Sister George was an influential queercore
band from London
that was formed in 1994.
The groups' name was inspired by the 1968 UK movie The Killing of Sister
George.
Although queercore bands had existed in the UK
in the 1980s,
such as The
Apostles, Academy 23, and No Brain Cells and early 1990s, such
as Tongue Man, Sister
George brought queercore into the spotlight there. The members were
Lisa on bass,
Daryl on drums,
and Lyndon on guitar
and vocals. Ellyot Dragon shared vocals with
Lyndon; she had left The Darlings, a band which included Lesley Woods,
formerly of the post punk band Au Pairs, and Debbie
Smith, later in Curve and Echobelly.
Their first album, Drag King, came out on
Catcall Records. The band found themselves heralded in the pages of
British music magazines such as the NME. They toured with acts like Huggy Bear
and Hissyfit at first, but
soon they were joined by other queer bands such as Mouthfull and Children's Hour, and it was
these groups that popularized queercore in the UK. Their album was
rereleased in the U.S. by Outpunk Records, and a music
video for the song "Handle Bar" was made. This song also appeared on
the Outpunk Records compilation, Outpunk
Dance Party. Also featured on Drag
King was a hardcore style cover
of the Tom Robinson song "Glad To Be
Gay", although Sister George was less than sincere in regard to the
sentiment of the original. The Sister George version featured the voice
of serial
killer Aileen Wuornos chanting, "We kill in
self defense" throughout the entire song.
The band broke up in the midst of recording their second
album. Afterwards, Ellyot Dragon went on to form Nightnurse which featured then 16
year old Charlotte Hatherley on
guitar, who would later have success with the band Ash.
Daryl drummed for The Elements Of Crime with
Chris and Jo from Huggy Bear, Layla from Skinned Teen, Dale from Blood
Sausage and Andrew from Linus, releasing the single "The things
we do for love...".
Sister George performed in and are interviewed in the film, She's Real, Worse Than
Queer by Lucy Thane.
See also
