Wasn't Born To Follow - The Monkees Peter Tork on Vocals From the album:
Rhino Records Released 27th May 2016
US Chart #14
UK Chart #29
Written by Carole King and Gerry Goffin Originally produced by The Monkees Originally started during the sessions for 'The Birds, The Bees & The Monkees' but previously unfinished or unreleased. Recorded at RCA Victor Studios, Hollywood, March 9, 1968, and Lucy's Meat Market, Los Angeles, February 2016
Yesterday the news came through of the death of Peter Tork (77years old) of The Monkees, so it seemed fitting that today's Tidy Tune should be something from that band with Peter's vocal ringing out.
Tork may have played a bit of a dimwit on The Monkees TV show but he was actually a very intelligent fellow, a songwriter and multi-instrumentalist.
Peter Tork
Live at Wolfgang's Vault
22nd April 2011
Reissue of the 1976 Greatest Hits album originally released on Arista Records (which was has also been reissued in 1980, 1982, and 1986).
Strangely enough, the track listing for this album is exactly the same as Re-Focus - The Monkees that was released by Bell Records in 1972 and Bell Records eventually became a part of the Arista Records stable in 1974.
With all the really good albums released in 2016 it was quite hard to pick my most favourite one as the choices were quite tough but one album in particular really stood out for me and since its release back in May I have played it at lease once or even twice a week at times.
Good Times! - The Monkees
Rhino Records
Produced by Adam Schlesinger & Andrew Sandoval
Released 27th May 2016
US Chart #14
UK Chart #29
Good Times! (Deluxe Version with Bonus Tracks)
CD Deluxe Edition
Good Times! Track Listing (with songwriters noted) 1. "Good Times" (Harry Nilsson) 2. "You Bring The Summer" (Andy Partridge) 3. "She Makes Me Laugh" (Rivers Cuomo) 4. "Our Own World" (Adam Schlesinger) 5. "Gotta Give It Time" (Jeff Barry/Joey Levine) 6. "Me & Magdalena" (Ben Gibbard) 7. "Whatever's Right" (Tommy Boyce/Bobby Hart) 8. "Love To Love" (Neil Diamond) 9. "Little Girl" (Peter Tork) 10. "Birth Of An Accidental Hipster" (Noel Gallagher/Paul Weller) 11. "I Wasn't Born To Follow" (Carole King/Gerry Goffin) 12. "I Know What I Know" (Michael Nesmith) 13. "I Was There (And I'm Told I Had A Good Time)" (Micky Dolenz/Adam Schlesinger 14. Terrifying (Zach Rogue) 15. "Me & Magdalena (Version 2)" (Ben Gibbard)
In the US the Vinyl Release included a bonus Limited Edition 7". This was only available from Barnes & Noble.
Side 1
Side 2
All tracks including the bonus 7" and tracks featured on the Deluxe Edition of the album are included in the Playlist above.
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Today it is the 74th Birthday of Michael Nesmith of The Monkees. It would also have been the 71st Birthday of Davy Jones of The Monkees (he passed away 29th February 2012).
I know I posted about their Good Times! album way back in May but it is a good time to revisit it I think as I've updated the Playlist to include all tracks from the album as well as the bonus tracks from the Deluxe and Bonus 7" single.
When I was thinking about some of my favourite albums of 2016 one of the best I think was this first studio album in 20 years from The Monkees and released in their 50th Anniversary year! People might wonder why on earth a bunch of blokes in their Seventies are still making music (and still going out on tour as well!). One listen to this album and you can really understand exactly why they are still at it. Their is a real freshness to the sound and a new spring in their step (or shuffle!).
The owners of Rhino Records (John Hughes and Mark Pinkus) were the ones who first floated the idea of a new album from The Monkees to celebrate their 50th Anniversary. Adam Schlesinger of Fountains of Wayne was hired to produce the album. The project initially was going to include unreleased songs by a number of the songwriters they used back in the 1960s - Carole King & Gerry Goffin, Neil Diamond, Tommy Boyce, Harry Nilsson and Bobby Hart . The plan was expanded and newer writers like Andy Partridge (XTC), Ben Gibbard (Death Cab For Cutie), Paul Weller/Noel Gallagher and Schlesinger himself ended up contributing freshly written songs.
All four of The Monkees are represented on the album including a long lost vocal from Davy Jones.
