Though it was written by Brad Nack (a former boyfriend of Tracey's) for his own band, The Tortilla Flats, "I Walk The Earth" is the perfect signpost to describe the first few years of Voice Of The Beehive's existence. The early days were charac-terized by much motion: transcontinental moves by the girls, relentless promotion and touring, tons of product output by the record label.
The first step was founder Tracey Bryn's wanderlust. In the early 1980's, Tracey followed her then-boyfriend, Brad Nack, from sunny Southern California to not-so-sunny London, England. The trip was planned more as a vacation than a permanent stay, but much like one her rock heroes, Chrissie Hynde, Tracey took to London and decided to stay.
Tracey had been inspired by British music for years, classic pop bands like the Kinks and the Beatles, as well as current outfits like Bow Wow Wow, so staying in London to be a part of the scene that spawned such great music seemed only logical. Tracey had always wanted to be in a band (and, indeed, had already been in a short-lived "psychedelic garage band" back in California called The Boys). Once in London, she joined another short-lived outfit, The Love Bombs, in which she learned the fundamentals of playing and writing music on guitar. "Just A City" was one of the songs that emerged from this period.
Shortly after The Love Bombs broke up, Tracey invited her sister Melissa Brooke Belland over for a short holiday, which evolved into a permanent stay. The girls, who'd once pledged as young sisters to be in a band together, set out to make that dream a reality. Their first step towards that goal was establishing themselves on the London indie music scene. The girls became good friends with bands like Zodiac Mindwarp And The Love Reaction, My Bloody Valentine, Gaye Bykers On Acid, and Bill Drummond (of the KLF). Indeed, Tracey and Melissa's first appearance on record was as backing vocalists on the track "Married Man" on Bill Drummond's country and gospel-tinged first solo album, The Man. Though their vocals are mixed so low they're almost impossible to pick out, the girls were billed for the first time in the liner notes as Voice Of The Beehives [sic].
On a sidenote: The source of the band's name has been misidentified for years. No one is quite sure where the myth started, but at some point someone printed a story that claimed that Voice Of The Beehive got their name from an old Bette Davis film of the same name. The story became a much-quoted fact, but the "fact" of the matter is, that story is patently untrue. If you believe it, I challenge you to find a Bette Davis film of that name. Rather, Tracey and Melissa went through a series of lackluster names, among them The Fashion Don'ts, Down Worm and The They Monster. Finally, they hit upon the phrase "Voice of the (fill in the blank)." A mock dialogue between Tracey and Melissa, which appeared on the liner notes of the later London Records compilation album Giant, as well as the Midja Pack 12-inch release of "I Say Nothing," is telling:
Melissa: "Tracey, I'm sick of L.A. -- All this sun, sand and surf crap is getting me down." Tracey: "And you can't find any decent cider 'round here!" Melissa: "Right! Hey, I got an idea -- let's go to London!" Tracey: "And live in squats in Bow with outdoor toilets." Melissa: "And freeze our asses off." Tracey: "...when it's not pissing down with rain." Melissa: "And meet some cute guys." Tracey: "And form a band." Melissa: "And call it...?" Tracey: "Voice of The..." Melissa: "Grapefruit?" Tracey: "No!...BEEHIVE!" The dialogue is a little silly, and more than likely made up by London Records staffers, but the manner in which the band's name was selected was accurate. Fill in the blank until you find something that sounds good, and voila! Thank heavens they didn't go with grapefruit.
Shortly after recording with Drummond, the girls met Mike Jones, a Welsh guitarist who owned his own 4-track studio, and Voice Of The Beehive as a band officially started taking shape. The trio, using a rotating line-up of guest bassists and drummers, put together a few demos and sent them to various labels. Food Records, an independent label run by Andy Ross and ex-Teardrop Explodes founder David Balfe, was the first label to show an interest. Food offered the Beehive a one-off record deal.
In the meantime, Daniel (Woody) Woodgate and Mark (Bedders) Bedford, both former members of Madness, caught a Voice Of The Beehive gig at the Bull And Gate in Kentish Town. Acquainted with the Beehive's manager, they asked if they could gig with the band a few times, and the band readily agreed.
