Song review - I'd Rather Jack, The Reynolds Girls

Once in a generation, a band bursts onto the scene with the ferocity of such purity and righteous anger that it washes away everything that came before with a tidal wave of youth and vigour. Once in a generation may be pushing it, surely this is more likely once in a lifetime. Like the Sex Pistols and The Clash before them, the Reynolds Girls didn’t care about what had gone before and burdened themselves with the moniker of saviours of modern music. By natural extension, the spokes girls for the house generation were born. A giddy position to seize way back in 1989 when most of middle Britain only knew about the house scene from the raging headlines in the red-top newspapers. Well, then, just as now the girls were not prepared to have their sound trampled on by the tabloids. This was bleepy blippy war.

It is fair to say that The Reynolds Girls didn’t quite manage to rise as far as most of us thought they would. Although this is through no fault of their debut (and sadly, eventually only) hit. A hit that took a violent swipe at the ‘oldies’ -  which young rebellious teen cannot connect with this idea. The Reynolds Girls, Linda and Aisling did not choose their targets lightly, they went straight for the jugular of classic rock and establishment sounds of both Fleetwood Mac and the Rolling Stones. Let’s face it one such opponent would have been ambitious but the two showed them for all their glorious fearlessness. In short, they chose to hit hard at the heart of the music scene with both the biggest band ever and the biggest band at the time. Not only did they attack the true goliaths of the time but they swapped David’s slingshot for 303 basslines and house rhythms, a true gamble at the time when no-one knew how big house music was going to be . . .  or did they?

But what should have been the glorious war cry of a jilted generation turned out to be a comet of rage that burned so bright and with such luminescent that it could not be maintained. Incandescent lyrics that stood them square on the dancefloor with that other warrior of house, Yazz.

 However, Yazz turned out to be a thick stick of willow in the spokes of their revolution. She chose to distance herself from the inferno of destruction aimed squarely at the heart of the music business and even went so far as to deny that they had ever sung along with her. 

In their final public appearance at Liverpool magistrates court, the girls failed to produce the receipt that proved their purchase of The Only Way is Up. Unable to corroborate claims of singing with Yazz on the radio and damned by their own testimony through their lyrics “What happened to the radio, they never play the songs we know?” They were found guilty of fabricating an allegiance with Yazz and fined six pounds fifty.

Their credibility took a further body blow when Mick Fleetwood and Bill Wyman told reporters that they had been paying the girl’s legal fees. A calculated move that proved pivotal in the battle for the hearts and minds of the worlds youth. The old guard had won this battle and sat comfortably with their Horlicks assuming that this victory surely meant the war was also won.

For the Reynold’s girls though the damage was done. With a reputation in tatters and so much time wasted while that signature righteous energy burned so bright, the girls were most ousted the spokespeople for the house generation and any momentum they had garnered slid under the fiery red bus to bootle along with their career.

Not even the combined power of  Stock Aitkin and Waterman could control the whirling dervish of the girls' frustration and exposed rebellion. Even with their experience of working with Jason Donovan and Sonia to fall back on they inevitably struggled to control the girls as they bounced from project to project like a freshly lit catherine wheel. Unfortunately for the girls and, let's face it for all of us they couldn’t make anything stick and one final eruption of rage they walked away from Stock, Aitken and Waterman, the studio and the music world. Another victory for Mick and Bill!

 They have since disappeared underground, refusing to comment on their brief but important work to shake up the music industry. One can only assume that they are tucked in a DJ box somewhere at some underground club in Liverpool, still leading from the front.

A scathing yet witty headline in the sun read “I’d rather Jack . . . it in”