DJ Monkey
Another Evolution
7 Records Music
As I listened to this album, I could not help but hear my Catholic elementary school teachers imploring to not go outside the lines. I hated them for making me do something I wasn't remotely interested in. As far as I was concerned, I was free to draw outside my lines and onto the paper of the person next to me. Furthermore, I was damn proud of myself. That's the exact feeling I get listening to DJ Monkey's Another Evolution.
DJ Monkey, featuring Joey Alkes, a published poet, make it very difficult to pigeonhole their sound. At the same time, their diversity shows an extreme intelligence, knowledge of, and adaptability towards many genres including rap, hip hop, alternative rock, jazz, and, most notably, spoken word. One review described it as "Public Enemy's Chuck D. cut(ting) his teeth with NWA, join(ing) forces with the Roots and add(ing) Branford Marsalis for flava."
This is not a band that has come from nowhere and gotten lucky. They bring an extensive resume to the table. Alkes was the co-writer of "A Million Miles Away," recorded by both the Goo Goo Dolls and the Plimsouls, as well as featured in the above-average B-movie Valley Girl, which starred Nicolas Cage. Mick McMains was a integral member of Earl Slick's NYC, and Jamal “lil’ tip toe” Cryer’s credits include Rass-Kass-Van Gough and Bad Azz “Word On The Street.” Cryer has also collaborated with the likes of Snoop Dogg and Jelly Rolly to name a few.
Another Evolution takes you to places both familiar and unfamiliar. In those that are familiar, you will still discover little nuances that you may never have heard before. Those unfamiliar will transport you on a sonic journey that will leave you yearning for a permanent vacation from the real world.
7 Records Music music re-release Another Evolution as part of a deal that sees DJ Monkey sign a recording deal.
Track Listing:
1 5th Avenue Jam
2 U-Boat
3 Beatnik
4 Too Cool
5 Hollywood & Vine
6 My Life Is
7 Big Oil
8 Messages
9 No One Speaks
10 Raindance
11 Boomerang
12 Jerusalem
On TGB ratings scale, this release flies onto Venus!!!
posted by ST @ 3:49 PM
18 Comments:
Excellent review, man. DJ Monkey are indeed mindblowing and Joey Alkes used to write tunes with Peter Case during his Plimsouls days.
7 Records is also a very cool and up and coming lagel with many good acts, but DJ Monkey is a favorite, and they've got a new album coming out on 7 Records very soon.
keep up the great work,
RadioMike
It's great to see such enthusiastic response to DJ Monkey. I saw them perform in Santa Monica CA. DJ Monkey really has a unique and important sound coupled with presentation of right-on current thinking.
A very exciting group!.
Been loving Dj Monkey (I have the "Glowbody" CD from 7 records). It's good stuff.
FYI, "Glowbody" is a compilation disk with lots of great stuff on it...I really like RIPE and VIRGO too (also on the compilation).
Really well done......Not my usual thing, so it's all the more suprising that I enjoyed it as much as I did.....
With all the great comments, makes me wonder why I waited so long to get this review up. I guess am interview will have to come next.
Sal Treppiedi
Publisher
"The Great Beyond"
An absolutely lovely CD. I've had the demo for a while and it keeps on surprising me. Thanks!
Marie,
Amsterdam
"Another Evolution", DJ Monkey's debut effort, blows me away with it's eclecticism, brutal honesty, and creative genius! These guys mix Rap, Hip-Hop, Beat Era jazz, poetry, rock and religion into a amalgam that constantly surprises and inspires. I especially like "Beatnik", "Big Oil", "UBoat", and "Jerusalem". It makes you think and it makes you dance! I'm really looking forward to the next DJ Monkey offering.
Incredible vibes between these two cats (Joey and Mick) is what makes DJ Monkey so inimitable. They are polar opposites but that's why the music is so explosive. Their music transcends the cosmos. . .touching all of us. There is something for everyone in their music. The music speaks to the mind; powerful, eclectic, moving oneself as art should.
cc
The energy is fantastic. This music is an ingenious blend that feels uniquely fresh. The tunes paint a vivid landscape that is equally rendered in words and music. Quality musicianship. Rumor has it that their next CD is even hipper, cooler, more musically exciting. Can't wait for more.
