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Ben Is Dead was a Los Angeles-based zine published from 1988 through 1999. Its creator, Deborah "Darby" Romeo, got its name from a dream Romeo had had about her husband, a Frenchman she divorced not long into the magazine's run. It began as a scuzzy-looking, amateurish publication featuring interviews with punk bands of the era (including such then up-and-comers as Nirvana and Hole ) alongside the confessional and often shocking writing of Romeo and her many contributors (which included such colorful personalities as Vaginal Creme Davis, Ron Athey, Howard Hollis, Lisa Crystal Carver, Jessica Jones, Stymie Baldwin and I.P. Freely.) Each issue had an overall theme ("Revenge," "Obsessions and Bad Habits," "Depression," etc.) which the zine's writers would explore in exhaustive detail, freely recounting their own suicide attempts, kinky sexual adventures, addictions, disgusting illnesses or family horror stories. The zine gradually became quite slick-looking and featured interviews with such mainstream acts as Tom Jones , "Weird Al" Yankovic and Duran Duran alongside underground heroes like William S. Burroughs , Johnny Rotten and Anton LaVey . Eventually BID had a circulation in the tens of thousands and was being sold in Borders across the USA, leading many hardcore, DIY zinesters to grumble that it was no longer a zine at all. As the zine continued, its tone became increasingly erratic as Romeo mixed the dark, confessional material with more and more light-hearted pop culture commentary, including many articles about her fascination with Beverly Hills, 90210 . Romeo's "90210" obsession eventually resulted in her creating the "I Hate Brenda" newsletter, a one-shot publication which was widely covered by the mainstream press. She also co-wrote the 1993 Pinnacle publication, "The 'I Hate Brenda' Book" and even formed her own band, Rump, who released a CD entitled "Hating Brenda." Today BID is perhaps best known for the three-part series of "Retro" issues, in which dozens of writers looked back at the trends and fads of their childhoods with a mix of nostalgia and horror. These issues were compiled into the sprawling book, "Retro Hell: Life in the '70s and '80s, From Afros to Zotz." In the mid to late '90s, Romeo was often interviewed by the mainstream media, serving as a rather ambivalent spokesperson for the zine movement; she once joked that unless she found a way to make her zine pay off, she was soon going to be doing CNN interviews from a cardboard box. Romeo was constantly embroiled in feuds with other zinesters, and her last known publishing project was "Socially Fucking Retarded," a 2000 one-shot zine chronicling the KillZine tour she went on with various other zinesters and the controversies along the way. Romeo regularly interviewed her cantankerous father in BID, and in one interview she told him she couldn't imagine publishing a zine after 30. And indeed, not long into her 30s, Romeo announced she was ceasing publication. The last issue of "Ben is Dead" featured the theme of "Celebrity".Actor/artist/oddball Crispin Glover appeared on the cover and was the subject of a lengthy and very peculiar interview. While many of "Ben is Dead's" writers have continued their writing careers ( Vaginal Davis writes for "LA Weekly," Lisa Crystal Carver has written several books, etc.), Romeo, who was widely acknowledged as one of the most talented writers in the entire zine movement, has ceased writing. EXTERNAL LINKS
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