At first they tried to downplay the Madness connection --they didn't want to be seen as "the new Madness." And though Woody and Bedders played on the first single, "Just A City," they were not pictured in the band photo that appeared on the 12-inch release, nor were they billed as band members (they only received a thank you credit on the sleeve).
Just prior to the first single's release, on January 28th, 1987, the band played the ICA Rock Week, a series of concerts at London's Institute of Contemporary Arts to showcase independent labels and their new acts. However, when corporate sponsor EMI Records announced that a condition of their sponsorship was that every band had to contribute tracks to a special compilation album, the original line-up changed drastically.
Voice Of The Beehive was one of the bands that stayed on, and early live versions of their songs "Sorrow Floats" and "What You Have Is Enough" can be found on the albums On The Dotted Line (Here) and On The Dotted Line (There), respectively, which were both released in July of 1987. After the ICA show, Mark Bedford left the band to form his own outfit, Butterfield 8, and Martin Brett stepped in to fill his place. The band line-up, as it would be known for the next several years, was set.
In March of 1987, Food Records released the "Just A City" single in 7-inch and 12-inch formats, and the buzz on the band was great. The single performed very well on the independent charts and got plenty of radio airplay, so the major labels immediately started calling.
The band quickly signed with London Records (a subsidiary of Polygram), over second place Go! Discs, because "there was something about that youthful drunken label that was so appealing." And though they lost the Beehive to a major, Food Records and David Balfe benefited greatly from the deal as well. Food signed a distribution agreement with EMI that remains in place to this day, and David Balfe signed on as the Beehive's manager.
With the ink on the contract barely dry, the London Records machine chugged into high gear, starting a flood of Voice Of The Beehive product that would continue for the next two years. "Just A City" was re-released on 7-inch and 12-inch formats in April of 1987, with different cover art and different b-sides (the 12-inch included the band's cover of Led Zeppelin's "D'Yer Mak'Er"). The singles were released in conjunction with Food Records, the only time the two labels would officially work together again on a Beehive project.
The next several months were spent on the road, touring extensively with such acts as Boys Wonder and the Proclaimers, as well as in the recording studio. In July, the EMI On The Dotted Line LPs were released. In September, London released Giant, a compilation release of several of their current signings. Voice Of The Beehive were represented by the track "Beat Of Love" (the same version that would later appear on Let It Bee). Also in September, Sounds magazine (a music paper like NME and Melody Maker) included a freebie 7-inch EP with one of their weekly issues. Voice Of The Beehive's "What You Have Is Enough" (an early version that is much different than the version fans would later get to know and love) appeared alongside tracks from three other bands: the Primitives, the Soup Dragons, and the Band Of Holy Joy.
In October 1987, London released "I Say Nothing" in a variety of formats (including two 7-inch variations, and three different 12-inches). Almost immediately, the band took flak from the prudes at the BBC, who demanded that the lyrics "she says I get it every night" and "he'll rip you right in two" be changed. The band obliged and the lyrics became "she says I see him every night" and "he'll rip your heart in two," but Radio 1 DJ Janice Long continued to play the original and the band eventually thanked her for doing so in the Let It Bee liner notes. The single quickly disappeared from the markets because of the offending lyrics and the band was none too pleased. Fortunately, they were able to keep the original lyrics on Let It Bee, and in live shows even changed one of the lyrics to "she says I fuck him every night" (this wily lyrical fix can be heard in the live version of "I Say Nothing" that appears on the "Perfect Place" CD single). The band also made a video, their first, for "I Say Nothing." Hoping to incorporate a little Madness-style fun into the video, the band performed the song on a soundstage and goofed around a lot. The girls also cleaned out their wardrobes for this one (they go through what seems like dozens of colorful costume changes). There were also two versions made of this video, one for the UK, and another for the US (which simply has less split-screen effects and fast cuts).
The rest of 1987, and much of the first half of 1988, was spent on television. Voice Of The Beehive, and especially Tracey and Melissa, became fixtures on British music programs, talk shows, and children's programs. When they were asked about their frequent appearances on shows aimed at very young kids, the girls claimed that they loved doing it because it got them on stage in front of an audience that wouldn't normally be able to attend their adults-only club gigs.
