SAN JOSE MERCURY NEWS
Monkey Review …Brad Kava

This isn’t just as good as Bay Area Ska gets, It’s as good as any ska around the world!
 

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Review of CRUEL TUTELAGE …Stewart Mason

From the woozy horn-spiked intro of the opening "Summertime Sun" onward, it's clear that San Francisco's Monkey isn't your average ska band. Unlike the vast majority of third- and fourth-generation ska bands, Monkey's collective knowledge of ska history goes well beyond the first set of 2 Tone singles: there's no punk or new wave influences to speak of in these ten songs, but Monkey isn't quite a bunch of old Studio One revivalists, either. Cruel Tutelage sounds unexpectedly fresh and modern. By going back to ska's Jamaican roots and skipping the homages to the Specials and the Selecter, Monkey has, somewhat paradoxically, made the least tradition-bound and most enjoyable pure ska album in quite some time.
 

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Review of Cruel Tutelage …Brian Heater

After nine years of touring the country and selling self-released records from the trunks of cars, the San Francisco-based group finally managed to catch a bit of a break, landing themselves a spot on Mike Park’s Asian Man Records, alongside some of the most notable names in the genre. Cruel Tutelage, the group’s first record for the label (their third in all), is their warmest, fullest record to date: an organ driven affair that happily marries first-wave ska and rocksteady with rock guitar, with the occasional Perry-esque echo-heavy dub thrown in for good measure. The record sways back and forth between mellow Hepcat-type grooves and more rocking affairs, no doubt the product of many a late night spent wearing down the vinyl of a few Toots and the Maytals Lps.
 

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Review of Cruel Tutelage …Colin Kutch

Monkey knows how to party. As a matter of fact, it’s what they know best. Cruel Tutelage is all about getting your groove on to the smooth sounds of Latin ska. While many third wave ska bands left their horns in the basement in favor of a more pop-punk sound, Monkey stays true to its roots playing a more traditional mix of rock steady. _Monkey has been around for a decade; they aren’t jumping on any bandwagon or trying to start a new trend. The singer sounds like Elvis Costello after spending some time in Jamaica. The rhythm section holds down a dancey groove and the horn section never gets too crazy, preferring to keep thing cool and light. Those who thought Bay Area ska was dead should grab their checkered suit and check this band out.
 

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Review of Cruel Tutelage …James McQuiston

Unlike many of the bands currently out on the market who would front-load their music to ensure the most sales, Monkey’s music on “Cruel Tutelage” gets better as the disc spins on. While there is a certain compelling nature to early-disc tracks like “Shanty Party”, the evolution of harmony and a more-emotive feel towards the end of the disc really keeps listeners listening. This disc is perfect party music, as was said before but should not be underestimated in regards to artistic worth. The arrangements are as intense and inspiring as any other act, and Monkey is one of those rare acts who can please on many levels.
 

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Monkey Review …Music Editor

Forget beachy reggae beats drenched in Red Stripe; this San Francisco outfit plays an urban and urbane brand of ska revival. Though far less punk than the Specials, Monkey's sound is clearly influenced by British Two-tone, with island beats & a liberal infusion of lyrical angst.
 

METRO NEWSPAPER SAN JOSE
Monkey Digs Deep for Roots …By Todd S. Inoue

FRIDAY NIGHTS at Cupertino's Coffee Society aren't what they used to be. Back when going to a bookstore and a cafe took separate trips, the Coffee Society nurtured a gentle Bohemian roar. As America's love affair with Starbucks has blossomed, the Coffee Society has been reduced to Coffee Subculture, the crowds sucked away one frappuccino at a time.

Coffee Society is also Monkey's unofficial board room. It's where the five members meet and iron out band business. In its own way, Monkey understands the plight of the old-school flame keepers--in caffeine as in music. As the South Bay's premier purveyor of traditional ska, Monkey reveres the grand champions of the Jamaican precursor to reggae. It should. Monkey’s new album, ¡Changito!, is a living testament to the musical legacy of the Skatalites, Prince Buster and the Specials, as well as non-ska monuments like Tito Puente.

"Just to know that [Skatalites saxophonist and Grammy Nominated] Roland Alphonso played on our album--wow!" raves Monkey Guitarist, Curtis Meacham. "He blessed the album. He said the music gave 'heem a keek.' We give him utmost respect."

