18 Monkeys On A Dead Man's Chest
New Orleans Fuzz
Numbers Man
Little Sister
Habeas Corpus
Brunswick Parking Lot
Nebraska Alcohol Abuse
Sad Eyed Lowlands
Golden Surf
Prepare For The End

David Thomas and two pale boys
18 Monkeys On A Dead Man's Chest

Released March 20 2004.
Produced by David Thomas.

Pix Lyrix

Release Notes

18 Monkeys On A Dead Man's Chest is the companion to Pere Ubu's Carnival of Souls. It completes the first cycle of two pale boys albums and acts as a lynchpin between the pale boy and Pere Ubu projex. The Chinese Whispers methodology, tested and readied, was to be absorbed into Ubu - the stories and characters, as well as musical ideas, were taken for Carnival Of Souls. 18 Monkeys On A Dead Man's Chest provides key elements of the backstory and is essential to the 'getting' of Carnival Of Souls.'

David Thomas and two pale boys generate strange and beautiful shapes, rolling stories, and sonic panoramas from spontaneous deconstructions. The simple seesawing of a melodeon gives way to cascading electronica and expressionistic soundscapes - sometimes pulsating and abrasive, sometimes mysterious and exploratory. Through it all is woven the mordant wit of one of the most distinctive and charismatic singers in modern music, Pere Ubu founder David Thomas.

18 Monkeys On A Dead Man's Chest, their third studio album, takes the group's extraordinary sonic lexicon, the trademark soundscaping of electronic trumpeter Andy Diagram and guitar/synthesist Keith Moliné, and injects a furious rock urgency. Check the zigzagging riffs and knife-edge angularity of the blistering Numbers Man. (Look, ma, no drums!)

18 Monkeys is a sonic novel stretched across a non-linear, non-narrative compendium of hieroglyphs. The sense of drama unfolding is a by-product of the improvisatory nature of the band's approach to recording. At the end of a chain of Chinese Whispers is the seat-of-the-pants theatricality of their concerts. The songs of 18 Monkeys were compiled in the studio from extemporised performances, subsequently deconstructed, reconstructed, re-amped and reconfigured -mthe left hand never knowing the business of the right.

Habeas Corpus is a terrifying, coiled mystery, while the explosive New Orleans Fuzz rides a groove so oozing and swollen it seems on the point of haemorrhage. Sad Eyed Lowlands recasts the "thin, wild mercury sound" that Dylan was chasing on Blonde on Blonde, mesmeric and compelling.

Elsewhere, the group fashion ghost-worlds of shifting perspectives creating the splintered micro-drama of Nebraska Alcohol Abuse, the epochal Prepare For The End, and the noir-ish tandem of Little Sister and Golden Surf. Everywhere are surprising details and unique textures - Mr. Diagram's shivery brass-vocalese, Mr. Moliné's feral violin embellishments and Mr. Thomas's wheezing, fragile melodeon.

Mr. Thomas himself is perhaps more lyrically reflective and revealing on 18 Mnkeys, exploring the twin psychologies of personal loss and collective myth, rooting his findings in the specifics of a very personal American geography. Time and again, he eschews the obvious in his vocal delivery, delivering the sparse, yearning Brunswick Parking Lot. Bitter nostalgia manages to be both heart-rending and hilarious.

Surf's Up! (2001) was the group's second studio album. The Wire said of it, "Recalls and then surpasses Swordfish Trombones period Tom Waits. Indeed, he shares with the film maker David Lynch the ability to parody a genre while simultaneously unlocking its forgotten power... Amazing" The Wire also raved about EREWHON (1996), the group's debut, describing it as "red-blooded, haunted and literally fantastic." Mirror Man (1999), a live recording featuring the group expanded lnto David Thomas and The Pale Orchestra, was praised widely and enthusiastically. Mojo called it a "tour de force." It is the soundtrack of Mr. Thomas' rogue opera that toured in the UK with Linda Thompson, Jackie Leven, Robert Kidney and others. In 2003, it premiered in the USA in Los Angeles, featuring Syd Straw, Van Dyke Parks, Robert Kidney, Frank Black, George Wendt and others.

