b. Beth Torbert, 15 June 1971, New Delhi, India. Confrontational, tattooed, hard rock singer-songwriter Bif Naked was born to two private-school teachers who gave her up for adoption. Torbert was adopted by two American missionaries, and her childhood was spent in locations including Lexington, Kentucky, USA, and Winnipeg, Manitoba in Canada. Her first band was Jungle Milk, who specialized in rap cover versions of Doris Day songs backed by 10 conga players. She then worked with three of Canada's premier underground bands - Gorilla Gorilla (she was briefly married to drummer Brett Hopkins), Chrome Dog, and Dying To Be Violent. Bif Naked made her debut with her own band in 1994 with the EP Fours Songs And A Poem. It won her instant attention, and heralded a talent that was more fully realized on a full-length album released later that year on the Plum label. With the rest of her band - Randy Black (drums), Rich Priske (bass) and X-Factor (guitar) - the major theme of the lyrics was the politics of sex and love. However, it was her skill in articulating different perspectives on gender issues that really distinguished her - from the male lust expressed in 'Everything' to an account of her own rape ordeal ('Tell On You'). The musical backgrounds ranged from conventional, grinding hard-rock to the seductive hip-hop beats of 'Daddy's Getting Married', a song concerning the remarriage of her father, which became the first single released from the album. When Plum went out of business the singer bought back the master tapes and licensed the album to Edel Records in Europe. The album was also re-released by Montreal's Aquarius label in 1996. The follow-up was a spoken word collection entitled Okenspay Ordway, which included ruminations on her adoption of a 'straight edge' lifestyle. Her second album proper, I Bificus, was released in Canada in February 1998. Lava picked up a reworked version featuring two new tracks for US release in August 1999. The album subsequently went gold, aided by the radio success of the 'Moment Of Weakness' single and some high-profile appearances on MTV and the Lilith Fair tour.