Zack De La Rocha

Background information
Birth name	Zacarías Manuel de la Rocha
Born	January 12, 1970 Long Beach, California, U.S.
Genres	Alternative metal, rap metal, funk metal, rapcore, hardcore
Occupations	Musician, songwriter, activist
Instruments	Vocals, guitar, drums, keyboard, jarana
Years active	1988 - present
Labels	Epic, Revelation Records, ANTI-
Associated acts	Rage Against the Machine, Inside Out, Hardstance, One Day as a Lion

Zacarías Manuel de la Rocha (born January 12, 1970, in Long Beach, California) is an American rapper, musician, poet, and activist of Mexican, German, and Irish descent. He is best known as the vocalist and lyricist of Rage Against the Machine and is currently the frontman of the music duo One Day as a Lion.

Early life and childhood

De la Rocha's father, Roberto "Beto" de la Rocha, played an integral part in his son's cultural upbringing. Beto was a muralist and member of Los Four — the first Chicano art collective to be exhibited at a museum (LACMA, 1973). De la Rocha's grandfather was a Sinaloan revolutionary who fought in the Mexican Revolution and an agricultural laborer in the US. Later, de la Rocha would see the hardships his grandfather endured reflected in the struggles of the Zapatistas (also known as EZLN).

When de la Rocha was a year old, his parents separated. He and his German-Irish mother, Olivia de la Rocha, moved from East Los Angeles to Irvine, California, where she attended the University of California at Irvine and earned a Ph.D. in Anthropology. Zack described Irvine as "one of the most racist cities imaginable. If you were a Mexican in Irvine, you were there because you had a broom or a hammer in your hand." It was also at an Irvine grade school, where young Zack met his friend and future Rage Against the Machine bandmate, Tim Commerford.

In 1981, Beto suffered a nervous breakdown, took his religious ideals to extremes, and destroyed his own artwork. When Zack would visit on weekends, Beto forced him to fast, sit in a room with the curtains closed and door locked and help destroy his father's paintings. Not long after, Olivia stopped the visits.

At the age of 14, de la Rocha became a vegetarian, saying in 1989 of the diet: "I think vegetarianism is really great, and I stand really strongly behind it." When asked why, he explains "Inside me, I think that an animal goes through a lot of pain in the whole cycle of death in the slaughterhouse; just living to be killed. That whole situation is really messed up for animals, growing up in those little cooped-up pens. I just don't think its worth eating that animal. I think animals should be free. There's so much other food out there that doesn't have to involve you in that cycle of pain and death."

Early career

While attending junior high school, de la Rocha became involved in the punk scene and played guitar for a band called Juvenile Expression with Tim Commerford. His interest in bands like The Clash, The Sex Pistols and Bad Religion turned into an appreciation for other bands like Minor Threat, Bad Brains, and The Teen Idles. Soon after entering high school, Zack joined the straight edge band Hardstance.

De la Rocha and Hardstance bassist Mark Hayworth eventually formed the Hardcore band Inside Out, which gained a large national underground following. They released a single record, No Spiritual Surrender, on Revelation Records in 1990 before breaking up. In de la Rocha's words, Inside Out was "about completely detaching ourselves from society to see ourselves as...as spirits, and not bowing down to a system that sees you as just another pebble on a beach. I channeled all my anger out through that band."

After Inside Out broke up, he embraced hip hop and began freestyling at local clubs, where he met Tom Morello and Brad Wilk. Eventually De La Rocha's Juvenile Expression bandmate Commerford joined them and Rage Against the Machine was formed.

On working with DJ Shadow and Reznor, de la Rocha admitted in a 2008 interview that:

“

When I left Rage… first off, I was very heartbroken, and secondly, I became obsessed with completely reinventing my wheel. In an unhealthy way, to a degree. I kind of forgot that old way of allowing yourself to just be a conduit. When I was working with Trent and Shadow, I felt that I was going through the motions. Not that what was produced wasn’t great, but I feel now that I’ve maybe reinvented the base sounds that emanate from the songs.

”

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