Monkey Bastard's MP3 Blahg

OMG LOOK! It's a post by Monkey Bastard that's not a mix! About damn time, frankly. This hasn't happened since, what? August? This little thing on The Soundtrack Of Our Lives is something I've been planning for months but never got around to. I put it off for way too long. A band this good deserves its own post, period.

TSOOL got quite a buzz about five years ago, during the whole "garage rock revival" thing along with The Hives, The Strokes, The White Stripes etc. Despite the fact that they don't even play garage rock. Their third album, 2001's Behind The Music was nominated for a Grammy and everything. Formed in Gothenberg, Sweden in 1994 when Ebbot Lundberg (vocals) and Björn Olsson (lead guitars) rose from the ashes of their previous band: the infamous, hellraising rock maniacs Union Carbide Production (a band which I will also make a post about one day). UCP called it a day after four albums and a string of trashed venues. Go to YouTube and search for "Union Carbide Production", for a couple of kick ass videos from back in the day (the 80's...) with pure rock decadence and mayhem.





Welcome To The Infant Freebase (1996)

The first album, Welcome To The Instant Freebase was released in 1996 to glowing reviews. Rightfully so, it's easily one of the top 5 Swedish albums of all time (along with The Hellacopters' By The Grace Of God, The Hives' Veni Vidi Vicious, Silverbullit's Arclight, and one more album I can never decide on...), and it ended up winning a grammy. Björn Olsson left shortly after the recording of the album to focus on a career as a solo artist and a producer. He was replaced by Ian Person, also with a past in Union Carbide Productions.

Mantra slider (highly recommended!)
Firmament vacation (highly recommended!)
Embryonic rendezvous (highly recommended!)

Extended Revelation For The Psychic Weakling Of Western Civilization (1998)

Two years later the follow up, Extended Revelation For The Psychic Weaklings Of Western Civilization saw the light of day, to good but not quite as glowing reviews as Welcome To The Infant Freebase, probably due to the fact that the band's signature mix of good old fashioned rock 'n' roll, 60's pop and psychedelia and 70's arena rock was wittled down a bit and apart from two or three rockers, Extended Revelation... was a much more sombre affair. Darker, trippier and sometimes just downright weird. Consisting of leftover material from the first album and newly recorded material, it's still a damn good album, just not as "direct" as the rest of their catalogue. Parts of it take a while to get into, but it's well worth it.

Pointless trivia: The album contains a track entitled Jehova Sunrise, which was one of the names the members were playing around with thinking of a name for their band. Luckily, they didn't go for it.

Century child
From gravity to gold
Black star (highly recommended!)

Behind The Music (2001)

As mentioned above, 2001 saw the release of Behind The Music, considered to be their return to form, and the album that introduced them to the world. They appeared on the Late Show With David Letterman and the Tonight Show With Jay Leno, performing the lead single from the album, Sister Surround.

Tonight (highly recommended!)
Nevermore
The flood (highly recommended!)

Origin Vol. 1 (2004)

After Behind The Music, the world seemed to be their oyster. Whatever that means. Origin Vol. 1 was deemed a little anti-climactic after its power predecessor. And it perhaps it was. It didn't contain anything new, just more of the same and perhaps that's what disappointed people. It does have it's weak moments, and it's the only TSOOL release that not essential, but it's still a good album that needs to be heard by as many people as possible.

Believe I've found (highly recommended!)
Transcendental suicide
Bigtime

A Present From The Past (2005)

TSOOL planned to release Origin Vol. 2 shortly after the release of Vol. 1, but had a change of heart and postponed Vol. 2 indefinitely (it will most likely be released in 2008) and instead put out this double disc rarities collection containing 32 track recorded between 1995 and 2005. B-sides, tracks from out of print EP's, and never before released tracks from the Origin sessions, this is a great introduction for anyone not familiar with the band as well as an unmissable treat for the converted, as it contains all non-album tracks the band has ever recorded. It also has one of the coolest packaging and album artwork in recent years. So cool that you don't see what's so cool about it until you look reeeeeeaaaaaal close.

Avenger Hill Street blues
Can't control myself (highly recommended!)
Dow Jones syndrome (highly recommended!)

If you like what you hear (and I'm pretty sure you will), get busy buying the albums and supporting the artist.

Okay, that'll do for now. There will be a new Monkey Mix tomorrow featuring Nirvana, Radiohead, Solomon Burke, Fibes Oh Fibes, The Platters, The Pogues and Amy Winehouse. So I'll see you tomorrow, bitches.