In 1983, songwriter and guitarist Nick Christian Slayer spotted Wendy James singing in a club in Brighton, and soon began writing and recording songs together. These songs were intended to be the soundtrack to a sci-fi film they wanted to make called "Saturn 5" and they soon came up with a name for themselves - Transvision Vamp.
Nick and Wendy moved to London and in December 1986 Tranvision Vamp got a record deal.
Dave Parsons (who they met in a pub) joined the band to play bass guitar, and Tex Axile, who had a flat in London near where the band were recording, met Nick, Wendy and Dave and became the keyboard player and drummer in the band.
In 1998, Transvision Vamp released their debut album, "Pop Art" which included the singles "I Want Your Love", "Tell That Girl To Shut Up", "Revolution Baby" and "Sister Moon".
In 1989, the follow-up album "Velveteen" was also successful and included several hit singles, including their biggest hit "Baby, I Don't Care".
The band then recorded the album "Little Magnets Versus The Bubble Of Babble", but the release of this was delayed by their record company until 1991, and when it did finally get released it received little media attention. The album didn't have the success of the first two albums and the band soon split up.
AFTER...
Tex Axile played keyboards in a band called Max for several years and they released the album "Silence Running" before they were dropped by their record label in 1994. Since then he has been doing solo work, and has released the albums "Diary Of A Genius" and "Little Monsters".
Dave Parsons joined the band Bush, who although having relatively little success in the UK, have been hugely successful throughout the world with hit singles including "Little Things", "Comedown", "Glycerine" and "Swallowed".
After some failed attempts at song writing with Wendy James in the mid-1990s, Nick Christian Sayer has now left the music business altogether.
During Transvision Vamp's final tour when things weren't going well, Wendy James wrote to Elvis Costello detailing her frustrations. In response to this, Elvis Costello wrote an albums worth of songs for Wendy which she released as a solo artist in 1993 called "Now Aint The Time For Your Tears". This was not successful, however, and Wendy was soon dropped from her record label.
In 1995, Wendy got a new record deal and recorded an album called "Lies In Chinatown", although problems with the record company meant that this did not get a proper release and only a few copies of this are known to exist.
After recording demos under the name Racine, Wendy moved to New York City, where she set up a record label and recorded the album "Number One". This was released in late 2004 along with the single "Grease Monkey" and both have been well received critically. A tour at many countries across the world is planned for later this year.
DO YOU REMEMBER...
Wendy James' screaming.
Some of Wendy's famous quotes... "I will be more famous than Madonna", "I will win an Oscar",...
DID YOU KNOW...
Wendy used to date comedian Rowland Rivron.
Wendy was abandoned as a baby, and ran away from her adopted family when she was 16.
LINKS...
Click here to discuss Transvision Vamp in The Bubble Burst Forum
