Pleasure

Girls At Our Best! were one of the greatest and most influential bands to emerge in the early 1980s as part of a new wave of independent acts. DJ John Peel championed them, playing their singles repeatedly and inviting them to record a session for his programme.

Wry vocalist Judy Evans and brutal yet melodic guitarist James Alan who’d met at art college in Leeds fronted Girls At Our Best!, the proto-Indie band that formed from the ashes of Alan’s 1977 punk band SOS!

Disc 1 contains the album ‘Pleasure’ that reached number two in the Indie Chart, plus all the Girls At Our Best! singles recordings and influential BBC sessions for Peel and Skinner.

All four of their singles are here, including their classic self-financed debut, ‘Getting Nowhere Fast’, released on their own Record Records label in April 1980 - a #9 Indie chart hit that was later covered by The Wedding Present. Its sardonic B-side ‘Warm Girls’ also features, along with ‘Politics!’, ‘Go For Gold’, ‘Fast Boyfriends’ and its flip side, a cover of Sister Rosetta Tharpe’s ‘This Train’ that the band made their own.

Disc 2 includes a superb live concert recorded at Edinburgh University on 2/11/81 plus two demos and Disc 3 features a bootleg live recording of their New York Peppermint Lounge gig on 6/11/81 from the ill-fated US tour that led to the band splitting.

Jez Pritchatt AKA James Alan of Girls At Our Best! has been fully involved in the release and has given it his approval, while long term fan Steve Flanagan has written the notes; the booklet incorporates copies of original single sleeves, photographs and memorabilia.