Formed in 1991, The Monkeywrench fused blues, punk, and classic garage rock. The project began when Mudhoney members Mark Arm and Steve Turner connected with Tim Kerr, guitarist from the Big Boys and Poison 13. After Arm and Turner voiced their admiration for Kerr’s Poison 13 era, he proposed they record together. Kerr handled guitar, Arm played piano and harmonica while singing, and Turner took up bass. The roster was rounded out by second guitarist Tom Price, ex of the U-Men, and drummer Martin Bland, previously with Lubricated Goat, the Primevils, and Bloodloss—the final group also featuring Arm on vocals and guitar.
Sub Pop Records learned of the new supergroup in 1991 and signed them at once. Later that year the band tracked its debut LP, Clean as a Broke-Dick Dog, at Egg Studios in Seattle with producer Conrad Uno. Released in 1992, the album was accompanied by a 7" containing two of its tracks—“Bottle Up & Go” and “Cold Cold World”—plus the extra song “Out of Focus.” The members stepped back in the mid-’90s while Arm and Turner remained occupied with Mudhoney and Kerr concentrated on the Lord High Fixers, yet they still issued a split 7" of the Germs song “Shut Down” on Gasatanka Records in late 1995. That track also appeared on the 1995 Grass Records tribute album A Small Circle of Friends.
In the latter half of the decade Kerr grew closer to Estrus Records’ Dave Crider, producing numerous acts for the label and playing in Jack O’Fire and the Lord High Fixers; these ties prompted the Monkeywrench to join the Estrus roster in 1999. That November the band entered Private Radio Studios with producer Jack Endino to cut its second full-length, Electric Children, which came out on April 4, 2000. Another eight years passed before the group reassembled, yielding Gabriel’s Horn, issued by Sub Pop in March 2008.
