JAM

“My almost-wife ran off with an Elvis impersonator and married him,” relates Toy Matinee singer Kevin Gilbert. “In my mind she was the accomplished, intelligent creative person, but I had no idea who she was. I just built her up to that, even though most of what we had in common was good sex. In the end she showed her true colors, and I lucked out. I’m glad it happened.”

Gilbert was so glad in fact, that he wrote the lyrics to “The Ballad Of Jenny Ledge,” one of many literate songs on Toy Matinee’s self-titled debut.

“I went out and visited her and her husband where they live in Hawaii,” says Gilbert. “She sleeps ‘til two in the afternoon, gets up, eats at Jack-In-The-Box, goes and watches this guy’s Elvis show for the three thousandth time, and then they go out, with him still dressed as Elvis, and pick up people to go home and have sex with. I saw what her life’s like, and she’s happy now. She would never have been happy the way I wanted to live.”

Toy Matinee is one of the most absorbing debuts of the year. Spearheaded by Gilbert and keyboardist Patrick Leonard (known mostly for his work with Madonna and Bryan Ferry), Toy Matinee creates innovative pop music, undefinable in terms of any radio format. They tread the ground formerly championed by Genesis, and 10cc, with a musical versatility as obvious in their playing as in their writing. Toy Matinee maintains the integrity of the seventies with a focus appropriate for the nineties. But the band has a greater challenge to face.

“What we have here is an un-formattable record,” explains Kevin Gilbert. “Something that doesn’t fit comfortably into any one format. I wouldn’t be doing this if I didn’t think there were people out there who would find it worthwhile. I just think that those people aren’t watching television or listening to radio, ‘cause I’m not. It’s going to be really difficult to get to those people.”

Toy Matinee’s first single and video is the LP-opening cut, “Last Plane Out,” which Gilbert describes as “a metaphor for Noah’s Ark; a careless consumer, rapping about what an irresponsible time he’s having with the environment.” The song is eloquent, catchy, and full of content, yet Gilbert is skeptical about its potential for chart success.

“I don’t think that it’s going to top the charts, because the charts are a reflection of radio and MTV airplay. Since those markets are dominated by ten-to-fifteen-year-olds, I don’t think we’re going to do that well.

“I’d like the college radio audience to turn on to it,” hopes Gilbert. “But I think that the ‘establishment-pop-music’ connection that Pat has is going to turn off that group. In some respects, it’s a real asset that Pat’s done work with Madonna because it gets immediate attention for the album that it normally wouldn’t get. In the long term, it connects us to part of the industry that we shouldn’t be associated with, since we have nothing to do with corporate hit-making or industry politics.”

Patrick Leonard also sees his ties to Madonna as being both harmful and helpful. “It’s an unfair thing, since I’ve only done a couple of songs every few years with her. I wrote the music to “Oh, Father” and “Live To Tell,” but people just assume I make dance records because they’re anxious to pigeon-hole things. The connection has helped, but it’s also hurt, since people either don’t want to hear another dance record in Toy Matinee, or they’re gravely disappointed that Toy Matinee isn’t that at all. But I try not to harbor feelings one way or another.”

Kevin Gilbert began his music career at age fifteen when he entered a California recording studio with a band called NRG. Admittedly, Gilbert was “overbearing as hell,” looking over the engineer’s shoulder, instructing him on how to record the act - so much so that the engineer eventually went home, leaving Gilbert to finish the job. NRG’s three-song demo eventually won radio station KSJO’s ‘Best Of The Bay’ contest in San Jose, and Gilbert landed a job at that same studio, recording what he calls “bad Mariachi bands” during the day and working on his own projects at night.

Gilbert kept the studio job for several years, then enrolled in UCLA. After a year of college, he dropped out, taking a gig playing keyboards for Eddie Money on his “Take Me Home Tonight” Tour in ‘87.

