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Clever and droll but also hypnotic and mysterious.
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Monkey House doesn't contain as many excellent songs as Thirteen Tales (which enjoyed more memorable hooks and catchier lyrics), but it is, unquestionably, the group's most thematically grounded and bracing record to date, celebrating and critiquing the messiness of the music world as effectively as any album in recent memory.
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FilterThe progression into synthetics and New Order-isms seems so natural, it's almost hard to imagine the Dandys could ever have made music any other way. [#7, p.86]
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Q MagazineAs synth-rock rebirths go, it's highly convincing. [Jun 2003, p.95]
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A diverse collection of consistently good songs with little filler.
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What's most fascinating about Welcome to the Monkey House is that, in the midst of copious drug usage, heavy drinking and god knows what else, the Dandy Warhols have emerged with an album so cleverly coherent that it simply couldn't have come from anywhere else.
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A staggering, synth-smeared beauty of a record.
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Alternative PressRelentless rhythms and boisterous basslines propel the disc's quick-paced tunes to their catahrtic capital-letter choruses. [Aug 2003, p.104]
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UncutIt's arrogantly risky. That's their best feature. [Jun 2003, p.100]
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Entertainment WeeklyAn unlikely but not unwieldy combination of New Order and later Sparks. [22/29 Aug 2003, p.132]
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Guest stars (from Simon LeBon to Tony Visconti) arrive at a faster clip than truly memorable songs, but the slick vibe allows the album to slink by until it arrives at bright spots like the transcendently trashy "You Were The Last High."
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Here's the '80s revival long plotted by style journalists given an accessible alt-rock face, a deftness missing from most of the arid purveyors of sexy robot music.
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MojoComes on like an evil Duran Duran making future music for damaged teens.... It's both disturbingly compelling and very, very wrong. [Jun 2003, p.112]
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BlenderSmarter, bouncier and more full of insidious electronic hooks than its predecessors. [Aug 2003, p.124]
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Thirteen Tales From Urban Bohemia might still be the band's most accomplished album, but by embracing their emptiness and stylishness on Welcome to the Monkey House, they've crafted an album that is no less enjoyable because of its disposability.
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On first pass the album might feel like a lateral or even backward step. After repeated spins, however, its subtler arrangements take up digs in your head like pesky squatters who one day, inexplicably, start doing chores or even paying rent.
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UrbThere are fewer acerbic-tinged, catchy pop tracks that made thier last two efforts so essential. [Oct 2003, p.86]
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Feels like a prototype for something not yet fully realized.
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These songs highlight the poseur mentality and insincerity that paradoxically plagues and blesses The Dandy Warhols.
User score distribution:
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Positive: 13 out of 16
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Mixed: 2 out of 16
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Negative: 1 out of 16
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Dec 17, 2013
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Mar 22, 2012
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JohnCMar 6, 2007Man .... I love this album and have played it more often than any other album I own.