He was the first of Charles Manson’s crazed followers to commit murder – and is still serving time in jail for the brutal torture and killing of his friend Gary Hinman in July 1969. But as well as achieving notoriety as a member of America’s most infamous killing cult, Bobby Beausoleil has spent the last six decades carving out a career for himself as a musician – with his compositions even endorsed by Lady Gaga.

The revelations come in the book The Last Charles Manson Tapes: Evil Lives Beyond the Grave. Authors Dylan Howard and Andy Tillett reveal how prior to falling under Manson’s spell, Beausoleil showed some promise as a guitarist, singer, and actor.

"For six years he moved between Los Angeles and San Francisco, but wasn’t exactly drifting,” they write. “Bobby was good looking and talented. He was an actor and played pickup in rock ’n’ roll bands, including a forerunner of Arthur Lee’s band, Love.”

Beausoleil would later claim that Lee also changed the original name of the band – at that time “Grass Roots” – to Love in honor of one of his nicknames, “Cupid."

“Bobby even sang backup on Frank Zappa’s Freak Out album, though he would later say Zappa did not allow him to officially join his band, The Mothers of Invention, because he did not know how to read music,” added Howard and Tillett.

Charles Manson himself had musical ambitions, enlisting the help of Beach Boy Dennis Wilson to try to secure him a record deal, and after joining the Manson Family, Beausoleil contributed electric guitar on Manson’s pop compositions. But the cult leader had other plans for him.

On July 25, Manson ordered Beausoleil and two other members of the Family to the home of Gary Hinman, a friend and former housemate of Beausoleil’s, supposedly to either extort money from