Biography

Taking their moniker from the nickname for charismatic Depression-era bank robber Charles Arthur Floyd, Hollywood's Pretty Boy Floyd emerged in 1987 near the tail end of the glam and pop-metal scene. The band's 1989 debut album, Leather Boyz with Electric Toyz, cracked the Billboard 200 and yielded the hits "Rock and Roll (Is Gonna Set the Night on Fire)" and "I Wanna Be with You." Disbanding in 1994, Pretty Boy Floyd reconvened in the late '90s and have gone on to release an EP (A Tale of Sex, Designer Drugs, and the Death of Rock n' Roll) and two full-length efforts (2004's Size Really Does Matter and 2017's Public Enemies). Rock & Roll (Is Gonna Set the Night on Fire), a collection of demos, covers, and re-recordings, appeared in 2021. Pretty Boy Floyd coalesced in 1987 around the talents of singer Steve Summers, guitarist Kristy Majors, bassist Vinnie Chas, and drummer Karl Kane. The group's debut album, Leather Boyz with Electric Toyz, was released in 1989 and reached number 130 on the Billboard Albums chart on the strength of the singles "Rock and Roll (Is Gonna Set the Night on Fire)" and "I Wanna Be with You." As tastes shifted from pop-metal to grunge in the early '90s, Pretty Boy Floyd soon found themselves without a label, and ceased operations in 1994. However, the group reunited in the late '90s, issuing an EP titled A Tale of Sex, Designer Drugs, and the Death of Rock n' Roll in 1998; later in the year, the compilation album Porn Stars was released by Cleopatra. After a lengthy hiatus, the group re-emerged in 2004 with Size Really Does Matter on the Deadline imprint. In 2017, after a long period of relative inactivity that saw bandmembers working on other projects, Pretty Boy Floyd inked a deal with Frontiers Records and released Public Enemies, which guitarist Majors described as the true follow-up to their 1989 debut. In 2019, the band issued Stray Bullet, a set of demo recordings from the early '90s that was originally intended to be the follow-up to Leather Boyz with Electric Toyz, and in 2021 they released another demos and rarities collection called Rock & Roll (Is Gonna Set the Night on Fire). ~ Steve Huey & James Christopher Monger, Rovi