"Long Haired Weirdos" "Resistance to their long hair"
"The only time you saw long haired kids on Television was when
they were being arrested."
These are quotes from a tv show on the Smithsonian Channel about
the Monkees. Of course their hair is short compraed to my hair
today and others on this board.
Wow does this bring back memories.
(A post scr ipt to this. I know a woman who worked for Davy Jones
when he lived in Pennsylvania. Davy Jones died recently.)
I'm still peeved that the Monkees never got inducted into the Rack and Roll hall of fame.
I personally do not consider the Monkees to be in the same league as some of the people who have been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
One reason being was the Monkees were widely known to be a pre-fabricated group put together with the backing of a powerful record company and an were in essence an imitation of the Beatles. They got the nickname of the Pre-Fab Four for that reason. The Monkees were served up fame on a silver plate with a lot of media publicity provided by their record company. The idea for the Monkees were not their own. So you had four pretty looking young men being guided as to how to act and what to play whereas as most other groups wrote their own songs from their own creative sweat and had to work very hard to achieve fame. I wonder if any of the Monkees ever wrote or composed their own songs?
Sure they achieved big hits on the charts and sang some memorable songs like "I'm a believer" (my personal favourite Monkee song).
As a condolence to them they were accepted into the Hit Parade Hall of Fame in 2008.
I do enjoy listening to the Monkees but never saw them as being the equals of the Beatles.
I feel to be truly accepted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame is to have been a trail blazer pioneer who paved the way for others to follow.
I will always see the Monkees as imitators only. They were good imitators though.
Peace,
Duncan
Re: The Monkees. Peter Tork and Mike Nesmith were accomplixhed musicians in their own right, before being "monkees' Mike Nesmith was country and Peter Tork was Folk. True, the group was assembled as way to cash in on the Beatlemania then still in strength. Mickey Dolenz was an actor since childhood (Remember the show "Circus Boy") and Davey Jones was a stage actor. By virtue of his having a Brit accent and an acting resume. Jones was a given. The fact that Boyce 7 Hart wrote their first hit tunes is a matter of record, Howeverm they did write there own songs as early as 1967. True, They may not be on the level of the Beatles, Dylan, the stones, Cream, etc. But don't totally discount their musicianship.
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I totally agree, Duncan. They were Hollywood created. Marketing is everything, and they were well marketed. They were decent musicians, with good talent, but not on a par with The Beatles. You have said almost exactly what I would have regarding the Monkees.
I included a link, I hope it works.
Scott
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Monkees
Not true, many groups did songs that were written by someone
outside of the band.