Respect. It's about paying tribute to those who deserve it. During our interview, the band members spend half the tape giving props to the Skatalites, Unsteady, Skankin' Pickle, Jump With Joey, Yeska, Hepcat, Toots, Bob Marley, Tito Puente and even local promoter Eric Fanali and his folks--all with lustful ardor. They go on about this one's live show, that one's work ethic, the generosity of these people, the originality of this approach.

IN THE EARLY DAYS, Monkey practiced by playing cover songs by the Skatalites and Bob Marley. The band has added some Latin inflections to arrive at its current recipe of dance-floor originals collected on ¡Changito!. The formula is working.

"I don't think traditional ska will ever be as big as punk-ska," Meacham admits. "There's a saying that ska will go nowhere until you mix it with something: ska-polka, ska-rocksteady, ska-rockabilly. Just straight ska will go nowhere. [People] can only listen to oompa-oompa-oompa for so long [before] they get bored and stop dancing."

True to Meacham's word, Monkey took the basic element of ska--the groove--and infused it with swing and big-band elements ("No Color No Power") and plenty of Latin ("Quemará," "Cha-Cha Ska," "Calle de Amor") and South American echoes ("Skamba").

"Just as a ska fan, it was getting harder to dance," says Meacham, about the new school. "We wanted to do something more groove-oriented."

RESPECT ALSO means educating the fans, who are overwhelmingly white, about the music's roots. Monkey is quick to preach the gospel of the Skatalites, offering rich praises during a show. But there is something even more important to the band than honoring the forefathers of the genre.

"Before ska, there is musicianship," Meacham starts. "Musicianship is not knowing how to play an instrument--it's about surviving the hard times and understanding why you're doing this. It's almost like a religious experience. It's day in, day out. You're always wondering how to get to the next level. It's not about being greedy or self-centered. Ska comes second to musicianship, but a very close second."

"I give respect to all bands," says Meacham. "We've played with all kinds of bands: metal, swing, Latin, punk. They're working hard. It's not easy getting your name out there. I understand now."

And there's the "R" word again. In today's get-rich-quick times, it's reassuring to find a band that won't let the old guard fade into obscurity. It's fitting that Monkey uses Coffee Society instead of Starbucks as its meeting place of choice. It couldn't be any other way.
 

SAN JOSE MERCURY NEWS

It's a jungle out there, but Monkey stays together   ...Brad Kava 1/25/06

For San Jose's Monkey, Staying together as a rock band for a decade hasn't been monkey business. It's been years of sleeping on hard floors, driving the country in beat up vans and dining at fast-food drive-throughs.

Monkey, which plays Ska - the Jamaican folk music named for the chunky, rhythmic ska, ska, ska sound of it's guitars - has defied the odds and celebrates it's 10th year as a recording and touring unit on friday at San Jose's Blank Club. It will include appearances by many of the 39 musicians who have passed through it's ranks over the years.

"School, settling down, real jobs, those are the things that people have left for," says founding member Curtis Meacham, 33, the band's guitarist.

"The early tours taught people a lot, too. It was the breaking point for a lot of members, who didn't know if they wanted that lifestyle."

The lifestyle, says Meacham - who has a day job at Santa Clara's appropriately named Starving Musician - is strictly low budget: playing clubs and sleeping on the floor at homes of fans or friends they meet along the way.

"It's about establishing a larger family network in the U.S.," Meacham says. "That's very important to the survival of a band."

The band's last album, "Cruel Tutelage," is on San Jose's Asian Man Records. It's the only San Jose band on the popular Punk and Ska label.

It's a strong work, with crafty, catchy writing and seriously fun songs, such as "Trailer Park Love," "Summertime Sun," and "Shanty Party."

 

SJ METRO NEWS

Decade of Decadence (Secrets of Longevity) ...By Todd Inoue

MONKEY'S effervescent ska is like a cool mojito on a sweltering day: refreshing and bubbly with a kick. The band has survived trends, promoter rip-offs, a changing club landscape and personnel instability (membership tipped 39 at last count) to tour 200 days out of the year and release three full-length CDs. On the eve of its 10-year anniversary show and in celebration of its newest CD, Cruel Tutelage (Asian Man Records), Monkey founder Curtis Meacham shares a few of the lessons learned.

