Jello Biafra (Punk Singer) – Overview, Biography

Name:Jello Biafra
Occupation: Punk Singer
Gender:Male
Height:175 cm (5′ 9”)
Birth Day: June 17,
1958
Age: 62
Birth Place: Boulder,
United States
Zodiac Sign:Gemini

Jello Biafra

Jello Biafra was born on June 17, 1958 in Boulder, United States (62 years old). Jello Biafra is a Punk Singer, zodiac sign: Gemini. Nationality: United States. Approx. Net Worth: $500 Thousand.

Trivia

He ran for president during the 2000 presidential election as a member of the Green Party.

Net Worth 2020

$500 Thousand
Find out more about Jello Biafra net worth here.

Physique

HeightWeightHair ColourEye ColourBlood TypeTattoo(s)
175 cm (5′ 9”) N/A N/A N/A N/A N/A

Before Fame

He studied acting and history at the University of Santa Cruz. His first punk band was The Healers, which he joined in the late 1970s.

Biography

Biography Timeline

1965

As a child, Boucher developed an interest in international politics that was encouraged by his parents. An avid news watcher, one of his earliest memories was of the John F. Kennedy assassination. Biafra says he has been a fan of rock music since first hearing it in 1965, when his parents accidentally tuned in to a rock radio station. Boucher ignored his high school guidance counselor’s advice that he spend his adolescence preparing to become a dental hygienist.

1977

He began his career in music in January 1977 as a roadie for the punk rock band The Ravers (who later changed their name to The Nails), soon joining his friend John Greenway in a band called The Healers. The Healers became well known locally for their mainly improvised lyrics and avant garde music. In the autumn of that year, he began attending the University of California, Santa Cruz.

1978

In June 1978, he responded to an advertisement placed in a store by guitarist East Bay Ray, stating; “guitarist wants to form punk band,” and together they formed the Dead Kennedys. He began performing with the band under the stage name Occupant, but soon began to use his current stage name, a combination of the brand name Jell-O and the short-lived African state Biafra. The band’s lyrics were written by Biafra. The lyrics were mostly political in nature and displayed a sardonic, sometimes absurdist, sense of humor despite their serious subject matter. In the tradition of UK anarcho-punk bands like Crass and the Subhumans, the Dead Kennedys were one of the first US punk bands to write politically themed songs. The lyrics Biafra wrote helped popularize the use of humorous lyrics in punk and other types of hard-core music. Biafra cites Joey Ramone as the inspiration for his use of humor in his songs (as well as being the musician who made him interested in punk rock), noting in particular songs by the Ramones such as “Beat on the Brat” and “Now I Wanna Sniff Some Glue”.

His platform included unconventional points such as forcing businessmen to wear clown suits within city limits, erecting statues of Dan White, who assassinated Mayor George Moscone and City Supervisor Harvey Milk in 1978, around the city and allowing the parks department to sell eggs and tomatoes with which people could pelt the statues, hiring workers who’d lost their jobs due to a tax initiative to panhandle in wealthy neighborhoods (including Dianne Feinstein’s), and a citywide ban on cars. Biafra has expressed irritation that these parts of his platform attained such notoriety, preferring instead to be remembered for serious proposals such as legalizing squatting in vacant, tax-delinquent buildings and requiring police officers to run for election by the people of the neighborhoods they patrol.

1979

In June 1979, Biafra co-founded the record label Alternative Tentacles, with which the Dead Kennedys released their first single, “California Über Alles”. The label was created to allow the band to release albums without having to deal with pressure from major labels to change their music, although the major labels were not willing to sign the band due to their songs being deemed too controversial. After dealing with Cherry Red in the UK and IRS Records in the US for their first album Fresh Fruit for Rotting Vegetables, the band released all later albums, and later pressings of Fresh Fruit on Alternative Tentacles. The exception being live albums released after the band’s break-up, which the other band members compiled from recordings in the band partnership’s vaults without Biafra’s input or endorsement.. Biafra has been the owner of the company since its founding, though he does not receive a salary for his position; Biafra has referred to his position in the company as “absentee thoughtlord”.

1981

Biafra married Theresa Soder, a.k.a. Ninotchka, lead singer of San Francisco-area punk band the Situations, on October 31, 1981. The wedding was conducted by Flipper vocalist/bassist Bruce Loose, who became a Universal Life Church minister just to conduct the ceremony, which took place in a graveyard. The wedding reception, which members of Flipper, Black Flag, and D.O.A. attended, was held at director Joe Rees’ Target Video studios. The marriage ended in 1986.

1986

In April 1986, police officers raided his house in response to complaints by the Parents Music Resource Center (PMRC). In June 1986, L.A. deputy city attorney Michael Guarino, working under City Attorney James Hahn, brought Biafra to trial in Los Angeles for distributing “harmful material to minors” in the Dead Kennedys album Frankenchrist. However, the dispute was about neither the music nor the lyrics from the album, but rather the print of the H. R. Giger poster Landscape XX (Penis Landscape) included with the album. Biafra believes the trial was politically motivated; it was often reported that the PMRC took Biafra to court as a cost-effective way of sending a message out to other musicians with content considered offensive in their music.

