Meet The Moniters – a sub indie dirty electro-rock 3 piece from Brisbane, Australia.

The Moniters – ‘Exit the System’

The story so far is a fairly organic one: Comprising of frontman Jimi Lucas, drummer Matt Schrader and bassist Barney Gickel, the three band members met at a Killers concert when Jimi and Matt ran into Barney whom Matt already knew through some session work that they’d both collaborated on a few years earlier. They began demoing ideas up at Jimi’s place, with Jimi and Barney laying down ideas over sampled drums which Matt would then make his

changes across the top of. Once they had enough tracks together, they sent the demo’s down to Melbourne based producer Forrester Savell (Dead Letter Circus, Birds of Tokyo). Forrester, loving the tracks, asked the band to fly down to record them with him at sing sing south studios. Titled “Sex City Lovers” their resulting debut Ep is scheduled for 2011 release.

First Up though – The Moniters are proud to present the first taste thereof –debut single Exit The System. Check it out here: http://www.myspace.com/themoniters

One of the first things Savell pointed out to the band upon commencement of the sessions was that he felt the use of the sampled drums in the demo’s they had sent, was a real signature of their sound. Subsequently – all the samples that made the cut onto the EP were literally dragged strait from the demos. With Forrester fine tuning it all as they went, live drums were then added across the board as well.

Says Lucas: “with Exit The System (and the EP in general), we were looking for that really slick, tight sound, as the song does have those electronic components. I was listening to a lot of She Wants Revenge and wanted to go for that dirty, sexy, baritone vocal style. The drums, bass and guitars we focused on sharp energy, aiming to keep that driving, anxious, nervy feel at the core of the song. The choruses then really open up, which releases that on-edge vibe.”

Lucas had originally written the lyrics to Exit The System over Jack Daniels and cigarettes – recording them in his lounge room in a similar mood. This made for one major problem when it came to tracking though, as Lucas explains: “I was drunk at home when I first recorded the Exit the System vocals on the demo, and the hardest thing about recording with Forry was trying to replicate that. He really dug the original demo but it was recorded too poorly to salvage anything that could be used. It was a bummer because the original demo take was the first time I had ever sung the song and is so soften the case, it was a ripper, so it proved a real mission to recapture that.

It wasn’t till we actually got back to Brisbane and Forry still wanted some more takes of the vocals. So I bought a mic off ebay, plugged it straight in to my home recording setup, and again, just recorded them in my lounge room. I sent them back down to Melbourne and Walla – we had the final takes.”

Debut EP “Sex City Lovers” is out early 2011

Catch The Moniters:
Fri Oct 20 @ X & Y Bar, Fortitude Valley, Brisbane.
(official Exit The System single launch)
Fri Nov 19 – Great Northern, Newcastle
Sat Nov 20 @ Open Arms Festival, Coffs Harbour
Sat Dec 11 – Cherry, Melbourne