Honey Bane is the stage name of Donna Tracy Boylan, an English singer and actress from London, born in 1964. She works in punk and related styles, and is best known for the 1981 UK Top 30 single “Turn Me On Turn Me Off”.

Career

Honey Bane begins performing at 14, in 1978, when she forms the punk band Fatal Microbes. The group issues a split 12-inch record with anarcho-punk band Poison Girls the same year. Its first single, “Violence Grows”, attracts press attention and receives positive reviews in the music paper Sounds.

After Fatal Microbes breaks up in 1979, she works with the Essex-based anarcho-punk activist group Crass while on the run from Social Services after serving a sentence at St. Charles Youth Treatment Centre in Essex. Under the name Donna and the Kebabs, she provides lead vocals on the EP You Can be You, released by Crass in 1980. That year she also sings with Killing Joke on “What’s the Matter” during a February 1980 performance at London’s Venue club; the recording later appears on Killing Joke - Live At The Venue LP.

In 1980 she meets Sham 69 singer Jimmy Pursey, who manages her career, and she signs a five-year contract with EMI/Zonophone Records. In 1981 she releases “Turn Me On Turn Me Off”, which reaches number 30 in the UK singles chart and leads to an appearance on Top of the Pops. The single marks a move away from her earlier punk material towards a more new wave sound. She later releases several more singles, although they do not chart strongly.

Acting and later work

In 1982 she appears in a play opposite Richard Jobson of The Skids at London’s Arts Theatre. In 1983 she takes a prominent role in Mai Zetterling’s film Scrubbers, playing Holly in a story about young women held in a British girls’ borstal. The film also features Amanda York, Kathy Burke, Pam St. Clement, Robbie Coltrane and Miriam Margolyes.

During the rest of the 1980s, she works as a pin-up model for erotic magazines. In the 1990s she fronts the band Dog’s Tooth Violet. In 2006 she issues the two-track 7-inch single “Down Thing/Got Me All Wrong”.

Associated acts

Her notable associated acts include Fatal Microbes, Donna and the Kebabs, Crass, Killing Joke, and Dog’s Tooth Violet.