I like it!
― timellison, Thursday, 28 April 2016 23:18 (eight years ago) link
"she makes me laugh"? more like, "this song is laughable"!
i'll be here all week.
― wizzz! (amateurist), Friday, 29 April 2016 00:15 (eight years ago) link
It sounds nothing like and recalls pretty much nothing of the Monkees so maybe this is finally the sequel to Pool It! I've been longing for.
― Your Ass Is Grass And I Will Mow It With My Face (Old Lunch), Friday, 29 April 2016 01:37 (eight years ago) link
Micky asked Ami who's that band that her kids like these days and she said she thought they were called Weezer and by the time this conversation got back to her mortified kids Micky had already recorded the song.
― Your Ass Is Grass And I Will Mow It With My Face (Old Lunch), Friday, 29 April 2016 01:39 (eight years ago) link
It sounds nothing like and recalls pretty much nothing of the Monkees
It sounds like a '60s-ish band with a tambourine player. Lyrically, this is the band that did "Cuddly Toy."
― timellison, Friday, 29 April 2016 02:08 (eight years ago) link
sincerely hope that everybody involved in this cash-in garbage dies ASAP
― the 'major tom guy' (sleeve), Friday, 29 April 2016 02:40 (eight years ago) link
I think I just read that they did, iirc.
― Your Ass Is Grass And I Will Mow It With My Face (Old Lunch), Friday, 29 April 2016 02:41 (eight years ago) link
it's not that bad, y'all calm down.
― 6 god none the richer (m bison), Friday, 29 April 2016 03:00 (eight years ago) link
Lyrically, this is the band that did "Cuddly Toy."
I mean that was written by Nilsson, and not specifically for the band, so . . . ?
― a 47-year-old chainsaw artist from South Carolina (Phil D.), Friday, 29 April 2016 12:27 (eight years ago) link
Cuomo isn't fit to lick Nilsson's shoes
― Οὖτις, Friday, 29 April 2016 15:17 (eight years ago) link
Rivers Cuomo is a better songwriter than 3.5 Neil Diamonds
― PaulTMA, Friday, 29 April 2016 17:02 (eight years ago) link
The complete series/Head/addenda blu-ray box is actually tempting me.
I'm glad I went for it when it was first announced -- the money was there so I thought "Eh, let me just pay now and that way it'll feel like a bonus when it finally comes out." The more they keep adding to it the more I'm intrigued, but it sounds like they've at least reached final cut-off.
― Ned Raggett, Friday, 29 April 2016 17:05 (eight years ago) link
― timellison, Thursday, April 28, 2016 10:08 PM (2 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
r u serious? "Cuddly Toy" is a great melody, especially that Beatlesy minor key middle 8. i think the lyrics are a bit deeper than you give them credit for, i see it of a mind w "Under My Thumb"/"Get Off My Cloud"-era Stones or Floyd that peculiar British take on psychedelic, a twee/regressive/(proto-punk?) cynical whimsy tinged with sex and drugs
― AdamVania (Adam Bruneau), Saturday, 30 April 2016 17:22 (eight years ago) link
my main problem w this song is the production, it sounds like a robot. the words are all choppy. the swing is not there, you can get a more rock swing from a casio keyboard beat. the meter of the words is just not enjoyable for me to hear.
the melody could be cool maybe but it sounds like someone who has played music so much they don't even know what to do anymore and are just trying bad ideas just for the sake of not being bored while writing song #536
― AdamVania (Adam Bruneau), Saturday, 30 April 2016 17:26 (eight years ago) link
I was just arguing that the silliness in the lyrics does not seem out of character for a Monkees song to me at all, especially a Micky song. If "Cuddly Toy" was not the most apt song to bring up, there are others.
― timellison, Saturday, 30 April 2016 18:17 (eight years ago) link
It's not the silly lyrics that make it not sound like a Monkee's song but rather the fact that it doesn't sound like a Monkee's song. And I wouldn't argue that it's bad, just that it doesn't sound like a Monkee's song.
― Your Ass Is Grass And I Will Mow It With My Face (Old Lunch), Saturday, 30 April 2016 19:10 (eight years ago) link
I have no idea why I just possessive-ized Monkees four times.
― Your Ass Is Grass And I Will Mow It With My Face (Old Lunch), Saturday, 30 April 2016 19:11 (eight years ago) link
The Andy Partridge tune is out, and basically sounds like they copied and pasted Mickey's auto-tuned vocals into an XTC demo:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n_D6XNpYxdU
The phrasing is so Partridge-esque that Schlesinger and Partridge may have directed him line-by-line.