In February of 1988, the band released their third single, "I Walk The Earth." Again, London Records pumped out a variety of formats, including two 7-inches, a 12-inch and a CD single. A video was produced, this one directed by Cure video veteran Tim Pope. In it, the girls could be seen bouncing around a room filled with clothes and other "stuff," while the boys in the band played their instruments and looked on in amusement. Turns out, though, that the room is actually a large suitcase. Get it? Tracey and Melissa hated it. At the time of the video's release, British music shows were more likely to show short snippets of videos instead of the whole thing, and so they only showed the middle part where the girls bounced around, looking silly, and not the ending which explained the silliness. Like "I Say Nothing" before it, the song barely grazed the Top 40, but the Beehive's profile was growing. The TV appearances were paying off.
On February 26, 1988, the band stopped by the Radio 1 Studios to record an Evening Session that would be played on the air a week later, then released as a 12-inch and CD single a year later. Needless to say, they didn't play "I Say Nothing." Instead their set consisted of two b-sides ("No Green Blues" and "Jump This Way") and two cover songs (the Comsat Angels' "Independence Day" and the Velvet Underground's "Jesus").
In May of 1988, London Records released the fourth single, "Don't Call Me Baby." Derisively called (by the band) "the piss take that made it big," the song took its title from a line uttered by Ann-Margret to Elvis Presely in Viva Las Vegas. Released in seven different formats, including three 7-inches, a 10-inch, a 12-inch, a CD single, and a Video CD single (which could only be played on European PAL standard laser disc players), "Don't Call Me Baby" was the band's biggest chart hit to date, reaching a high of 15. Two videos were produced for the single. One, a simple blue-tinted, black-and-white studio performance with a few animated squiggles and jots flitting about the screen (this is the version that would later play on US television). The second was set in a drive-in theater, with the girls driving the car (and the boys stowed away in the trunk) and the original video being projected on the screen.
"Don't Call Me Baby" preceded the release of Let It Bee by a month. Driven by that single's success, Let It Bee reached a chart high of 13 in early July. London Records was so delighted by the back-to-back successes that they quickly churned out a re-release of "I Say Nothing." This time the song was released with the sanitized lyrics, new cover art, and a slate of new b-sides. Like the three or four singles before it, "I Say Nothing" (Mach II) hit the market in a slew of different formats: three 7-inches, two 12-inches and a CD single. The re-release charted much higher, peaking at 22 on July 23rd. The band, meanwhile, was in the midst of a successful British tour with Big Bam Boo and A House opening up.
The fall of 1988 saw Tracey and Melissa doing a bit of moonlighting from the Beehive. First, they contributed a cover of "Five Feet High & Risin'" to 'til things are brighter, a Johnny Cash tribute album. They were billed on the record as Tracey and Melissa Beehive. Also, sometime in the fall, the girls put in a appearance in the video for Crazyhead's "Time Has Taken It's Toll On You." They didn't sing in the video, just danced like go-go stowaways from that old 60s show, Laugh-In. November found them popping up as vocalists on The Bomb Party's cover version of "Sugar Sugar." The girls also sang lead and backing vocals on the b-side, "Do The Right Thing."
Back on the Beehive front, London Records was pleased enough with the summer re-release of "I Say Nothing" to give "I Walk The Earth" another try. The single came out in six different formats: three 7-inches, a 10-inch, a 12-inch, and a CD single. While the single puttered around the bottom of half of the British Top 100, the band turned their attention to America.
In November, Tracey joined her boyfriend, Steve Mack of That Petrol Emotion, at a college radio convention in New York City. The buzz on the Beehive in the US was growing (MTV was able to squeeze a few spins of "I Say Nothing" onto their playlist between the glut of hair metal bands that clogged the channel in those days, and college radio played the song enough to get it up to #11 on Billboard's Modern Rock chart) and That Petrol Emotion was gearing up for the release of their next album, End Of The Millennium Psychosis Blues. It only seemed natural that a double bill tour of the US should be planned, and it was decided at that time that one should be set up for early 1989.
