Clive John Webbe
Benji Webbe is a Welsh singer, songwriter and musician and is most known for his role as lead vocalist for the Skindred, a heavy metal band. Webbe is also active in Diamond Spider, Dub War, Mass Mental and his own solo project. He has also featured on albums by Bullet for My Valentine and Soulfly.
1967
Newport, Wales
Jamaican descent
1993- Released two studio albums Pain and Wrongside of Beautiful with Dub War
1995- Released an album with Mass Mental
1998- Webbe appeared on Soulfly’s debut album which sold over 226, 569 copies worldwide
2002- 2018- Skindred released six studio albums; three of these, Kill the Power, Volume and Big Tings all making the top 40 in the UK charts
2006- Webbe performed with Korn’s in Download Festival
2008- Webbe appeared on Bullet For My Valentine’s album Scream Aim Fire on the Single Take It Out On Me. This album sold over 1, 400, 000 copies worldwide
2011- Skindred performed at the Pol’And’Rock Festival to a crowd of 750,000 people.
2015- Webbe released his debut solo album I Haven’t Been Nicking In Ages
Benji Webbe was born in Newport, Wales, to Jamaican immigrant parents. Webbe’s father was brought to the UK on the Windrush ship and arrived in Manchester in 1948. Webbe’s father struggled to find work so moved to Wales to find employment. Benji Webbe lost both of his parents by the age of 12 and was subsequently raised by his older siblings. His brother’s love for reggae music allowed Webbe to explore his own musical tastes further. Webbe has reflected on how challenging his childhood years were, particularly growing up being one of the only black families in the area. Webbe also recalls how he was heavily influenced by a trailer for the film called Dance Craze . He said he ”saw these black guys on stage with these white guys…these guys looked like they were from a council estate like me…it was like wow, if they can do that kind of stuff, then I can do that kind of stuff”
Dub War
Webbe released two studio albums Pain and Wrongside of Beautiful with Dub War under the label Earache. Dub War were a fourpiece metal band from Newport who formed in 1993 and they split in 1999. Webbe left Earache after they refused to record his solo album.
Mass Mental
Webbe was briefly part of this shortlived project which formed in 1995. Mass Mental was a band with Robert Trujillo, who is now the bassist for Metallica. They released one live album.
Skindred
Skindred was where Webbe really found his success. He formed Skindred with the former members of Dub War and signed with the label Bieler Bros and continued to release six studio albums between 2002 to 2018. Three of these, Kill the Power, Volume and Big Tings made the top 40 in the UK charts.
Skindred have done several tours, with their last one travelling around 30 countries. andperforming in Durbuy Rock Festival in Belgium, Greenfield Festival in Switzerland, Alpen Flair Sudtirol in Italy and many more.
They have over 35,000,000 streams on Spotify on their single Nobody.
1998 – Webbe appeared on Soulfly’s debut album which sold over 226,569 copies worldwide.
2006:
2006 – Webbe stepped in for Korn’s lead singer after he was taken ill in their set in Download Festival. Korn are a notable nu metal band from America and Download Festival is a popular metal UK festival which has a capacity of 111,000.
2008 – Webbe appeared on Bullet For My Valentine’s album Scream Aim Fire on the single Take It Out On Me. This album sold over 1,400,000 copies worldwide.
2011 – Skindred performed at the Pol’And’Rock Festival to a crowd of 750,000 people.
2015 – Webbe released his debut solo album I Haven’t Been Nicking In Ages, a purely reggae album which was produced by Monsta Boy.
-He has also performed with reformed Mass Mental.
Webbe spent five years in America but decided to return to his roots in Newport because he found great comfort there.
ITV Wales News, ‘Skindred’s Benji Webbe on bringing unity through music and refusing to leave his hometown of Newport’, Black Voices In Conversation, ITV News (ITV, revised October 2020) [accessed 18 February 2022]
Joe Daly, ‘Benji Webbe reveals all about Skindred’s new album Big Tings’, Metal Hammer, Louder (Louder, revised April 2018) [accessed 18 February 2022]
