Saucy Monky - Celebrity Trash

A part-American, part-Irish quartet, Saucy Monky have earned their spurs playing the college scene around LA and it shows on Celebrity Trash, an assured debut album by any standards.

The eight tracks on Trash (excluding bonus cut, ‘Sun’s Coming Up’) exude confidence, sassiness and an eye for a killer hook. In particular the opener ‘I Don’t Wanna Know Your Name’, is all sun-kissed guitar-lines and twin vocals from Cynthia Catania and Annmarie Cullen that could have come from Chrissie Hynde’s top drawer. It is a fine statement of intent.

Listening to Celebrity Trash, I found myself pining for those cloudless Californian blue skies and open highways. There’s certainly more of Los Angeles than Dublin about their laid-back rock melodies and sweet harmonies, the fact that two of the four hail from the ould sod (and fellow Dub Naimee Coleman chips in backing vocals on two tracks) notwithstanding.

‘Seven Days’ is more resigned than angry, as the realisation dawns that a relationship has run its course. ‘Paranoid’ employs a quirkier melody taking the Monkys off the highway and onto a by-road but it’s an interesting detour nonetheless. ‘Disco Ball’ is surely a single in waiting, as the girls lay on the melancholy and chorus-euphoria in equal measure. The bittersweet ‘Trapped’ is another gem that will appeal to the legions who worship at the altar of Aimee Mann.

Just when you fear they’re getting too serious, though, they hit you with a double whammy: the frantic singalong of ‘Make-Up’ and the sparky, punky ‘Permanent Midnite’, before the country-tinged balladry of ‘Flicker’ finishes the album proper off with aplomb.

The Wollons and Meraez Remix of ‘Sun’s Comin’ Up’ (a dancehall version of ‘Disco Ball’) just seems out of place and I can’t help feeling that it was included simply to lift the running time above the half hour mark. It’s an unnecessary gesture.

In this case, brevity is indeed the soul of wit: Celebrity Trash is extremely radio friendly and easy on the ear. Saucy Monky have created a perfectly tuneful, harmony-laden debut album that many bands would trade their tattoos for.