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Leslie Benson of Irene & Reed
Autobiographical
(c) Leslie Benson 2004
It’s not 1969… when the fires burnt.
The age of the singer-songwriter has died.
I pull on headphones, strum rusty bent guitar strings
listen to a lo-fi fix, fuzzy air crackling
on a blue 4-track recording,
and filter poetic rock backlash.
I’m not glitz or glam.
I’m not a circus.
Mine is a grateful art….
An Introduction
Striving to learn more about the world and about myself are important paths to self-fulfillment. I feel pride when accomplishing something from nothing, allowing dreams to reach fruition. There is nothing more satisfying at the end of the day than to hold in my hands the culmination of a creative project, which started from scratch. Whether a recorded song, a poem or a publication, it’s all about hard work, sacrifice and taking on challenges. I get mileage out of deep, thoughtful group discussions – those you find in spiritual meetings, in small college classrooms or in literary/writing workshops. I need that sort of bouncing back of ideas and that release and expression of emotions to live a healthy and fulfilling life.
As a journalist by trade and a poet and songwriter by nature, this blog is meant to show my growth as a musician and an artist learning to blend three creative outlets into one productive canvas. Hopefully in some way, the information I share with you will help inspire your own creative work. By sharing my experiences, achievements, trials and tribulations, I hope to offer you a glimpse behind-the-scenes into the process of songwriting, as well as forming (and maintaining) a band. Perhaps you are also someone who understands that life is all about creation and experimentation, because without it, our existence would seem less meaningful.
Journalism Experience
I have worked in various facets of the journalistic world since 1999. With a bachelor of arts in English and a master of arts in journalism, I have managed magazines, newspapers and literary journals, using my skills as a writer and an editor to produce daily, weekly and monthly publications. Some jobs of note include serving as an associate editor for Angie’s List Magazine and as the assistant editor of Chicago-based Global Cosmetic Industry magazine, covering news for the beauty and health industries. I also worked as the music editor of Nuvo Newsweekly, Indianapolis, Ind.’s alternative newsweekly; the managing editor of Wright State University’s The Guardian newspaper; the editor in chief of Indiana University Bloomington’s Weekend magazine; an editor for Ball State University’s Expo and Alumnus magazines; and a freelance restaurant and nightlife critic for AOL CityGuide.
During my five years writing music and arts columns for the Dayton City Paper (formerly Impact Weekly), I received my first accolade — the Mark of Excellence Award — first place from the Society of Professional Journalists in the Midwest-based feature writing category for “A Painter for the People,” the first cover story I ever wrote, published in 2001. Additional experiences of note include having interned for Indianapolis Monthly, Journey and Endless Vacation magazines. However, most personally rewarding was my launch of an original magazine, Echo Immortalis, in 2005, which I founded, wrote, edited and designed. For the project, I even created a magazine business plan, a marketing kit and a website, sold ads and spearheaded a team of freelance writers and photographers to print three, full-color issues. Through my experiences, I have become proficient in Web site design and photo editing, as well as InDesign, InCopy, QuarkXPress and Pagemaker software, among other software and database platforms.
Music Background
As a child, my parents asked me at age 10 if I wanted to start dance lessons or learn a musical instrument. “I want to be in a band!” I exclaimed. My enthusiasm for music stuck. In 1991, I began taking lessons on flute, the instrument that would teach me how to read and compose music, how to perform in a live symphonic band and how to march in choreographed patterns across a football field. The flute also introduced me to classical music, rock, pop, folk, doo-wop, blues and jazz, and by the time I entered high school in Dayton, Ohio, composing music became a full-time passion.
I wrote my first song, “Xavier,” an electric guitar-based hardcore rock song sometime around 1997. My first guitar was a used black and white striped monster crafted to look like the famous Van Halen guitar; it was distorted and totally metal. Influenced by bands like Bauhaus, Switchblade Symphony, Siouxsie and the Banshees, Depeche Mode and Nine Inch Nails, my friends and I formed our first band, Mr. Eyetooth and the Majestic Moose. Though short-lived, the experience introduced me to songwriting and had me begging my parents for an acoustic Gibson Epiphone guitar by Christmas.
Widening my musical influences, I began collecting as much music as I could. I listened to everything from my parents’ classic rock and folk records to Broadway show tunes to grunge and rock to punk rock to EBM and industrial to glam, pop and disco to poetic singer-songwriters to rockabilly to alt-country and more. With such a wide penchant for music, it was no surprise my interests in music and poetry would blossom into songwriting throughout my teens and into adulthood. Other short-term musical projects I formed included The Little Black Box (1998-1999) and The Rainy Parade (1999), for my senior talent show, during which time I sang “White Rabbit” by Jefferson Airplane.
Other than playing flute for seven years in school-based bands and joining church choir groups as a teen, I did not form my first “real” music project until March 2001, when I founded Burning Veda, a rock band with folk and blues influences, which debuted for a concert at Wright State University’s Rathskeller dive bar. The group eventually performed live for Wright State’s Battle of the Bands at the Ervin J. Nutter Center, on a stage once graced by Cher, Lynyrd Skynyrd and others.
“While Burning Veda’s sound draws to mind the contemporary sounds of 10,000 Maniacs, Lucinda Williams and The Cowboy Junkies, there’s a lot of old-time wisdom in it as well,” wrote Impact Weekly writer Melissa Fowler in 2002, after Burning Veda released our debut album, The Campfire EP. “It’s an emphatic departure from the nouveau garage-rock ‘flavor of the moment.’”
While I sang vocals, played some guitar and bass, Burning Veda also featured Michael St. Christopher McLain on lead guitar, Zach Hohenstein on rhythm guitar and Tim Amrhein, formerly of The Crotch Rockets, on drums. Various guest musicians stood in on bass. We played our final show together during the 2002 Dayton Band Playoffs at the Canal Street Tavern. That same year, I won the Mudrock student writer’s competition for my original song, “Love in the Same Way,” about embracing diversity. I then took a seven-year hiatus from music to focus on my career in journalism, which brought me to Bloomington, Ind., then to Muncie, Ind., then to Indianapolis, Ind., then to Chicago, Ill. and then back again to Indianapolis. In June 2009, after joining forces with my musician friend Jason Reed Milner, I forfeited my musical “silence” and jumped headfirst into the musical collaboration Irene & Reed. In 2010, we launched our debut album, Closer to Home, welcomed drummer Eddie Venable and bassist Scott Carroll to the mix, and began performing our first live concerts for fans. In 2011, Scott left the band for other projects, and we welcomed jazz bassist Eric Latham.
If you need more information, please e-mail me at echomag@hotmail.com.
– Leslie Benson, 2010
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Lastly, read about my roller derby character, Kerosene Irene #23, here.
