Augusto Pinochet
Pinochet was born in Valparaíso, the son of Augusto Pinochet Vera, a descendant of an 18th-century French Breton immigrant from Lamballe, and Avelina Ugarte Martínez, a woman whose family had been in Chile since the 17th century and was of partial Basque descent. Pinochet went to primary and secondary school at the San Rafael Seminary of Valparaíso, the Rafael Ariztía Institute (Marist Brothers) in Quillota, the French Fathers' School of Valparaíso, and then to the Military School in Santiago, which he entered in 1931. In 1935, after four years studying military geography he graduated with the rank of "alférez" (Second Lieutenant) in the infantry. In September 1937, Pinochet was assigned to the "Chacabuco" Regiment, in Concepción. Two years later, in 1939, then with the rank of Sub-lieutenant, he moved to the "Maipo" Regiment, garrisoned in Valparaíso. He returned to Infantry School in 1940. On 30 January 1943, Pinochet married Lucía Hiriart Rodríguez, with whom he had five children: Inés Lucía, María Verónica, Jacqueline Marie, Augusto Osvaldo and Marco Antonio.
Daniel Puente Encina
In his native Chile, he is better known as "Daniel Puente" o "Dani Puente", founder, lead singer and bass player of the anti-fascist new wave/post-punk group Pinochet Boys formed with a few friends in the Santiago of the mid-1980s, one of the most repressive periods of Augusto Pinochet's dictatorship. His first group, it formed part of the Chilean revolution, as noted in a number of books, documentaries and the fourth episode of Chilean drama TV series "Los 80" by Canal 13. In 1984, Carlos Fonseca, a friend of the group and presenter of the programme "Fusión contemporánea" on Santiago's "Radio Beethoven" station, offered them a contract with the record company "Fusión", owned by his father Mario Fonseca, on the condition that they changed its provocative name –something the group refused to do. The contract was later offered to group Los Prisioneros. Los Pinochet Boys' clandestine concerts were routinely broken up by the police shortly after they began, soon sparking to a youth movement in the Chilean capital. Its four members were harassed, threatened and persecuted for their irreverent attitude and wild performances, and often arrested for having dyed hair. In 1987, after only three years together, Los Pinochet Boys were unofficially forced by the military regime to leave the country. After almost two years of organising their own concerts and touring with, amongst others, the Inocentes and Plebe Rude in Brazil and Todos Tus Muertos in Argentina, the group returned to Chile to play an active role in the "No" campaign for the Chilean national plebiscite, 1988, which put an end to Pinochet's regime. Their sole musical legacy consisted of two cassette recordings: "Botellas contra el pavimento"/"En mi tiempo libre" and "La música del general"/"Esto es Pinochet Boys", which have been copied on numerous occasions over the past decades. In 2012, record company "Hueso Records" from New York remastered both to produce a 500-copy limited edition 7-inch record entitled "Pinochet Boys".
In 1989, after travelling through Europe, "Daniel Puente" moved to West Berlin a few months before fall of the Wall. There, he became friends with members of "Einstürzende Neubauten", who would later on play an important role introducing him to a wider audience.
After the fall of the Berlin Wall, Puente Encina settled in Hamburg, where he founded the multicultural group Niños Con Bombas, sharing the stage with a number of bands from the so-called Hamburger Schule indie scene, such as Tocotronic, Blumfeld and Die Goldenen Zitronen. In 1995, Niños Con Bombas won the "John Lennon Talent Award" and signed deals with Stuttgart label Intercord, Potomak, WEA and New York-based international alternative Latin record company Grita! Records, founded by Bad Religion's original drummer Jay Ziskrout. The band released two albums: Niños Con Bombas de tiempo en el momento de la explosión (1996) and El Niño (1997). Due to the MTV Music Television Video Rotation and radio airplays, songs such as "Skreamska" and "Postcard" were popular in Europe, South America and the US, which the group toured in 1997, with concerts in New Jersey, Boston, Philadelphia, Washington, Virginia, New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco. In 1998, they played in front of a crowd of 90,000 at the Rock al Parque festival in Bogotá, Colombia and, in 1999, at Austin's South by Southwest (SXSW) Music Festival, with The New York Times saying "one of the most interesting performances was that of Niños Con Bombas". In South America, Puente Encina and his group toured countries such as Chile, Argentina, Mexico, Brazil and Colombia and performed its alternative Latin Jazz-Ska-Rock sound in Europe as openers for Einstürzende Neubauten. In 1999, Niños Con Bombas moved to Los Angeles, but due to internal differences split shortly afterwards.
In 2000, Puente Encina moved back to Europe and began performing and producing under the name "Polvorosa" in Barcelona, Spain. Once again changing musical direction, he created a new style: "Latin-Elektro-Clash". "Polvorosa" toured Europe and, as openers for Chambao and Ojos de Brujo, the entire Iberian peninsula. In 2004, he released the album "Radical Car Dance". The track "Behind de mi House" became known worldwide after its video, created by German film director Marten Persiel, was chosen by MTV Music Television for its 2004 DVD compendium "Los Vídeos Mas Espectaculares" ("The Most Spectacular Videos"). In 2009, Puente Encina abandoned electronica in favour of a more natural feel and more organic sound. The end result was a mix of Latin, desert rock, jazz and world music. In 2011, he was chosen by Spanish nonprofit organization Instituto Cervantes in Tel Aviv to give a number of concerts in Israel.