Precious Recordings of London have excelled themselves once again with the latest of their album length session releases, this time celebrating Edinburgh sisters Gaye and Rachel Bell, aka The Twinsets, in compiling all three of their Peel Sessions. This release may also attract a whole new set of fans following their inclusion in the excellent Since Yesterday documentary.
Forty odd years on from the airing of the three sessions this feels like the debut album the band never got the chance to release having only ever released one single, Heartbeat, on cassette which also included their cover of The Shangri-Las Sophisticated Boom Boom, the Peel Versions of which both appear here. It’s a bit of a travesty that the band were never picked up by a label at the time, not uncommon for girl groups back in the day, a theme explored in the Since Yesterday documentary. Let’s just say then that it’s better late than never and a wonderful document of the bands music, thanks to Nick Godfrey’s unerring quest to unearth and release sessions like these and many other independent bands from Edinburgh and Glasgow and further afield.
The aforementioned Sophisticated Boom Boom (not to be mistaken for the Glasgow band of the same name…) is one of several covers to be found across this release, with the band also covering The Cadets Stranded in the Jungle (having heard this initially via the New York Dolls cover) and giving it a more minimalistic Slits-esque makeover and also Elvis Presley’s Suspicious Minds. Each of these songs is given The Twinsets treatment and in doing so make them their own while respecting the originals. One thing that is noticeable is the development of their sound across the sessions, clearly taking their blueprint from girl groups of the 60s like the aforementioned Shangri-Las and adding to it some of the musical styles and the influences of the times, initially with modestly sparse arrangements like on The Cadets cover and I’ll Remember You, and taking on the mantle of the likes of The Raincoats and The Slits.
Later on the album there is more of an angular post punk/jangle pop vibe that shines through alongside more of a complexity to the arrangements, but that central core influence of sixties girl groups remains and shines through on songs like Girl On Her Own and with Crush which seems to be channelling You Can’t Hurry Love. But what is omnipresent throughout and is the USP of the band that makes these songs stand out are Gaye and Rachel’s superb vocal harmonies, check the intro to the brilliant Zippo, and the distinctive vocals on Glittering New Day, and the glorious echoing dual vocals on Meant to Be and the doo woo stylings of the albums closer, the aforementioned Girl On Her Own. It is those voices that really gave the band their memorable sound.
This is another must have release from Precious Recordings, and I’m going to make up for all those lost intervening years and give this some heavy rotation for some time to come.
PRELP 4: Peel sessions 82-83 | The Twinsets | Precious Recordings of London