John Borra played his first bar gig when he was 16 at Toronto’s punk rock dive The Turning Point, in 1982. Since then he’s played in dozens of bands, played on dozens of records and played hundreds of live shows across North America and Europe.

Currently he fronts the John Borra Band and Rattlesnake Choir, which released its debut record Live Music in 2008 and will release a new album Walking The Wire in 2010. The Rattlesnakes also play every Monday night at Toronto’s popular Dakota Tavern. His weekly Communist’s Daughter “Sunday Revival” with (Screamin’) Sam Ferrara just celebrated five years and is going stronger than ever. John can also be found playing bass with The Swallows, The Screwed, Groovy Religion and Joel Stewart and the Future Hall of Famers.

John Borra’s first band of any note was A Neon Rome, who’s brief time (1984-1989) has reached near legendary status. Their debut record New Heroin was met with rave reviews from the English press when it was first released in France, in 1987, on New Rose Records. “Desperate people have tried to tell you that such feeble knee-knockers as Husker Du are vital. Poppycock, Neon Rome, built for today, don’t go all out but go in, out, then shake it all about. They want to be violent poets sitting on stone steps in a sun-soaked ghetto.” Melody Maker, 1987.

Filmmaker Bruce Macdonald’s award winning film, Roadkill was initially set to be a documentary about A Neon Rome on tour in Northern Ontario, but the band imploded before filming could begin. Macdonald went on to make the film into a fictional tale with characters and events based on the real-life Rome Boys.

After the break up of A Neon Rome John began playing bass for numerous Toronto bands including Groovy Religion, Scott B. Sympathy, Ron Sexsmith, Kyp Harness, The Boneheads and many more. He joined Ian Blurton’s Change of Heart in 1993.

While playing bass for Change of Heart the band won $100,000 from radio station CFNY (now 102.1 The Edge), recorded the album Tummysuckle and toured practically non-stop including stints with The Tragically Hip and Blue Rodeo. John would leave the band in 1995 to pursue his own, more rootsy original songs.

In 1996 he recorded the first of these songs, “Ballad Of The Girl,” for a benefit album to help the Leonard Peltier defence fund, alongside artists such as Sarah McLachlan, Blue Rodeo, Molly Johnson and The Tragically Hip. In early 1997 he released his first album shortly before going on tour with Greg Keelor as opening act and bass player for Keelor’s band. Returning from tour he put together the John Borra Band who have since released two more studio albums. 1999’s Band and 2002’s One Night At Seven In The Morning.

In 2005 John and fellow J.B. Band mates Cleave Anderson and Steve Koch formed The Screwed with The Sinisters’ Steve Saint. It was originally conceived as a party band playing the classic punk and pre-punk songs that had made them all start playing music in the first place. They’ve since started writing their own songs and will release their second album in 2010. The band has also become the go-to backup group for some of the greats from that era, including The Dead Boy’s Cheetah Chrome, Johnny and the G-Rays, Screamin’ Sam, Teenage Head’s Gord Lewis, The B-Girls and The Ugly Ducklings’ Dave Bingham. In 2006 John was also a member of a reformed Viletones who played several gigs and recorded live for CIUT in Toronto.

John Borra continues to perform and record with people he loves playing music with and shows no signs of stopping. If anything the best is yet to come from this long time contributor to the world of great music.

2010 will see the release of a new Rattlesnake Choir record, a new Screwed record and a new Swallows record.

Other artists John Borra has performed or recorded with include The Cash Brothers, Crash Vegas, Serena Ryder, Lucy Idluit, Busted Flush, Bob Egan, Barney Bentall, Wil, Earl Slick, Jim Carroll and many more.