Rossdale was born in Kilburn, London, to parents Lucy Stephan (b. Scotland) and Douglas Rossdale (a doctor of Russian descent; Jewish family name was originally Rosentar). His parents divorced when he was eleven years old, and he was raised primarily by his father and aunt. (His mother remarried and moved to South Tampa, Florida, off fashionable Bayshore Blvd.). Rossdale has a younger sister, Soraya, and an older one, Lorraine.
Rossdale modelled briefly, producing some fashion shots with good friend, Marilyn. He learned to play bass guitar after hanging out with his sister Lorraine's boyfriend, who was in a band called The Nobodyz, but he switched to rhythm guitar. At 17, he left the Westminster School, played semi-professional football until side-lined by an injury, and formed a band called Midnight (formerly Little Dukes), which produced a couple of singles and many publicity photos. In 1991, Gavin moved to Los Angeles for 6 months, lived where he could, and took whatever part-time jobs were available, including production assistant on video shoots. He spent some time in NYC before returning to England where he hooked up with future manager Dave Dorrell (MARRS), whom he had met in LA. In 1992, Gavin formed Future Primitive, whose original line-up (under the name The Diceheads) included screenwriter Sacha Gervasi, who left to pursue a film-making career. The band changed its name to Bush in the summer of 1994 and released the promo Sixteen Stone. |
