Cheryl "Killer Kiss" 7"
The hit of the summer of ‘81 that never was, is NOW! It’s CHERYL with her lone single ‘Killer Kiss’ - an unfairly forgotten soundtrack to an endless hot-girl-summer. Whilst the charts of 40 years gone were clogged by the likes of TOYAH, SHAKIN STEVENS, and KIM CARNES,CHERYL’s update to the girl group sound of the 1960s outpaces ‘em all, squeezing and pleasing with pouty-shouty vocals and warnings (danger: heartbreak dead ahead) all done up and updated in a trashy/punk-y throwaway power pop style CHERYL - aka then-eighteen-year-old London-born Cheryl Powling - bored - bounced from school, modeling and dead-end jobs until she caught the eye of former ANIMALS manager and Barn Records boss CHAS CHANDLER.
Recorded at Stage One Studio in London and released in January 1981 on Penthouse Records (perhaps in a nod to another one of CHERYL’s past employers), ‘Killer Kiss’ is an absolute heartbreaker’s declaration of intent. As the ear-worm chorus so proudly states:
‘Killer kiss!
One kiss’ll kill ya!
Killer kiss!
Red hot lips!
Got the kiss of the killer kiss!
It’s a fever, fever, fever!
Buffeted about with an almost QUICK-like nursery-rhyme guitar keyboard run, ‘Killer Kiss’ sound should have carried CHERYL out from Page 3 to the top of the charts, but the single sadly did not make it above the fold. With no future musical prospects, CHERYL packed it in. Cheryl now breeds chickens and works as a professional stained glass artist and mother of three.