Monster Magnet Albums Ranked Worst to Best
Monster Magnet have always been a band out of time: Their unspoken mission is to revisit, revive and reinvent the music of classic rock’s ‘60s and ‘70s heyday for those who are too young to have experienced it for themselves.
And here’s why: The band’s leader Dave Wyndorf, who was born in Red Bank, N.J., in 1956, didn’t just revere the ‘70s. He lived them. By the time Wyndorf sang on a pair of late-‘70s singles with a punk rock band named Shrapnel – their gimmick was wearing battle fatigues; the band also featured future Ramones producer Daniel Rey on guitar – he’d absorbed the previous decade’s greatest, wildest and deepest sounds in exhaustive detail.
That “education” would serve Wyndorf well when he started assembling Monster Magnet in the late ‘80s with singer and drummer Tim Cronin and guitarist John McBain, both of whom were like-minded classic-rock freaks.
Though the founding trio’s original ties were to New York’s artsy, underground rock scene, Monster Magnet saw their career swept along by the ‘90s’ post-grunge alternative movement after they issued their first demos, a self-titled EP and the Spine of God LP through Germany’s Glitterhouse Records.
With Cronin now working behind the scenes, McBain replaced by Ed Mundell and the Joe Calandra/Jon Kleiman rhythm section fully installed, Monster Magnet signed to a major label, A&M Records, and embarked on a relentless campaign toward fame and fortune – or so he thought – culminating in 1998’s commercial pinnacle, Powertrip.
Unfortunately, Monster Magnet’s career crashed against all kinds of adversity in the new millennium, yet Wyndorf soldiered on despite an ever-changing cast of henchmen, steadily adding to the band’s formidable legacy (if not their bank accounts) as one of stoner rock’s cornerstone acts and arguably its most enduring champions.
Wherever classic rock’s past, present and future collide and explode like a supernova, Monster Magnet will be there, yanking on the spine of God, kissing the mouth of the scorpion, spanking your demons (and making them pay) and talking to planets … baby.