R.I.P. Mel Benner (1973-2012)

(Note from 8/1/12 – Yesterday I got a heartbreaking message from Elizabeth Deifell (Dryman):

"I am writing with the sad news that Mel Benner passed away. She was killed by a drunk driver outside of Philadelphia. I posted links on my FB page. She had moved back from LA to be closer with her parents and was planning on starting a MA program in June. So sad."

Mel's online obituaries including guestbook tributes are here and here.

Mel's last FB profile pic

What a tragic, senseless death. I unsuccessfully tried tracking her down in 2010 after digging up the cassette tape she gave me when she came along with me, Lem, and Derek Elliott on our New England Tour roadtrip back in '93. Now I really wish I had re-connected with her.

Mel was such a sweet, gentle soul. And what an amazing athlete. She was a track star in high school:

YOUNG MUSTANG POWERS TEAM TO 3D AT STATES (Philadelphia Inquirer - May 25, 1987) Melissa Benner may have been one of the youngest competitors in Friday and Saturday's PIAA Class AAA and AA track and field championships at Shippensburg University, but the Gwynedd-Mercy Academy freshman made her elders take notice. Benner won the Class AA 800- and 1,600-meter runs and teamed with Jennifer Budniak, Jane Heffernan and Debi McMahon to finish fourth in 4 minutes, 4.69 seconds in the 1,600-meter relay...

BIG DAY FOR GWYNEDD-MERCY'S BENNER (Philadelphia Inquirer - April 26, 1990) She has run in the Penn Relays a grand total of one time, but the event already has become Melissa Benner's personal favorite. In fact, it has become such a highlight of her outdoor track season that she is willing to curtail another of her favorite activities: eating. "It's a race I've been looking forward to all year," said Benner, the talented senior distance star from Gwynedd-Mercy Academy...

and later at UNC-CH. In fact, while in junior high, she set at least two national track records, in the 800 meter and 1500 meter runs. Her time of 2:11:28 in the junior girls’ 800 meter run remained unbroken as of 2006, and may stand to this day.

She had great taste in music. Although she’s not listed on the Fall '93 WXYC schedule, I could have sworn she was a DJ around that time.

I will always remember her mom cooking us breakfast when we dropped Mel off at her folks’ place in Philadelphia. I think she made us pancakes, and she was super warm and welcoming to our road-weary crew. It was great to get to see Mel at home like that. My heart goes out to her parents and brother and sister.

Seriously, drunk drivers need to be kept off the freaking roads. I’ve never felt as anti-DUI as I do right now. The girl who killed her was only 19. Why can’t breathalyzer ignition locks become mandatory for vehicles registered by drivers under age 21? And heavy fines instituted for parents who allow underage kids to drive vehicles without ignition locks. And the locks certainly made mandatory for anyone convicted of even one DUI. That all seems like common sense. But none of it will bring Mel back, and that’s what really sucks.)

Flashback to the New England Tour '93 and a Suede/Bowie soundtrack

Now that I've got the digital audio hook-up, I'm gradually recording artifacts from my cassette collection. It was while looking for more tapes from the Pink House era earlier tonight that I happened to find the mix tape Mel Benner made for us the day we left town with Lem and Derek Elliott to drive north on the New England Tour '93.

Lem's cousin, Derek, Lem & Erik at Lem's aunt's house in Boston, Dec. '93

It wasn't really a mix, it was simply Bowie's 1973 LP Aladdin Sane on one side, and on the other, a new, self-titled debut LP by Suede, a UK group I'd never heard of. Although apparently, that's because I wasn't reading any issues of the British music press that littered the XYC studios. During '92-'93, Suede were the most-hyped English band since the Sex Pistols, and when their debut record dropped in late March '93, it was the fastest-selling UK debut since Frankie Goes To Hollywood's Welcome To The Pleasuredome in 1984.


Mel, however, was tuned in. At the time, she was living in a tiny house on one of the streets of Northside that ran west off Church Street, a little ramshackle shotgun shack. She was really excited about Suede, and thought they were the reincarnation of glam-era Bowie. So she made this tape for us to play on our roadtrip. It added some rockin' flavor to everyone else's preferred vibes (hip hop for Derek, deep house for Lem, and 70s funk for me).

I was hooked from the first song "So Young," because their debut album was a freaking classic, a neo-glam masterpiece.



It didn't hurt that it was probably also the first time I'd ever heard Aladdin Sane (except for the better known tracks "Panic in Detroit" and "The Jean Genie").



For the next seven years or so, this tape never left whatever car I was driving at the time. Even during the period I was rocking my deathtrap '84 Mazda GLC that lacked a tapedeck and I had to cart around a little boombox in the back floorwell. The Suede/Bowie tape became part of my essential driving soundtrack. I’m shocked it's still playable.


Don't know what happened to Mel Benner, because she graduated and left town the next year and I never saw her again. I can't find a Facebook or other definitive link for her, but she was a track star at UNC, and I did find mention of a Melisssa Benner in PA who was still running in charity 5K races as of 2009. So hope she's doing well.

