Through the next two plus hours, the viewer is transported in the past, somewhere around the tristate area of New York (and some other places later on) where a young JayJay French was going through some musical transitions, discontent with what was going around at the time, a sort of glam rock scene, with people that had some wildly impressive costumes and personas, but pretty much sucked when it came to performing. So that gave young JayJay the spur to want to do his own improved version of that… former members, fans, fellow musicians, journalists, pretty much everyone involved with the band on some capacity or other, gets to give their own spin on how everything happened. Band members have been interviewed for this feature and often their quotes, some of them blatantly honest and truthful, will make you go WTF?!, while at other times, particularly when Dee candidly offers some anecdotal info, will make a smirk appear right across your face.
[collapsed title=Spoiler Alert!]From the humble beginnings when JayJay was trying to put together a band, while Dee was in bands like Heathen (not the thrashers) and Peacock and the crazy shenanigans of the first few lineups that eventually imploded, we‘re transported to early 1976 by which point Eddie Ojeda, a former high school band mate of JayJay’s was invited to join, while the band was struggling to not fall to pieces after their latest singer at that point, one Rick Prince failed to show up. The band who had initially dismissed Danny Snider (Dee), asked him to try out and this “sixth” Mk of the band started the “assault” on the bars. You can hear the band getting progressively better through the feature, because some of the initial performances are sort of “sucky”. Next big “event” is Dee meeting Suzette, his future wife, but girlfriend at the time that both made him want to excel and slowly turned him onto wearing make-up on stage to complement the “drag” look. Dee was hesitant to do so at first, thinking he’d have his sexuality challenged, which is kind of ironic considering the band’s attire, but countless bars shows later the band was getting slowly closer to what they came to be known as.
Tensions grew when the band all moved to a house and Dee started challenging the amount of cover material and JayJay’s leadership a bit, in a way, asking to be given the freedom to create some original material, because what the band was coming up with in terms of original material wasn’t impressing him. He eventually managed to “hi-jack” the songwriting away from the others, which probably was a good thing. By that point it was late ‘77 and JayJay who’d usually hassle the crowd if they weren’t responsive got the idea to have the drummer gong guys who’d come on stage out, to sing along if they sucked or buy em shots if they were good … through such bizarre tactics and of-the-top of their heads inventions the band started to get more noticed and the crowds that would come to see em multiplied. Then Twisted Sister’s “crusade” against Disco got started, including the smashing of disco singles with a sledgehammer, ripping of John Travolta posters, even the hanging of an effigy of Barry White(?!)…
At one point, Dee’s g/f, Suzette showed up wearing almost the same clothes as him, which prompted her to start making various stage outfits for him, which made the other band members jealous and eventually the whole band’s wardrobe would get handled by her as well, plus their makeup and hair. Slowly the combination of showmanship, songwriting, seer energy and bizarre hideous glam aesthetic begun to gel and little by little, show by show (with the band some days playing 3 per night) their name started becoming bigger and bigger, further fueled by the controversy their looks generated, with them starting to fill larger venues, while blowing away almost all competition that might have been in the “clubs” circuit.
By 78 the band had gotten pretty big and while they were trying to mount a big summer “tour” the band asked former The Dictators bassist, to help em out as a roadie. Little did he know that after Kenny Neill, the band’s longtime bassist, would quit after one of the band’s first “Theater” shows, he would be called in as a permanent replacement, but that’s exactly what happened as Neill decided to leave the band in order to cure his drinking habit, which also made him a born again Christian, which according to some people in his immediate environment, was in conflict with him playing in such a “satanic” band. Oh well… the new bassist’s out and out style made the band decidedly heavier and was probably the tipping point after which things started to really happen. Selling out the Palladium in Manhattan, the largest and most prestigious club/theater in the heart of NYC made the band the talk of the town, since they managed to sell it out in no more than a week, despite the industry specialist dismissing them. Mind you, it almost didn’t happen as Eddie Ojeda fainted and was nowhere to be found on the original show date of 16/03/79, so the band couldn’t go on, without their lead guitarist. They had to postpone it, only to return a little later to steal the show, but unfortunately be met only by A&R assistants and secretaries and none of the heads of companies they were hoping to attract in order to get signed. There was some interest from Epic, but while the band re-did the entire show for one executive, nothing came out of it, which left the band devastated. Enter Mark Puma, a local promoter, who became the band’s road manager, from that point onwards relieving JayJay from having to worry about managing the band. Eventually the band managed to catch another break and caused a traffic jam in the process, when their free concert at Long Island’s Adventureland theme park attracted some 23.000 people literally just jamming the streets around the place. Eventually the band also decided to press their own singles and T-shirts, creating their own label and merchandising company in the face of complete apathy from the traditional big labels and in a bid to get them interested in the band. Combined with a new single and a new tour in the summer of 1980 and the infamous “demolition” of 5-6 clubs by fans of the band, who were asked by the club owners to do so, because they hated the landlords (what???) it further added to the notoriety of the band. Things did slow down, when the drinking age got raised, culling the potential concert attendees significantly but again the band managed to rally their fans and convert ever more by playing tagged adds that contained songs on the radio in collaboration with the clubs and organizing their own fan club, “the SMF” (Sick Mother Fucking Friends of Twisted Sister) that gave the fans a sense of community.