In the meantime, back in England, London Records released "Man In The Moon" to compete in the brutal British Christmas single derby. For once, London pulled back the reins and only released the single in 7-inch, 12-inch and CD single formats. The song didn't perform that well on the charts, but it didn't matter. The band had turned their attention to America anyway.
February and March of 1989 found the Beehive travelling to America, opening up for the Petrols. And I'm sorry to say this about my pals in the Petrols, but the Beehive stole just about every show. The tour was such a success for the Beehive that they were forced to do two additional daytime concerts in Los Angeles alone, just to meet the fan demand.
The enthusiastic response that American fans showed the Beehive was surely welcome, but upon returning home to London the Beehive were completely exhausted. They'd been going at it relentlessly for more than two years now, and they were aching for a period of decompression. Tracey and Melissa tried to throw off everything related to the Beehive, and just be regular girls, enjoying time with their boyfriends in London and their family back in California. The guys returned to life with their families, as well, and except for a few sporadic appearances here and there (like the Reading Festival in September and a few surprise club gigs under the name The Buzzing Barbarians), Voice Of The Beehive pretty much ceased to exist for the rest of 1989.
But, as we all know, the taste of honey lingers. The voice in Voice Of The Beehive wouldn't be silenced for long.
sleek video, which made Tracey especially happy because she got to wear her beloved babydoll dress in it.
In May of 1991, "Monsters And Angels" was released on the British market, and it slowly proceeded to climb the charts (eventually getting close to "Don't Call Me Baby's" highwater mark of 15). In June, as Honey Lingers was being released, the band embarked on a UK tour, which culminated in the now legendary Orgy Under The Underworld shows. Touted in advertisements as "the squalid tale of two innocent girls' descent into the moral quagmire that is rock 'n' roll," the Orgy shows were specifically planned to be decadent multimedia events, not just your ordinary concert. To that end, the Underworld nightclub was tacked up in fake fur, cheesy lighting, and softcore porn videos were projected onto the walls. The sexy, sleazy atmosphere was apparently a huge success. No one who was there for any one of the three Orgy shows will likely ever forget it. Legend has it that a few concert-goers even took the orgy theme so seriously, they got sexual right there in the club. The media ate it up. The album did well in its opening weeks and things were looking good.
In September, London Records released the second single from Honey Lingers, "I Think I Love You." Cannily capitalizing on the Orgy shows' publicity, London packaged the 7-inch and 12-inch singles with the Underworld concerts' poster art on their covers. The 12-inch even came with a limited edition "Orgy Print" and a remix was dubbed the "Orgy Mix." The video for "I Think I Love You" also ran with the Orgy theme. Set in a hip, underground club, it featured the girls, in super-stacked platform shoes and feather boas, dancing with a group of beautiful drag queens and glammed-out clubgoers. The CD single was released in a limited edition heart-shaped pack, with Don Was' original version as an additional track, as well as a techno-styled remix by Mike Edwards of Jesus Jones fame. The single did fairly well on the British charts, reaching a high point of 25 in early October, just as the girls were heading to America to drum up support for Honey Lingers on their home soil.
The October 1991 press tour was designed as a quick sampler to whet fans' and industry types' appetites for the Beehive's upcoming November/December tour of America. The girls stopped in several large cities (Los Angeles, San Francisco, Boston and New York) to meet and greet the press. In each city, the girls performed a short acoustic set at the local Hard Rock Cafe, then sat down for quick question and answer sessions with the press. In some cities, the girls also made appearances on local radio and television talk shows.
In mid-November, they returned to America again with the full band in tow, and rising band The Odds as their support act. As they traversed the American landscape, "Monsters & Angels" was making its own modest mark on the Billboard charts. The Beehive's first single to crack the American Hot 100, "Monsters & Angels" would reach a peak position of 74. But the tour was only a mediocre success. In some cities, they played to packed houses, while in others fan turnout was disappointingly sparse. Near the end of the tour, the band was forced to cancel a few shows because both Tracey and Melissa lost their voices. Fortunately, they were back up to snuff in time for the last two shows in San Francisco and Los Angeles, which were soldout smashes.
