The Monitors - S/T

(Revised from 16 Jan 2011's original draft)

The Monitors – S/T (2003? 2005?)

A1. Electric Knife

A2. Fungus Boy

B1. Missing Hand

B2. Bubble Drome

Yeah! This was the first Milwaukee punk band I saw, back in April or May of 2006 at the now defunct Riverwest Commons. I was 19. The Monitors blew me away—what a sight they were. Wendy (keyboards/vocals) wore a plastic toy motorcycle cop helmet, Ryan (bass) looked slutty in drag, and Mechadrum beat the crap out of his drum kit. No guitar. Jokey horror themes. Fast, funny songs. I got loaded on mixed drinks because like all other new drinkers, I drank too hard too quickly.

Ryan and Wendy have since been in Plexi-3 and have now formed Ramma Lamma with Jered from the Reckless Hearts. When I saw Ramma Lamma opening for White Mystery (see below),they had a box of 7”s at the merch table to flip through. I found the Monitors 7” in there and I jumped. Here was a piece of my history, an out of print record and a concrete link to a ½ remembered, but nonetheless fun time.

As I played it again, the memories came back. The drums sound tighter than I remember, probably because of the studio production. A sweet little record, one of three the band made. 4 songs worth of keyboard driven punk.