Bez from Happy Mondays challenges Joe Wicks with his own online fitness class

Get Buzzin' With Bez launches later this month

Happy Mondays' Bez has been lots of things: a dancer, a member of an iconic British band, a winner of Celebrity Big Brother... He even ran an unsuccessful campaign to become an MP. However, 'fitness guru' is probably not the term you would associate with him. Nor would 'The next Joe Wicks'. But that could be about to change, as Bez (real name Mark Berry) is launching his own lockdown fitness channel on YouTube. Get Buzzin' With Bez will launch on January 17th, and, well, you can probably guess what it will be like from the title. "I’d like to think I’m somewhere between Joe Wicks and Mr Motivator," Bez told the Sun. "I’ve started this new year seriously unfit, with a fat belly and creaky hips, and I can’t stop eating chocolate. Last lockdown I got unfit, fat, lazy and into some seriously bad eating habits. This year, this lockdown, I need to sort it out sharpish." Never one to take himself too seriously, Bez said that viewers could join him "on this mad journey or just sit on the sofa and have a good laugh at me". "At the very least, I know I'll be making people smile, at best I'll be helping people get fit and mentally happier alongside me." It is at this point where we might have to explain who Bez is to our younger readers. We could use Jez from Peep Show's take that he was the British Flavor Flav. But Bez was part of Happy Mondays, the iconic Madchester band of the 1980s and early 1990s. Bez was a vital part of the Shaun Ryder-fronted band, but did not actually provide any vocals or play any instruments, outside of shaking the occasional maracas. Instead, Bez was the band's on-stage dancer and de facto mascot.