The band returned to England in mid-December, just as London Records was getting ready to release the third single from Honey Lingers. For the third time, "Perfect Place" had been completely re-recorded, but again it turned out to be an overproduced, glossy affair that didn't sound much like the plaintive and pretty, but very simple song that Voice Of The Beehive played live. London just didn't know when to stop meddling. Fortunately for the fans, the single's cover art and video were something truly special. Dressed in black, their hair done up in springy curls, Tracey and Melissa veritably glowed from the inside out. Shot in sepia-like tones, they looked like heartbroken angels, ruminating on the failures of the world. Perhaps because the song's tone was so sad, the single did not perform as well on the charts as the previous two had. "Perfect Place" only just managed to graze the bottom half of the British Top 40, peaking at 37 in the end of January. It was the last Voice Of The Beehive record that London Records would ever release in the UK.
In early 1992, London Records also gave "Perfect Place" a whirl in the US (for some reason they put the more obvious single, "I Think I Love You," on the b-side), but the record got next to no airplay and very few rabid Beehive fans even knew the record had been released. A few months later, "Adonis Blue" was released in the US, but only as a promotional CD. Sadly, American DJs didn't take to the song, so it was never commercially released.
The slow fizzle of Honey Lingers at the end of 1991 and into early 1992, both in the UK and the US was surely a disappointment to everyone involved, but darker days were ahead. In the next two or three years, Voice Of The Beehive would very much earn the right to their third album's title, Sex and Misery.
in Honey Lingers at this time because Tracey more than likely would have been miserable having to promote pop records while dealing with such an anguishing personal problem. The only positive product that eventually came from this period was the song "Moon Of Dust," which Tracey wrote at the time to express her disappointment with how the relationship ended.
A bright spot appeared in the spring of 1992 when the Beehive found out that they were in the running for the opening slot on Crowded House's upcoming British tour. As the leaders of Split Enz, Tim and Neil Finn had been early musical heroes to Tracey and Melissa, so the Beehive camp lobbied hard to secure the warm-up slot and eventually succeeded. Sadly, though, the Crowded House tour did not turn out to be the positive experience Tracey and Melissa had been hoping for. The time they were allotted as openers was painfully brief, especially given the fact that they'd been touring as headliners for at least five years by that point, and the restrictions they were given seemed a little harsh. For instance, the Beehive were not allowed to record any of their gigs from the soundboard for possible future b-sides. The response from Crowded House's fans was also tepid, at best. The silver lining to this excursion was that the band got along quite well with the Finn brothers and the rest of Crowded House.
The late summer also brought another unexpected surprise: the complete resurgence of Woody's old band, Madness. In January of 1992, just as "Perfect Place" was limping its way up the British singles chart, Madness' classic song "It Must Be Love" was used in a British TV commercial. The song suddenly started getting heavy requests on British radio, so the song was re-released and made it as high as number 6 on the British charts. The surprise success of that single led to a Madness greatest hits album, which also charted well. The sudden resurgence of Madness as one of Britain's most beloved bands inspired the nutty boys to reunite for a special gig in August of 1992, which they called Madstock. As we all know now, Madstock turned into a huge event, spawning several other subsequent gigs (Madstock II, Madstock III, as well as full-scale tours), and Woody suddenly found himself torn between staying with the relatively inactive Beehive or rejoining the reinvigorated Madness full-time. By the early winter of 1992, he'd decided to go with Madness.
Just as he was leaving, though, Voice Of The Beehive was tapped to re-record the Rolling Stones' "Gimme Shelter" with Jimmy Somerville for a homeless charity called Putting Our House In Order. The theme of the project, apparently, was to pair unlikely recording artists together to see what they might come up with. Other than the Beehive and Jimmy Somerville, a few interesting pairings included Samantha Fox with Hawkwind and Tom Jones with New Model Army. Stepping in to fill Woody's shoes was a great drummer
named Tom Fenner (who stayed with the band for most of the next year), but Melissa proved to be irreplaceable. Although she appeared in the later video and all of the promotional projects for "Gimme Shelter," Melissa did not appear on the actual record. She was out of the country at the time of recording, so Tracey was left alone to belt the Stones' classic along with Jimmy Somerville.