Shoot for the sky but be willing to accept the same fate of not making it. "If you have a really good audience but you envision yourself having a great one, don't hate yourself for it. We'll play a hall with 200 300 one night and then some place in Modesto the next to 25 30 people. As long as people are attentive we can have a show be as good as a 200 300 seater."

This band is about doing things and making things happen. "When I audition people, I tell them that this band is not about money, drugs or a crazy image. It's about the music. We're willing to accept a player without the greatest skills if the desire to play the music is greater than the ability to play an instrument. The ability will come."

It comes down to devotion. "I've had this conversation where I'll say, 'If you can't look at me and say you love this music, you have to look at yourself and ask why you're here." You have to find what you love about the music. That's the thing about being in a band; it's a huge social experiment. It's people creating art simultaneously without killing each other."

Over the past 10 years, I've seen hundreds of bands just dissolve. "It's a general depression caused by the economy and the politics of the nation. In 2002, there was a big shift with what people did with their spare time. Bands fell apart. My band nearly fell apart. In the '90s, music was explosive and huge. The world was Las Vegas. Everyone was doing well. The economy was going crazy. There was swing, rock, ska, pop punk. But then, a new president, 9/11, and now, nobody wants to go outside to see people they don't know and spend money."

Swing annihilated ska. "Everyone said, 'You're going to look back and be so embarrassed wearing the suits and the checkerboards.' But then swing got big, and we were going, 'Oh my God, this is buffoonery!' Half the ska bands started playing swing, and suddenly there were 5 billion new swing bands in a week and a half. Everyone is playing swing and wearing zoot suits. It lasted six months, and it was like a cartoon mockery of itself. It went away so fast, and it took ska with it."

When you serve too many masters, it exposes you and your audience. "It wasn't hard as far as personal choice to stick with ska. I like ska and rocksteady. There's some reggae I like, but it's mostly rocksteady and ska and some Latin. Some bands completely changed their sound. First they were ska, then swing, then punk, then electro indie pop, then they fell off the planet."

There's a saying in the industry: the average overnight success is 10 years. "It's true. It took us nine years for an indie label to take a chance on us. Either it'll come to an end or success will come really fast. We've been around long enough that we've seen the industry begin repairing itself. And everything is looking better."

Keep getting better. "Sometimes I look at myself in the mirror and ask when I'm going to stop doing this. It's like a bad habit. I was really struggling to get shows and do anything for a buck. Like what fire hoop do I have to jump through, how many packages do I have to send off? Now we have contacts in the gigging world. Now I can call up clubs and book a tour in two hours. We've become a commodity that's part of people's lives."
 

 

On a cold, wet North East England night a glimpse of California sunshine hit The Forum in Darlington last night when Monkey came to town.

Although the crowd turnout was quite poor the band gave it`s all and judging by the reactions from the crowd they were well and truly appreciated. Most of the music was lost on the audience who seemed to be mainly students - no doubt friends of the support acts who played earlier in the night. However there was also 4 old skinheads (myself included) that pretty much danced solidly through the gig and loved every note played. One of the funniest events of the night was when one of the students started copying me as I danced, then another, then another…line dancing ska style!!

This is one tight band! To my ears absolutely note perfect and appearing to enjoy every song they played. One highlight for me was an absolutely superb version of Guns Of Navarone that took me back to the heady days when ska ruled the airwaves. But Monkey are far more than a band who play straightforward covers. The original material they play blends in so well with the handful of classics that you`d swear you knew the songs from years ago. Good solid guitars and drums with a bouncy brass section all backed up by a keyboard player that`s going to end up as America`s answer to Mike Barson.

What more can I say? This is a band not to miss. If they play near you give yer ears a treat and go see them. Be warned though it`s impossible not to dance once Monkey starts it`s magic onstage.

 

You guys def. represent for the South Bay! 
 

Monkey brings floor-pounding ska to San Jose
By Shay Quillen
Mercury News
Article Launched: 04/19/2007 01:43:05 AM PDT

A couple of veteran San Jose bands will be marking big milestones Friday night at downtown clubs.

