Twin Redux

Awhile back I wrote about the Twintones album issued by Sentinel. This attracted the attention of fellow Cornish music aficionado David Waller, who is putting together a potentially fascinating live show about the Cornish music scene, and who has recently managed to track down the Twintones. There's dedication. Here's his report, in full.


From Shirley Temple to the Jackson 5, and the millions of youngsters currently belting out hits in their bedrooms on YouTube, the idea of children recording music is hardly unusual. But it was for Cornish kids in the 70s, especially when it meant having their own LP. The Twintones' 11 Plus 2 album, released in 1975, was recorded by a pair of young twins, Nanpean's Gary Tucker on drums and his sister Kay on organ. Laid down over two years at Job Morris' Sentinel Records studio in Newlyn, the LP featured such hits as Remember You're a Womble and These Boots are Made for Walking, as well as a message from TV's Dick Emery on its sleeve. We tracked them down and caught up over a coffee near St Austell.

How did the record come about?

Kay: We were quite well known locally as a musical family. Our uncle Ken may have written to Job Morris at Sentinel to ask if we could come down and record a demo disc. He was trying to promote us as Cornish talent.

Gary: Job Morris knew Basil Soper, ents manager at Talk of the West [club in Perran View Holiday Park]. Dick Emery was performing there and wanted some back-up, and Job said this little Cornish duo would make a great spot. So we did this gig with Dick Emery, and that spurred the record.

What are your memories of recording the album?

K: It was a big thing for us – we were only 11 years old. We had a brilliant time down there. Now there's reality TV with children all on stage and singing, but back then for us to go in with no musical backing was quite innovative. We just thought it was great. We just went down there and did what we did at home in the front room. I thought: “God, I'm here recording like the Bay City Rollers”. I was in love with them.

On These Boots are Made for Walking, this engineer Alan brought in a plank of wood and wore cowboy boots, and walked in the same rhythm as the piece, to embellish what we were doing. On Remember You're a Womble, Gary played the bass part on his euphonium and I played another part on the trombone and they double tracked that in.

We started recording the album when we were 11, but thanks to a strike somewhere in the chain it took two years for the record to come out. When we asked what we should call the record, Job Morris said: “Well, 11 plus 2”. It was a reference to the exam, and the fact we were now 13.

G: The sleeve looked very dull to me, for two youngsters. They just used a flash camera, and it was all brown around the outside. They didn't do any location shooting – it was in the studio, they took the camera. We could have gone out on the cliffs and done a lot more to make it a bit brighter – not two children stuck in this dark hole.

What was the response?

K: We got played on Radio Cornwall. We'd have people saying “ooh, I heard your record”. At that time it was a big thing, whereas now you'd just download it. They'd sell it in Hocking's, the record shop in St Austell. But there was no great scale. Of course we always had a box to take with us when we were singing, to sell to holiday makers at the end of the evening, and we used to sign them. So lots of the records will have gone back up country.

What are your memories of Sentinel?

K: The front of the shop sold records, then you went down some steps to the soundproofed recording studio, where you could open a hatch and see the river running through Newlyn. It was very small, but huge for us.

G: Job and Irene were a lovely couple. We were young and looked up to them, and they gave us great guidance. Brenda Wootton was being promoted at the time we were doing ours. The Johnny Austin Showband was very close behind us being produced. Job didn't use to hang around with these things. We went back later to produce an organ cassette, 'Kay Plays Technics', which we'd recorded ourselves at home, and Job had a go at me saying he could have done another two in the time it had taken us to record it.

What was this cassette?

K: After the record, which was made up of more or less standalone pieces, people at dances would came up to us and asked why we didn't do a dance album. So we did, playing music for waltzes, the quickstep, samba or whatever on the new Technics Pro 90 concert organ I'd bought. Gary recorded it at home on an Akai reel-to-reel, and Sentinel produced it. People bought the tape to dance to. We'd sell these cassettes at gigs.

Did you perform a lot of shows?

G We started as a family group playing local chapels and fates, and then we progressed into doing dance music and cabaret, entertaining guests at hotels and social clubs. By the time we were 15 or 16 we were out five nights a week round the hotels as a duo. Kay was offered a full-tome position on the Blackpool Tower Wurlitzer. It was a big step for a Cornish girl to go all the way to Blackpool. We declined it.

K: We had lots of offers over the years, but were happy doing what we were doing, with our family. We sent recordings to the Audience Entertains on Radio 2. We went up to Devon and Somerset. We had the opportunity to do cruise ships. Back then there were groups everywhere, it was all live music. We couldn't play a whole evening in a club, because we were too young and there were licensing issues. As well as playing for dancing I used to sing a lot of Carpenters music. We played whatever was in the charts – Boney M, Cliff Richard – as well as traditional waltzes and quicksteps to cater for families on holiday.

While the Twintones' career petered out in the 80s with the onset of marriage and children, the perfomances haven't stopped entirely. Gary has continued peforming in local opera and theatre. In late 2013 the pair reformed for a charity show in support of cancer support charity Tanya's Courage Trust – along with Kay's sons, James and George.




This is what Dave does when he's not interviewing The Twintones. It's great.