'An Adventure Within Itself': Brisbane's Ben Mackay Leans Into Surrealist 2000s-Era YouTube Brainrot For His 'Distracted' Video

Ben Mackay is a Queensland-based musician, moving between alternative rock bands and solo acts. In late September, Mackay released his newest single, Distracted, under his solo act, the palindrome titled Beneb. 

If you’re a Brisbane muso aficionado, then you’ve most likely seen Mackay also perform in acts like CityPiss and Les Suits, or collaborate alongside musicians like Amy Sheppard and Sahara Beck.

When he’s not performing as a retro rock synth musician, Mackay is an ensemble lecturer at JMC Brisbane and a NDIS support worker. Specialising in mental health, Mackay helps clients produce, write and release their music and learn their instruments, as well as community access and daily living. 

At the time of interviewing the Brisbane musician, Mackay had just gotten back from Cairns, playing at the camping music festival, Savannah In The Round, with Sheppard. 

Despite describing himself as very dusty from the festival and his slightly delayed flight home, Mackay was keen to discuss Beneb as a solo act, releasing Distracted and his upcoming album, his history and reflections on the music industry in Brisbane.

Mackay has been part of the music industry for 20 years. Beginning at 18, Mackay formed Le Suits straight out of high school in 2007, and they performed as a group for almost a decade. 

“It led me to find my love for all genres of music, and I started doing other bands and finding session work, playing for other mates’ bands, and it kind of led to becoming a full-time musician,” he explains.

Having worked within various circles, Mackay recalls how supportive the Brisbane music industry has become in the last decade. 

“When I was first coming on the scene, there was a bigger divide between local bands and bands that had made it, but everyone's just doing each other favours,” he says. 

“It's how the industry's kind of run here, and we’re all helping each other to get our projects up and running and to save money, saying, ‘Oh, if I do this gig for you, will you play on my record, or will you come do this tour with me, and I'll play these shows for you?’ kind of thing. But yeah, it's very supportive in that sense.”

Across his time in the music scene, Mackay has noticed some changes within the industry. “It's so much easier to share your music with everyone, which is not what it was like when I started,” he adds. 

“There's a new divide between reality and social media, but I feel like it’s now bringing more value to live music experiences because everyone's tolerance has reached a new level, and it feels like gigs are fresh again.” 

In reference to the growing trend in AI music, Mackey believes that there will be an oversaturation point, and those who play instruments as opposed to artificially created sounds will gain more interest.

When finding his sound in music, Mackay mentioned bands like Frank Zappa, King Crimson, Pink Floyd, Talking Heads, Queen, and Queens Of The Stone Age were among his biggest inspirations. He also namechecks other acts such as Justice, Infected Mushroom, and Daft Punk, as well as abstract electronic/psychedelic types of sounds.

Beneb began life as a project for Mackay at 25 years old, towards the end of his first band. After focusing on Beneb for a few years, Mackay switched to paid work but has since recently decided to revamp his solo act. 

“Now that things are kind of changing, I want to go back and rehash some old songs that I wish I released back then and a bunch of new songs as well that I've written while building other people's empires and wishing you were building yours,” he says.

As a solo act, Mackay performs the guitar, vocals, programmed drums and synths. When describing his sound, he mentioned how he doesn’t allow one specific genre to influence his work and lets new sounds navigate his inspiration. 

“I'm just always trying to follow something that excites me or makes me laugh, because then I feel like I can create the song properly or I can get whatever I'm feeling in that moment out,” he explains.

As Beneb’s newest song since Expectations in 2024, Distracted was first written in 2017 as a way for Mackay to overcome a breakup at the time. 

“I think having these darker sounds and synths and all that was kind of like a way to help fill that gap,” says Mackay. “I was feeling really empty, so I wanted to fill it with lots of sub-bass and very colourful sparkly sounds.”

Turning his attention to the relevancy of the song, Mackay mentioned the parallels of working in other circles as opposed to his own. “So much has changed since I first wrote the song,” he explains. “There’s also so much of it that’s still constant, and it feels like it's a continuing adventure or battle on top of my own distractions.”

To accompany the one-of-a-kind tone of Distracted, Beneb released a music video that was self-described as early 2000s YouTube brain rot.

Initially, he created a teaser for the video, which was the ending segment of the song, to see the type of attention it may get from his audience. After describing the warm and enthusiastic reception of the stylised vision teased, Mackay worked backwards to get to the conclusion of the music video in a comedic way. “I went on YouTube and found lots of free backgrounds, and it helped with the quality of the video and how it’d look on the green screen keyed out,” he explains.

While working against a self-imposed deadline to finish the music video within two weeks, Mackay suddenly came down sick and was passing kidney stones, during which time he described editing the Distracted film clip to distract himself from how he was feeling. 

“It was an adventure within itself creating it, and there were a lot of moments where I wanted to feel the opposite of pain, so some of the stuff just made me laugh, and hopefully that translates to people who watch it,” says Mackay.

For the bizarrely entertaining vision behind the Distracted music video, he cited the clip-art animation style of Monty Python and South Park as sources of inspiration, as well as the surrealist tongue-in-cheek tone of Tim & Eric. 

“There’s something so funny about crude imagery that's unnatural while also alluding to reality,” says Mackay. “It feels fabricated, but I find it very funny and enjoyable.”

“I wouldn’t say this film clip is on par with those guys and their level of animation, but it's definitely something that I would love to work towards.”

Looking ahead, Mackay plans to gradually release new songs as part of his upcoming God Knows album. The next song, which shares the same title track name, is another collaboration with Alistar Richardson of The Cairos and is expected to be released in early November. 

Originally pitched as a CityPiss song, Mackay says the song and the album itself will be of a different vibe to Distracted. “It’s kind of in the same sort of tone where I'm trying to be a bit satirical and paying homage to tradition,” he notes.

“Throughout the album, there are a lot of electronic funky dance songs, but there are a lot of weaves and turns through a few different genres. I'm not sure how accessible it will be to a lot of people, but I just wanted this selection of songs to almost act as a journal of the last eight years of my life.”

Mackay also teased a live launch of the God Knows album, which is intended to take place in Brisbane in early 2026, though you’ll have to stay tuned for the full details.