Go Furness

A Monster with a Good Heart!

Dave Crossley started Monster Monster 5 years ago after completing an unrelated degree in Lancaster and realising that he wanted to work with music. His love of music began in childhood when he was immersed in punk and guitar sounds.

He was deeply influenced by his older brother’s vinyl collection. He spoke fondly of the ‘good old days’ growing up in Ulverston when there were lots of great gigs and bands around. Today, Dave laments the lack of venues willing to back live music and aims to find a regular outlet for music lovers in Ulverston in the very near future.

From early teens he was massively into all kinds of music; electronica, hip hop, drum and bass, rock and pretty much everything in between. This eclecticism was to prove important in the development of MM.

But MM is much more than just music; one of the most important things to Dave is the show. Each event is a month long project. And I have to say each show is more creative and more surreal than the last. He has dancers, MCs, live video projections, percussionist and a theme for each show. The props take many hours to create. All of the dancer’s costumes are made professionally and are specific to each event. It is no wonder that each show will fill 2–3 floors of a club in Manchester…

Some of his previous themes have included (The Burtonesque Burlesque (Tim Burton), Day of the Dead, Monster on the Orient Express, Super Monster and Monster in Wonderland. As a non-driver, Dave has been known to carry very odd props around on the trains…such as 3 blind mice, several planets and a giant fly agaric mushroom. He sees the club space as a blank canvas, an opportunity to create a random Glastonbury bizarreness and transport people to another place.

If this all sounds a little odd, just look at the photos. The smiles and the crowds say that what he is doing works. In fact, Dave promotes ‘indoor festival behaviour’. He deliberately brings different kinds of music under one roof. He could be said to be a lateral-thinking peacemaker; by cross-pollinating the scene, he has brought diverse groups together and has never had any trouble.

It took 2–3 years to really establish himself and now you would be hard-pushed to find a young person in Furness who doesn’t know what Monster Monster is. Just look at the number of friends on his MySpace. He currently attracts quite a young audience at the moment in Furness, although this is changing. In Manchester you are likely to find people between 18 and 50 at his events.

He admits that at first, his efforts were purely hedonistic but now he wants to develop into an inspirational creative business. He would like to work in schools, perhaps with his MC, Marvin, who is already doing this in Manchester. Marvin (Crown Jewelz) actively campaigns against gun crime whilst singing with the kids.

As well as Monster, Dave is busy working with others in Ulverston to establish UCAN (Ulverston Community Arts Network).

Interested? You can see Monster Monster on the 16th of February at the Canteen and they will be occupying a stage for the day at the popular Kendal Calling Event. It will be interesting to watch how the Monster Plans evolve…

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Posted by Kay Hebbourn on 6th February.