Peter Tork, Micky Dolenz and Michael Nesmith (coming out of semi-retirement) also have contributed a song each. Most of the vocals are by Micky Dolenz but Peter Tork takes the lead for Little Girl and the Carole King & Gerry Goffin penned I Wasn't Born to Follow, and Michael Nesmith for I Know What I Know. Gibbard's Me and Magdalena has Dolzenz and Nesmith singing together as does Weller & Gallagher's Birth of an Accidental Hipster.
Some tracks on the album have their roots in songs going back to the 1960's: album opener Good Times was originally a 1967 demo from Harry Nilsson that they managed to turn into a duet between Micky Dolenz and Nilsson! There's also Love To Love, which had been a discarded song written by Neil Diamond and is here with an updated backing track but with the original vocal by Davy Jones. Whatever's Right and also Gotta Give It Time use music from original tapes recorded in the 1960's.
The newer songs I think sound absolutely stunning and in some ways whilst it sounded like it could be a bit of a car wreck with such a diverse bunch of writers, they actually made it that the songs could only have been recorded by The Monkees.
Reviews for the album were generally very positive (the negative ones were quite few - The Evening Standard and The Irish Times and The Times gave it a bit of mixed review). A 4 out of 5 review by The Independent, who declared that Good Times! was "probably The Monkees' best album, after their hits compilation."The New York Times concluded their review "Fifty years later, the Monkees are still endearing", while Record Collector stated "to everyone’s considerable relief and delight, they’ve pulled it off. They really have," and gave the album four stars. Rob Sheffield, writing for Rolling Stone said, "Monkees freaks have waited far too long for this album. But it was worth it." Barry Divola in the Australian edition of Rolling Stone gave it full marks whilst noting "Producer Adam Schlesinger of Fountains Of Wayne knows a thing or five about classic pop, and although Good Times! is a Frankenstein's monster of something old, something new and something in between, he manages to orchestrate the whole thing into something beyond an embarrassing heritage act."Ultimate Classic Rock declared it "is nothing short of a masterpiece."
Mojo music magazine ranked it #30 in The 50 Best Albums of 2016.
Last Train To Clarksville / Take A Giant Step - The Monkees
Colgems #1001
Produced by Tommy Boyce and Bobby Hart
Released 16th August 1966
US Chart #1
UK Chart #23
A-Side
B-Side
In the age in which we are now living there has been a constant snubbing of the nose toward Manufactured Pop Music that has come out of shows like X Factor, The Voice and American Idol and some of the displeasure is valid. But what people forget is that in one sense there has always been "Manufactured Pop Music" going right back to the 1950s and especially in the Sixties.
Davy Jones had already been recruited and so on September 8–10, 1965, Daily Variety and The Hollywood Reporter ran an ad to cast the remainder of the band/cast members for the TV show:
Madness!! Auditions. Folk & Roll Musicians-Singers
for acting roles in new TV series. Running Parts for 4 insane boys, age
17-21. Want spirited Ben Frank's types. Have courage to work. Must come
down for interview.
Out of 437 applicants, the other three chosen for the cast of the TV show were Michael Nesmith, Peter Tork and Micky Dolenz. Nesmith had been working as a musician since early 1963 and had been recording and releasing music under various names, including Michael Blessing and "Mike & John & Bill" and had studied drama in college; contrary to popular belief, of the final four, Nesmith was the one member who actually saw the ad in the Daily Variety and The Hollywood Reporter. Tork, the last to be chosen, had been working the Greenwich Village scene as a musician, and had shared the stage with Pete Seeger; he learned of The Monkees from Stephen Stills, whom Rafelson and Schneider had rejected. Dolenz was an actor (his father was veteran character actor George Dolenz) who had starred in the TV series Circus Boy as a child, using the stage name Mickey Braddock, and he had also played guitar and sung in a band called the Missing Links before The Monkees, which had recorded and released a very minor single, "Don't Do It". By that time he was using his real name; he found out about The Monkees through his agent.
On this day in 1966 the Debut Single by The Monkees was released and the rest as they say is history. They had four #1 albums between 1966-67, 6 Top Ten Singles between 1966-67 (which included 3 #1's - Last Train To Clarksville, I'm A Believer and Daydream Believer).
The Monkees are still on the go 50 years later having released what I think is one of the albums of the year in Good Times.
So much for Manufactured Pop Music not staying the course!
Dedicated to my mate Ralph!
He's still waiting for The Monkees to come down his street!
I don't know if you'll believe me or not but the first Studio Album from The Monkees in 20 years (Justus in 1996) might actually turn out to be their best album ever!
It's been 50 years since the release of their debut album The Monkees and also their debut single Last Train To Clarksville and listening to the new album there is a real feel for the late sixties on it whilst also maintaining a very contemporary feel to it.
