In early January, fans of Jayne County will have their Holy Grail delivered unto them;a combined CD release of the first two Jayne County studio albums , reflecting her transition from'Wayne' and her solo status, as The Electric Chairs ceased to exist as a recording or touring entity. It's not a secret that I've been working with, supporting and helping Jayne , on and off, since the mid 1970's, to the present day , as her worldwide manager. In the 'off' periods, Jayne was headquartered overseas, primarily in the UK and Germany; during those periods , we kept in touch via letters, post cards and sometimes international phone calls; and then sometimes, there were extended periods when we were not in touch.

In the early 80's, I talked Jayne into returning to the UK, to take advantage of the Batcave scene and the post punk craziness; there she met Warren Heighway,who became her UK/Europe manager. Jayne's earliest recordings as just Jayne County were put together by Warren, a combination of new songs, cover versions, and a County classic or two . The first sighting of these recordings was a vinyl only release on the Belgium based indie Konexion Records in 1985, titled "Amerikan Cleoptra", a rousing, rocking, fun catchup round for new fans and the loyalists from punk; "Man Enough To Be A Woman" and "Bad In Bed" had shown up on Electric Chairs albums originally, but were given re vamped, newly energized treatments here.

Ramped up covers of 1960's classics, "Are You A Boy Or Are You A Girl"( The Barbarians) and "Double Shot Of My Baby's Love"(The Swinging Medallions) brought a mapcap party vibe.. and then there were the new songs: "Xerox That Man", "The Lady Dye Twist", "When Queens Collide", "Fun In Amerika", "I Fell In Love With A Russian Soldier" and "Love Lives On Lies" were brilliant welcome additions to Jayne's repertoire. Still, The Belgium based label didn't seem to have the financial backing or the public relations know how to get the album off the ground, and into other countries, especially the U.K., where Jayne had a major fan base since 1977. So it was that in 1986, Warren got the U.K. label Revolver Records to release the album in England as"Private Oyster" (which was the title of a short intro Jayne delivered as the album began, with the tracks in different order). Dave Thompson gave "Oyster" a rave review , and "The Lady Dye Twist" got some UK press, but the album did not get the distribution and promo push that it needed; it was , again, a vinyl only release, and did not remain available after a number of years.

I had a discussion with MVD Distribution to begin "The Jayne County Legacy Series", to make available the indie County albums that had gone out of circulation, many of which had never gotten proper distribution in the first place; the first of the series was the 1993 album "Goddess Of Wet Dreams" which had been released in a poorly packaged and poorly distributed version by the ESP DISK label; MVD released a beautifully re packaged edition of "Goddess' just about a year ago, which is available everywhere, including Amazon, Spotify, itunes, and really cool record shops; now, MVD is ready to release a combined into one CD edition of "Amerikan Cleopatra" and "Private Oyster", the first time that either title has been available on anything other than vinyl (although fans put the 'Oyster' tracks up on Youtube long ago.) You can place advance orders now on Amazon and finally get your hands on the great, lost early Jayne County albums that never made their way to the USA. Enjoy!