Ken Owen

Ken Owen (born April 23, 1970) is a drummer, born Billinge, grew up in Gayton, Wirral, England. He is best known as one of the founding members of Carcass, for which he also handles some of the vocals in the beginning. After the band broke up in 1995, he started Blackstar along with two other Carcass members. In February of 1999, he suffered from a brain haemorrhage at home and spent 10 months in Hospital slowly emerging from a coma, making it impossible for him to continue playing the drums. Recently, he seems to have recovered largely, and has started playing drums again but mostly makes music using the computer software program Reason. In 2008 he joined Carcass on stage at the Wacken Open Air festival to play a short drum solo.

Ken was a pioneering drummer, first amongst a handful to (eventually) master the blast beat. His hard playing from the shoulders influence on modern death/metal is much under estimated.

He also inspired Carcass to make medical references as a lyrical concept and also wrote many of the band's riffs on the first three albums. His father a vetenarian, artistic influence was taken from the tools of the trade.