Toy Matinee released self-titled debut

Toy Matinee Toy Matinee

Released: June 28, 1990 Peak: 129 US, 13 DF Click for codes to charts. Sales (in millions): -- Genre: adult alternative/neo-progressive rock

Tracks: Click on a song titled for more details. Last Plane Out [5:13] Turn It on Salvador [4:54] Things She Said [4:57] Remember My Name [5:18] The Toy Matinee [5:02] Queen of Misery [4:31] The Ballad of Jenny Ledge [5:50] There Was a Little Boy [5:35] We Always Come Home [4:29] Total Running Time: 45:44 The Players: Kevin Gilbert (vocals, guitar, keyboards) Patrick Leonard (keyboards, backing vocals) Brian MacLeod (drums, percussion) Tim Pierce (guitar) Guy Pratt (bass)

Rating: 3.844 out of 5.00 (average of 12 ratings) Quotable: A “marvelous hour or so of progressive pop music” – Duke Egbert, Daily Vault Awards: (Click on award to learn more).

About the Album They only had one album, but it “is a gem of progressive pop and worth digging for.” DE Keyboardist, producer, and composer Patrick Leonard worked with Madonna on her True Blue through I’m Breathless albums. He approached bassist Guy Pratt, who he met while working on Madonna’s “Papa Don’t Preach,” WK about forming a band. They added drummer Brian MacLeod of Wire Train, guitarist Tim Pierce, and singer, lyricist and multi-instrumentalist Kevin Gilbert, who’d released two albums with the band Giraffe. Despite the others’ contributions, Toy Matinee was promoted as a duo of Gilbert and Leonard. They crafted “polished and carefully arranged pop/rock ditties.” JV Their “clever, intelligent, rich pop music” DE ran the “gamut…from dance to rock to ballad to almost-blues.” DE “All in all, …Toy Matinee…offers thoughtfully constructed and exceptionally played pop/rock songs alongside a number of slightly derivative songs that have a bit too much of that teased-out 1990s hair band aura.” JV However, with its “marvelous hour or so of progressive pop music, Toy Matinee is a definite winner.” DE The group was short-lived. Pratt, who was engaged to the daughter of Pink Floyd’s Richard Wright, had a commitment to tour with that band. Leonard wasn’t interested in touring. MacLeod and Pierce moved on to other session work. Only Gibert remained, working desperately to promote the album with a newly assembled band which included guitar Marc Bonilla, bassist Spencer Campbell, drummer Toss Panos, and then-girlfriend Sheryl Crow on keyboards. No more studio efforts from Toy Matinee were released, but in 2010, Live at the Roxy was released. Gilbert and Bottrell went on to work with Sheryl Crow on her Tuesday Night Music album and Leonard formed another one-time band, Third Matinee, with Mr. Mister frontman Richard Page. Gilbert’s death in 1996 ended any chance of another Toy Matinee album. Special Edition A rereleased Special Edition of the album included demos of “Things She Said,” “There Was a Little Boy,” “Last Plane Out,” unreleased “Blank Page,” and the odd thirty-second “Eenitam Yot Eht” (“The Toy Matinee” backwards). The Songs Here’s a breakdown of each of the individual songs.

Last Plane Out Toy Matinee

Writer(s): Kevin Gilbert, Patrick Leonard, Guy Pratt Released: promo single (9/22/1990), Toy Matinee (6/28/1990), Toy Matinee Acoustic (acoustic recordings, 1990-91), Live at the Roxy (live, recorded 5/1/1991) Peak: 23 AR, 5 DF Click for codes to charts. About the Song: The album “starts with the layered vocals of Last Plane Out, a powerful anthem about the world and its downhill path.” DE “Like most of the band's songs, [it is] characterized by diatonic vocal harmonies, a tight rhythm section, blues guitar riffs, and a hook-heavy chorus.” JV The song grew out of Pratt’s long-time fascination with “the idea of the last flight out of a war zone.” WK

Turn It on Salvador Toy Matinee

Writer(s): Kevin Gilbert, Patrick Leonard, Guy Pratt Released: Toy Matinee (6/28/1990), Toy Matinee Acoustic (acoustic recordings, 1990-91), Live at the Roxy (live, recorded 5/1/1991) Peak: 18 DF Click for codes to charts. About the Song: “With Turn It on Salvador, a song dedicated to Salvador Dali and immersed in appropriately surreal lyrics, Julian Lennon chimes in with backing vocals in a section that sounds particularly Beatlesque. Sal's Clarinet Trio — Jon Clarke, Jon Kip, and Donald Markese — closes [the song] with a swinging melodic phrase that compliments Leonard's concordant piano passages.” JV

