Blog Posts

My name is Benjamin Wagner. I’m the Executive Producer of MTV News Digital by day, a performing singer/songwriter by night, and an author, blogger, marathoner, triathlete, aspiring filmmaker, son, brother, uncle, and boyfriend in between. I’m here at Emerson tonight to tell you that you can be anything you want to be. Here’s how. My…

‘Over it,’ I thought to myself as I approached my ninth MTV Holiday Party. ‘Been there, done that, drank the bottom shelf liquor.’ It’s a big mess of an affair. Five thousand MTVN employees packed into The Hammerstein Ballroom, wolfing down stale sushi, tossing back shots of Mr. Boston Vodka, and shaking their humps to…

Everything I own was stacked against the far wall of my apartment when I walked through the door tonight. It as all there in a big pile: my couch, my big red chair, my Ikea chair, three guitars, two lamps, and my shag rug all rolled up and sad. And it was all covered in…

Walker, Chris, and Tony were already on stage when I walked into the venue last night. I stood alone on stage throughout last week’s tour. It was just me, my voice, and my guitar. Solo acoustic works for moving hearts, but not so much in moving bodies. I like to movie bodies too. So it…

My first time at the Eastern Iowa Airport was September 28, 1971. My family was moving from Iowa City to Washington, D.C. It was my first time on an airplane. I was three weeks old. Thirty-four years later, I’m here again, waiting on American Airlines flight #4239 to Chicago, then connecting to #360 to Laguardia.…

I just had a fairly major revelation on I-35 between Des Moines and Ames, Iowa. My new record, “Heartland,” sounds fucking excellent. That might sound a bit arrogant. But I’m as surprised as anyone to hear myself say so (or see myself write so). It was either absolute serendipity or complete randomness that made this…