Rapper turned stand-up Doc Brown explains his journey to the microphone

My name is Ben Bailey Smith. They call me Doc Brown. Why? Well, as a 16-year-old smart-arse yet nerdy outcast — a strange mix of awkward and ballsy — the nickname “Doc” or Doc Brown stuck in reference to the eccentric scientist of Back To The Future fame.

I’ve never really been a fan of my moniker, but then you should never choose your own nickname — it will always sound suspiciously cool and tellingly out of step with how other kids actually view you. I am Shinobi the Destroyer! No you’re not.

So, Doc Brown it was, and despite outwardly being something of an Indie kid, I was fascinated by the energy and DIY quality of Rap, and secretly wrote rhymes that were never breathed aloud in public, but were all signed with the same logo I use today, a symmetrical amalgamation of a capital D, O and C.

Into my later teens I began attending battle rap nights in Camden, only a 20-minute bus ride from my mum’s house, and I stood in awe watching these ghetto wordsmiths pull improvised insults from nowhere and fly by the seat of their pants, eye-to-eye with the toughest of opponents. The best of these would find ingenious, endlessly fresh and inventive ways of ridiculing your face, while the less imaginative would riff aimlessly around your mum and her propensity for street-based lasciviousness. Eventually, I had a go myself. And… I was actually not bad.

No question in my mind that those early battle experiences mixed with my dad forcing me to watch reruns of Porridge, The Rise and Fall of Reginald Perrin and Blackadder all combined neatly to create a huge comic influence on me, an influence that I had no idea would ever come in useful.

Fast forward ten unproductive years and being vaguely known as an underground rapper got me some occasional work with the BBC, as a slang consultant on a Lenny Henry comedy show with an all-black cast. It was a chance finally to utilise the unique street humour I’d gathered in my teens and early twenties through Hip Hop, and it was the Beeb who encouraged me to try Stand Up.

I was a grown man, unemployed with two children the first time I stepped on a comedy stage in 2008. I’d not watched Stand Up before, bar the usual fare: Pryor, Murphy, Hicks. In a strange way, it helped. I had a different rhythm to other comics. I had rhythm. Plus I was focussed on feeding my family.

I didn’t intend to create something different, I just instinctively knew I had to tell my own story and that would have to involve me rapping, otherwise people would just think I was joking. In 2014 I’m still joking, but I’m deadly serious about it.

You can make your own mind up when I return to Oxford — always a knowledgeable and fun crowd.

See you there!

l Doc Brown is at the Oxford Glee tonight. Call 0871 4720400 or visit www.glee.co.uk/oxford