Thursday Throwback is a new feature on Squawkin’ Good Tunes where we dig up a forgotten gem from at least 10 years ago, play it on that week’s edition of Squawkin’ Good Radio, and review the album on squawkingood.com.
This week we go back and revisit one of my favorite bands from high school, A. Yes, their name is just the letter A, making them one of the most impossible bands to google. They were a band from England who were pretty popular in their home country in the early 00’s, and were popular in a few other countries like Germany and Japan. Their sophomore album, A vs. Monkey Kong (also just known as Monkey Kong in the states) was my introduction to the band.
A were another band I discovered on my local alt-rock station WEQX’s new music show Download, and they were a favorite of Download host Alex Taylor’s as well. 5 different songs from this album would receive airplay on Download, the first of which “Old Folks” would also go on to be in rotation in EQX’s regular playlist.
A’s music is best described as pop-punk but they mixed a lot of genres together including punk, metal, Britpop, 60’s pop and whatever else they felt like. Monkey Kong showed just how diverse their songs could be. In addition to their energetic, melodic rockers like “Old Folks”, “Down On the Floor” and “Miles Away”, there are a couple short hardcore punk tracks “Warning” and “Don’t Be Punks”, as well as some weird slower songs like “Hopper Jonnus Fang” and “Jason’s Addiction”.
These days, my personal favorite track off the album is “Here We Go Again (I Love Lake Tahoe)” a song that couldn’t have been written by anyone else and perfectly shows off their sense of humor with lyrics like “Yeah the trees are pretty wide/That’s where Sonny Bono died.”
While I wouldn’t consider this album a classic, it’s still worth revisiting every few years along with their other three albums: Their more commercially successful followup Hi-Fi Serious, their hard to find debut How Ace Are Buildings, and their final heavier, darker album Teen Dance Ordinance.
Check out their official site for more info on A (it saves you from googling them!) , and listen to Monkey Kong on Spotify below:
Squawkin' Good Tunes 
You don’t mention ‘Exit Stage Right’,the live album which was released between Monkey Long and Hi Fi. Actually at 26 minutes, perhaps its an EP. All the best – Chris
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