The following article was written by Len Fagan of the Coconut Teazer where Bobbi was a frequent headliner during the last year of her life. It was printed as a 2 page spread in the LA Weekly in December of 1988. This short Bio meant so much to her family and friends and is appreciated even more so many years after her death. Thank you Len!
-Kathy Brown
Bobbi Brat. How can you capsulize a person’s life within a few hundred words? You can’t. Especially someone as special as Bobbi Brat.
Looking at her, many people were intimidated by her rough, biker-like appearance. But those who chose to look further found a gentle, funny girl who was blessed with tremendous talent. And, in this day of the liberated women, Bobbi was independent and self-reliant, but she always managed to retain her femininity. Unlike so many others, Bobbi did not confuse being a strong woman with being a bitch. In fact, she was as charming a lady as I’ve ever met.
I came to know Bobbi very well during the 7 months she held down her regular residency at the Coconut Teazer in Hollywood. She played between one and three night a week, every week….except for the two gigs she had to cancel because she was in the hospital. (It wasn’t enough for her to cancel just because she was ill – and most of you don’t know the entire time she played the Teazer she had a tube inserted into the side of her stomach which was draining a blood clot. Still, she performed and sang like no one I’ve ever heard before! No, Bobbi only cancelled because she was literally in the hospital.)
Once I came up behind her to hug her from behind, and before I had barely touched her she yelped from the pain caused by her extremely sensitive side. Still, she never complained or even told anyone about her problem.
There’s no way to tell what great things the future had in store for her. I know that more than one record company was interested in recording her and made firm offers. Two major film companies as well had projects in which they had offered her the female leads.
I was fortunate to hear the new material she had written with her new band. I can promise you it was strong exciting classic rock, just the thing that would have appealed to the masses, and I believe, made her world famous. She was certainly a world class talent. I was proud to be her friend and truly privileged to be there with her near the end during those final days when she so bravely battled the cancer that was ravaging her once gorgeous body. She was the embodiment of the word “courage”. All she asked from her family and friends during those final, trying days was love. And that was easy to give, because Bobbi was so easy to love.
Bobbi was barely 5 foot four inches tall, but I don’t remember her as being “petite”, as so many reviewers describe her. Her personality was so strong that you never thought of her as being small. And at the end, she again showed just exactly how “big” she could be.
What follows is a brief reminiscence and biography. If space allowed, the entire issue could be filled with loving memories, as each of us who knew her has memories we shared that we’ll never forget. As guitarist Michael Wilcox said “Those of us who knew her as a friend were the “chosen ones”. She chose US.
And those of you who were fortunate enough to see her perform were also very lucky. For the rest of the world will never know what they missed. She could have been one of the all-time greats. As a person, she already WAS an all-time great.
Bobbi Brat/Deborah Ann Brown was born July 14, 1962 in Los Angeles. Her biological Father, Daryl Tisinger, was a full-blooded Black Foot Indian and her Mother, Rebecca Brown was only 15 at the time and shortly after married Michael Brown who adopted Bobbi.
Bobbi grew up in Canoga Park and moved to Agoura Hills in her teens, graduating from Agoura High School in 1980.
As a child her interests were skate boarding and karate, though music was always a constant, as her mother and sister, Kathy, would enjoy harmonizing songs by Joni Mitchell, Linda Ronstadt and Carole King.
At 18 she left home, finding shelter wherever she could: her car, shared apartments, condemned buildings or park benches. While dancing professionally she put together her first band, Red Scare, a punk outfit who toured most of America supporting an LP released on Upstart Record in 1984.
By 1985 she she’d grown weary of the punk scene and put together the first version of Bobbi and the Boneyard Brats, a cowpunk unit finally able to showcase her vocal potential. Playing in small LA clubs as well as the Palace and Olympic Auditorium, this foray eventually led her to the formation of the Bobbi Brat Band, playing classic rock, along with a taste of country and rockabilly.
In the spring of 1987, known simply as Bobbi Brat, she landed a residency at the Coconut Teazer on the Strip, amassing a large following and record company interest. Music Connection chose her as Top Club Draw for 1987, and LA Weekly nominated her for Best Country Artist along with Dwight Yoakum, Rosie Flores and Dave Alvin.
