Prior to the start of her own solo recording career, Kirsty appeared – masquerading as Mandy Doubt – on the E.P. ‘The Drug Addix Make a Record’. If you can find it, it was on Chiswick Records SW39, originally released in June 1978 when Kirsty was only 18. Here’s Kirsty in action with the band at the Venue in London.

Guitarist George Lloyd says they were a ‘good fun, no frills R&B band’, they operated under a cloak of pseudonym as Art Nouveau (guitars and vocals), Sterling Silver (vocals), Alan Offa ( bass) and Ron Griffin (drums).

According to Record Collector in 1994, “The band recorded a four track demo which Chiswick promptly released as a single.  It whipped up a mini controversy because, in Kirsty’s words, it was ‘quite rude’. One song, ‘Gay Boys in Bondage’, became a talking point for obvious reasons.  It was meant to be a parody of the Lou Reed School of Seediness, a piece of camp corn that lent itself to stage dramatics.” The band’s mix of ‘Sweet Jane’ type riffs and slide-guitar-propelled R&B fell between two audiences.”

There are four tracks: ‘Gay boys in bondage’ (also available on the compilation album ‘The Chiswick Story“), ‘Addington Shuffle’, ‘Special Clinic’ and ‘Glutton for Punishment’.

Kirsty seems most prominent on the ‘Special Clinic’ track, though as she later said, “All I did on the record was backing vocals. You can barely hear me.  We weren’t actually a punk band, but at the time punk was king and we called ourselves that just to get some gigs. Everyone expected an outrageous, Sex Pistols type of band but we weren’t.  We were all slide guitar and R&B.  I was just the token boiler on backup vocals&hellips; Of course that annoyed me but you’ve got to start somewhere.  If you can’t really sing and you can’t play anything, you can’t argue about it.”

The track ‘Gay Boys in Bondage’ appeared on a Spanish release promo alongside Riff Raff and The Jook. The title was ‘Rock’n’Roll Suburbano de Londres’ and featured ‘Chicas de Romford’ by Riff Raff (featuring Kirsty’s friend Billy Bragg), ‘Lugar de Vejacion’ by the Jook and ‘Los Gay Estan Escalvizados’ by Drug Addix.

Incidentally, the Addix single and the original ‘Suburban Rock’n’Roll’ EP came out on the same day as Riff Raff’s debut. Each single was a 4,000 copy limited edition.

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