While one would have expected The Monkees to fade into obscurity after the decade ended like so many other sixties fads, for some reason they kept coming back.  Like the swallows of San Juan Capistrano.  Or a herpes outbreak.

In 1976, on the 10^th anniversary of the show’s debut, Micky and Davy were looking to get the band back together.  They were unable to talk either mike or Peter into it, so instead they reunited with Monkees songwriters Tommy Boyce and Bobby Hart.  For legal reason they couldn’t call themselves The Monkees, but the self-titled album they recorded is essentially a Monkees record in everything but name.  There’s some good songs on there – as well some that either Tommy or Bobby sang that lacked the personality of a good Monkees tune.  The first three songs on this playlist come from that album.  I also included Gotta Get Up from the cast recording of a 1977 West End revival of Harry Nilsson’s The Point, as that also feels like something of a Monkees reunion with the two main singers doing the material of one of their better known songwriters.

In 1986, on the 20^th anniversary of the show’s debut, MTV played a marathon session of all the episodes of the TV show in a row.  This in turn sparked a new wave of Monkeemania, and the band’s reunion tour was upgraded to nearly stadium levels.  To capitalize on this freak phenomenon, The Monkees recorded their first album under their own name in 16 years, Pool It!  And then to destroy whatever momentum they had built up, The Monkees pissed off MTV so much that they refused to promote the album at all.  Which is probably for the best.  Pool It! is an example some of the worst traits of eighties songwriting and production all in one convenient package, as the next five tracks illustrate.  There was also a short-lived attempt to re-boot the TV show as The New Monkees around this time. I have not heard that album, but reportedly, it’s a lot like this only better. The best parts of the Pool It! are the two track courtesy of Peter Tork, who had rejoined The Monkees.  Despite the major popularity and renewed interest in the group at the time, Mike sat this out completely except for guesting on a couple of songs at one show in LA.

In 1996, on the 30^th anniversary of the show’s debut, Nesmith had decided he was ready to be a full-time Monkees, and for the first time since Head in 1968, all four Monkees worked on a new album together.  However, Mike insisted that The Monkees themselves write and play every single note themselves.  As we discussed in this episode of the podcast, the resultant album did not sound anything like The Monkees.  It certainly was a better album than Pool It!, but even with a one-hour TV special written and directed by Nesmith, the nineties reunion was nothing compared to the hype around the eighties reunion. Once again Peter Tork’s songs were the highlight.

In 2006, on the 40^th anniversary of the show’s debut, the various Monkees were in the middle of one of their periods of not talking to each other, and for the first time one of their ten year anniversaries was not marked by a new album.  This is a shame because in 2012, Davy Jones passed away thereby making a full reunion of all four Monkees impossible to achieve ever again.  However, much to everyone’s surprise, the cantankerous Nesmith, rejoined the band for what was supposed to be a brief jaunt to commemorate Davy’s passing.  Mike ended up having such a good time that he has stayed with the band pretty much ever since.

In 2016, on the 50^th anniversary of the show’s debut, Rhino Records had convinced the remaining three Monkees to let them do another album the old-fashioned way.  They convinced some more current songwriters like Weezer’s Rivers Cuomo and XTC’s Andy Partridge to write new material for the group.  They then hired Andrew Schlesinger to produce the album and just bring the Monkees in to add vocals and do their thing on top of the completed tracks.  This was rounded out with a couple of old songs with new vocals added to them.  The results, Good Times, was infinitely better than anyone would have predicted, earning The Monkees some of their greatest critical and commercial acclaim since their sixties heyday.  Never one to leave good things alone, 2 years later they repeated the exact same formula to make a Christmas album to predictably diminishing returns.  Christmas Party features a heavily auto-tuned Peter Tork vocal on Angels We Have Heard On High, which would be one of his last recordings before his death in 2019.

Who knows if Micky and Mike will still be around and talking to each other in 2026 – but if they are, there’s a good chance that we may need to add a few new tunes to this last playlist.

If phase one was feudalism, and phase two was democracy, then phase three of The Monkees career is anarchy.  As much as the members of The Monkees wanted freedom from Don Kirshner, so did they also eventually want their freedom from each other.  And it’s not that surprising.  The four of them didn’t have a lot in common to begin with and were sort of thrown into this together.  As a result, each Monkee would go to their own studio with their own musicians and record their own songs that the new music supervisor, Lester Sill, would sift through to create the last few Monkees albums. 

But it wasn’t just Micky, Mike, Peter, and Davy that were each off on their own, recording their own version of “Monkee” music.  The record company, noticing a decline in sales from where they once were, started re-hiring old producers to try and recapture some of the old Monkees magic.  It was a tough time for Colgems, The Monkees’ record company.  Despite high ratings, The Monkees had become such a huge pain in the ass to NBC, that it was mutually decided that the second season of their TV show would be their last.  So no more free half-hour commercials for Monkees albums week on prime time.  The Monkees didn’t see this as a problem.  Bob & Bert had a plan to launch them as movie stars.  Hiring struggling actor Jack Nicholson (!) to write the screenplay, the Monkees’ feature length denut, Head, would take all the criticisms that the band/TV show had received and comfront them head head-on and upend everything.  Or perhaps, Bob & Bert wanted to blow up the whole phenomenon so they could start making real art like Easy Rider. 