Some bits of the album have their roots in tracks going back to the 1960's: album opener Good Times was originally a 1967 demo from Harry Nilsson that they managed to turn into a duet between Micky Dolenz and Nilsson! There's also Love To Love, which had been a discarded song written by Neil Diamond and is here with an updated backing track but with the original vocal by Davy Jones (it's actually quite cool hearing him alongside the band again). Whatever's Right and also Gotta Give It Time use music from tapes recorded in the 1960's.
It's the songs written by newer artists that are the most surprising though. I can remember when I first heard about this project I thought that's just going to sound strange hearing songs written by the likes of Paul Weller/Noel Gallagher, Andy Partridge (XTC), Ben Gibbard (Death Cabe for Cutie) and Adam Schlesinger (Fountains of Wayne) performed by The Monkees, but you know, these songs sound like they were something that only The Monkees could perform!
Peter Tork, Micky Dolenz and Michael Nesmith (coming out of semi-retirement) also have contributed a song each. Most of the vocals are by Micky Dolenz but Peter Tork takes the lead for Little Girl and the Carole King & Gerry Goffin penned I Wasn't Born to Follow, and Michael Nesmith for I Know What I Know. Gibbard's Me and Magdalena has Dolzenz and Nesmith singing together as does Weller & Gallagher's Birth of an Accidental Hipster.
I know I get a little excited about music from time to time and with this new album from The Monkees I feel the excitement is well worth it.
Most of the reviews I've seen so far for the album have been pretty glowing, and rightly so. This album joins the pile for The Soundtrack4Life Album of the Year!
A Sneak Peak at Good Times!
Good Times! Track Listing (with songwriters noted) 1. "Good Times" (Harry Nilsson) 2. "You Bring The Summer" (Andy Partridge)* 3. "She Makes Me Laugh" (Rivers Cuomo)* 4. "Our Own World" (Adam Schlesinger) 5. "Gotta Give It Time" (Jeff Barry/Joey Levine) 6. "Me & Magdalena" (Ben Gibbard)* 7. "Whatever's Right" (Tommy Boyce/Bobby Hart) 8. "Love To Love" (Neil Diamond) 9. "Little Girl" (Peter Tork) 10. "Birth Of An Accidental Hipster" (Noel Gallagher/Paul Weller) 11. "I Wasn't Born To Follow" (Carole King/Gerry Goffin) 12. "I Know What I Know" (Michael Nesmith) 13. "I Was There (And I'm Told I Had A Good Time)" (Micky Dolenz/Adam Schlesinger
Today is the 71st Birthday of Micky Dolenz of The Monkees. Big congratulations on making it this far!
2016 is also the 50th Anniversary of the band and the TV Series (You can watch all the Episodes here!). They are due to release a brand new album in June this year entitled Good Times!
There's going to be a tour (see link above) in the States (no word of elsewhere yet). Michael Nesmith will not be on the tour and it will be just Micky and Peter Tork. Nesmith had joined them on some dates in 2012 following the death of Davy Jones, these had been his first shows with the band since 1997 Justus Tour (the last to feature all four Monkees). He did a couple of more tours but after the 2014 dates he stepped aside and so the 2015 shows just featured Tork and Dolenz.
Anyway, it gives a good excuse to post some music from The Monkees.
There are many compilations of the music of The Monkees but this 57 Track 2CD set is a real cracker.
