Monotonix
Ding Dong, Melbourne
Thursday 4th March 2010
The first time I saw Monotonix, it was at a faux church space tucked away in West Philadelphia. I was blind drunk and wound up hoisting singer Ami Shalev in the air on a stool while he pounded the bass drum. When I saw Monotonix last night, I arrived just in time for the band’s set, stone-cold sober and with a book under my arm. Yes, I brought a book to a Monotonix show. The irony of that won’t be lost on anyone who’s witnessed the cult Israeli trio, a manic blur of sweat, flesh, body hair, and swampy garage-blues.
Shalev and guitarist Yonatan Gat were already standing atop the thin table central to Ding Dong when I got there. Drummer Haggai Fershtman was somewhere in the scattered crowd of punters, out of view but diligently playing away. Shalev was soon brandishing his bare ass and making the most of his limited physicality, having broken his leg during a show less than six weeks ago. Monotonix has no problem stopping songs live while Shalev works himself into various states, and the music always resumes with a vengeance. All long curly hair and minimal clothing, the three members are road dogs first and foremost; they live for the live show. The band’s latest album, Where Were You When It Happened?, stands up well on its own, but having gone to such extremes live for so long now, Monotonix can never turn back.
And so, recent injury be damned, Shalev and company were there to entertain. The crowd was small but devoted, many poised on benches and tables to catch the band’s gypsy-like progress from one unlikely corner of the bar to the next. Beaming fans hauled along the drum kit piece by piece, while Gat’s impossibly long guitar cord let him follow Shalev into the toilets at the opposite end of the room before he finally found himself unplugged. Shalev crowd-surfed liberally and screamed his guts out while the guitar and drums let loose an endless barrage of overblown riffs and crowd-abetted rhythms. For one fleeting moment at least, it felt like a jam band from a parallel universe.
All three members mounted the bar to deliver the standout ‘My Needs’ from that precarious perch, under the hawkish eye of an unimpressed bouncer. People were still ordering drinks throughout, and soon the band was on the move again, fans towing various props. Eying one punter with a rug in tow, Shalev calmly announced, “We’re gonna play music. We don’t need the rug.” And from there Monotonix got truly down to business, blasting punch-drunk anthems that channeled Hendrix as much as Blue Cheer. And when Shalev ordered everyone to dance like “mad fucking kangaroos,” they mostly did. Such is the power of Monotonix.
Doug Wallen