Monophonics – Sound of Sinning (Vinyl)

Description

The Monophonics are sort of a more psychedelic west coast counterpart to the Dap-Kings, masters of all things darkly slinky and soulful. They get extra props for starting their career as an all-instrumental band: it wasn’t until fairly recently that they even bothered with vocals. But that’s a good thing, because it adds yet another trippy dimension to their ominous grooves. They’ve got a new album out, Sound of Sinning.

The new album opens with Lying Eyes – an original, not the cheesy 70s hit by the Eagles – setting a well-traveled 60s noir garage guitar hook to a jaunty, shuffling soul-clap beat. It gets darker and trippier as it goes along, with hints of dub. Frontman/organist Kelly Finnigan’s raindrops-on-the-keys attack and gruffly impassioned vocals rise above an echoey backdrop, part Zombies, part noir soul, on the title track.

The slowly swaying 6/8 soul ballad La La La Love Me is straight out of 1967, right down to the reverb on all the instruments…but with a creepy undercurrent. Promises is a killer update on late 60/early 70s Rare Earth that adds reverbtoned depth and menace missing from the era’s original stuff. Then the band returns to a brooding nocturnal ambience with Falling Apart, guitarist Ian McDonald alternating between bright, Memphis tinged licks and dark-water chorus-box lines against a backdrop of period-perfect strings and brass.

Drummer Austin Bohlman propels Hanging On with a tight latin soul pulse, up to a darkly rising brass chart anchored by trumpeter Ryan Scott – and then they channel Jethro Tull for a few bars, an unexpectedly droll touch. Strange Love has a Spectorish majesty, Myles O’Mahony’s precise, hollowbody-toned bass dancing over the string section, bells and growly baritone sax. Find My Way Back Home artfully pairs watery guitar and airy organ for what sounds like a prototype for jazz-inflected 70s Stylistics art-soul balladry

They follow that with Holding Back Your Love, the hardest-hitting, most direct song here, infused with McDonald’s fuzztone Yardbirds riffage. Too Long follows a similarly straightforward groove, but a slow-burning, menacingly nocturnal one with a towering noir soul arrangement. The final track, Everyone’s Got is a surreal mashup of trip-hop, Lee Hazlewood southwestern gothic and oldschool soul. The Monophonics have been touring with Galactic and probably blowing that band off the stage, night after night. Fans of the dark side of soul and psychedelic pop – Clairy Browne and Nick Waterhouse in particular – will love these guys. Not to give away anything that’s going to happen here later this year, but an awful lot of best-of-2015 lists will have this album on it.