Monkey Records

Eclectic boutique indie record label originally established in New Zealand in the year 2000 and now based in Berlin. 

[monkeyrecords]

Berlin-based father and son duo, Cosmo and the Cosmonaut will release their debut album, Ultra Mega, in August 2019.

Their first single, The World is Burning, addresses the issue of climate change through the eyes of a seven year old and features the voice of fifteen year old climate activist Greta Thunberg.

Lyrics:

I’m only seven years old and I’m just a kid

But it’s clear in my mind that we must forbid The burning of fossil fuels, it’s causing climate change So please tell me why we can’t arrange Clean, green energy for the whole earth It’ll cost lots of money but surely it’s worth To save us people, the animals and the planet I think it’s high time that we demand itCome on people, we must do somethingCome on people the time is nowCome on people the world is burningCome on people let’s work it outThe weather is changing and it’s easy to seeEven for a kid as young as meThe summers are hotter than ever beforeIn winter there’s no longer snow outside my doorSo politicians stop clowning around!There’s no question, the science is soundMake the changes before it’s too lateOtherwise you will have sealed our fateCome on people, we must do somethingCome on people the time is nowCome on people the world is burningCosmo on people let’s work it outCome on people x 10Come on people, we must do somethingCome on people the time is nowCome on people the ice is meltingCome on people let’s work it outCome on people, we must do somethingCome on people the time is nowCome on people the ice is meltingCome on people let’s work it outCome on people x 4

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Wandering Ukrainian musician Make Like a Tree was visiting Berlin recently so we invited him to drop in at Monkey HQ for a chat on the couch.

(via https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q9L8CGXCNtc)

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New video from Ukrainian wandering minstrel Make Like a Tree filmed in Bali.

"This song is about changes. If we imagine that life is a forest, then we are birdwatchers who were once amazed by its beauty but we got lost and it’s hard to find the way home. The forest changes us during our wandering and when we finally find the way back we are not the same as when we stepped into it. There are no guidelines or signs in the forest and only birds and rivers can help us to find the way." Sergey Onischenko (Make Like a Tree).

The Animal album is a result of Onischenko’s two and a half year hitchhiking journey through 13 countries from Ukraine to New Zealand. In June 2013 he left his hometown Kharkiv in Ukraine with his guitar in hand and headed to the East chasing the rising sun. It was the beginning of a vagabond trip that he had always dreamed about. Along the way, he played about 250 gigs in around 200 cities in Russia, China, Hong Kong, Macao, Lao, Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, Australia and New Zealand. 

(via https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=997x4OdTOl0)

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Second single and title track from John White’s beguiling new dream folk album, Henry Green and the Tuliarts.

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Very excited to announce that the new album from dream pop artist John White will be out on 7th October. The first single, Batholemule Brixton, is a lush piece of dream pop/chamber folk with glorious vocal harmonies and exquisite string arrangements. It’s available as a free download from SoundCoud. 

Preorder the album here: http://preview.tinyurl.com/HenryGreen

[monkeyrecords]

Make Like a Tree's new album, Animal, is a result of Sergey Onischenko's two and a half year journey hitchhiking through thirteen countries from Ukraine to New Zealand. In June 2013 he left his hometown Kharkiv in Ukraine with guitar in hand and headed East chasing the rising sun. It was the beginning of a vagabond trip that he had always dreamed about. Since then he’s played about 300 gigs in around 200 cities in Russia, China, Hong Kong, Macao, Lao, Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, Australia and New Zealand. Upon his return, he toured Ukraine and Russia extensively and will be touring throughout Europe in summer 2016.

[monkeyrecords]

The Animal album is a result of Sergey Onischenko’s two and a half year hitchhiking journey through 13 countries from Ukraine to New Zealand. In June 2013 he left his hometown Kharkiv in Ukraine with his guitar in hand and headed to the East chasing the rising sun. It was the beginning of a vagabond trip that he had always dreamed about.

Since then he’s played about 250 gigs in around 200 cities in Russia, China, Hong Kong, Macao, Lao, Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, Australia and New Zealand. In late 2015 he toured Russia and Ukraine to promote the release of his new album with touring plans for Europe and who knows where else in 2016.

Sergey started giving birth to this album when he made a stop in Bali and recorded three songs in his DIY studio that he set up in bungalow near the ocean where he was living. Three other songs were recorded in Auckland, New Zealand at the MAINZ studio. The last two songs were made in collaboration with Cosmic Setter (Russia), Compact Substance (Ukraine) and Anna Denisova (Ukraine). Overall the album is surprisingly cohesive and Sergey’s breathy understated vocals over minimal acoustic arrangements (with the exception of the last two electronic-infused tracks) are sometimes reminiscent of early Iron and Wine or Bon Iver.

Album available here on CD or digital: monkeyrecords.bandcamp.com/album/animal

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Download free Robin Pahlman's first single from his forthcoming album, Temporary Everything. Musically and geographically, Finnish guitarist and songwriter Robin Pahlman has traveled thousands of miles since he recorded and toured with his band Agent Kooper in the early 2000s. Robin started writing songs for a solo album in Seattle, WA, recorded his debut lo-fi acoustic EP in his tiny home studio in Vienna, Austria, toured all over Europe, and wrote and produced his first full-length album “Temporary Everything” in New York City.