Monkeemania (The Very Best of The Monkees) - The Monkees
Released 9th May 2011
Disc 1 - Track listing "(Theme From) The Monkees" (Tommy Boyce, Bobby Hart) – 2:20 "Last Train to Clarksville" (Boyce, Hart) – 2:46 "Take a Giant Step" (Gerry Goffin, Carole King) – 2:31 "Saturday's Child" (David Gates) - 2:44 "Papa Gene's Blues" (Michael Nesmith) - 1:59 "I Wanna Be Free" [Album Version] (Boyce, Hart) – 2:26 "I'm a Believer" (Neil Diamond) – 2:46 "(I'm Not Your) Steppin' Stone" (Boyce, Hart) – 2:23 "She" (Boyce, Hart) – 2:39 "Mary, Mary" (Nesmith) - 2:17 "Your Auntie Grizelda" (Diane Hilderbrand, Jack Keller) - 2:29 "Look Out (Here Comes Tomorrow)" [Extended Mix] (Diamond) – 2:49 "Sometime in the Morning" (Goffin, King) - 2:29 "When Love Comes Knockin' (At Your Door)" (Neil Sedaka, Carole Bayer Sager) - 1:48 "A Little Bit Me, A Little Bit You" (Diamond) – 2:48 "She Hangs Out" (Single Version) (Jeff Barry) - 2:34 "The Girl I Knew Somewhere" (Nesmith) – 2:33 "All of Your Toys" (Bill Martin) - 3:09 "Randy Scouse Git (Alternate Title)" (Micky Dolenz) – 2:34 "You Just May Be the One" (Nesmith) - 2:04 "Forget That Girl" (Douglas Farthing Hatlelid) - 2:26 "Shades of Gray" (Barry Mann, Cynthia Weil) – 3:23 "For Pete's Sake" (Peter Tork, Joey Richards) – 2:11 "Sunny Girlfriend" (Nesmith) - 2:33 "You Told Me" (Nesmith) - 2:25 "No Time" (Hank Cicalo) - 2:09 "Salesman" (Craig Vincent Smith) - 2:36 "The Door into Summer" (Douglas, Martin) - 2:49 "Daily Nightly" (Nesmith) - 2:32 "Star Collector" (Goffin, King) - 4:24
Disc 2 - Track listing "Pleasant Valley Sunday" (Goffin, King) – 3:08 "Words" (Boyce, Hart) – 2:51 "What Am I Doing Hanging 'Round" (Michael Martin Murphey, Owen Castleman) – 3:08 "Cuddly Toy" (Harry Nilsson) – 2:40 "Daydream Believer" (John Stewart) – 2:58 "Goin' Down" (Dolenz, Hilderbrand, Davy Jones, Nesmith, Tork) - 4:23 "Valleri" (Boyce, Hart) – 2:14 "I'll Be Back up on My Feet" (Sandy Linzer, Denny Randell) - 2:28 "P.O. Box 9847" (Boyce, Hart) - 3:15 "Tapioca Tundra" (Nesmith) - 3:06 "D.W. Washburn" (Leiber & Stoller) - 2:48 "Daddy's Song" (Nilsson) – 3:28 "Porpoise Song (Theme from "Head")" (Goffin, King) – 4:13 "As We Go Along" (King, Toni Stern) – 3:54 "Can You Dig It?" (Tork) – 3:24 "Circle Sky" (Alternate Mix) (Nesmith) - 2:31 "Long Title: Do I Have to Do This All Over Again?" (Tork) – 2:39 "Tear Drop City" (Boyce, Hart) - 2:01 "A Man Without a Dream" (Goffin, King) – 3:03 "Someday Man" (Roger Nichols, Paul Williams) – 2:40 "Listen to the Band" (Nesmith) – 2:28 "Some of Shelly's Blues" (Nesmith) - 2:30 "How Insensitive" (Antonio Carlos Jobim, Vinicus DeMoraes, Norman Gimbel) - 2:32 "Good Clean Fun" (Nesmith) - 2:18 "Mommy and Daddy" (Dolenz) - 2:13 "Oh My My" (Barry, Andy Kim) - 3:01 "(Theme from) The Monkees" (TV Version) (Boyce, Hart) – 0:50
Bonus
The sound and visual quality is not great on this but it is the first full concert performance of all four of TheMonkees since 1968!
Back when I was a kid the TV always threw up a wee delight or two musically speaking. One particular show and band that always seemed to be on the TV were The Monkees. Their show actually was cancelled in 1968 (when I was a mere nipper of 5 years old!) but even up to the mid and late 70's it was still on the box! And I could hardly believe it that every episode in full is up on You Tube!Check it out here!
The Monkees of course were a band that was "created" for a TV Show but Micky, Pete, Davey and Mike took the step to make fiction a reality and actually became a band. Micky Dolenz would later describe it this way, "The Monkees really becoming a band was like the equivalent of Leonard Nimoy really becoming a Vulcan!" It's a pretty amazing story, which you can discover in this documentary:
Their Theme Song is almost like a Manifesto for every Youth Music Scene that has sprung up over the years and when I was a teenager their music was brought to life even by the Punk Scene with the Sex Pistols playing '(I'm Not Your) Steppin' Stone'! One of the things I like about The Monkees is that their music is not disposable pop music, rather it has a longevity about it that I'm fairly certain few would have predicted back in the late 1960's and I don't think you can talk about the music of that era without mentioning them. Yes it all went a bit downhill for them once the TV Show was cancelled but the music that came out of that has stood the test of time. Personally I feel no sense of shame saying that I was and still am a fan of the music of The Monkees and it's great today to be able to spolight them in Alphabetical Beats.
The Music Box (2001)
Summer 1967: The Complete U.S Concert Recordings (2001)
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