Videos by American Songwriter
The Minus 5
Of Monkees and Men
(Yep Roc)
Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
It seems that Scott McCaughey is in closet cleaning mode. The frontman/auteur and only consistent member in the ever-changing lineup of his Minus 5 alter-ego rounded up stray tracks recorded over a few years for his last release, 2013’s impressive Dungeon Golds. Now he lets those without turntables get acquainted with an album previously only available on vinyl as part of a limited edition five LP box set (that quickly sold out), created for Record Store Day 2015.
As its title implies, Of Monkees and Men is a tribute of sorts to the made-for-TV band of the 60s that, even with its far from organic conception, has managed to stick around for 50 years. Or half of it is. The CD is comprised of nine original tracks that reproduce side one and two of the record. The Monkees idea is a good one, but it appears that McCaughey abandoned the project after the five tunes relegated to the vinyl’s first side. The final four selections don’t seem to have much if anything to do with the Monkees either lyrically or musically. The copyrights date back to 2013 so these were lying around for a few years even when they appeared in their limited edition format.
Interestingly, the music isn’t Monkees-styled or particularly pop oriented. Rather, McCaughey lays down melodic, strummy folk/rock with occasional country twang touches miles away from “Last Train to Clarksville” or even “Pleasant Valley Sunday.” The Monkees’ tribute tunes use each band member along with songwriters Boyce & Hart in their titles and range from the sprightly 1:58 of “Mickey is a Cool Drummer” to the far more substantial, brooding and sprawling 9:17 opening “Michael Nesmith.” The latter features about 135 lines of lyrics, the wordiest song here.
As he makes clear in the Dolenz track, “Never criticize a man/ until you’ve walked a season in his TV show,” and true to that concept, these songs praise the Monkees and their songwriters both as a band and, more specifically, individuals. That’s especially the case as McCaughey describes meeting a somewhat melancholy Peter Tork later in his career after a solo show with “now you smile and tell the crowd you’re glad they came/could be 10,000 or 200, it’s all the same.”
The final four selections abandon, at least superficially, the Monkees theme but are no less insightful and in a few instances, far more introspective. In “Blue Rickenbacker,” he tells the story of his loving relationship with that, apparently now long gone, 12 string electric guitar. He also pays respects to actor Robert Ryan but spends the album’s longest song, “Weymer Never Dies,” as an ode to a lost comrade, a Van Morrison fan who turned him on to a variety of under-the-radar music from Sandy Denny to Art Tatum. During its nearly 11 minute length McCaughey and a multi-instrumentalist who goes by the name of Betsy Ross spin through psychedelic folk that gets progressively more experimental, spacey and twisted as it moves into its final, extended 6 minute instrumental section, a musical pastiche that includes backwards tapes and an approach that is as avant-garde as McCaughey gets.
Which is to say Scott McCaughey, in his Minus 5 guise, funnels his eclecticism into a somewhat cohesive whole that marries folk, country and rock with disarming ease. He uses his veteran musical instincts to craft tuneful yet genre pushing material that thankfully is now widely available for all to appreciate.