While googling Suede to see where they are today, I found out they're back together and touring Europe right now! They've got a UK gig coming up at London's 02 Arena on December 7. Not that I'm gonna hop on a plane and go, and unfortunately, they're touring without their original lead guitarist Bernard Butler, who co-wrote all the songs on their first LP and played a huge role in shaping their sound. But surely it will be a great show, and for that reason alone, right now seems a particularly appropriate time to be looking back to the moment 17 years ago in a Northside driveway when we were preparing to embark on yet another memorable Pink House road trip and Mel first turned us all on to Suede.

"This is dedicated to all those who will contribute to the New England Tour '93, whether in the city or on the road..." – Lem, 12/21/93, 2:32 am

The New England Tour '93

It was late December, right before Christmas, and we all needed to get north. Our friend Mel Benner was headed home to Philadelphia. I was going up to Rhode Island. For whatever reason, Derek Elliott was bypassing his parents' place in New Jersey on the drive up, instead heading for Boston to hang with Lem who was visiting his aunt in Jamaica Plain.

Lem's cousin, Derek, Lem & his aunt at her house in Boston

Mel's mom very graciously greeted us with open arms when we showed up around 8 am in the morning. Then she cooked us breakfast, I think it was pancakes. Clearly, we had gotten a late start, and drove through the night from Chapel Hill.

This was actually the second time in a space of a few months that Derek and I had breakfast at someone named Mel's house in Pennsylvania – the first being our Fall Break '93 trip to NYC when we crashed at Pink Housemate Mel Lanham's place (just south of Valley Forge) along the way. But dropping Mel Benner off meant a trip to the heart of downtown Philadelphia. Before we got back on the road, Derek, Lem and I made some new friends on the mean streets and with our tour guides along for the ride, took a driving tour of South Philly that shocked all of us. The blocks we drove through looked like war zones. It was the most rundown urban landscape in America I've seen before or since.

After Xmas, in the aftermath of a blizzard-strength Northeast snowstorm, all of us (minus Mel) would connect in Boston with Tony Fishel, who was at that point living in an apartment on Mass Ave.


It was right before Tony moved to a huge three-story house in Jamaica Plain with my brother Jared and several other roommates, including his then-girlfriend Shelly and possibly Pete Moss, who would later relocate to Baltimore and become a fairly well-known DJ on the rave circuit. Jared and Tony lived in two attic rooms on opposite ends of the third floor, and it was a swank pad. Their house was within blocks of Lem's aunt's place.

Then the three of us drove down to NYC to spend New Year's Eve with Dana in the city. To be exact, we were crashing at his place, although on our own for entertainment, because he was probably spending the night with Erika. I think that's how everything went down.


Details are hazy, but among other places we stopped by a party at Rashmi's apartment in midtown Manhattan after running for like, twenty blocks through the cold streets to try and make it there by the time the ball dropped. We could hear the Times Square crowd in the distance.


And then likely ended up over at Sapphire, our favorite little out-of-the-way NYC club, which was around the corner from a spot where my RI buddy Robb Teer was working as a bouncer for a hot minute.

Altogether, we hit three major cities, which was about par for the course on a Pink House road trip.


"This is dedicated to all those who will contribute to the New England Tour '93, whether in the city or on the road..." – Lem, 12/21/93, 2:32 am

Christmas Cocktail guest list

Guest list

1-2.      Lydia Craft / Mary Anne

3.         Mike Thomas

4-5.      Firas Amad (+1 Jason)

6.         Derek Shadid

7-10.    Jyoti Argade (+3 Amy J. / Hadley / Matt Frish)

11-13.  Swati Argade (+2 Mary / Dana / etc.)

14.       Trent McDevitt

15-16.  Chris Lee / Scott

17-18.  Chris Pedigo / Brandon

19.       Lem Butler

20.       Sophia Sacks

21.       Chris Lyn

22.       Clint Curtis

23.       Zak Bisacky

24.       Derek Elliott

25-28.  Ramah / Dina (+2 Leigh / Tamar etc.)

29-31.  Sue Busby / Jenny Shippen / Cristina Perez

32.       Michelle Sinott

33-36.  Lindsay Bowen / Dana Terebelski (+2 Shea / Kate Smith)

37.       Mel Benner

38-39.  Penny Bakatsias / Tina Bakatsias

40-43.  Clay Boyer / Matt McMichaels (+2 Ian Williams / etc.)

44-45.  Bryan Ellerson / Allen Copeland

46.       Yvonne

47.       Kevin Harris

48-49.  Evan / Renee

50.       Heather Reilly

(Note from 2014 - A few days before Thanksgiving '93, and I must have already been in the holiday spirit, because I drew up my invite list for our upcoming Christmas Cocktail party. I'm sure there would have been substantial overlap between my list and whoever Jay planned to invite, but this was my preliminary assessment of the roughly fifty heads I thought had Pink House VIP status at the time. Obviously, it would have included all former housemates, but only Lydia, Clint, Bryan Ellerson, and Michelle Sinott were still in town.)