But Bobbi was also heavily influenced by the harder rock music she’d listened to while growing up: Led Zeppelin, Foghat, Queen and Rolling Stones, and in the spring of 1988 she began writing new songs with a much harder edge. Unfortunately the medical treatments she was undergoing did not allow that project to be fulfilled, and prevented her from availing herself of the recording opportunities and film offers which had presented themselves.
Bobbi was perhaps the greatest singer, finest lyricist and strongest visual presence I’ve ever seen. More importantly, she was also the finest PERSON: warm, selflessly giving, funny, humble, loving and brutally honest.
After solving her own drug and alcohol problem, she and her boyfriend, Drac, continually took friends into their home to help them to do the same. Upon meeting Bobbi, you soon realized that she was just a cute little girl hiding behind a mass of tattoos; protective of her friends and devoted to her love of animals – as well as Harley Davidsons.
She had an untiring and fought her cancer to the very end, holding on to the life that was so dear to her, though never complaining or feeling sorry for herself. She was perhaps the sweetest person I have ever known and definitely the bravest.
Bobbi was not concerned with petty things. She just wanted to get down to the nitty-gritty of making music and loving people. A brief story which exemplifies her character would be the time she noticed that the marquee spelling of her name –announcing her bands appearance- was misspelled, having omitted one b from her first name. It read “Bobi Brat” rather than “Bobbi”. Instead of griping and demanding that it be changed, as so many others would have done, she just exclaimed, “Look! It’s (pronounced) B-oh-bi! I’m B-oh-bi Brat!”
As most of her friends agree, I’m sure I’ll never meet anyone quite like her again. But the sorrow we must share is for ourselves, not her. Because as she wrote in one of her last songs:
Save me a seat on that salvation train
Open up the gates I’m comin in from the rain
No more sorrow, no more pain
Save me a seat on that salvation train
I close my eyes and I hear the angels sing
I close my eyes and see the light of their heavenly wings
Now I lay me down to sleep
What you sow is what you reap
My time has come I’m leavin you
Headed for the wild blue
We’ll miss her and lover her, but I know she got a ride on that glorious train……and she’s in a better place now.
-Len Fagan 1988
-Kathy Brown
Bobbi Brat. How can you capsulize a person’s life within a few hundred words? You can’t. Especially someone as special as Bobbi Brat.
Looking at her, many people were intimidated by her rough, biker-like appearance. But those who chose to look further found a gentle, funny girl who was blessed with tremendous talent. And, in this day of the liberated women, Bobbi was independent and self-reliant, but she always managed to retain her femininity. Unlike so many others, Bobbi did not confuse being a strong woman with being a bitch. In fact, she was as charming a lady as I’ve ever met.
I came to know Bobbi very well during the 7 months she held down her regular residency at the Coconut Teazer in Hollywood. She played between one and three night a week, every week….except for the two gigs she had to cancel because she was in the hospital. (It wasn’t enough for her to cancel just because she was ill – and most of you don’t know the entire time she played the Teazer she had a tube inserted into the side of her stomach which was draining a blood clot. Still, she performed and sang like no one I’ve ever heard before! No, Bobbi only cancelled because she was literally in the hospital.)
Once I came up behind her to hug her from behind, and before I had barely touched her she yelped from the pain caused by her extremely sensitive side. Still, she never complained or even told anyone about her problem.
There’s no way to tell what great things the future had in store for her. I know that more than one record company was interested in recording her and made firm offers. Two major film companies as well had projects in which they had offered her the female leads.
I was fortunate to hear the new material she had written with her new band. I can promise you it was strong exciting classic rock, just the thing that would have appealed to the masses, and I believe, made her world famous. She was certainly a world class talent. I was proud to be her friend and truly privileged to be there with her near the end during those final days when she so bravely battled the cancer that was ravaging her once gorgeous body. She was the embodiment of the word “courage”. All she asked from her family and friends during those final, trying days was love. And that was easy to give, because Bobbi was so easy to love.
Bobbi was barely 5 foot four inches tall, but I don’t remember her as being “petite”, as so many reviewers describe her. Her personality was so strong that you never thought of her as being small. And at the end, she again showed just exactly how “big” she could be.