While the "Gimme Shelter" project was still being put together by Food Records and EMI, Tracey got down to the business of writing songs for the next Beehive album. By the end of the year, she had 30+ songs in the bag, but Polygram informed her that they "didn't hear a single." They encouraged her to try again and even suggested matching her up with XTC's Andy Partridge as a writing partner.
While Polygram worked on setting that partnership up, Tracey took a holiday in Derry, Ireland, visiting with That Petrol Emotion and Undertones founder Sean (John) O'Neill and his family. It was a relaxing time for Tracey, something she desperately needed.
In February of 1993, Andy Partridge agreed to work with Tracey on a few songs, and the project went quite well. Besides "Blue In Paradise," Tracey and Andy put together a few other songs, and mutually agreed to work together again sometime in the future. Sadly, that agreement would never come to pass.
The chief majority of March and April was taken up with promotional work for the "Gimme Shelter" project. A video for the song was produced, and, together with Jimmy Somerville, the girls did a slew of television and print interviews. Unfortunately, the Food/EMI distribution plan for the record never really made any sense. Rather than release a full-length album, the twelve collaborations were parceled out between four genre-themed single releases. The first three (rock, alternative and dance) were released as CD-singles, but the Beehive's version was stuck on the pop release, which was only released as a cassette single. In March, the band appeared with Jimmy Somerville on Top Of The Pops (theirs was the only version chosen to represent the project on that seminal British music program), but it didn't seem to help. The "Gimme Shelter" single (I'm not sure which of the four releases was considered the "official" single) debuted at 23 on the British chart, then immediately dropped the next week and that was the end of it. Had it not been for the charity angle, the mishandling of the project's release would have been simply pathetic. But with the project having been designed to help those in need, it was heartbreakingly sad. Sometime later, Toshiba EMI in Japan released a 10-song compilation of the "Gimme Shelter" tracks on CD (the Beehive's track is included; I'm not sure which two versions were dropped), but that CD is near impossible to find. Its release must have been extremely brief.
The rest of the spring and early summer saw Tracey continuing to write and Polygram continuing to stall. Frustrated by it all, Tracey left for America in July to be with an old friend, Marlon, who was bravely fighting AIDS. Tracey brought with her a gift for Marlon, a song she'd written for him called "Moonblind." She spent the next month and a half with him, and (somewhat poetically) he would pass away on December 31st.
Also in July of 1993, Polygram had signed up Pete Vettesse to work with the Beehive on their next album. Although the projects he'd been involved with previously (Annie Lennox's Diva album, for instance) didn't sound much like Beehive material, Tracey and Melissa took to him quite well. It was also an encouraging sign that Polygram was moving ahead with assigning a producer, rather than balking about Tracey's songwriting. By the end of August, Tracey had returned to England and the initial production of Sex & Misery had begun. In the end of October, the Beehive took time out from recording to play a surprise gig in London. The response from the fans was encouraging, so the band re-entered the studio with a new vigor. Unfortunately, the record company situation was not getting any better.
By January of 1994, things had gotten so bad that the band started negotiating a release from their contract. When the release was final, they gave themselves three months to find a new deal or pack it in. In March, the boys in the band decided they'd had enough. Sex & Misery was half done and it sounded nothing like the Beehive of old. Tracey and Melissa were on their own. As they continued to pursue a new record deal, they briefly flirted with the idea of going by a new name: "new name, new look, new everything." By May, they had signed with East/West Records, a subsidiary of Warner Brothers, and things were looking very good. The East/West team seemed extremely enthusiastic. They also encouraged the girls to stick with the Beehive brand name, if only for name recognition. With the ink on the new deal dry, the girls re-entered the studio with Pete Vettesse and set to work on finishing the much-delayed project.
In the fall of 1994, as they were finishing up the recording process on Sex & Misery, another personal tragedy befell the group. Like Tracey's (a year and a half before hers), Melissa's longtime relationship with her boyfriend broke up very bitterly. With so much personal devastation in their lives, the girls poured their pain into their work. By November, Sex & Misery was done.