At the Blank Club, 44 S. Almaden Ave., the ever-entertaining ska band Monkey will be celebrating the successful completion of its first tour of England. The cover for the show, which also features 880 South, is $10.

According to head Monkey Curtis Meacham, the sextet made a lot of friends and had a great tour, even though its van was broken into in Bristol and a busted transmission forced the cancellation of a show in Wales. One highlight was playing Liverpool's Cavern Club, made famous by the Beatles.

Meacham says the English clubs weren't quite used to Monkey's Yankee work ethic. One promoter couldn't understand why the band wanted to perform for more than its allotted 20 minutes. Two hours in, Meacham says, the promoter was stunned to see the dance floor being "pounded to death."

"That's a Monkey crowd," Meacham told the promoter. "That's what we do. We bring the good times."

Meacham says Monkey might throw in a few British tunes Friday that are being worked up in preparation for a planned summer tour of the West and Mexico with classic 2-Tone band Bad Manners.

Meanwhile, a few blocks away at Johnny V's, 31 E. Santa Clara St., the rock band INQ will be commemorating the fifth anniversary of its first show, which took place April 20, 2002, at the now-defunct Black Door on South First Street.
 

REVIEW: Monkey - Cruel Tutelage
By: Robot Tourist

I got Cruel Tutelage from eMusic before I cancelled my subscription. I’d heard an amazing song of their’s, called ‘$30 Suit’ on Dao’s podcast (episode 41 I think) and I needed a Monkey fix.
Unfortunately $30 Suit is not on Cruel Tutelage, though you can hear streaming from www.myspace.com/monkeyska.
Fortunately the lack of this song is not too bad because it’s a great album.


The tone-wheel organ sound is much underused in popular music in my opinion. My church has a real Hammond, but anyone who plays it tries to make it sound like a pipe organ. It’s not a pipe organ and it can’t do the pipe organ sound right, so most of the musically-minded people in the church hate it. I admit there are things wrong with our organ, but fortunately it’s too expensive to get a new one at the minute. Hopefully they keep it long enough for me to learn how to play in the Hammond style.


Take time to listen to the album. I’ve given the songs at least 4 stars. They aren’t all killer A-sides, but they are much better than most B-sides I’ve heard.


‘Trailer Park Love’ is a good laugh. ‘Shanty Party’ is a good party song and ‘Would You Wanna’ is a touching lament of unrequited love. Also nice is the instrumental title track, which sounds as if it would have been a great jam session to have seen live. There are two truly great tracks on the album though, songs which I believe could really hit the charts if they got onto iTunes. The lyrics to ‘Voice of America’ aren’t just as funny as ‘Trailer Park Love’ but it has much more danceable, upbeat music and a great singalong bridge. The only problem is that it would take a very self-assured radio DJ to play it because that bridge goes “Bring me the head of the head of the radio station... the DJ’s lost his soul to the corporate control”.


The other great song is ‘You Don’t Know’. It has the best organ on the album and really powerfully delivered lyrics that are full of deep feelings. The shame is that I’d hazard radio executives might not like it’s slightly lo-fi sound.


The quality across the whole album is not in any way bad, but I think it has been made to sound more like a bar-room recording than an expensive studio. It sounds like each track has been recorded live but that the levels for the lead vocalist haven’t been set right. Personally I quite like that style because it sounds authentic, but your mileage may vary.

Short version: Monkey deserves more attention
 

REVIEW: Monkey - Cruel Tutelage


By: Nate Seltenrich



Here's the thing about ska: It's not cool.


Although the genre enjoyed a brief renaissance during the mid-'90s, today it's about as hip as smooth jazz. So for the five members of Monkey (skilled musicians who play traditional ska spiced with roots reggae and rocksteady), this certainly isn't trend-hopping -- a passionate connection to the music naturally infuses their performance. The nine-year-old Cupertino group invokes the names of influential pioneers like the Skatalites and Toots and the Maytals, but not without an innovative modern touch: The funky, drop-beat opener "Summertime Sun," instrumental reggae/swing fusion title track, and socially aware groover "Unity Dub" (To the homophobe and racist man: The time has come when you must pay for the evils you have done) present three sides to Monkey's adaptive revival. No matter where its muse leads, the band remains focused and confident across Cruel Tutelage. For at least forty minutes, ska is cool again.