe...

- - - Album: The Defamation of Strickland Banks Why: Plan B, otherwise known as Ben Drew, achieved the career turnaround of recent pop history with his second album. Previously a potty-mouthed rapper in the vein of a British Eminem, albeit with an acoustic guitar strapped to his chest, his return as a blue-eyed soul boy left many a critic readying their poison pens. But didn't he do well, eh? The Defamation... (a concept album!) has been a mainstay on the albums chart ever since its April release, debuting at number one (in the same week that Scouting For Girls released their second LP) and returning there soon after. It's spawned top-ten singles, and turned Drew into a star with the world at his feet. If the Mercury was the World Cup he'd be: Japan or South Korea Watch on YouTube: She Said , Stay Too Long , Prayin' And if not him: He'll never switch his style in the manner of Plan B, but south London's Giggs has had a year to remember so far (albeit for reasons fair and foul).

His debut for the XL label, Let Em Ave It , is easily one of the best British rap records of the last 12 months. - - - Album: Total Life Forever Why: Guitar pop, mainstream indie, whatever you want to call it - it's not had much joy in a commercial sense lately as the charts, and playlists, have been dominated by RnB and rap acts. But Foals' Total Life Forever broke the top ten, and its singles have received substantial airplay, marking them out as a British guitar band with genuine cross-demographic appeal. The same can't, sadly, be said for several other great acts with excellent new records - recent long-players from The Futureheads and Mystery Jets missed the top 40. That Foals' second album (their debut, Antidotes , was also a top ten hit) is not only a winner on a sales front but also a superb evolution that demands all the respect it's received - it averages an 8/10 score - is a brilliant bonus. It absolutely deserves to be recognised as one of the best British albums of this Mercury year.

If the Mercury was the World Cup they'd be: The Dutch (without the dirty antics) And if not them: Mystery Jets ' Serotonin and The Futureheads ' The Chaos are both fantastic, and there's no doubt both acts could do with a little pick-me-up following disappointing sales figures. - - - BBC - BBC Music Blog: Mercury Prize 2010: Runners and Riders (Part 2) Post categories: Mercury Prize , album reviews Mike Diver | 14:38 UK time, Thursday, 15 July 2010 Yesterday I profiled six acts in with a good chance of featuring on this year's Mercury Prize shortlist - read about The xx, Dizzee Rascal, Laura Marling, Wild Beasts, Steve Mason and Four Tet here . The 12 artists competing for the award, now in its 19th year, will be revealed on Tuesday, 20 July. Here, I give you another six, plus alternatives. (I realise there's no classical pick amongst my 12, but there's not been one on the Mercury shortlist since 2002.

Don't hold your breath for one this year.) - - - Album: Waiting for You Why: 2010 is a big year for dubstep, with the ever-evolving genre taking significant steps into the mainstream - Rusko has already broken cover with his patchy O.M.G.! album, and there are high-profile long-players on the horizon from Skream and his collaborative project with Benga and Artwork, Magnetic Man. But my pick from this broad musical arena is a rather less busy affair. King Midas Sound is Kevin Martin, Kiki Hitomi and Roger Robinson; their music is an intoxicating mix of doom-edged slow-mo mechanics and dubbed-out beats, ethereal vocals and woozy atmospherics. The Hyperdub-released Waiting for You is a wonderful record that infects the listener with a feeling of uneasy calm, chill-out vibes tempered by an inherent paranoia. Martin should have earned a nomination for his last record as The Bug, London Zoo, in 2009; the judging panel can do the right thing in 2010 and give him the wider exposure his latest work deserves.

If the Mercury was the Word Cup they'd be: Ivory Coast Watch on YouTube: Goodbye Girl , Earth a Killya , Meltdown And if not them: Sticking to the Hyperdub label, which received a nomination in 2008 for Burial's Untrue, Ikonika 's superb Contact, Love, Want, Have album is a treat of chiptune tangents and sink-into synths. Or, on a more playful tip, Hudson Mohawke 's aquacrunk adventure Butter would be a worthy shortlist inclusion. - - - Album: Here's the Tender Coming Why: Every year the Mercury selects a 'traditional' folk act as one of its shortlisted 12, and with a nomination already under their belts (albeit as Rachel Unthank and the Winterset, for their The Bairns album of 2007) this Northumberland group stand a good chance of being 2010's fairly token inclusion from their field.

