ANTHRAX and PANTERA drummer, Charlie Benante, and his longtime girlfriend, Carla Harvey of BUTCHER BABIES fame, have announced their official engagement.
Earlier today (Sunday, January 28), 61-year-old Benante revealed the news via a social media update. He posted several photos featuring himself and Carla, aged 47, enjoying a U2 concert at the Sphere in Las Vegas. Additionally, he shared a brief clip of U2‘s performance along with the following message: “We went to see @u2 and this happened @carlaharvey,” adding an engagement ring emoji. “they played ‘all I want is you’…”
During a 2021 interview with Anne Erickson of Audio Ink Radio, Benante was asked how he met Harvey, to which he responded: “Actually, we met at… Well, she says we met earlier, but I don’t remember it. She says she interviewed me at the [Revolver] Golden Gods Awards, but I don’t remember it, but she does have a picture of it, so I know I was there. And then we played a festival in San Bernardino [California] together. I think it was — it could have been Knotfest. And then afterwards, our manager said, ‘Oh, the BUTCHER BABIES, they covered one of your songs for this, blah, blah, blah,’ and I’m, like, ‘Oh, cool.’ And then, that’s how I ended up meeting her, at that show. And we were both kind of interested in the same type of things — like, goofy, nerdy s**t.
“But at the time, we were both kind of involved in marriages and stuff, and that was it. We would e-mail here and there, ‘Hey, did you check out this book?’ or, ‘Did you see that?’ And then that was it. I didn’t talk to her for a bit. And then one day, I was in L.A. making a record, and I hit her up, and I said, ‘You wanna meet around here, go get a coffee or something?’ And, she turned me down. And then I hit her back up a little bit later, and she’s, like, ‘Okay, I’ve to gotta go to the art store in that area. Do you wanna come with me? And we ended up going to an art store. And that was it.”
