Jay Dee Bentley
Jay Dee Bentley (born on June 6, 1964 in Wichita,
Kansas) is the bassist and co-founding
member of the punk rock group Bad
Religion. He has played with the band
through its whole existence with a small break between 1983 and 1985.
Bad Religion
Jay played in Bad Religion for three
1/2 years (between 1979 and 1983), and left while the band was in the midst of
writing and recording their 2nd album, Into the Unknown. Jay was
also a onetime member of such notable L.A. groups as Wasted Youth, T.S.O.L.,
The Circle Jerks
and Cathedral Of Tears. He rejoined Bad Religion in late 1985 while the How Could
Hell Be Any Worse? line-up – adding Circle
Jerks' Greg
Hetson as the band's second guitarist –
was reuniting to record the first three reunion albums, Suffer,
No Control and Against the Grain, which
are often considered their best releases. Today, Bentley continues touring and
recording with Bad Religion.
Jay Bentley grew up in Saugus, CA. and later moved to the San Fernando Valley suburb of Woodland Hills, CA. As with guitarist Brett Gurewitz and lead singer Greg Graffin, Jay was also a student of El Camino Real High School.
He has appeared on every Bad
Religion release, with the exceptions of Into the Unknown (1983)
and the Back to the Known (1985) EP. The band's most recent studio album, True North, was released on January 22, 2013.
Personal life
He has two sons: Miles (born 1991),
Hunter (born 1993). Today, Jay is a resident of Costa
Mesa, California.