Zip Pain identifies as an English Irish Scottish French Celt and is both a British and Irish citizen. George Harrison was his first musical hero and in 1963 he received a plastic ukulele for Christmas and 5 years later a beaten up old guitar. He has been strumming arrhythmically ever since.
In 2013 he appeared in a US TV commercial for Guitar Center playing his ukulele on his surfboard for a few seconds. He used his 1000 dollar fee to go to Hawaii and catch some waves at Waikiki and join the strummers behind the beach police station.
He likes to write his own songs and parody a range of genres, mostly self mockery of his own pretensions for instance his 19 Chord Singer Songwriter Song that goes on and on or his Protest Song which surprisingly also goes on and on. As a retired school teacher he feels his job is done when everyone is slightly confused.