“I respect Eddie’s singing immensely,” says Gilbert. “But he was a drag to be on tour with; he was a heroin addict, and his managers took advantage of me because I was young. I quit and said, ‘Forget this! I’m not going to deal with management companies or record labels. They’re jackals, all of them. I’m just going to make records that I want to make.’”

Gilbert went back to San Jose and put together Giraffe, a band that performed the music Gilbert was writing in his 24-track garage studio. Giraffe put out a CD in the Bay Area, selling out their first pressing at a time when CD’s weren’t yet big business. Giraffe entered Soundcheck - The Yamaha Rock Music Showcase, winning the competition in California and placing second at the world finals in Tokyo, Japan.

“I felt great about it, since it was an album full of songs like Toy Matinee, very non-commercial. People would describe us as ‘what Genesis would have sounded like if Peter Gabriel hadn’t left.’”

Patrick Leonard had been one of the Soundcheck judges and took a liking to what Gilbert was doing. After working with Madonna on two of her tours and many of her hit records, Leonard had decided the time was right to make his own record.

“I felt that it was time to get back to representing myself with things that I believed in,” says Leonard. “It was a matter of finding people who understood, who wanted to make the kind of record that Toy Matinee is. We wanted a collaborative band with an outside producer, making a record the way they were made ten years ago.”

Leonard contact Gilbert a few weeks after the Soundcheck competition and they began writing the songs that would surface on Toy Matinee. They assembled a group of session players and musicians who, in Gilbert’s words, “wanted to make music from the heart.”

Bassist Guy Pratt took time off from his work with Pink Floyd, and Wire Train drummer Brian MacLeod added his talents as well. Guitarist Tim Pierce was the first player that Toy Matinee auditioned, but the band didn’t feel the need to look any further. The membership issue was settled.

“Nobody wanted to make a perfect producer’s record,” explains Gilbert. “It was five guys in the studio, working on tunes and recording them.”

Producer Bill Bottrell (Madonna, Tom Petty, Traveling Wilburys) was brought in as the outside producer. Gilbert maintains that Bottrell made the “single greatest contribution to the record.”

“Bill was the honesty factor,” says Gilbert. “He defined the sound, and kept the album from being ‘overdub-land: a bunch of perfect parts played by perfect people in a perfect way.’ It was a pretty emotional record. In fact, Pat left the studio in tears a couple of times. If you listen with that in mind, you can hear the angst involved.”

Gilbert offers Bottrell his “complete unending kudos” for advice in the vocal department. “We sat down for days on end and listened to other people’s records, listening to the character in people’s voices and trying to forget if the singer’s in tune or not. The point he was trying to make was that all in music is not pitch or rhythmic accuracy. He didn’t want me to sing like a ‘singer,’ but as someone who had written the song.”

Even with the record finally finished and in the stores, the individual members of Toy Matinee are at odds as to whether the band will tour. “We were slated to start rehearsals this week,” explains Patrick Leonard. “But we’re not going to, because it’s not time.”

Leonard’s management is maintaining a ‘wait and see’ attitude toward the prospects of embarking on a cross country tour. Although chart action so far has been, in Gilbert’s words, a “steady upward motion, no downward trends anywhere,” the financial aspect of touring would not be practical until the radio and MTV audience is more familiar with Toy Matinee.

According to Gilbert, “I’m anxious to climb in the back of a Winnebago and do a ‘Police’ tour,” referring to The Police’s wing-and-a-prayer tour of the U.S. following their first album. “The other guys are rarin’ and willing to go, too, but at this point, there’s no money to be made. It’d be a lot of discomfort while you’re building a following.”

“I want to tour,” adds Patrick Leonard. “But it’s important that it be worth it, that it has a positive feel. If we’re out there losing money, and nobody knows us and nobody cares, then that’s not a positive feel.”

Whatever the future of Toy Matinee, their LP is an effort to be proud of. According to Patrick Leonard, “This is something that I’ve waited for years to start, and we have a good combination of people involved. It’s a magical thing, but I’d like to see the industry aspect of the project work well enough to get this music in front of people who will like it. If we can find our audience, and they love it...that’s what we want.”