Music author Reebee Garofalo argued that Biafra and Alternative Tentacles may have been targeted because the label was a “small, self-managed and self-supported company that could ill afford a protracted legal battle.” Facing the possible sentence of a year in jail and a $2,000 fine, Biafra, Dirk Dirksen, and Suzanne Stefanac founded the No More Censorship Defense Fund, a benefit featuring several punk rock bands, to help pay for his legal fees, which neither he nor his record label could afford. The jury deadlocked 5 to 7 in favor of acquittal, prompting a mistrial; despite a motion to re-try the case, the judge ordered all charges dropped. The Dead Kennedys disbanded during the trial, in December 1986, due to the mounting legal costs; in the wake of their disbandment, Biafra made a career of his spoken word performances.

Biafra became a spoken word artist in January 1986 with a performance at University of California, Los Angeles. In his performance he combined humor with his political beliefs, much in the same way that he did with the lyrics to his songs. Despite his continued spoken word performances, he did not begin recording spoken word albums until after the disbanding of the Dead Kennedys.

1988

Biafra has a cameo role in the 1988 film Tapeheads. He plays an FBI agent who arrests the two protagonists (played by Tim Robbins and John Cusack). While arresting them his character asks “Remember what we did to Jello Biafra?” lampooning the obscenity prosecution.

In 1988, Biafra, with Al Jourgensen and Paul Barker of the band Ministry, and Jeff Ward, formed Lard. The band became yet another side project for Ministry, with Biafra providing vocals and lyrics. According to a March 2009 interview with Jourgensen, he and Biafra are working on a new Lard album, which is being recorded in Jourgensen’s El Paso studio. While working on the film Terminal City Ricochet in 1989, Biafra did a song for the film’s soundtrack with D.O.A.. As a result, Biafra worked with D.O.A. on the album Last Scream of the Missing Neighbors. Biafra also worked with Nomeansno on the soundtrack, which led to their collaboration on the album The Sky Is Falling and I Want My Mommy the following year. Biafra also provided lyrics for the song “Biotech is Godzilla” for Sepultura’s 1993 album Chaos A.D..

1993

Biafra is an ardent collector of unusual vinyl records of all kinds, from 1950s and 1960s ethno-pop recordings by the likes of Les Baxter and Esquivel to vanity pressings that have circulated regionally, to German crooner Heino (for whom he would later participate in the documentary Heino: Made In Germany); he cites his always growing collection as one of his biggest musical influences. In 1993 he gave an interview to RE/Search Publications for their second Incredibly Strange Music book focusing primarily on these records, and later participated in a two-part episode of Fuse TV’s program Crate Diggers on the same subject. His interest in such recordings, often categorized as outsider music, led to his discovery of the prolific (and schizophrenic) singer/songwriter/artist Wesley Willis, whom he signed to Alternative Tentacles in 1994, preceding Willis’ major label deal with American Recordings. His collection grew so large that on October 1, 2005, Biafra donated a portion of his collection to an annual yard sale co-promoted by Alternative Tentacles and held at their warehouse in Emeryville, California.

1994

On May 7, 1994, punk rock fans who believed Biafra was a “sell out” attacked him at the 924 Gilman Street club in Berkeley, California. Biafra claims that he was attacked by a man nicknamed Cretin, who crashed into him while moshing. The crash injured Biafra’s leg, causing an argument between the two men. During the argument, Cretin pushed Biafra to the floor and five or six friends of Cretin assaulted Biafra while he was down, yelling “Sellout rock star, kick him,” and attempting to pull out his hair. Biafra was later hospitalized with serious injuries. The attack derailed Biafra’s plans for both a Canadian spoken-word tour and an accompanying album, and the production of Pure Chewing Satisfaction was halted. However, Biafra returned to the Gilman club a few months after the incident to perform a spoken-word performance as an act of reconciliation with the club.

1998

In October 1998, three former members of the Dead Kennedys sued Biafra for nonpayment of royalties. The other members of Dead Kennedys alleged that Biafra, in his capacity as the head of Alternative Tentacles records, discovered an accounting error amounting to some $75,000 in unpaid royalties over almost a decade. Rather than informing his bandmates of this mistake, the suit alleged, Biafra knowingly concealed the information until a whistleblower employee at the record label notified the band.

1999

In 1999, Biafra and other members of the anti-globalization movement protested the WTO Meeting of 1999 in Seattle. Along with other prominent West Coast musicians, he formed the short-lived band the No WTO Combo to help promote the movement’s cause. The band was originally scheduled to play during the protest, but the performance was canceled due to riots. The band performed a short set the following night at the Showbox in downtown Seattle (outside the designated area), along with the hiphop group Spearhead. No WTO Combo later released a CD of recordings from the concert, entitled Live from the Battle in Seattle.

