Monstrous’ stealthy rise on the independent music scene has gone largely unnoticed, mainly because the trio has made most of its progress out of town, specifically in Portland, Oregon. “We used Portland as a base for touring,” explains Led Gethway, the band’s guitar-strummer and frontman. “We’ve built up a good fan base on the West Coast and we wanted to find a good central point to travel between Los Angeles and Vancouver.”
NATURE BOYS: Monstrous in action. |
Out west the band made some great contacts, including the Dandy Warhols, Portland’s favorite sons, and other luminaries like the Black Rebel Motorcycle Club. It seems Portland’s music scene runs left of center, and Monstrous, a slithering, ’70s-style hard rock/glam/ grunge outfit, was a breath of fresh air. But shortly after the move, the band clinched a record deal with Howler, a label in New York City. That transaction prompted Monstrous to return east, where they could be closer to their business people and focus on the release of their new disc, Mother Nature’s Sons. Better to have two homes than none at all. “Actually, we never stopped saying we were from Providence,” says Gethway, “even when we didn’t live here.”
Monstrous, which also includes Led’s brothers Ken and Alex — all sons of a Chilean opera singer and a singer-songwriter — came of age in South Kingstown. They began playing when they were pretty young and plugged away blissfully, without giving a thought to public appearances. But relatives and friends, impressed with the strapping young lads’ take on post-punk rock, encouraged them to play out. The Met Café and AS220 hosted their first few real gigs. They made a couple of primitive records and enjoyed gigging occasionally at the mills in the late ’90s. But in 2004, after the mills closed, the scene began drying up. That was when Monstrous took off.
“Originally, our plan was to make some money, get a deal, and come back here,” says Led. “We played so much over there that we wanted to see if we could do the same thing somewhere else.”
Mother Nature’s Sons is raucous and original, with offerings to the spirits of T. Rex, Kurt Cobain, and the Jesus and Mary Chain. It’s decibel-generous, with intoxicating hooks and potent swigs of melody. In fact, Led admits the band has commercial aspirations. “We love hit songs. We don’t really care about staying indie. We like mainstream music, music that everyone knows, like nursery rhymes.”
The band is making progress. They’ve already licensed a track from to a major sports network and big-label A&R folks have taken such zealous interest in Monstrous that the band has several industry showcases on tap. Says Led: “We’d love to see some sort of explosion happen around here.”
MONSTROUS + SPIDER ROCKETS + YEAR OF THE COW | December 15 | AS220, 115 Empire St, Providence | 401.831.9327
