Very interesting.

Having watched some of the clips of The Monks I see the similarities
with The Fall. Driving drum beat, distorted bass, lo tech keyboard
sounds. Its almost the sound of the Fall today!!

I am old enough to have lived through the 60's and remember it. A rare
achievement they tell me. I was very musically switched on by the late
60's and remember many "underground" bands of that time. I never
remember hearing about The Monks at all until much,much later in the
80's when they were regarded as a cult band. They obviously had a lot of
success in Germany judging by the amount of Monk Beat Club videos on
YouTube.

Check out this link and see if it works for you.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3bMVcuiv6Q&mode=related&search=

There was a band that lived just around the corner from me in the 60's
called Barclay James Harvest. They made a few albums and had very
limited UK success but were massive in Germany, not sure what it was
that the Germans saw in their music that no one else did. They (like The
Monks) have reformed and although I wouldn't recognise any of their
songs, they are playing to festival crowds of 100,000 in Germany. It
seems the Germans are very loyal to their favourite bands.

The forthcoming Monks gigs sound interesting although the surviving
members must be in their mid 60's by now. It will be interesting to see
the age mix of the crowd. At Fall gigs there is a broad age range from
teens to 60+ so maybe these gigs will be the same.

Fast forward 10 years to a future Fall gig and me arriving at the venue
via Ring & Ride after using half my pension to buy a ticket. This vision
is in one way quite frightening, but also seems absurdly real.

@+
Graydon

In message <egr4kq+74hp@eGroups.com>, PJ <dirtywaterclub@...>
writes
>
>Did anyone see the little piece in Mojo magazine where he talks about
>sixties weirdo band the Monks?
>
>Check out the entry in Wikipedia -
>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Monks - where they mention the song's
>the Fall have covered.
>
>The Monks are playing London this week -
>http://www.dirtywaterclub.co.uk - and it is sure to be a memorable
>evening. I don't know if Smith will turn up to the gig on Thursday
>(does anyone know if he's busy elsewhere that night?) but I know he
>will be travelling to Germany to appear with the Monks at the weekend
>of the 21st/22nd.
>
>If you've not heard the Monks before I recommend everyone checks them
>out - if you like the Fall or the Velvet Underground or just have an
>interest in plain weird music, you can't not like the Monks.
>
>Scroll down to the bottom of the entry on Wikipedia and you'll find
>some links to video clips from German tv in 1966. Amazing stuff!
>
>
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