[monkeyrecords]

After 15 years in the business of being a record label, finally we release an actual record! Fresh off the press, here is Freddy Fudd Pucker’s new album Hourglass Wine which comes with a hand drawn graphic booklet by Freddy himself.

Hourglass Wine is a 10 track offering of break-neck speed, emotive, folk songs. The bulk of the which revolve around the simultaneous, multi-instrumentation of one boy and his high-gain acoustic guitar, bass drum and voice. Lyrically, the songs seem to be born out of a desire to restructure and rebuild dialogues often over-simplified in mass media. When listening to the album one picks up the fury and disillusion Freddy perhaps feels in this modern age of disinformation that shapes conversations around issues such as ecological catastrophe and the politics of international migration. Freddy pleads with the listener, and perhaps with himself, to search for a sense of self-worth beyond simply that of a consumer within an unmerciful, global economic system. The heavy lyrical content of Freddy’s songs proves he is not afraid to explore complex ideas within his high-energy, strangely fun, punkrock influenced, folk music.

Order the vinyl here.

[monkeyrecords]

Happy B Song is the first track to be released from Make Like  a Tree's forthcoming album, Animal to be released on the 3rd December, 2015. Preorder here.

Make Like a Tree is a representation of travels expressed in music and photography by Sergey Onischenko, a wanderer from Ukraine who has been hitchhiking around the world spreading his indie-folk tunes and collaborating with other musicians along the way.

The Animal album is a result of Sergey Onischenko's two and a half year hitchhiking journey through 13 countries from Ukraine to New Zealand. In June 2013 he left his hometown Kharkiv in Ukraine with his guitar in hand and headed to the East chasing the rising sun. It was the beginning of a vagabond trip that he had always dreamed about. Since then he’s performed about 250 gigs in around 200 cities in Russia, China, Hong Kong, Macao, Lao, Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, Australia and New Zealand.

[monkeyrecords]

Don't Fail Me Now is the second single to be released from Freddy Fudd Pucker's forthcoming album, Hourglass Wine, available on CD or download from September 18th and vinyl from October 30th. Physical formats come with a 16 page graphic booklet hand drawn by Freddy. Preorder here.

What do crudely drawn pictures of a bloody knife, a key, a toaster, the words “Everything Will Be OK”, have in common? There is no punchline. It is a genuine question.

The video for Freddy Fudd Puckerʼs new single Donʼt Fail Me Now appears to be some kind of psychological experiment. Similar to a game of memory or asking someone to explain their first impression of what an ink-blot may represent. The video is a slow moving animation of over 120 drawings by Freddy himself, that could have no connection to one another. However, appearing in a sequence, they must inevitably become something bigger than just a string of unrelated images. Couple that with a very lyrical song and the viewerʼs own life experiences, and you have an endless myriad of potential associations and conclusions.

Donʼt Fail Me Now opens with the lines “They would have had your tongue cut out, had you not already done it yourself with your rusty scissors made from Sundayʼs papers, singinʼ Mother Superior, hear me, donʼt fail me now.” The song is possibly a comment on the self-censorship of oneʼs instinctual moral compass in order to navigate modern society in the western world. Much like the album it belongs to, the song maybe asks more questions than it answers. Humankind seems to forever claim to have direction in its step. Yet war, slavery and injustice are are both the ingredients and byproducts of everyday conveniences and the very earth we all share is being destroyed at a seemingly perpetual rate. To live in modern western civilization is to be confused. Perhaps Freddy is just attempting to give that confusion a melody.

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The delightfully whimsical track Little Sparrow by Charity Children features a class of school children from Berlin Metropolitan School singing along in the chorus. From Charity Children’s debut album The Autumn Came.

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Excellent cello-heavy remix by Berlin-based producer Broad Oak of Charity Children’s dark tale of infidelity, Empty Vicious Nights.

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Download Freddy Fudd Pucker's first single, Blood Diamond Mind, for free from our SoundCloud page.Freddy Fudd Pucker (Tom Young) is originally from a small city at the edge of the earth called Dunedin, New Zealand. However, he has spent the last five years or so touring the world, playing hundreds of shows across Australasia, the USA and Europe. The last two years have seen him based in Berlin, Germany, focusing on a nearly constant European tour schedule. Freddy looks at touring as a way of cultivating not only a growing and loyal fan base but the very experiences and characters that make up his songs.

A one-boy-band of sorts, his live show consists of a guitar, banjo, distorted loops and samples, a suitcase bass-drum on one foot, a tambourine on the other and the howl of someone that refuses to grow into what he considers an ugly, modern idea of adulthood. With these tools he performs intensely lyrical songs wrapped in extremely fast rhythms and melodies.

Artwork by Freddy. Album due later in the year.

[monkeyrecords]

Broadoak’s new video Leaves Autumn is a lo-fi psychedelic ride through the streets and parks of Berlin. While filming the video with a small camera taped to the front of his bike he was chased by three drug dealers through one park and was lucky to escape with the footage intact.

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New Zealand based electro-noir artist Graveyard Love is the featured artist on the Band of the Day app today just in time for St Valentine's Day.

[monkeyrecords]

This succinct but utterly beguiling song was inspired by the meeting of He Pingping of China with Sultan Kosen of Turkey on January 14, 2010 in Istanbul. From Charity Children's debut album, The Autumn Came.