2000

In May 2000, a jury found Biafra and Alternative Tentacles liable by not promptly informing his former bandmates of the accounting error and instead withholding the information during subsequent discussions and contractual negotiations. Biafra was ordered to pay $200,000, including $20,000 in punitive damages. After an appeal by Biafra’s lawyers, in June 2003, the California Court of Appeal unanimously upheld all the conditions of the 2000 verdict against Biafra and Alternative Tentacles. Furthermore, the plaintiffs were awarded the rights to most of Dead Kennedys recorded works—which accounted for about half the sales for Alternative Tentacles. Now in control of the Dead Kennedys name, Biafra’s former bandmates went on tour with a new lead vocalist.

In 2000, the New York State Green Party drafted Biafra as a candidate for the Green Party presidential nomination, and a few supporters were elected to the party’s nominating convention in Denver, Colorado. Biafra chose death row inmate Mumia Abu-Jamal as his running mate. The party overwhelmingly chose Ralph Nader as the presidential candidate with 295 of the 319 delegate votes. Biafra received 10 votes.

2004

After losing the 2000 nomination, Jello became highly active in Ralph Nader’s presidential campaign, as well as in 2004 and 2008. During the 2008 campaign Jello played at rallies and answered questions for journalists in support of Ralph Nader. When gay rights activists accused Nader of costing Al Gore the 2000 election, Biafra reminded them that Tipper Gore’s Parents Music Resource Center wanted warning stickers on albums with homosexual content.

2005

On March 25, 2005, Biafra appeared on the U.S. radio program This American Life, “Episode 285: Know Your Enemy”, which featured a phone call between Jello Biafra and Michael Guarino, the prosecutor in the Frankenchrist trial.

2006

In 2006, along with Alternative Tentacles employee and The Frisk lead singer Jesse Luscious, Biafra began co-hosting The Alternative Tentacles Batcast, a downloadable podcast hosted by alternativetentacles.com. The show primarily focuses on interviews with artists and bands that are currently signed to the Alternative Tentacles label, although there are also occasional episodes where Biafra devoted the show to answering fan questions.

His ninth spoken word album, In the Grip of Official Treason, was released in October 2006.

2011

In 2011, Biafra appeared in a singular concert event with an all-star cast of Southern musicians including members from Cowboy Mouth, Dash Rip Rock, Mojo Nixon and Down entitled, “Jello Biafra and the New Orleans Raunch & Soul All Stars” who performed an array of classic Soul covers to a packed house at the 12-Bar in New Orleans, Louisiana. He would later reunite with many of the same musicians during the Carnival season 2014 to revisit many of these classics at Siberia, New Orleans. A live album from the 2011 performance, Walk on Jindal’s Splinters, and a companion single, Fannie May/Just a Little Bit, were released in 2015.

2012

Biafra was an anarchist in the 1980s, but has shifted away from his former anti-government views. In a 2012 interview, Biafra said “I’m very pro-tax as long as it goes for the right things. I don’t mind paying more money as long as it’s going to provide shelter for people sleeping in the street or getting the schools fixed back up, getting the infrastructure up to the standards of other countries, including a high speed rail system. I’m totally down with that.”

After Barack Obama won the general election, Jello wrote an open letter making suggestions on how to run his term as president. Biafra criticized Obama during his term, stating that “Obama even won the award for best advertising campaign of 2008.” Biafra dubbed Obama “Barackstar O’Bummer”. Biafra refused to support Obama in 2012. Biafra has stated that he feels that Obama continued many of George W. Bush’s policies, summarizing Obama’s policies as containing “worse and worse laws against human rights and more and more illegal unconstitutional spying.”

2015

On September 18, 2015, it was announced that Jello would be supporting Bernie Sanders in his campaign for the 2016 presidential election. He has strongly criticised the political position of Donald Trump, saying “how can people be so fucking stupid” on hearing the election result, and later adding “The last person we want with their finger on the nuclear button is somebody connected to this extreme Christianist doomsday cult.”

2020

On February 28, 2020, Jello announced that he would be supporting both Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders in the 2020 presidential election. “I personally like Warren slightly better than Bernie because: 1) She’s done her homework. Bernie too, but not to quite the same depth or degree. 2) Think about it — who really has a better chance of actually beating Trump, and helping flip Congress and state legislatures? It’s Elizabeth Warren, hands down.” He went on to say that he considered Joe Biden and Mike Bloomberg “almost as bad as Trump.”

On April 12, 2020, Jello expressed disappointment that Bernie Sanders had suspended his campaign for the 2020 Democratic Nomination.

🎂 Upcoming Birthday

Currently, Jello Biafra is 63 years, 1 months and 11 days old. Jello Biafra will celebrate 64th birthday on a Friday 17th of June 2022.

Find out about Jello Biafra birthday activities in timeline view here.

Jello Biafra trends

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