I am well familiar with Joey Alkes' work - I was a little girl when Montego Bay was playing on the radio, as I remember Million Miles Away when I was a teenager, and I even own some of his books of poetry. Needless to say I am quite a fan. In my opinion DJ Monkey is the best thing he has ever done. His collaboration with Mick McMains is phenomenal, but adding the poetry of rapper Lil Tip Toe was a stroke of pure genius. What a perfect blend of 3 very talented individuals.
DJ MONKEY MUSIC GETS BETTER AND BETTER THE MORE I LISTEN .
I AM A SENIOR CITIZEN AND THE MUSIC MAKES ME FEEL YOUNG AGAIN .
Finally, new music I love to hear. Tomas
the intelligence and soul of DJ Monkey will hold them in good stead as they continue to explore what can only be termed their own, unique genre of music; it is cool, hip, current; one can't help but think when the music's on
DJ Monkey's "Another Evolution" is
an interesting change of pace at a time when most new music in the Popular genre is sadly lacking in such areas as Taste, Originality,
Artistic Fortitude, Imagination,
Musicianship, etc...
DJ Monkey are the greatest. Alkes is in top form. Mitch too. I've known them a long time. Joey's interesting collaboration with Mick is especially interesting and definately, inspiring. I love them.
Viva DJ Monkey!
Joey Alkes is the most intellectually provocative poet since Dylan
genre jumper?
ADD?
Schizophrenic
musically?
DJ Monkey
solution
Another
Evolution
Rock & Roll
R & B
hip-hop jazz
poetry
image-rich
melody
message sent
brilliantly
D. Saraceno
poet/producer
Dj monkey: “Another Evolution”
The music industry is now suffering a state of creative stagnancy, an era of nobody-has anything-to say-ness and nothing-newness --- lyrics are flat, repetitive, and bitchy about nothing that matters -- an unfortunate symptom of a technological age in which television and the internet serve as surrogate families, friends, and entertainment outlets. “Another Evolution” offers a decisively much needed break from the increasingly burrowing fiber optics abyss and easy-bake-oven brand of music production, and, more significantly, a sobering account of prevailing ailments plaguing society, and, moreover, what is so shamefully lacking in it.
“Another Evolution” is a fresh, inspiring amalgamation of jazz, rap, rock, poetry, and surprisingly refreshing existentialism. Joey Alkes’ lyrics, which reflect his own shamelessly naked yet graceful moodiness, stirred into a rich blend of McMains’ tunes that embody a range of human emotions, represent a mirror boldly shoved in your American face. What any intelligent listener sees of himself in today’s materialistic society is a tragic absence of family and friendship values (“U-Boat,” “My Life is”), a pathetically unquenchable thirst for money (“Raindance,” “Big Oil”), especially politicians and corporate fatheads, who are likely to snobbishly shun this brilliant record because they don’t want to be told the truth about themselves, and the mournful struggle of today’s youth to find anchor in a world without parents, who are too busy chasing things “Bourgeois, and therefore, obviously meaningless.” The latter (youthful struggle) is skillfully represented in “Too Cool,” with Cryer’s silky rap on craving a family, with lyrics both wise and naïve. The innocence turns cleverly sarcastic in “My Life Is,” reminding us how pathetically dependent we are on fictional families that reside in boxes in our living rooms.
With scourging accuracy, Alkes and McMains show us how psychotic and infected with our own delusions we’ve become (“Hollywood and Vine,” “Messages,” “Boomerang”). They make a noble attempt to reel us back to a time when we considered our actions and remembered whence we came (“have to return to the classics” – “Beatnik”), and back it up, without embarrassment, by allowing us to walk back with them to their roots in “5th Avenue Jam,” “Raindance,” and the masterfully crafted “Jerusalem.”
Thanks for the beautiful trip, D.J. Monkey. Well done.
L.A. Keith
Rio Rancho, New Mexico
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