Twat Vibe

Twat Vibe were an all-girl punk / garage rock band from Chicago. Formed in 2002, the band comprised Kylee Coffman (vocals), Julia Wright (guitar), Alissa Noonan (bass), Erica Corniel (drums) and Marianne Sadler (keyboards).

Alissa Noonan writes: "'We played mostly in the Chicago garage scene with bands like The Ponys, Functional Blackouts, Kilowatts, Alex White, and The Manhandlers but also had gigs with hip hop group, Farm Crew and math rockers Crush Kill Destroy. Besides the songs on Maybe Chicago, we had a handmade, hand-stamped demo CD sold in a white leather case with four songs: Train Song, Randy Rattail, Blood on The Dashboard, and Stereo. It was recorded at Atlas Studios in Chicago with Neil Hennessy and Matt Allison. We toured in the summer of 2003 - Detroit, Rochester, NY, NYC, Jersey City, NJ, Philadelphia, PA, Atlanta, GA, and St. Louis, MO. We broke up later that year, after recording the Maybe Chicago comp songs. We tended to leave a trail of broken mic stands behind us and had a superfan, Dan The Fan (a Chicago and Chicago garage rock institution) who would pogo dance at our shows wearing our spray-painted t-shirt and underpants over his jeans. We reunited for one night in 2006 for Dan The Fan's birthday party, a show played with Miss Alex White & The Red Orchestra, CoCoComa, Magnetix, and The Dials.'"

Links with Peel
"'I really want to know more about these people.' (02 March 2004)"

Peel came across Twat Vibe when he heard the two tracks they contributed to the compilation LP "Maybe Chicago", which was issued in 2003 by the Criminal IQ label. He was very impressed with these and played both tracks at least twice over the next few months. On these occasions he would often express his desire to discover more information about the band and mention the numerous unsuccessful attempts the programme had made to contact the outfit. For example, on 08 April 2004, he stated:

"'If they ever ask me to curate All Tomorrow's Parties I'll certainly ask [Lightning Bolt] back again I think. I'd also insist that we had Twat Vibe on there, despite the fact that we've not been able to discover anything about them or track them down and they completely ignore all of our pathetic attempts at communicating with them.'"

After then playing their "Train Song", he added, "well we're going to give up trying to track 'em down fairly soon because it's getting frustrating."

On 18 May 2004, Peel was informed that earlier that day a representative of the band had been in touch at last. Unhappily, the communication imparted the sad news that the group had split up. On the night when Ipswich Town had seen their promotion hopes dashed following defeat by West Ham, it was a bitter blow. "Yet another disappointment tonight. This has not been a good night for me, I have to say" sighed Peel.

Shows Played

 * 2004
 * 25 February 2004: Train Song (Various LP - Maybe Chicago) Criminal IQ
 * 02 March 2004: Got Nuthin' (Various LP - Maybe Chicago) Criminal IQ
 * 09 March 2004: Train Song (Various LP - Maybe Chicago) Criminal IQ
 * 06 April 2004: Got Nuthin' (Various LP - Maybe Chicago) Criminal IQ
 * 08 April 2004: Train Song (Various LP - Maybe Chicago) Criminal IQ

Acknowledgement
Grateful thanks to Alissa Noonan for providing the information used in this article.