Monkeying About

Please, Dearest Friends, grab a vine and swing on over to the Contrast Podcast jungle post haste, and get ready for more fun than a barrel of monkeys. Yes, this week the CP goes all apeshit on us with an entire episode dedicated to humanity's simian cousins. The apesolutely fantastic selection of tunes is enough to make a monkey out of anyone, and Dearest Tim is, as usual, the masterful organ grinder. So get ready to do the funky gibbon and come join in all the baboonery by downloading the podcast directly here, then gibber and hoot about it over here (Stop it right now, the cliche police have been called - Ed). And here's all the monkey business (I said stop it!! - Ed):

(00:00) Hoagy Carmichael - The monkey song
Tim from The face of today

(03:37) Comsat Angels - Monkey pilot
Adam from Pretending life is like a song

(08:09) Free Kitten - Bananas
Ross from Just gimme indie rock

(11:10) The Pixies - Monkey gone to heaven (BBC version)
JC aka The Vinyl Villian

(14:18) The Kinks - Apeman
Anna from Desert Island Jukebox

(18:50) The Mummies - (You must fight to live) on the planet of the apes
FiL from Pogoagogo

(23:31) The Bottle Rockets - Coffee monkey
Linda from Speed of dark

(26:01) The Specials - Monkey man
Dirk from Sexy Loser

(29:39) The Traveling Wilburys - Tweeter and the monkey man
James from Appetite For Distraction

(35:21) The Monkees - What am I doing hangin’ around
Natalie from Mini-obs

(38:26) The Intruders - Me Tarzan, you Jane
Greer from A Sweet Unrest

(41:46) John Hadfield - Robot monkey head
Rick from Are you embarassed easily?

(45:28) The Apparitions - God monkey robot
Andy from Circles of Concrete

(50:15) Bachelors of Science - Jungle monkey
Eiron from The S+7 Method

(58:13) The Czars - Killjoy

Tricia

There seem to be a lot of apes and monkeys inhabiting my music collection, and though The Mummies were my choice this week (since I was feeling a bit garagey), a few other tracks screamed for my attention:

Add N To X - Sir Ape (buy here)
I love these guys and the jarring electronic noises that they make. And yet I've never been able to listen to a whole album of theirs from start to finish, coz usually by track three or four my nerves are shredded and the low frequencies have caused my internal organs to collapse.

The Maytals - Monkey Man (buy here)
Dearest Dirk posted the storming Specials cover of this skankeriffic song, so here's the 1969 original from ska kings The Maytals. The Specials version has actually become a fast favourite of Darling Daughter and Little Man - they sing along perfectly to the line "beeg, beeg, monkey man" before dissolving into fits of laughter.

Don Ho - Shock The Monkey (buy here)
Yes, you read right. That's the late Hawaiian kitschmeister himself doing a luau-lounge version of the Peter Gabriel standard. If that isn't enough to make your grass skirt flip, you MUST visit his website...

The Wynona Ryders - Bang Bang Orangutan (buy here or e-here)
The only punk song I know that namechecks this splendid beast.

This podcast got me musing: what is my favourite primate, not counting man? I decided that while I am rather partial to howler monkeys and do have a very soft spot for the pygmy marmoset, it's the aye-aye that I hold most dear. Yes, there is a certain depth of character to this nocturnal beast, considered unjustly as a harbinger of death by the humans who inhabit its home of Madagascar, that other monkeys and apes cannot match. So, what's your favourite ape, lemur, or monkey??

And then there are the fictional primates. The clear winner for me there is Magilla Gorilla, the TV cartoon ape with whom I spent many a childhood hour. To this day I'm prone to singing the theme song at random. Here, let me introduce / reacquaint you:




OK, I think I'm rapidly losing the plot here and I'd better stop; I was about to tell you a story about proboscis monkeys and mistaken subtitling in Dutch films. Next week's CP theme is "Threats & Promises," so get thinking of a submission and submit. Or else...