What follows is a brief reminiscence and biography. If space allowed, the entire issue could be filled with loving memories, as each of us who knew her has memories we shared that we’ll never forget. As guitarist Michael Wilcox said “Those of us who knew her as a friend were the “chosen ones”. She chose US.
And those of you who were fortunate enough to see her perform were also very lucky. For the rest of the world will never know what they missed. She could have been one of the all-time greats. As a person, she already WAS an all-time great.
Bobbi Brat/Deborah Ann Brown was born July 14, 1962 in Los Angeles. Her biological Father, Daryl Tisinger, was a full-blooded Black Foot Indian and her Mother, Rebecca Brown was only 15 at the time and shortly after married Michael Brown who adopted Bobbi.
Bobbi grew up in Canoga Park and moved to Agoura Hills in her teens, graduating from Agoura High School in 1980.
As a child her interests were skate boarding and karate, though music was always a constant, as her mother and sister, Kathy, would enjoy harmonizing songs by Joni Mitchell, Linda Ronstadt and Carole King.
At 18 she left home, finding shelter wherever she could: her car, shared apartments, condemned buildings or park benches. While dancing professionally she put together her first band, Red Scare, a punk outfit who toured most of America supporting an LP released on Upstart Record in 1984.
By 1985 she she’d grown weary of the punk scene and put together the first version of Bobbi and the Boneyard Brats, a cowpunk unit finally able to showcase her vocal potential. Playing in small LA clubs as well as the Palace and Olympic Auditorium, this foray eventually led her to the formation of the Bobbi Brat Band, playing classic rock, along with a taste of country and rockabilly.
In the spring of 1987, known simply as Bobbi Brat, she landed a residency at the Coconut Teazer on the Strip, amassing a large following and record company interest. Music Connection chose her as Top Club Draw for 1987, and LA Weekly nominated her for Best Country Artist along with Dwight Yoakum, Rosie Flores and Dave Alvin.
But Bobbi was also heavily influenced by the harder rock music she’d listened to while growing up: Led Zeppelin, Foghat, Queen and Rolling Stones, and in the spring of 1988 she began writing new songs with a much harder edge. Unfortunately the medical treatments she was undergoing did not allow that project to be fulfilled, and prevented her from availing herself of the recording opportunities and film offers which had presented themselves.
Bobbi was perhaps the greatest singer, finest lyricist and strongest visual presence I’ve ever seen. More importantly, she was also the finest PERSON: warm, selflessly giving, funny, humble, loving and brutally honest.
After solving her own drug and alcohol problem, she and her boyfriend, Drac, continually took friends into their home to help them to do the same. Upon meeting Bobbi, you soon realized that she was just a cute little girl hiding behind a mass of tattoos; protective of her friends and devoted to her love of animals – as well as Harley Davidsons.
She had an untiring and fought her cancer to the very end, holding on to the life that was so dear to her, though never complaining or feeling sorry for herself. She was perhaps the sweetest person I have ever known and definitely the bravest.
Bobbi was not concerned with petty things. She just wanted to get down to the nitty-gritty of making music and loving people. A brief story which exemplifies her character would be the time she noticed that the marquee spelling of her name –announcing her bands appearance- was misspelled, having omitted one b from her first name. It read “Bobi Brat” rather than “Bobbi”. Instead of griping and demanding that it be changed, as so many others would have done, she just exclaimed, “Look! It’s (pronounced) B-oh-bi! I’m B-oh-bi Brat!”
As most of her friends agree, I’m sure I’ll never meet anyone quite like her again. But the sorrow we must share is for ourselves, not her. Because as she wrote in one of her last songs:
Save me a seat on that salvation train
Open up the gates I’m comin in from the rain
No more sorrow, no more pain
Save me a seat on that salvation train
I close my eyes and I hear the angels sing
I close my eyes and see the light of their heavenly wings
Now I lay me down to sleep
What you sow is what you reap
My time has come I’m leavin you
Headed for the wild blue
We’ll miss her and lover her, but I know she got a ride on that glorious train……and she’s in a better place now.
-Len Fagan 1988