Felt Me & A Monkey On The Moon CD - Import

Digitally remastered edition of the indie pop group's final album incorporated a slide guitar into the mix, lending an alt-country twang to the proceedings. A first class finish.

Personnel: John Mohan (guitar); Martin Duffy (piano, electric piano, Fender Rhodes piano, Clavinet, Mellotron, synthesizer); Gary Ainge (drums, percussion); Peter Astor, Rose McDowall (background vocals).
Photographer: Donna Ranieri.
Felt's main man, Lawrence, had a plan. Ten years, ten records, then break up the band. This is that tenth record and Felt goes out on a high note. Me and a Monkey on the Moon is the most musically accomplished and personal record of the band's career. It is emotional, funny, and loaded with memorable melodies, some of Lawrence's best. Felt always came across as incredibly remote and icy. The sound was sparse and jagged, the lyrics -- when not vague -- were hostile and acerbic, and Lawrence's vocals were pitched somewhere between Lou Reed and talking in his sleep. Me and a Monkey on the Moon is so intimate and personal that it almost sounds like a different band. The record sounds like Lawrence's autobiography, with songs about childhood, family, lost love, and the end of Felt; eight of the ten songs have "I" in the first line and they are all sung in a voice aching with loss and regret. The emotional nature of the lyrics and singing is bolstered by the lush and autumnal musical backing provided by the band. Martin Duffy is amazing here; he plays a wide range of keyboards from piano to mellotron to ARP string ensemble with just the right notes and feeling. The record is filled with instrumentation that was totally new to Felt, like long rock & roll guitar solos, pedal steel guitars, and female backup vocals. It all works to create a rich and heartfelt farewell to Felt, full of sentiment but not sentimental -- the sound of a band reaching its potential and kissing it goodbye. As great as Lawrence's next band, the glam and novelty rock-inspired Denim, was, it is too bad he didn't further explore the adult and emotional sounds of Me and a Monkey on the Moon. ~ Tim Sendra
With ME & A MONKEY ON THE MOON, Felt's Lawrence announced that, as he'd completed his objective of releasing ten albums and ten singles in ten years, Felt was over (actually there were eleven singles, but that would have wrecked the symmetry of the thing). By this time, Lawrence was the only original member of the band, though Martin Duffy had been around since 1985's IGNITE THE SEVEN CANNONS. (ME & A MONKEY also features backing vocals by Rose McDowall, who used to sing for Strawberry Switchblade.)
Album highlights include "Budgie Jacket," which features a weirdly dispassionate first-person lyric about child sexual abuse, and a baroque guitar line that recalls those of Maurice Deebank, the band's original guitarist. "New Day Dawning," which begins as a sparse, sinister confessional, bursting into an uncharacteristically cheerful final two and a half minutes worth of wheeling and soaring guitar solos. "Down an August Path," meanwhile, lyrically walks the fine line between unbearably sad and faintly optimistic that Lawrence has always made it his business to tread. ME & A MONKEY ON THE MOON ends Felt's career on an appropriate high note.