Early 1995 found them back in England and gearing up for a big promotional push for Sex & Misery. East/West seemed extremely happy with the final results. In late April, the girls were sent to Paris to shoot the album cover art, then to Las Vegas to film the video for the first single, "Angel Come Down." The video was shot by Greg Masuak (who had directed a lot of their previous videos), and was set in Las Vegas' old neon graveyard. The resulting video was a haunting, dreamy affair, but it would almost never be seen.
In May, East/West started complaining about the album's title, Sex & Misery, but it was the most appropriate name the girls could come up with. Given the personal battles they'd had to endure over the last couple of years, it seemed all too fitting, so they stuck to their guns and East/West backed down. In the late summer, "Angel Come Down" was released and promptly tanked, going no higher than 84 in the British charts. There are more than a few reasons why the single didn't do well. First and foremost, East/West didn't promote the record at all. There was little press, no reviews, and the video wasn't shown more than a few times. Beyond that, the song was a strange choice for lead-off single. Slow and melancholy, it wasn't your usual peppy summer single release. Something like "So Hard" might have done better, but it was already too late. East/West was so spooked by the first single's failure that they pulled Sex & Misery from its release slate. It was now uncertain when they would get around to dumping the album on the British market.
For Tracey and Melissa, East/West's skittish move was the last straw. Seeing no reason to stay in England any longer, Tracey moved back to California in September, with Melissa following soon after. The remainder of 1995 was spent getting back to real life and re-establishing themselves in their old California world. In early 1996, East/West finally released Sex & Misery, as well as "Scary Kisses" as a CD-single. Both did abysmally on the charts. Other than a Best Of release from their London Records period (indeed, the best of album is basically the first two albums, minus three tracks), and a single release of "Heavenly" the following May, that was the end of Voice Of The Beehive in Britain.
Back in the U.S., however, Discovery Records (formerly a jazz-only label, under the Warner Brothers umbrella) was branching out into pop/alternative market. They picked up several already finished projects that were languishing at other Warner Brothers subsidiaries, among them The Finn Brothers (Tim & Neil) and Voice Of The Beehive, and released them to the U.S. market. Sex & Misery was released in the late spring of 1996, as was a single for "Scary Kisses." To, perhaps, everyone's surprise, "Scary Kisses" caught on at a few prominent Top 40 radio stations, and the single became a modest hit, getting as high as 77 on the U.S. charts in early summer. Sadly, Discovery Records didn't know how to capitalize on the single's success. Rather than beat the press drum, or rush a "Scary Kisses" video into production, or put the girls on talk shows, or book a proper tour, Discovery Records hooked Tracey and Melissa up with a few journeymen musicians and sent them out for a few sporadic radio festival shows and (more humiliating than anything else) gigs in shopping mall parking lots in towns that had never heard of Voice Of The Beehive. It was a pathetic marketing effort and any momentum that had been built with "Scary Kisses" had been completely lost by late summer when they decided to release "So Hard" as a single (at least they made a video this time!). By late fall, with the bloom off Sex & Misery, Discovery Records informed Tracey and Melissa that they would not be renewing their contract. Voice Of The Beehive was officially finished.
It was a sad end to a truly great band.
So what happened after that? Well, Tracey and Melissa returned to being normal girls. They got jobs, new boyfriends, and a new place to live. Tracey spends a lot of her free time writing and illustrating children's books. Melissa designs gorgeous fairy statues and sculptures, which you can find in a few gift shops in Laguna Beach. Martin went on to form a new band called Dollshouse (be sure to check out the Dollshouse website). For a short time, Woody was in Dollshouse as well, but as with the Beehive he was forced to bow out when his Madness obligations got to be too much. Mike Jones has simply disappeared. If you know of his whereabouts or what he's up to, feel free to drop me a line.
As for a reunion of the Beehive (the question I'm most asked by Beehive fans on the Internet), we'll finally be getting what we want when the band joins The Wonder Stuff on a reunion tour of the UK in late 2003. Hope to see you there!
