Aurelio Voltaire

Voltaire's father died when he was four months old. At ten months old, Voltaire emigrated to New Jersey with his mother and sister remarried. However, he states that he did not enjoy residing there, stating he was a victim of bullying because of his heritage and strange hobbies and interests. At the age of ten, Voltaire was inspired by the films of Ray Harryhausen (Jason and the Argonauts, The 7th Voyage of Sinbad), and began animating on a super 8 camera. By piecing together snippets of information from fanzines, he eventually was able to teach himself how to make foam rubber animation models and animate them. His stepfather was abusive, considering Voltaire's strange hobbies and interests to indicate he was homosexual. A family friend sexually molested him from infancy into his teenage years. His girlfriend at the time committed suicide, which made him consider doing the same. Before he followed through, he promised himself to live one more day, doing and saying what he wanted to do and say. This allowed him to stand up to the people who were bullying him, and instantly elevated his self-esteem. Though he considered committing suicide again the next day, he was able to hold it off indefinitely. At the age of 17, he ran away from home and moved to New York City. His first job there was an animator with Parker Brothers. Voltaire says that he loves New York, and that the only other place he would be happy living is Tokyo.

In 2017, Voltaire has made a web series called Gothic Homemaking, which he posts a new episode of every Monday morning AM on his YouTube channel The Lair Of Voltaire.

Voltaire has acted in movies. One movie he appeared in as the character "Verrill", was "Model Hunger" (2016). He additionally contributed a cameo as the exorcist Altair in The Velocipastor in 2017.

Voltaire will be appearing in visual companion content for American Murder Song as Unwed Henry.[1] The first video featuring his character was released at the 2016 Steampunk World's Fair and later on YouTube.

In 2014, his tenth album, Raised by Bats, was released. Contrasting with the dark cabaret instrumentation of most of his album, Raised by Bats is more deathrock- and gothic rock-inflected, and it counted with guest appearances by Ray Toro of My Chemical Romance, Craig Adams of The Mission, Julia Marcell and much more.

In mid-2013, Voltaire had written a novel called 'Call of the Jersey Devil' which is available on Amazon. He is currently writing another novel called 'The Legend of Candy Claws' which is about a bat that steals candy from naughty children on Halloween, and gives it to good children on Christmas. According to his official Facebook page, he was in the process of making Candy Claws Plush Teddies. (after his Black Unicorn / My Little Pony Plush Teddies were a huge success).

On September 25, 2013, Voltaire announced on his official blog, that he and his wife were to be divorced. Saying, "On October 1st of this year, my wife and I would be celebrating our 4th year wedding anniversary. Unfortunately, it's not to be. After nearly four years of marriage and a couple more of dating, we are parting ways. It saddens me so deeply that things didn't work out. It's been a difficult process for both of us to come to this decision, one that I really don't wish upon anyone. Nothing is worse than seeing your best friend in pain."

On September 2, 2012, Voltaire released his ninth studio album, BiTrektual. It contains songs parodying Star Trek, Star Wars and Doctor Who, and featured guest appearances by Jason C. Miller, Tim Russ, Garrett Wang and Robert Picardo.

Appeared on the Discovery Channel series, Oddities, in 2012, buying a "slice of brain" for a music video prop.

On September 2, 2011, Voltaire released his eighth studio album: Riding a Black Unicorn Down the Side of an Erupting Volcano While Drinking from a Chalice Filled with the Laughter of Small Children. Participating musicians include Rasputina frontwoman Melora Creager on cellos, Brian Viglione on drums, former Bauhaus bassist David J on bass and Franz Nicolay on accordion.

In 2010 Voltaire released an "Alt Country" CD called Hate Lives in a Small Town. He also released a children's CD, Spooky Songs for Creepy Kids, containing his previous works for Cartoon Network, as well as other age-appropriate songs.

Voltaire performed a musical special for Artix Entertainment in their MMO game AdventureQuest Worlds, altering some of his songs in To the Bottom of the Sea to suit their standards. Over 32,000 players attended. It was released at 8:00PM on Friday the Thirteenth of March 2009.

Voltaire married his long-time girlfriend, Jayme, on October 1, 2009, at the Angel Orensanz Center in New York City. Voltaire has a son, Mars, from a previous relationship, born in 1998. Voltaire is an agnostic.

In early 2004, for his DEADY comic book, Voltaire signed a deal with Toy2R. The first toy that was created was a 2-inch posable DEADY key chain for the company's "Qee Bear". It was released at San Diego Comic Con and sold out. A second figure, an 8-inch DEADY figure was created in January 2005 and could be redeemed on aqworlds for a rare non-member only digital pet. In June 2007 the Deady Minigame was released on ebilgames.com, a site hosting various minigames created by Artix Entertainment. AE's Massively multiplayer online game AQWorlds also featured a Friday the 13th event featuring songs by Voltaire. Voltaire voiced his in-game persona for the occasion. In 2008, Voltaire shot the Animation short film X-Mess Detritus. The movie was the third film of his directorial career; the others are Transrexia (1993), Rakthavira (1994) and Transrexia II (2008).

As an adult, Voltaire formed a band which included a violin, a cello, drums, and himself as the vocalist and the acoustic guitar player. Within a year, Projekt Records signed them and by June 1998 they released their first album called The Devil's Bris. Two years later their second album, Almost Human was released.

Voltaire was hired for his first directing job in 1988 with MTV, creating the "MTV-Bosch" station ID in the style of Hieronymus Bosch. The stop motion tour of the hellish Garden of Earthly Delights won several awards including a Broadcast Design Award. This station ID was included in a capsule of 21st century media that was shot into space. He has also made morbid station IDs and for clients such as Cartoon Network, Sci-Fi Channel and its Animation Station block, USA Network, and Nickelodeon.

Aurelio Voltaire Hernández (born January 25, 1967), professionally known as Aurelio Voltaire or by the mononym Voltaire, is a Cuban-born American singer, songwriter, and musician. His professional name is his given middle name.