Meanwhile, after a deal, which the band had signed with a company called X Records fell through, when the owner of the said company died on his way back to Germany suffering a heart attack (!) there was some interest expressed by a UK punk label called Secret Records, after the band started getting noticed following articles in UK music papers NME and Sounds, from some copies a fan had mailed to them for review. There were even people from Sounds flying over to see the band, who wrote a great piece for them, which eventually prompted Martin Hooker, from the aforementioned company, to fly over to see them play and “sign them” to a deal… but they had to fly over to the UK in order to record their album. In the meantime the band finally selected AJ Pero, after a series of drummers paraded from the rank following Tony Petri’s dismissal, over violent behavior, thus giving birth to the “classic lineup”. “Under the Blade” was recorded in a barn, over somewhere in the South of England! Ha!
But that’s not all, the band managed to get a fair slot at some Welsh festival below Motorhead mind you, a no BS rock n roll band with fanatic fans who hated “make-up bands”, which made the bad boys of rock n roll a little anxious about possibly getting bottled off the stage before even they had a chance to play a note. Lemmy, the late Motorhead frontman, sensing that there might be trouble, introduced the band, which gave them the time they needed to proceed tearing the place down and winning over one of the hardest, most hardcore crowds out there! Wow!
Meanwhile back in NY, a devastated Jason Flom (who’s been CEO of Atlantic, Virgin, Lava) is repeatedly told to “fudget about” signing Twisted Sister, because everyone at a position of power at Atlantic at that time “hated them” and thought they were “shit”, despite being hugely popular with concert goers. Actually Flom was even threatened to be dismissed, by then CEO Doug Morris, if he ever brought up the subject again after insisting numerous times on getting Twisted Sister signed.
Back in the UK the band managed to secure a slot in the prestigious Reading Festival, only to be pelted with food and even human excrement (!?!!??!?!), before Dee issued the now historic challenge to anyone that didn’t like em to meet him after the show, by the side of the stage, which turned things around completely, with the band completely stealing the show once more.
Back in America by mid-82 now, the band played for a couple of months and was preparing to release the album there as well, when a single day after the album came out in the UK, Secret Records (that in the meantime had been organizing a big tour and getting advances from Virgin for the album and ensuing tour) went bust when Martin Hooker’s partner in the label disappeared along with all the money. BOOM! Catastrophy as the band had already once again bid the US crowds adieu, saying that they’d be on their way to Europe for a massive tour… which made them go into hiding, in order to not be the subject of ridicule. Meanwhile back in Atlantic, Flom dismayed hands a manila envelope with a tape and a letter to Phil Carson, the then EU/UK Atlantic senior manager, in hopes that he’d sign the band behind Morris’s back. Cunning plan, but it didn’t go very far as Carson just threw the tape away after seeing their photo. Meanwhile back at “Sister towers” the band was getting desperate, but on MP’s insistence they decided to get enough money to go back to the UK, to a TV show that was arranged prior to Secret’s demise and see if on the strength of that they could negotiate something over there, to “salvage” their reputation. A week before Xmas the band showed up on that TV Show, “The Tube” along with the Tygers Of The Pan Tang and Iggy Pop live… with only 20 or so minutes to play, a “family friendly” mini set. The first couple of numbers get the crowd mildly worked up, but it’s not really good enough…until the moment of that Dee called on stage Robbo and Lemmy, which still didn’t quite cut it. Then Dee spoke again, asking for people if they had a problem because of “their makeup” and proceeded to wipe his face clean, asking the audience if that was the problem and if they’d take him seriously after that… which mysteriously they did… actually going nuts.
“The Phil Carson” happened to be at the same time standing next to the booth where Twisted Sister’s then manager was doing his calls etc., so when he made all the mental associations, he decided to go down and check them out, which led them to signing them! Mission accomplished! (Almost)… as Doug Morris must have changed a few hundred colors, when Carson broke the news to him but had to accept fate’s decree. “You Can’t Stop Rock n Roll” sold well in the UK, but back in the US only Flom was trying to do something to help the band in Atlantic, overstepping even his authority. The band decided to go on a tour supporting Krokus and Blackfoot for a couple of weeks, which afforded them only 29 minutes and all that without a budget, so the band had to drive to the various cities themselves and perform those 29 minutes like their lives depended on it. And it kinda worked… as the somewhat more polished “Stay Hungry” managed to become multi-platinum finally making the band international stars… and that’s the point where the doc comes to a close, as the “legend” of what happened afterwards is more or less “known”… but that’s material for another movie… hehe![/collapsed]
You have to appreciate Andrew Horn’s vision and clout to not give up. The band and him banded together in trying to both help this feature take form, but also be as true to the facts and authentic as possible with no interventions from the band. If you’re gonna take something away from it, is that if you want to succeed you got to be tenacious and chase your dreams, because things will almost never happen for you, by some good fortune if you sit around and weight. The guys from Twisted Sister, that 10-20 years ago might have terrorized your parents or indeed all the parents of America, prove to be more resilient than you’d ever thought, glib and smart individuals not to mention quite successful businessmen as well as pretty unique when it comes to the art of entertainment. That’s probably the reason they connected with so many people. A story, unlike Anvil’s, which caused you to feel pity, this one will make all you sick muthas, proud!