Toy Matinee

Toy Matinee was a short-lived American rock band, and also the title of their only album. Their sound was an array of mixed influences, including progressive rock, AOR and pop reminiscent of both the Beatles and the Beach Boys.

Toy Matinee was formed by producer/composer/keyboardist Patrick Leonard in collaboration with singer/lyricist Kevin Gilbert. Backed by a group of session musicians (drummer Brian MacLeod, guitarist Tim Pierce, and bassist Guy Pratt), and with guest appearances from several other musicians including Julian Lennon, the duo recorded just one self-titled album which was released on Reprise Records in 1990.

The album was engineered and produced by Bill Bottrell. Thematically, it covered a rather broad ground; two tracks were dedicated to Czech poet and political figure Václav Havel and painter Salvador Dalí, and "Queen of Misery" is about Madonna. (Leonard was the singer's longtime songwriting and producing partner and Gilbert had recently worked with her as an engineer.) Two of the other songs on Toy Matinee -- "The Ballad of Jenny Ledge" and "Last Plane Out"—received wide play on album rock stations, both of them peaking at No. 23 on Billboard's Mainstream Rock Tracks chart. Despite that, the album's highest U.S. chart position was No. 129.

After the album was released there seems to have been a clash of personalities and divergence of intentions of where the group would go on from where it was. Gilbert therefore went on to promote the album on his own. He assembled a promotional band for the album which featured Gilbert's then girlfriend, Sheryl Crow, on keyboards and Marc Bonilla on guitar and engaged in a fury of on-air promotions, including most notably frequent appearances on the Mark & Brian show on Los Angeles-area station KLOS.

Gilbert went on to do additional work with Bottrell including Sheryl Crow's debut album as well as his own solo projects. In 1994, Leonard and former Mr. Mister frontman Richard Page released the album Meanwhile as Third Matinee. Gilbert's untimely death in 1996 ended any possibility of a second Toy Matinee album, although a live recording of Gilbert and his touring band performing songs from the album in 1991 was released by his family.