Twisted Sister's Jay Jay French Discusses Rock Documentary on The Long Island Music & Entertainment Hall of Fame Podcast with Tom Needham

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Jay Jay French will be joining Tom Needham for an extended conversation about his documentary We Are Twisted F***ING Sister.  The film focuses on the ten grueling years leading up to Twisted Sister's commercial breakthrough as they cross-dressed their way all over Long Island bars and clubs to super-stardom.

Twisted Sister was a dangerous combination of the New York Dolls’ glam, KISS’ theatrics, and the shock-rock styling of Alice Cooper. In 1972, Jay Jay French formed a glam-rock cover band modeled after the New York Dolls. An apprenticeship on the local Long Island club scene followed, and, by early 1976, French hired Dee Snider and along with fellow guitarist and high school buddy Eddie “Fingers” Ojeda,  gave the band’s glam sound a kick in the chops and also quickly developed into the dominant songwriter. After a rotating array of ex members who couldn’t maintain the work schedule of 250 nights a year x 4 shows per night for 10 years,  Long Island native, bass player Mark “The Animal ” Mendoza (formerly of the punk legends The Dictators) joined in 1978 which also made the band much heavier sonically. 

The Long Island  club scene exploded (drinking age was 18) with ever larger rooms Twisted Sister started setting attendance records in many Long Island Clubs such as Speaks in Island Park, Hammerheads in Levittown & East Islip, The Mad Hatter in Stony Brook, and the Mad Hatter in East Quogue which, after many rejections, led to a record deal. In 1982 drummer AJ Pero completed the band line up.  In 1984, with the simultaneous explosion of MTV, and their groundbreaking videos,TS released their third album Stay Hungry, (7 million sold worldwide and counting..) that included the monster hits “We’re Not Gonna Take It” and “I Wanna Rock.” The band recorded and toured extensively around the world  (they took a hiatus from 1988-2001) and returned to become one of the biggest bands on the European and South American rock and metal festival circuit from 2003-2016

In 2006 TS released A Twisted Christmas, the most successful heavy metal Christmas album in history.

Drummer AJ Pero passed away in 2015 and was replaced by legendary Long Island drummer Mike Portnoy for the band’s remaining live performances.

This interview originally aired on Tom Needham's The Sounds of Film

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