Free Press

Issue date: 12/1/08 Section: Arts and Entertainment

The Monks documentary will show for first time in America beyond New York City or Chicago this Friday at USM. For more than thirty years this band of American GI's were not able to talk about their strange experience as a rock band in cold war Germany. In the film they recount their story for the first time.

The Monks were five American soldiers in 1960's Germany who billed themselves as the anti-Beatles. They were loud, and "heavy on feedback, nihilism and electrical banjo." They dressed like monks, they mocked the military and are credited with the invention of industrial, punk and techno music.

The documentary covers several genres, eras, and illustrates the pop music phenomenon in its political, social and cultural historic contexts. It also reveals the monks project as the first marriage between art and popular music-- even before Andy Warhol and the Velvet Underground.

The band entered cold war Germany in 1961 as soldiers and left the country in 1967 as avant-garde monks. Their harsh protest to the Vietnam War came through the first spoken/screamed pop music.

The film opens with the band playing on Germany's version of American Bandstand, BEAT CLUB, live in front of 6 million young people. The band documents five soldier's choice to stay and live in Germany after their years of touring there, stationed near the Berlin Wall as JFK was assassinated. The band creates a minimalist, deconstructed sound that has no beginning, middle, or end. The sound is raw and the lyrics are full of angst.

The film is sponsored by WMPG and will show at 7:00 p.m. in USM's Gerald E. Talbot Lecture Hall, Portland Campus. Free for USM student, $5 for the general public.

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