Music Lists - Top Ten "Primate" songs

Has anyone seen that ad on the tv (I think its for red meat) where Sam Neill dances with an orangatang? For some reason that one always brings a smile to my face. So it got me thinking as a theme for the next list – “primate” songs. Now, for the pedantic followers of my list, yes, I am well aware that humans are also primates, but I have looked to the non-human varieties for this list.

So when it comes to primates in music, my first thoughts went to some bands – The Monkees, and from more recent times, Gorrilaz. The Screaming Jets had an album with a gorilla on the front of it, and the Hoodoo Gurus had a B Sides Collection called Gorilla Biscuit. Jack Johnson recorded the soundtrack to the children’s film Curious George, so he has an album called Curious George. Then there is the drumming gorilla from the Cadbury advertisement, I like that ad as well.

Coming up with songs though, has proved a bit more challenging. So this week’s list is only a top ten. Having said that though, there are some mighty good songs on the list.



10 - Monkey Girl – Toots and the Maytals.
Toots and the Maytals are an influential Jamaican reggae group. In the 2009 after Christmas sales, I saw a double best of for the ludicrous price of 50 cents, so I decided to give it a go. I like it, although not being a huge lover of reggae music, the album is a lot to digest in one go.

9 - Monkey with a Drum – Josh Pyke.
I have talked about Josh Pyke in a previous post, and this is another of his nice little songs from the Memories and Dust album.

8 - Monkey to Man – Elvis Costello.
My friend Jiggy lent me a copy of Elvis’s album the Delivery Man some time ago, and although I haven’t listened to it a lot, I have liked the few times that I have. Monkey to Man is one of the highlights on the album, a great catchy track.

7 - Monkey Wrench – Foo Fighters.
Ok, so maybe this really should be under a tool theme list, but its an out an out rocker from the Foo Fighters. Again, talking about my friend Jiggy, his recent wirelesscranium blog post discusses the Foo Fighters and sums them up pretty accurately I think.

6 - Theme from the Monkees – The Monkees.
There is no way I could leave this catchy little track of the list. Yes it’s a bit corny, but its very enjoyable.

5 - King Kong – The Kinks.
A great stomping rock song from the Kinks…great great stuff. It is a bonus track on the version of Arthur.... which I own, but I think it was a B Side to one of their big hits. I forget which one.

4- Monkey on a Wire – Shane Nicholson and Kasey Chambers.
Another track from the husband and wife duo on their “Rattling Bones” album, which I think I have drawn from for previous music lists. Apart from the title track, this is probably one of the highlights of that album.

3 - Ape Man – The Kinks.
At first listen, you could be forgiven for thinking Ape Man is a throwaway novelty song (with the simple but catchy chorus “I’m an ape man, I’m an ape ape man”) getting into your head. But once you start listening to the lyrics, you soon realize that its actually a bit of a paranoid song, about the threat of nuclear war (“I don’t feel safe in this world no more, I don’t wanna die in a nuclear war, I want to sail away to a distant shore, and live like an ape man”)

2 - Tweeter and the Monkey Man – Travelling Wilburys.
I know some people knock them, but I actually really like the Travelling Wilburys Vol 1, and would consider it one of my favourite albums of all time (I said one of, not the top). People not familiar with the album may know the radio friendly hits like Handle with Care and End of the Line, but Tweeter and the Monkey Man is nothing like that at all. On this track, Bob Dylan takes the lead and gives us a Dylan esque track. There is a funny moment on the “making of” documentary where George Harrison talks about this song, saying that Dylan and Petty went in a room and wrote it together, and George did not understand what they were doing or singing about.

1 - Everybody’s Got Something To Hide (Except for Me and My Monkey) – The Beatles
And the top song goes to this track with the epic title. A catchy rock number from the White Album. With so many great Beatles songs, its easy for good songs to get lost a bit, but this one has always stood out as a great track to me. Not that I have a clue what it is about though!!


So there it is. What other songs have I missed from the list? I was struggling to come up with too many that fit the theme.

All feedback most welcome...come on people, humour me that more that one person actually reads these posts!!!