Things She Said Toy Matinee

Writer(s): Kevin Gilbert, Patrick Leonard, Guy Pratt Released: Toy Matinee (6/28/1990), Toy Matinee Acoustic (acoustic recordings, 1990-91), Live at the Roxy (live, recorded 5/1/1991) Peak: 23 DF Click for codes to charts. About the Song: “Things She Said” is a song about obsession. DE

Remember My Name Toy Matinee

Writer(s): Kevin Gilbert, Bill Bottrell, Patrick Leonard Released: Toy Matinee (6/28/1990), Toy Matinee Acoustic (acoustic recordings, 1990-91), Live at the Roxy (live, recorded 5/1/1991) Peak: 18 DF Click for codes to charts.

The Toy Matinee Toy Matinee

Writer(s): Kevin Gilbert, Patrick Leonard, Guy Pratt Released: Toy Matinee (6/28/1990), Live at the Roxy (live, recorded 5/1/1991) Peak: 15 DF Click for codes to charts. About the Song: “The band's songs are mostly unique, though shades of a Pink Floyd ballad can be heard at the beginning of the” JV “wistful” DE title track.

Queen of Misery Toy Matinee

Writer(s): Kevin Gilbert, Patrick Leonard Released: Toy Matinee (6/28/1990), Live at the Roxy (live, recorded 5/1/1991) Peak: 18 DF Click for codes to charts. About the Song: “Queen of Misery” was about Madonna, with whom Leonard, Pratt, and the album’s producer, Bill Bottrell, had worked. WK

The Ballad of Jenny Ledge Toy Matinee

Writer(s): Kevin Gilbert, Patrick Leonard Released: promo single (1/19/1991), Toy Matinee (6/28/1990), Toy Matinee Acoustic (acoustic recordings, 1990-91), Live at the Roxy (live, recorded 5/1/1991), Live at the Troubadour (live, recorded 6/1/1995), Bolts (archives: 1984-96, released 2009) Peak: 23 AR, 7 DF Click for codes to charts. About the Song: “Steely Dan-sounding chord progressions are undeniably present on…The Ballad of Jenny Ledge.” JV

There Was a Little Boy Toy Matinee

Writer(s): Kevin Gilbert, Patick Leonard Released: Toy Matinee (6/28/1990), Toy Matinee Acoustic (acoustic recordings, 1990-91), Live at the Roxy (live, recorded 5/1/1991) Peak: 1 DF Click for codes to charts.

Awards: (Click on award to learn more).

About the Song: Toy Matinee became that rare album where I eventually embraced every cut. The song that stood out the most, though, was “There Was a Little Boy.” It tackled the subject of child abuse, a topic recently traversed by other 1990 hits like Aerosmith’s “Janie’s Got a Gun” and Madonna’s “Oh Father.” “There Was a Little Boy” took the perspective of a nine-year-old boy whose new stepfather “waits around to play with sister / But he plays too serious, he plays too rough.” As an adult, he finds himself “questioning his once upon a time” as he tries to deal with the long-term effects of abuse. Gilbert sings, “This boy was once a strong man, but getting weaker / He carries more than just the shame inside.” The song matched the lyrical heft with its instrumental. An incessant beat demands the listener to crank up the sound and break into some serious air drumming. Gilbert amps up the volume himself when he gets to the chorus. While I’m fortunate to have never endured abuse myself, my heart goes out to those who have. Kudos to Leonard or Gilbert for crafting a song which I suspect is a very personal message from one of them to anyone else who has been abused.

We Always Come Home Toy Matinee

Writer(s): Patrick Leonard Released: Toy Matinee (6/28/1990), Live at the Roxy (live, recorded 5/1/1991) Peak: 18 DF Click for codes to charts. About the Song: “We Always Come Home” is a “hauntingly sweet ballad.” DE

Resources/References: DE Duke Egbert, Daily Vault JV John Vallier, AllMusic.com WK Wikipedia Related DMDB Pages: First posted 2/15/2008; last updated 8/29/2025.