`I could have killed her,” June Pointer said of her sister, Bonnie, who left the singing Pointer Sisters to go solo back in 1976.
”Me too,” Anita, the middle sister, said. ”We had to change our looks, have a whole new image after she left,” Anita said.
”I could have killed her, too,” said Ruth, the oldest Pointer who usually wears a blond wig. ”She seems to be happy, and we`re all on friendly terms now, but at first it was hard to take.”
The Pointers have come a long way from the days when they practiced in their bedroom in Oakland, Calif., where their father was a minister. He was pretty conservative, they say, limiting their TV music watching to ”The Lawrence Welk Show.” ”We never did see many girl groups except the Lennon Sisters,” Anita said.
But their father was fairly flexible when they would improvise on the hymns in church.
At first the quartet sang close harmony and music that echoed the `40s. They dug up their clothes from friends` garages. After Bonnie left, they found fancier garb and shifted into rock and pop, though they managed to score a country hit with ”Fairy Tale.”
After the break-up with Bonnie, the trio signed with Richard Perry of Planet Records. Their first album with him, ”Energy,” and its hit single
”Fire” by Bruce Springsteen went gold.
Life on the road, traveling with 13 people, can be tough. But no more so than other career responsibilities. ”When I`m up there on stage, not feeling too well, it helps to know that that money is coming in,” June said. ”Money helps you to smile and sing all the more.”
