The Twinkle Sisters
Easily too much for most people to handle.
Ladies and gentlemen, here is something of a rock family tree about a bunch of bands you never heard of.
In the summer of 1991 the freshman year of students at Crewe and Alsager college of higher education formed among whom were several outstanding musician types. This is the story of five unlikely rock gods who went on to not be rock gods.
Let’s introduce the band members in alphabetical order :
Colin “Col” Murrell – percussion/drums/experimental
Gary “Dog” Norton – guitar/harmonica/vocals
Matthew “Sparky” Ayling – bass/vocals
Sam “Rasmus P Man” Bennett – keyboards/sampling/noise/vocals
Steve “Ste” McGillivray – keyboards/god-awful shakuhatchi sound/vocals
Guest members included :
Darren aka Daz : vocals
Fleur “Effy Moon” Evans : vocals/psychosis
Marc “Garvey” Burrett : engineer/roadie/guaranteed gig attendee
In 1991 there were several projects involving the various members of the outfit later to be known as “Little G and the RayRees”, before becoming “The Raybees” before creative differences split the group with the splinter “Twinkle Sisters” rising from the ashes.
The Raybees original lineup of Col, Dog, Sparky and Ste with my bad self providing engineering, and the occasional musical hook, before being invited into the band to provide random pops and whistles in the form of samples. This usually took the form of samples of chainsaws, car crashes, police sirens and quotes from “Aliens” as well as deputising for Ste when his girlfriend would call in the middle of a gig (it happened once – I had Sparky yelling chord changes at me while Ste calmly explained to her on the phone that he was in the middle of something).
The basic style of the band was rhythm and blues and blues with covers such as “Johnny B Goode” mixed in with original tracks such as “Boink”, “She Says” and “Sam’s Bass”. A good number of artistic, alternative and stoned students counted themselves amongst the fans of the group, who gigged many times in the throbbing musical metropolis of Crewe.
Highlight gigs included the Alsager campus (the time when the power was shut off at the end, leading to a 20 minute drum solo), the Crewe campus (including the immortal line “Don’t look so miserable you fuckers” at the lack of response from the crowd), the first fashion show and many more Monday night stints at the pub whose name escapes me.
In 1994 the band split up after some heated words between two of the members prior to the second annual fashion show so rather than bail on the event a slightly more dance-oriented outift emerged made up of Col on drums, Dog on guitar and myself playing with a computer. The result of this particular project was the ground work for the Twinkle Sisters.
Following the end of the academia expedition, Dog and Rasmus P Man formed the Twinkle Sisters officially and set off to the Mecca of underground dance/blues/fusion (or heavy skiffle as we’d call it) Wolverhampton where for the best part of 2 years we wrote tunes, signed on and didn’t quite make it as rock legends. Naturally when Sony came calling, contract in hand we turned them down, but that’s what you have to do to maintain your artistic integrity.
It’s something of a shame it was abandoned when it was, the later material was starting to come on nicely with the likes of “Know Right” and “Free Dog Radio” being the most complete of anything written, but that’s the way these things go.
That, friends, is the potted history of the Twinkle Sisters.
If you’re feeling brave, you are welcome to try out some of the back catalogue. It’s all pretty average really, but that’s inevitable when you’re recording live onto a household hi-fi in your girlfriend’s house with no production, no engineering and not much of a clue.
But you should have seen us live…
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