Pete Burns

Pete Burns
Burns performing in 2008
Born	Peter Jozzeppi Burns (1959-08-05)5 August 1959 Port Sunlight, Cheshire, England
Died	23 October 2016(2016-10-23) (aged 57) London, England
Cause of death	Heart attack Cardiac arrest
Occupation	Singer-songwriter, television personality
Years active	1977–2016
Spouse(s)	Lynne Corlet (m. 1980–2006) Michael Simpson (m. 2007–08)
Musical career
Genres	Pop, dance, new wave, Hi-NRG
Instruments	Vocals
Labels	Epic, Sony Japan, Cleopatra, Avex
Associated acts	Dead or Alive, Nightmares in Wax

Peter Jozzeppi "Pete" Burns (5 August 1959 – 23 October 2016) was an English singer-songwriter and television personality. He founded the pop band Dead or Alive in 1980, in which he was vocalist and songwriter, and who rose to mainstream success with their 1985 single "You Spin Me Round (Like a Record)". He later rose to further celebrity status in the British media following his appearance on Celebrity Big Brother 4, in which he finished in fifth place. He appeared on further television reality shows, including as a presenter. Burns had a powerful singing voice and was known for his ever-changing, often androgynous appearance, which he freely admitted was greatly modified by cosmetic surgery.

Burns was born in Port Sunlight, Cheshire on 5 August 1959. His mother, Evelina Maria Bettina Quittner von Hudec (1913–1987), was born in Heidelberg. As her father was Jewish, she moved to Vienna to escape the anti-Semitic laws of the Nazis. There, she met an English soldier, Francis Burns (from Liverpool), at a tea dance. Evelina Burns was 46 years old when she gave birth to Pete. Burns wrote of his childhood in his autobiography Freak Unique. He described his mother's alcoholism and her suicide attempts but maintained that she was "absolutely the best mother in the world".

Burns spoke German until he was five, which resulted in local children spending days outside his door shouting "Heil Hitler". According to Burns, school was "almost non-existent", and his mother frequently kept him away so he could spend the day with her. He dropped out of school at the age of 14 after being summoned to the headmaster's office because he had arrived at school with "no eyebrows, Harmony-red hair, and one gigantic earring". At around this age he was raped by a man who took him for a drive; Burns later recalled that he wasn't upset by this, although he knew that people would expect him to be. He stated that he already knew the man, who drove him to Raby Mere and threatened him with an air gun.