Whatever the intent, the first task for this newly reconfigured Monkees was to record music for this trippy, meaningless, experimental film.  Mike wrote a song for the “live” portion of the movie, Circle Sky.  And that is actually just the four of them playing on the first track of the playlist.  He also produced a Harry Nilsson song for Davy to sing (Daddy’s Song) during the dance number.  Peter, who had only had one song co-authored by him up to this point, got two of the seven songs on Head, Long Title and Can You Dig It?  Carole King wrote and produced two songs for the movie as well, the theme song Porpoise Song and the elegiac As We Go Along. 

Lester Sill insisted on issuing a cover of The Coasters D.W. Washburn as a stand-alone single.  It was the first Monkees single to really flop, showing that Lester was as bad at picking hit songs as Don Kirshner was good at it.  Michael Nesmith finally went straight to the source, flying to Nashville to record a bunch of songs (including Good Clean Fun, St. Matthew, and Listen To The Band) that were far more country than rock.  Peter got disillusioned after the failure of Head and quit the band.  Colgems tried to squeeze every last dime they could out of their IP by releasing albums like Instant Replay and The Monkees Present that were a mishmash of leftover tracks from their earliest years and the new stuff that Mike, Davy, and Micky were recording as long as someone was bankrolling the sessions.

Finally Mike left too.  This just left Davy, the tambourine player, and Micky, who didn’t want to play drums.  There was no way to keep on pretending that this was still a band.  So in one last ditch effort, Colgems re-hired Kirshner lackey Jeff Barry to produce one last album for them.  Released in 1970, Changes was seen as the last ditch effort of a dying property that didn’t know when to quit.  But just as The Monkees (the recording conglomerate) was falling apart, The Monkees (the TV show) was returning to Saturday morning television, spawning a whole new generation of fans, who would eventually grow old and nostalgic prompting a Monkees revival that in itself would create another generation of fans.  And so, even though this really should be the end to The Monkees saga, there is still one last chapter to go.

While the first phase of the Monkees’ career was a bit of a totalitarian state, there was a revolution and instead was installed a more democratic republic.  The Monkees weren’t allowed to play on their first few records, but were expected to go out on tour and recreate the hits they had no hand in creating.  This is started to rile the actors whose names and faces were now being touted as The Monkees.  Particularly the prickly Michael Nesmith.  After a confrontation where Nesmith put his fist through a wall, Kirshner’s days were number and he was soon ousted. 

In his stead, the four actors who had been playing together as a band for a couple of months elected Chip Douglas, bass player from The Turtles, to produce their album despite having less experience producing than Nesmith himself at this point.  The first album they recorded together reeked of amateurish enthusiasm.  They were proving a point to the world.  Micky Dolenz played drums on every track, despite having only learned the instrument less than a year before.  Headquarters was recorded during the hiatus between the first and second (final) season of the TV show, and they wanted to prove that they were no joke.  Even though they still employed the services of several of Kirshner’s stable of songwriters, they started bringing more material to the band themselves.  Both Micky’s first song (Randy Scouse Git) and Peter’s first song (For Pete’s Sake) are on this record.  They were very conscientious about playing all the instruments themselves, it was in fact Chip Douglas who played bass on most of this record as Peter was far more accomplished on the keyboards.  Mike even arranged and Peter notated the French horn and cello parts on Shades Of Gray.  Davy even bangs his tambourine through hundreds of takes of these songs just to show that they can.  And they did.  Despite having no real singles from the album, Headquarters remained comfortably ensconced in second behind Sgt. Pepper throughout the entire Summer of Love. 

For many this is their finest album.  It is certainly their most consistent, although some may argue that having these under-rehearsed, newly founded band playing on every track leads to sameness in the sound of the record.  The other record frequently floated as The Monkees’ best is their next one, Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn, & Jones, Ltd.  Chip Douglas is still at the helm for this one, but it is a far less cohesive affair.  Davy has lost all interest in playing tambourine and maracas, which is a small loss.  However, Micky feels he’s proven himself as a drummer, and doesn’t want to spend the time necessary to do a whole other album.  So now we’ve got Nesmith on guitar, Chip on bass, Tork on keyboards, and session musician Eddie Hoh on drums.  As a result, the sessions go much quicker and smoother and the recordings sound far more polished and professional.  Whether you think this is a benefit or detriment I suppose is dependent on your personal taste.  While this is not quite the Headquarters line-up, it is still nice to know that even with The Monkees playing their own instruments; they were able to score some of their biggest hits (Pleasant Valley Sunday, Daydream Believer).  It would’ve been a little disappointing if as soon as the crew mutinied the boat immediately sank.  In fact, Daydream Believerwas such a hit, that it was held off of the album to ensure there would be a hit to help sell album #5.

