“Monkey Gone To Heaven” by Pixies

by Amanda London·February 2, 2022

“Monkey Gone To Heaven” commences with the vocalist referencing “an underwater god who controlled the sea”. It sounds like Frank Black may be referring to the likes of Neptune or Poseidon or however one may term such an entity.

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But really, this song isn’t about mythology or anything like that per se. Rather, more to the point is the said figure being depicted as getting “killed by 10,000,000 pounds of sludge”. So in actuality what the vocalist is alluding to, in a poetic way, is the issue of water pollution, thus setting the tone for the rest of the piece to come.

As such, the issues dealt with the second verse are the depletion of the ozone layer and the greenhouse effect, the latter of which in more contemporary times tends to be referred to as global warming or what have you. And the vocalist once again approaches these issues using metaphorical, and shall we science-fiction inspired language.

The Bible

Meanwhile, the third verse steers the listener in a different direction. Said passage, as explained by the songwriter, is actually based on Frank Black’s cursory understanding of Biblical numerology at the time. But basically, he uses the opportunity to present “man” as the number “five”, the devil as “six” and “God” as “seven”.

The connotation behind it all is that the devil is superior to man, with God trumping both. And needless to say, such terminology can lead to a number of speculations as to why the Pixies would include such an idea in a song which appears to be primarily about the environment in the first place.

But one logical postulation as to why the Pixies incorporated Biblical numerology into this piece is that man relatedly being designated as a “five”, placed lower than the devil even, points to the notion of that we, in a way, are even wickeder than Beelzebub. Under the estimation of the vocalist, it may be mankind’s adherence to the influences of Satan, i.e. being primarily motivated by greed and comfort, which are causing us to treat the environment so poorly.

“Monkey Gone To Heaven”

And then as far as the title goes, as reported by Rolling Stone the reason Frank decided to name the song so is because the titular phrase, to him, “sounds neat”. So there’s really no need to dive into what “monkey gone to heaven” is supposed to mean since, according to the author himself, it isn’t meant to actually point to anything.

But what could be said is that the comedic, if you will, nature of the title sorta offsets just how serious this piece actually is, dealing with the likes of environmental degradation and spiritual – or some may even argue Luciferian – philosophy.

Pixies' Black Francis talks about "Monkey Gone To Heaven"

Release Date of “Monkey Gone to Heaven”

This track is from the Pixies’ second album, “Doolittle”, also serving as the LP’s lead single. And to serve that purpose, the song was released by Elektra Records on the date of 20 March 1989.

The song didn’t make a lot of noise on music charts. However, it most notably peaked at number five on Billboard’s Alternative Airplay listing. But as such stories sometimes go, the tune still went on to be recognized as a “Single of the Year” by the likes of Rolling Stone, NME and The Village Voice. And even more impressively, it landed on the 2004 edition of Rolling Stone’s “500 Greatest of All Time” list (though it has been removed from the ranking since).

More Facts

The writing credit for this song goes to Pixies’ frontman Frank Black. He reportedly actually came up with the hook (i.e.” the monkey’s gone to heaven”) before the rest of the lyrics.

Frank also directed this track’s music video, alongside Neil Pollack. And with “Monkey Gone to Heaven” being the second single in the Pixies’ discography, said clip also marked the first music video which the band ever put together.

This song features a couple of cellists on top of two violinists, an addition that was made by producer Gil Norton. In doing so, he made this the first Pixies’ track to feature musicians outside of the members of the band.

The cover art to “Doolittle” features the image of a monkey (with a halo) as well as the numbers six and seven. The artist behind it, Vaughan Oliver, conceptualized the imagery after listening to “Monkey Gone to Heaven”. Also as originally intended, Frank was going to entitle the album “Whore”. But after seeing the cover art which Oliver put together, he opted not to.

The other members of the Pixies to participate on this song are as follows: