"As ethereal, moving, and uncompromising as its subject."
— Amy Taubin (Village Voice)
"It's the hypnotic long-form music video Smoke never got to make."
— Wesley Morris (San Francisco Examiner)
"There's such a rawness, purity and even mystical force to everything Benjamin says or sings, that anything else would seem extraneous and detracting from the impact of a man who has lived his life with absolutely no holds barred."
— Kevin Thomas (Los Angeles Times)
"It feels as though we're on a journey with Benjamin, who proves to be a wryly funny, passionate and complex traveling companion."
— Elizabeth Weitzman (New York Daily News)
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• BENJAMIN SMOKE BIOGRAPHY •
Benjamin (born Robert Dickerson) was an American singer-songwriter who fronted the Atlanta, Georgia bands Smoke and the Opal Foxx Quartet. He was noted for being a radical, gay rock 'n' roll performer.
Benjamin lived for many years in Cabbagetown, a neighborhood in Atlanta, an "unsafe" area peopled with hustlers and eccentrics. There, he occasionally dressed up as a drag queen from a young age. When he was just nine years old he would appear in public wearing woman’s clothing, "with a towel on my head like Whoopi, going to the Waffle House in a dress". In New York he found work at the famed club CBGB's, which he described as "the filthiest place I ever was". He earned $20 a day, his duties consisted of sweeping up broken glass left by performers and audiences the evening prior.
Benjamin was a known character in the underground scene in 1980s Atlanta and participated in a number of Atlanta music experiments such as Easturn Stars, Monroe is Naked Again, Freedom Puff, Blade Emotion, and the Opal Foxx Quartet (which often had up to 12 members). His bands played in such venues as 688, Celebrity Club, Pillowtex, Destroy All Music Festival, among others. For the band, Smoke donned the stage name "Miss Opal Foxx". During this time his vocals received media attention and Tom Waits comparisons arose. His voice has since been described as "resembling the roar of a wounded lion". After some of the musicians of the group died tragically, the band Smoke was conceived in 1992 with members Bill Taft, Brian Halloran, and Todd Butler. Coleman Lewis and Tim Campion later joined the band, followed by Will Fratesi. Smoke was renowned for his on-stage banter, never shying away from provoking his viewers, "for a faggot, do I have a rockin' band or what?"
Benjamin was addicted to the drug speed and he also had AIDS, though he claimed "HIV is not a death sentence". AIDS brought him closer to his estranged mother. He died on January 29, 1999 due to liver failure caused by Hepatitis C at age 39. He performed his final concert in Atlanta, Georgia on New Year's Eve, 1998.
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• FILM STILLS FROM THE DOCUMENTARY •
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• BENJAMIN SMOKE (2001) •
These days, terms like "independent film," "alternative music," and "outsider artist" are so widely misapplied, they've become nearly meaningless. But the real thing -- independent, alternative, and outside -- is always being made, by someone. Here you'll find all three.
In his late teens, Robert Dickerson took a new name, just one: Benjamin. If I say he was a speed freak, a drag queen, a boy who got into music after hearing Patti Smith's Horses, you might think you've been to this movie before, but you'd be wrong.
Benjamin Smoke is a film made by Jem Cohen and Peter Sillen. Shot over a decade, the last of Benjamin's life, it is (Cohen says) "the story of a boy growing up in the rural South who sensed his own difference, a 'queerness' that isn't just about gender." Beautifully assembled, combining 16mm, Super 8, video, and photographs, it is a portrait of Benjamin, but also of his band, Smoke, and the neighborhood much of the action springs from, Atlanta's Cabbagetown.
This moving, heart-breaking and often funny portrait premiered at the 2001 Berlin Film Festival, won the First Prize Juror's Award at the 2001 Doubletake Documentary Film Festival and had a national theatrical release by Cowboy Pictures, garnering acclaim from critics throughout the country.
After digging for many months, I was finally able to get my hands on this beautiful film. And now I am sharing this rare, out of print documentary with all of you. Enjoy this hauntingly gorgeous yet unflinching portrait of the man known as Benjamin Smoke.
Benjamin Smoke from Heather Amour on Vimeo.
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