Posted on: October 25, 2008 Posted by: James McQuiston Comments: 2

MONEY was invented by the Skeletons BAND: Jon Leland, Tony Lowe, Jason McMahon and Matt Mehlan and is being released by Tomlab late this year. You’ll find AMAZING LIVE FOOTAGE here:

Already up so early in the morning of 2008, Skeletons were hibernating in the safest, quietest, warmest place in the world: Times Square, New York. In a haunted WWII-era ballroom they recorded through the wintry nights when the studio was on fire. Taking breaks at 5am, standing under heat lamps listening to Hot Jass outside the Time Warp Hotel, soaking up the the empty streets with the leftover creeps while the tourists sleep. It’s just the same struggle any old human has to go through to make anything: make it to work on time, make an excuse, make babies, make war, make breakfast without getting into a fight. The child of this struggle is MONEY.

Moving on from the albums of your childhood: GIT (2005) was all heart attack and 808. LUCAS (2007) was trash cans and boiling oil. It’s time to get to know MONEY. MONEY was written in your sleep. MONEY was performed by hired extras. MONEY was produced by wanted celebrities. MONEY was engineered by a secret government. MONEY was arranged to be discovered by indigenous tribes. You’re in a forest of insects wearing night vision goggles and everything is the color of MONEY.

This album was recorded the old-fashioned way: LIVE, like psychic surgeons making cuts before a single note was played. Every sound rings out in it’s own place, every word given space – confusion in crystal-fever dream-form, right inside your earhole. You’re daydreaming out the window “maybe if I pray, the sun will shine for me…but I don’t have the time” while the overjoyed drivers play a choir of car horns (Fill my pockets full). You’re trying to dial in the classical station when a train bursts out of the tunnel, percussionists tossing their first born cymbals into the furnace (RIPPER aka the pillows). You’re singin’ and celebratin’ cause this long week of work is done and you got paid enough to eat (STEPPER aka work).

These songs are inspirationals – So rejoice! “There is a simple way to get through the day, if you like magic tricks” (Unrelentinglessness). See every beautiful tear! Hallelujah! “Are you waiting on change? Or is that a complaint?”(The THINGS). Dance! Move it like you’ve been bit. “Your

feet swell, keep walkin’, keep walkin'”(BOOM!). Feel embarassed and pass it on. This record is angry because it’s hungry, sad because it’s scared, and joyous all at once, ending with a celebration: “You can unknowingly believe anything!” (Eleven)

Why not call this release GASOLINE or DEATH? Because MONEY is the root, and this is Root Music. Because MONEY will still be there after you’ve thinned out. Because MONEY is TIME and TIME is SPACE. MONEY is YOURS!

MONEY is the house you built with your bare hands, waiting for the flood. MONEY is the pregnant woman who just dropped a new carton of milk on the kitchen floor. MONEY is the preacher on the corner, screaming this press release in your ear. MONEY is the billionaire you just gave your last dollar to because he was dressed like a bum. Put down the floor and start steppin’! MONEY is slang!

You can try and paper the walls with MONEY, but it wont stick. It is not music for the 77% of your body that’s vegetable water. It’s not music for the offices, the dance clubs, the slaughterhouses, or the top floors. MONEY is for your stomach, your hands and your feet. A product too bold to be in the background, too clear to be swept under the weird rug. It’s energy music, brain food, soul drugs, body memories, from a band striving for TRUTH. True to survival, true to contradiction, true to themselves, true to you, Skeletons give you MONEY.

-Kurt Coltrane and John Cobain

Hell’s Kitchen NYC, Summer 2008

P.S. Keep your handshakes greased and your ears in the cut like a good American because you’ll want to be ready for PEOPLE

2 People reacted on this

  1. Money is pretty good – the songs are well written, and it sounds like Mehlan has exorcised some of his demons from previous albums. I jack off to the album art, which is incredibly well realized by Justin Craun. Overall, it could be about 20 minutes shorter. The production is absurdly close to perfect, not hurt in any way by the (uncredited) help of Lenny Kravitz’s producer Henry Hirsch behind the controls on most of the tracks. The sound is haunting, raw, and driven.
    Subjectwise, the album seems to deal more with loss than anything else. My guess is these guys are broke. The maximalist arrangements and sheer volume of the mix tends to overshadow most of the vocals, which is fine because this is the kind of album that demands repeat listenings anyway, and the lyrics turn out to be great: “The blackest of the berries lie closest to the ground / the weight of their juice brings all the branches down / the best form a pillow for the rest to fall down / on and on and on” Mehlan croons on Ripper AKA The Pillows. The centerpiece of the album, “BOOOM (MONEY)” is an extravagant 11 minute gut-blast through swamps and alleyways from Baghdad to Brooklyn. “You’d like to see / the things you need / as means to be good / some kind of good / oh!”
    It adds up to a painfully honest album. An honesty that, unfortunately, a lot of people probably aren’t going to hear, but then again, I’m a pessimist.

  2. um i’m a friend of the band and they didn’t have any help at all in the recording or production of that album, i’m 100% positive they did it theirselves without any help at all

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