Pinhead Gunpowder
American punk rock band
Pinhead Gunpowder is an American punk rock band that formed in the East Bay area of California, in 1991. The band currently consists of Aaron Cometbus (drums, lyrics), Bill Schneider (bass), Billie Joe Armstrong (guitar, vocals) and Jason White (guitar, vocals). The band's name comes from a brand of "high-octane" green tea served at the Arcata co-op that was discovered by Aaron Cometbus during one of his many dumpster diving adventures.
History
Pinhead Gunpowder was founded in Arcata, California, in January 1991 by Aaron Cometbus and Jon Quittner. Cometbus wanted the name "Pinhead Gunpowder", while Quittner wanted to call it "50 Foot Hesher". Along with vocalist Doug "Douggie Grime" Rogers and bassist David "Atlas" Kimmel, the band played once at a party where Cometbus snapped his bass pedal in half in the middle of the set. Shortly after the show, Cometbus moved back to Berkeley, taking the name of the band and some of the songs with him. Quittner stayed in Arcata with the band and they changed their name to 50 Foot Hesher and acquired a new drummer. A few months later, Quittner left the band and the remaining members changed the name to "Lank".
Back in Berkeley, Cometbus formed the second incarnation of Pinhead Gunpowder with Bill Schneider and Sarah Kirsch of The Skinflutes, and Billie Joe Armstrong of Green Day.
“Pinhead Gunpowder” enters the record as american punk rock band. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Pinhead, Gunpowder and American can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 13, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1073468. VIAF identifies the subject as 150469103. The Library of Congress control number is no2006114082. 2 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1991.
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This entry incorporates text from “Pinhead Gunpowder” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.