Edgy, angst ridden, sharp witted revved up power pop for the 21st century with a flair for sugary choruses and the ultra catchy melody. Shades of Elvis Costello, Cheap Trick, and the Fab Four are combined with driving guitars and a slick production.

14 MP3 Songs
ROCK: Punk-Pop, ROCK: Modern Rock



Details:
"When he's not out on the road as lead vocalist/guitarist for power poppers Enuff Z'nuff, you'll find Johnny Monaco holed up in his Chicago home studio crafting perfect pop/rock gems that combine elements of British Invasion song craft with today's latest studio trickery. Influenced by the likes of Elvis Costello, The Beatles, Cheap Trick, Nirvana, Jellyfish, Oasis, and more, Monaco's music has a familiarity to it, yet is all together his own. Songs about love, life, lust, boredom and suburbia sit side by side with songs of distant planet aliens and dream demons. In Johnny Monaco's musical world, any subject is fair game, and he delivers with a style and swagger that is hard to resist."




Johnny Monaco
Overrated
The Wrong Crowd

Power pop veteran shows more songwriting class.

On this new solo album Enuff Z'nuff's Johnny Monaco comes across as a delightfully heavied-up Squeeze. He probably couldn't write a non-catchy song if he tried, and very catchiest of the catchy here include the Ash-meets-Costello kitchen-sink drama I'll Take You As You Are, and Let's Set Our Hearts @ Self-Destruct has the kind of rhapsodic elaboration of early solo Paul McCartney (a good thing, honestly). In short, this is straight-ahead angsty, hook-filled, Anglo-centric pop. Robbie Williams could do worse than beg Monaco for a few songs like these.

Paul Ging
Classic Rock, UK



Johnny Monaco
Overrated
(The Wrong Crowd)

This third full length CD release from the Enuff Z'nuff's singer/guitarist is an absolute joy to listen to from start to finish. Crammed full of more hooks than a fisherman's tackle box and with angst-ridden but sometimes very amusing lyrics (check out 'The Model Of A Woman'), Johnny has obviously put a huge amount of time and effort into his latest project. The songs are extremely well crafted and leave you humming the melodies for hours afterwards. The music is sing/song, catchy power pop together with a strong flavor of late seventies new wave punk,and his vocal style, a sort of heavy metal Elvis Costello, suits it well. The styles range from the full-on punkiness of 'Television Love', 'Overrated' and 'Let's Set Our Hearts @ Self-Destruct' to the more laid back and emotional 'Still Haven't Called' and 'Fatal Problem', along with the acoustic-Beatlesy-ness of 'I Like You More'. A truly superb album, well worth checking out and definitely worthy of wide-spread recognition and major success. It would be a crime if a talent like this was to go unnoticed. If this was put out on a major label and got tons of airplay it would be absolutely huge - and rightly so.

5 out of 5

Ian Trigg
Black Velvet Magazine, UK



Johnny Monaco "Overrated"

Johnny Monaco crams 13 high-octane, radio-friendly pop punk tracks into Overrated. The chunky riffs and driving rhythms recall lightweight contemporary outfits like Cartel, while the harder-rocking numbers ("Television Love, " "Long Way Down") veer closer to classic punk rock. "I'll Take You As You Are" is a shiny, slick number with a soaring, shout-along chorus, and "Still Haven't Called" treads perilously around rock ballady territory. Monaco played every instrument, recorded, mixed, and engineered the entire album, and the polished, finished product is a testament to his technical and creative talents. www.johnnymonaco.com

Patrick Conlan
Illinois Entertainer