Denton, 8.15.2026

Hit a wall this week so decided it's time for me to become an observational listener and scribe again for a minute. As fortune would have it, 'twas the evening when my favorite band, Monks of Saturnalia, was playing a pre-release show for their upcoming debut disc, Sacred Home, on new Oak Cliff-based indie Gentle Static Records, at a brand new venue, The Pony, a bar/restaurant-cum-eclectic music venue just off the square in Denton (314 E. Hickory, Suite 121, to be exact). So my buddy Mike and I saddled up and headed out to see what was what.

The Pony's a nicely appointed room with a maximum capacity of 55, good sightlines, and impeccable sound. I've been following the Monks for years and this was the first time I actually got to hear them the way they're supposed to sound, with leader Gregg Prickett's guitar ringing full and rich out front, up there with the (on this occasion) two-horn front line -- Dale Fielder on alto and soprano, Steve Brown on tenor -- and the rhythm section of bassist Drew Phelps and drummer Alan Green clearly audible (although sometimes visually obscured). Thanks to publicist extraordinaire Lisa Oldham's advance work, it was a full house, and The Pony's master of ceremonies Dorian Marsh started the evening with a request that the audience be quiet and listen.

Opening number was Prickett's Albert Ayler dedication "He Walked Into the River," which I first heard when it was performed by the very last incarnation of titanic drummer-composer Ronald Shannon Jackson's Decoding Society at Oak Cliff's Kessler Theater back in 2012. Previous versions with the Monks had included a spoken intro/outro with audience participation, but on this night, the music spoke for itself, the elegiac theme invoking the free jazz pioneer's combination of melodic simplicity and expressive emotionalism.

Second song "Hika" is a dedication to the first of four wolf hybrids Prickett has lived with over the years. It's a tumbling jazz waltz in the mold of late '50s Mingus, with Fielder and Brown locking horns like John Handy and Booker Ervin on Mingus Ah Um or Blues and Roots and Alan Green -- a master percussionist who combines subtlety and finesse with relentless swing -- providing the powerful propulsion. The first set closed with "Gone Dance," a new composition by bassist Drew Phelps, a Prickett collaborator since "before we were born," dedicated to Phelps' late wife Esther. The onstage communication between Phelps, Prickett, and drummer Green is nigh-on telepathic, and the bassist's compositions radiate warmth and soulfulness.

Second set started strong with another Phelps composition, "The Day the Crops Died," which gallops along like a Western movie soundtrack and provides ample opportunity for solo statements from all the players. Phelps is equally adept and expressive on arco and pizzicato, while Prickett combines classical chops with tastefully applied electronic effects and throws in an episode of nasty slide that evokes the shades of both Duane Allman and Sonny Sharrock. Fielder, a prolific leader in his own right, skirts the stratosphere on soprano and alto horns, while Brown is the epitome of the tough Texas tenor. 

The secret weapon, sitting in back, is Alan Green, a hard swinger in the tradition who's absorbed influences from the avant garde and can also groove hard like an R&B showband drummer. His brisk shuffle on Prickett's "My Underdog Soul" drives the tune relentlessly and serves as a launching pad for lots of horn pyrotechnics. That tune was followed by a moody change of pace, "Missing Requiem" -- a dedication to California wildfire victims co-composed by Pricett and baritone saxophonist Aidan Sears, who plays on the Monks record but is currently ensconced in the L.A. music scene. 

The Monks ended the evening with an improv exercise that's a digital-only bonus track on the album, which featured the band extemporizing freely while Prickett ran the changes to a standard ballad. As Mike and I were getting ready to return to the Fort, I told Lisa Oldham something on the order of, "You know how to get bodies in seats." Her response: "I just like to see Gregg smile." My favorite guitar player was smiling plenty last night. May it always be so.