The Heart Throbs

The Heart Throbs originated from an idea first formed at college in Birmingham by Rose Carlotti, born Rosemarie DeFreitas on 16 December 1963 in Barbados and responsible for guitar and vocals, together with Stephen Ward, born 19 April 1963 in Chelmsford, Essex, England and also handling guitar and vocals. The project took concrete shape in Reading in 1986 once Rose’s sister Rachael, born 25 May 1966 in Oxfordshire, England and covering bass and vocals, and Mark Side, born 24 June 1969 in Oxfordshire, England and playing drums, rounded out the lineup.

The band moved quickly toward wider notice, touring as support for the Jesus And Mary Chain and issuing the single ‘Bang’ in a record sleeve that portrayed a car crash and provoked immediate controversy. Additional attention arrived late in the decade when the group launched its own Profumo label, taking the name from the political sex scandal that rocked Britain in the early 1960s; the move prompted tastefully provocative photographs of singer Rose posed in the manner of Christine Keeler two decades earlier, an association strengthened by the fact that one of the scandal’s central figures shared a surname with guitarist Ward.

Such maneuvers, along with periodic critical praise for the group’s harshly bittersweet pop songs, never translated into commercial success. A UK agreement with One Little Indian Records arrived alongside a US contract with Elektra Records; after guitarist Alan Barclay, born 4 April 1968 in Singapore, joined the ranks, the band achieved moderate transatlantic recognition with its long-awaited debut album Cleopatra Grip, which featured the track ‘Dreamtime’. A difficult tour toward the close of 1990 ended with the departures of bassist Rachael Carlotti and drummer Mark Side.

Elektra soon dropped the act, and a subsequent US deal with A&M Records likewise collapsed while changes in management compounded the instability. Colleen Browne stepped in on bass for the uneven and largely overlooked Jubilee Twist. Although Vertical Smile delivered another strong collection, the Heart Throbs could not reclaim the ground lost in the intervening years and dissolved the following year.