Bobby Beausoleil & the Freedom Orchestra

Robert Kenneth "Bobby" Beausoleil (born 6 November 1947, in Santa Barbara, California), was a member of the Charles Manson "Family" who was convicted of killing music teacher Gary Hinman on July 25, 1969. He was sentenced to death but this was commuted to life imprisonment. Known in the family as "Cupid", Bobby had many girlfriends, one of whom was future Family member Leslie Van Houten. A musician by trade, he composed a soundtrack for Kenneth Anger's movie Lucifer Rising, in which he also appears, after Jimmy Page of Led Zeppelin who was to originally compose the soundtrack took too much time and was fired. He also appeared in "Invocation of My Demon Brother" and a soft porn film known variously as The Ramrodder in which a friend Catherine Share also appears. Share also became a member of the Manson Family. Bobby also was featured in Savage Passion. He later joined a band called The Milky Way He met Charles Manson in Topanga Canyon sometime after Manson was released from prison in March 1967, and later went on to be one of the group who killed Hinman. Some sources have alleged that Beausoleil and Hinman had a sexual relationship (this was brought up in Susan Atkins' 1985 parole hearing). The commonly accepted version of the murder is that Hinman was killed for money and property that Manson claimed he owed the Family. Accompanying Beausoleil that night were Susan Atkins and Mary Brunner, both later involved in other murders. Beausoleil has told various incompatible stories about his role in the Hinman murder. In one version, detailed in a Oui magazine interview, conducted in summer 1980 and published in November 1981, Beausoleil had come to collect $1,000 related to a mescaline transaction. He was under pressure from the Straight Satans, a motorcycle gang, who were unimpressed with their purchase. Hinman refused to pay back the money, and allegedly pulled a knife on Beausoleil. Beausoleil's versions of the murder were also inconsistent with the autopsy performed on Hinman, which depict a murder by torture, and with other testimony which described Manson slicing Hinman's ear with a sword (actually a long knife) before his followers killed him. Beausoleil was interested in music and was a fan of The Byrds. Opening for The Byrds one night was a racially integrated band, called The Grass Roots (not The Grass Roots of "Midnight Confessions" and "Live For Today" fame,) fronted by Arthur Lee. Bobby convinced Lee to let him join the group. During this time he promoted a private gay club called the Brave New World to the hippies of the Sunset Strip. According to Beausoleil, when Arthur Lee changed his band's name to Love, it was in honor of Bobby, sometimes called Bummer Bob, who had a particular Grass Roots-era nickname of Cupid. Beausoleil later played in the band Orkustra. In 2005, the Swiss label RD Records released hitherto unreleased music by the band. In December 2005 Beausoleil was denied parole for the eleventh time and transferred prisons. About Lucifer rising soundtrack: It's incredibly difficult, nay perhaps impossible, to discuss Lucifer Rising without mentioning its "controversial" (to put it mildly) creator and his story. Bobby Beausoleil is currently incarcerated in California, serving time for his part in the murders committed by the infamous Manson Family. But his bizarre and horrific criminal record is not what's interesting about Beausoleil, or Lucifer Rising. Before his involvement with Manson, Beausoleil was active on the San Francisco hippy music scene, and was engaged to score Lucifer Rising, an intense occult meditation on film by Kenneth Anger (also known as the genius behind the films Scorpio Rising, Fireworks and the book Hollywood Babylon). Beausoleil and Anger had a falling out at Lucifer Rising's first screening, and did not speak to each other for many years. After Beausoleil's incarceration, Anger engaged him again to complete the score, after Led Zeppelin's Jimi Page failed to finish. Finally released in 2004, Beausoleil's score recorded entirely in prison is a classic of instrumental psychedelia, akin to some of the better early Pink Floyd tracks. Imagine the sun rising over the pyramids, because that's what you're gonna see in your mind when you play this. Heavy. A dark psychedelic masterpiece! Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.