Dead End Drive-In: Now Showing – ‘We Are Twisted Fucking Sister!‘
Written by Gaz Tidey
Saturday, 09 January 2016 04:00
‘We Are Twisted Fucking Sister!’ (2015 – Monoduo Films)
‘We Are Twisted Fucking Sister!’, filmmaker Andrew Horn’s feature-length documentary, is the best music-based film that you’ll see in the whole of 2016. A bold claim you may think, especially as we’re barely into the second week of the new year, but this is one rock doc that seriously has it all.
The Twisted Sister story is, like those of most other bands operating in their fifth decade, littered with debauchery, disappointment, and death, but this particular telling of a tempestuous tale is as raw and bereft of glossing over as a project like this should be when detailing the incredible journey of a gang of musical misfits once described as looking like dockers in drag.
Horn’s superb documentary, all 137 minutes of it (and that’s without the couple of hours’ worth of bonus features that the upcoming DVD release will gift you), succeeds not purely because of its engrossing subject matter, or its technical attributes, but because it focuses on the early years of Twisted Sister, eschewing the trappings of many a rock documentary that wants to get to the current line-up as quickly as possible and re-write as much band history as it can in double-quick time. Like 2014’s ‘Super Duper Alice Cooper’ which climaxed with the ‘Nightmare Returns’ rebirth of The Coop, ‘We Are Twisted Fucking Sister!’ closes with TFS triumphantly becoming the platinum-selling artist it had threatened to become over the course of a ball-busting decade.
The archive footage and ephemera from the band’s early (really early) years is nothing short of spectacular and leaves little doubt as to Twisted Sister being Jay Jay French’s band, and the journey from that point, via much butting of heads and the transition from David Bowie to Judas Priest covers, to the one where new singer Dee Snider would finally harbour a fistful of control is an engrossing and ultimately ass-kicking one.
After pretty much hitting the peak of the New York (and surrounding areas) club scene – and we’re talking 3000+ capacity venues – Twister Sister struggled to find a record deal as potential suitors would either fall down dead or be faced with the stiffest competition from label hierarchy, the band’s subsequent success very much as a result of major British intervention: a single igniting the interest of the much-missed Sounds music paper; a follow-up article by Garry Bushell the catalyst for a UK record deal with punk label, Secret Records; recording in England resulting in the band’s appearance at the Motörhead-lined Wrexham Music Festival; a defiantly notorious shite-dodging slot at the (then-essential) Reading Festival; and a riotous, live television make-up removal on The Tube that featured dear old Lemmy, whose role in the TFS story is small yet crucial.
The film culminates with the Atlantic Records chief finally succumbing to pressure from his label’s reps, both home and abroad, and signing the band; Twisted Sister’s first album for Atlantic, 1983’s ‘You Can’t Stop Rock ‘n’ Roll’, going on to be certified Gold in the United States.
And that’s where ‘We Are Twisted Fucking Sister!’ ends, the band’s massive MTV-approved years, eventual fall from grace and subsequent reunion pre-credits footnotes. You’ll be left wanting more, for sure, but only because Andrew Horn has made a truly captivating documentary.
Twisted Sister will play their final UK show at the Bloodstock Festival this Summer, and if you weren’t already planning on attending to say goodbye to one of the most badass bands in rock ‘n’ roll history then a single viewing of this film will change your mind. Essential viewing.
‘We Are Twisted Fucking Sister!’ will be released on January 29th, 2016 on VOD (iTunes & Vimeo on Demand) and DVD (Amazon Europe and Monoduo Films Shop).
To pick up your copy of ‘We Are Twisted Fucking Sister’ – CLICK HERE