David Thomas is the founder of avant-rock legends Pere Ubu. The two pale boys (2pbs) are Andy Diagram (trumpets & electronics) and Keith Moliné (guitars, violin & electronics). Andy, a member of James since the early 90s, has played in a number of influential groups, including Dislocation Dance, The Diagram Brothers and The Honkies. Currently, he plays with the 2pbs and his own group, Spaceheads. Keith refuses to play in rock (or jazz) bands. His approach to music derives from "a careful diet of high-art electronica and low-art Goth." He is currently playing with They Came From The Stars I Saw Them and has worked with Infidel and Mesmerist.

The design of the 18 Monkeys package is the work of John Thompson. Mr. Thompson has designed all but two of the Pere Ubu albums since 1977 and all of the David Thomas albums.

David Thomas and two pale boys

David Thomas - vocals, melodeon, musette
Keith Moliné - guitar, electronics, bass, violin
Andy Diagram - trumpet, electronics

Production Notes

Produced by David Thomas.
Engineered by Paul Hamann at Suma.
Recorded by David Thomas and Andy Diagram in Hove and Hackney.
Package design by John Thompson/idrome.
Remixed at Suma by David Thomas and Paul Hamann on September 24 and 29 2014.

All songs written by Diagram - Moliné - Thomas and ©2004 Hearpen Music, except for Brunswick Parking Lot which is written by Thomas and ©2004 Hearpen Music.

Release History

Bomba BOM 24004 (Japan) Mar 20 2004 cd.
Glitterhouse GRCD 596 (UK & EU) Mar 29 2004 cd.
Hearpen Records HR118 cd.
Smog Veil SV51CD (US) Oct 19 2004 cd.

Press Reaction

BBC's Album of the Week for April 5 2004
"Strange, compelling, terrifying and great."

Cabin-Whipped, Ren Scarab, 9/16/04
"Nothing else to compare this to, really. It's ethereal, but not psychadelic, soft and smooth, but not soothing, experimental, but not inaccessible... Strange and terrifying, and right there on the verge of becoming something other than music." "Scary and wonderful."

Peter S. Scholtes, Minneapolis City Pages, 10/22/4
"Brilliantly deconstructive."

The Stranger Oct 14 2004
"A genius for assimilating traditional musical styles-- various types of folk, gospel, country, rock, and especially blues, without a shred of condescension or nostalgia, twisted this way and that, recombined, kicked into the future here, the antediluvian past there."

Rod Smith, Seattle Weekly Oct 13-14 2004
"A wider, more disorientating terrain that exists way beyond the stifling, intimate concerns of rock 'n' roll... a feeling of faint existential terror."

The Wire, April 2004
"Nothing else to compare this to, really. It's ethereal, but not psychadelic, soft and smooth, but not soothing, experimental, but not inaccessible... Strange and terrifying, and right there on the verge of becoming something other than music."

>Cahin-Whipped, Ren Scarab, 9/16/04
"Astoundingly dark and harrowing yet ultimately breathtaking... At times, '18 Monkeys...' beggars belief in its ability to meander from three chord punk'n'roll to Polanski-esque film scores and the downright disturbing"

Drowned In Sound, Dom Gourlay, March 2004
"It's good to have to wrestle with an album and win something worthwhile." -

Rock City, 3/26/04
Album of the Week at Elefterotypia (Greek best selling daily), "Like Captain Beefherat before him, Thomas deconstrucks rock music and creates something new and radical...this is music for passionate music lovers and not for pop consumers."

Les Inrockuptibles
"David Thomas réussit là une de ses plus belles annexes. C'est déjà sa troisième association aux Two Pale Boys, mais la mixture instable fonctionne aujourd'hui comme elle n'a jamais bouillonné. Cuivres, violons, voix déchirées, guitares bien sûr, tous les éléments se croisent, fusionnent, sans se télescoper. Si la trompette, l'accordéon, l'amalgame chaud-froid, l'avant garde sont des notions qui vous mettent en fuite, écoutez donc cette fusion neuve avant de prendre le large si besoin."