While Micky wasn’t playing on drums on this album, he did buy one of the first ever Moog synthesizers and brought that to the studio.  While they hired a professional to play it on Star Collector it was Micky himself who wrangled the random squeaks and noises on Daily Nightly.  The Monkees (and Chip Douglas) are expanding far beyond the limited reach of Headquarters.  Instead of having Peter play the banjo on What Am I Doing Hangin’ Round? they hire bluegrass legend Doug Dillard.  They discover Harry Nilsson and give him his first big songwriting break.  Indeed, Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn, & Jones, Ltd. has a nice combination of experimentalism without falling into self-indulgence, with songs ranging from country to lounge to rock to soft-shoe. However, the sweet siren call to the ego of self-indulgence would soon lure The Monkees to the third (and for a time, final) stage of their career.  Especially as the show was cancelled and any reason for them to continue as band and/or making records became far more nebulous.

Unlike The Beach Boys, The Monkees don’t have a single definitive album which provides a dividing line in their catalog.  Rather The Monkees’ discography falls into roughly three different phases, each with its own defining power structure.  The first section of The Monkees career is a bit of feudalism, with a number of lords and nobles jockeying for a power position under the King, Don Kirshner.

Since The Monkees were initially conceived and created as a TV show rather than a band, by a pair of Hollywood producers named Bob Rafelson and Bert Schneider.  The two of them hired Tommy Boyce & Bobby Hart to create the music that the band on this show would be performing.  Since the music for the show was initially seen as simply merch to help promote the main product (the show), Boyce & Hart were given somewhat free rein over the first album, save for a couple of songs.  The first five songs on this playlist (Theme from The Monkees, Last Train To Clarksville, Saturday’s Child, Take A Giant Step, and Gonna Buy Me A Dog) represent this period of the band.

However to many people’s surprise, the music started outselling the TV show, so NBC installed Don Kirshner as the music supervisor.  Despite having no actual musical ability himself, Kirshner had become somewhat famous as an impresario with a knack for predicting big hits.  In a way, he was the Simon Cowell of his time – famous as a music tastemaker, but not as an actual artist or producer or songwriter.  Once Kirshner was installed, Boyce & Hart became just one of many factions vying for the favor of his highness.

Despite the fact that only two of their songs ended up on the next album, Boyce & Hart wrote and recorded enough material for a complete follow-up.  As was typical during the Kirshner years, everyone was producing as much music as possible for Kirshner to cherry-pick from for the albums.  However, many of the songs Boyce & Hart recorded during this period ended up either being re-recorded or simply placed wholesale on later Monkees albums.  So while this is a chronological introduction to The Monkees, it is chronological in terms of when the songs were recorded and not necessarily when they were released.  The next six tunes (She, I’m Not Your Steppin’ Stone, Words, Valleri, Tear Drop City, and Looking For The Good Times) represent this period of the band, and are often the highlights of their more inconsistent later albums.

While Boyce & Hart might have been a little upset that Kirshner had usurped so much of their power, it was nothing compared to the acrimony of Don Kirshner’s Judas (or John Dean): Michael Nesmith.  Initially hired by Bob & Bert to play the part of musician Mike Nesmith, the real Nesmith took Bob & Bert’s vague mumblings of getting to make the music for the TV show as a promise and hired the Wrecking Crew and starting producing his own material.  Perhaps to placate (or patronize) the hot-tempered Nesmith, Kirshner would place a pair of Mike’s tunes on each of The Monkees’ first two albums.  While Mike’s submissions to Kirshner were often rejected for being completely (and possibly deliberately) noncommercial, he was the one making the most forward-thinking and interesting music of this period.  Years before the Eagles, or The Flying Burrito Brothers, or Sweethearts Of The Rodeo or Nashville Skyline, Texan Michael Nesmith was trying to fuse country into rock.  The next eight tunes (Sweet Young Thing, Papa Gene’s Blues, The Kind Of Girl I Could Love, Mary, Mary, I Won’t Be The Same Without Her, I Don’t Think You Know Me, All The King’s Horses, and You Just May Be The One) represent some Michael’s best work of the period, although most of it remained unreleased at the time not given the chance to influence they eventual birth of country-rock just a few years later.

While Boyce & Hart may have been ungrateful and Nesmith was antagonistic, Kirshner did have his allies and lackeys.  While all that music was being recorded in L.A., Kirshner, who hated to fly, has stationed on the East Coast, giving him access to all the Brill Building writers who were desperate for work now that the Beatles made writing your own songs so expected from a rock band.  Some would become famous after the stints writing for The Monkees (Carole King, Neil Diamond, Neil Sedaka).  Kirshner’s favorite henchman was a man named Jeff Barry.  Jeff was unapologetically a company man and more than willing to deliver the hits that Kirshner wanted.  While these may be some of the cheeziest, schlockiest, most calculated songs in the Monkees catalog.  However, they were also very successful.  While Boyce & Hart initially established The Monkees’ sound, it was Jeff Barry who produced their biggest and to this day best-known hits.  The final six songs (She Hangs Out, I’ll Be Back Up On My Feet, A Little Bit Me, A Little Bit You, Look Out (Here Comes Tomorrow), and I’m A Believer) represent Jeff Barry at his best – but also show why a palace coup was going to become unavoidable.