Benhur K

Benhur was born and raised in northeast India. After watching his older brother play guitar, he took an interest in guitar at the age of eight. Benhur began practicing with the guitar from his church. He would pick it up on his way home from school and practice into the evening. Then he would drop it off the next morning on his way back to school. Benhur did chores for his mom as a way of earning his first guitar which cost about $10.

For the first few years Benhur saw the guitar as a hobby but by the time he was 12 he started taking it seriously. From then on he lived and breathed guitar, practicing up to 16 hours a day. When he couldn’t get out of going to school, he developed a small fret board which he could take with him and use to practice silently during classes.

Benhur did not consider himself gifted musically but he had a passion to succeed. In his younger days he claims to have been the worst guitarist and singer. At church he was told to just mouth the words rather than sing with the other children. That drove him to also practice singing for hours on end.

At age 14, Benhur’s older brother gave him his first chance in a recording studio. His first session didn’t go so well, he needed more practice. He later joined his brother’s band, Oaths, and came to be known as “Lightning” due to his speed and ability. Then Benhur started his own band called COP and played many concerts in the Northeast. COP had a record deal with an American label in the works but due to problems with their manager, it didn’t work out. In his 20s, Benhur moved to Bangalore and started another band called Three Clay Men.

Benhur started out playing covers from Metallica, Nirvana, Mr. Big, and other metal bands but soon began composing his own songs. He was known for Thrash and Death Metal in the Northeast but in southern India he was also known as a country singer. His variety of musical styles only expanded from there. In 2004, Benhur left India for Chile, South America. There he again formed a band using his own name Benhur K. In South America he played mainly progressive music with a funk influence gained from his band members.

In Chile, Benhur met the woman who a few months later became his wife and lyricist. They had a daughter in Chile before moving to the States in 2009. While in Chile, Benhur produced a compilation album called INLA, composed many songs, began studying sound engineering online from Abbey Road Studios, and started a recording studio in which he recorded his first album Típico which he went on to release after arriving in the U.S.

Típico a mainly funk hard-core, Spanish-language album met with little success, so Benhur decided to soften his style with his second album Musings. When not composing or recording his own music, Benhur works on remix competitions. His remix of Tommy Lee’s “Good Times” received the highest number of votes. When Ollie of Autozamm commented on Benhur’s remix of “Want It Need It” he said, “It was just amazing. It was one of those moments where I just thought, ‘Why didn’t we record it like that? Why didn’t we write it like that? It’s just a super grooving guitar riff…’”

Benhur’s plans for 2010 include a solo instrumental album, an album with the band Falling Birch, a Christmas album and more remixes.