The Mercury has never shied away from nominating the same artist for consecutive albums - Bat for Lashes and Arctic Monkeys are two examples - so Here's the Tender Coming could well be amongst the far-from-dirty dozen come Tuesday's announcement. Nominations at the BBC's Folk Awards have been plentiful, and there's no reason why The Unthanks won't enjoy similar recognition from the Mercury's judging panel. If the Mercury was the World Cup they'd be: Mexico And if not them: Take your pick from The Imagined Village 's Empire & Love , Damien O'Kane 's Summer Hill , and Kris Drever 's Mark the Hard Earth . All are worthy, but not one actually stands a chance of winning the thing. - - - Album: Peepers Why: Much like the above reasoning for The Unthanks - Polar Bear have been previously nominated, in 2005 for Held on the Tips of Fingers, and play a style of jazz that lends itself to crossover circles. It's hardly easy on the ear, but features as many parallels with rock outfits as it does anyone from the jazz community.

Drummer Seb Rochford is a master of his art, and capable of earning awards entirely on his own - factor saxophonist Pete Wareham, ex-Loose Tubes man Mark Lockheart, electronics wizard Leafcutter John and bassist Tom Herbert, also of The Invisible, into the equation and you've the sort of ensemble that dreams are surely made of. Strange, surreal, jazz dreams, anyway. Peepers would be considered among the favourites, if only a jazz album had previously won the Mercury. It's hard to see the panel taking such a plunge this year. If the Mercury was the World Cup they'd be: Argentina And if not them: Strong albums from previous nominees Portico Quartet ( Isla ), bonkers relative newcomers trioVD ( Fill It Up With Ghosts ), and acclaimed pianist Django Bates (Charlie Parker tribute Beloved Bird ) are all good shouts. - - - Album: Wake Up the Nation Why: The BRIT-winning Modfather's tenth studio album is his best since 1993's Wild Wood, shortlisted for the 1994 Mercury (his only appearance to date, surprisingly).

Containing substantial soul alongside a hefty dose of grittiness, Wake Up the Nation is a strikingly varied solo record from a man who had previously seemed content to be pigeonholed as a rather past-it creative force. While it runs to 16 tracks it never once drags its heels, songs spat forth with alarming speed, and the album's slower moments are truly touching. Some would see a victory as overdue, but in truth Weller has never been more worthy of the Mercury than he is this time out. If the Mercury was the World Cup he'd be: England Watch on YouTube: Wake Up the Nation , No Tears to Cry , Find the Torch, Burn the Plans And if not him: Sticking to oldies whose time might well be now, why not Teenage Fanclub ? Their new album Shadows , released 20 years after their debut, has attracted universal acclaim. Amazingly, they've never been shortlisted before (no Bandwagonesque in 1992, no Grand Prix in 1995). Maybe, just maybe...

- - - Album: The Defamation of Strickland Banks Why: Plan B, otherwise known as Ben Drew, achieved the career turnaround of recent pop history with his second album. Previously a potty-mouthed rapper in the vein of a British Eminem, albeit with an acoustic guitar strapped to his chest, his return as a blue-eyed soul boy left many a critic readying their poison pens. But didn't he do well, eh? The Defamation... (a concept album!) has been a mainstay on the albums chart ever since its April release, debuting at number one (in the same week that Scouting For Girls released their second LP) and returning there soon after. It's spawned top-ten singles, and turned Drew into a star with the world at his feet. If the Mercury was the World Cup he'd be: Japan or South Korea Watch on YouTube: She Said , Stay Too Long , Prayin' And if not him: He'll never switch his style in the manner of Plan B, but south London's Giggs has had a year to remember so far (albeit for reasons fair and foul).

His debut for the XL label, Let Em Ave It , is easily one of the best British rap records of the last 12 months. - - - Album: Total Life Forever Why: Guitar pop, mainstream indie, whatever you want to call it - it's not had much joy in a commercial sense lately as the charts, and playlists, have been dominated by RnB and rap acts. But Foals' Total Life Forever broke the top ten, and its singles have received substantial airplay, marking them out as a British guitar band with genuine cross-demographic appeal. The same can't, sadly, be said for several other great acts with excellent new records - recent long-players from The Futureheads and Mystery Jets missed the top 40. That Foals' second album (their debut, Antidotes , was also a top ten hit) is not only a winner on a sales front but also a superb evolution that demands all the respect it's received - it averages an 8/10 score - is a brilliant bonus. It absolutely deserves to be recognised as one of the best British albums of this Mercury year.

If the Mercury was the World Cup they'd be: The Dutch (without the dirty antics) And if not them: Mystery Jets ' Serotonin and The Futureheads ' The Chaos are both fantastic, and there's no doubt both acts could do with a little pick-me-up following disappointing sales figures. - - -

Question: Ben Drew achieved a 2010 number one album fronting which band?
Answer: Plan B