― a 47-year-old chainsaw artist from South Carolina (Phil D.), Tuesday, 3 May 2016 13:18 (eight years ago) link
It's okay but I will never think of it again pretty much, I don't hear much in the way of auto-tuning in Dolenz's voice though, I'm sure it was corrected but it's still a little wayward in places.
― MaresNest, Tuesday, 3 May 2016 14:50 (eight years ago) link
Drummer sounds like Prairie Prince too
― MaresNest, Tuesday, 3 May 2016 14:51 (eight years ago) link
p good, does sound much more like an XTC song than a Monkees one but whatever
― Οὖτις, Tuesday, 3 May 2016 15:30 (eight years ago) link
"Birth of an Accidental Hipster" is awesome!
― timellison, Sunday, 29 May 2016 05:00 (eight years ago) link
the hell this reunion album is kinda awesome huh?? craziness
― rockpalast '82 (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Thursday, 2 June 2016 16:47 (eight years ago) link
I mean at least a part of this is the surprise and low expectations but goddamn this is all good-to-great and really nicely produced
― rockpalast '82 (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Thursday, 2 June 2016 17:03 (eight years ago) link
really like the very white album/nilsson-y "i was there (and i'm told i had a good time)"
― fact checking cuz, Thursday, 2 June 2016 22:36 (eight years ago) link
(not to be confused with the actual nilsson song on this album)
― fact checking cuz, Thursday, 2 June 2016 22:37 (eight years ago) link
I didn't like that Rivers Phoenix tune at all the first time I heard it, so was steering clear of this album, but I finally put it on just now thanks to the accolades and kind of digging it, even that RP tune.
― Jim Reeves in the Temple (James Redd and the Blecchs), Friday, 3 June 2016 00:57 (eight years ago) link
I like the production, neither too modern slick nor too retro schtick.
― Jim Reeves in the Temple (James Redd and the Blecchs), Friday, 3 June 2016 01:05 (eight years ago) link
Ha, I said Rivers Phoenix twice instead of Rivers Cuomo.
― Prince Rogers (Version) (James Redd and the Blecchs), Friday, 3 June 2016 01:22 (eight years ago) link
http://i.imgur.com/mMRCcSD.jpg
― small doug yule carnival club (unregistered), Friday, 3 June 2016 01:30 (eight years ago) link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o-5E6_qtXAw
― Prince Rogers (Version) (James Redd and the Blecchs), Friday, 3 June 2016 01:35 (eight years ago) link
I was steering clear because I've had mixed results with non-60s Monkees material but at a bare minimum the song "Good Times" is worth the price of admission for me
― STOP KILLING ANIMALS, THEY'RE MINT (DJP), Friday, 3 June 2016 13:52 (eight years ago) link
In related Monkee news, Wounded Bird has just done an expanded reissue of The Lewis and Clark Expedition album, which iirc has never been officially released on CD before.
― Now I Know How Joan of Arcadia Felt (C. Grisso/McCain), Tuesday, 7 June 2016 18:05 (eight years ago) link
This album really is surprisingly (for me, a non-Monkees fan anyway) good. Maybe most surprising is that songs written by actual Monkees (Tork's Little Girl and Nesmith's I Know What I Know) are as good as any of the other (also good) songs by the ringer songwriters.
― Dominique, Tuesday, 7 June 2016 22:47 (eight years ago) link
No surprise about Michael Nesmith, a fantastic songwriter.
― Larry 'Leg' Smith (Tom D.), Tuesday, 7 June 2016 23:13 (eight years ago) link
The surprise there may be that he's using a good song on a Monkees album rather than saving it for one of his own. Still haven't heard it, except for the Cuomo one, which I may have liked more had I not read the lyrics while listening to it.
― nickn, Tuesday, 7 June 2016 23:25 (eight years ago) link
Looking at his discography over the last 20 years, he's the opposite of prolific, so he may have been grateful to have a Monkees album to place the one or two really good songs he had in the can.
― pleas to Nietzsche (WilliamC), Tuesday, 7 June 2016 23:41 (eight years ago) link
http://www.rockcellarmagazine.com/2016/06/07/andy-partridge-interview-the-monkees-good-times-xtc-songwriting/#sthash.LtlqW0S1.ok6InECj.dpbs
― Οὖτις, Wednesday, 8 June 2016 20:04 (seven years ago) link
Mike Nesmith's final Monkees concert is tonight. There's been some good footage on facebook of the last few nights.
― timellison, Saturday, 17 September 2016 00:42 (seven years ago) link
Deep regret that thanks to accidental timing I missed both the Veldt playing SF -- which would have been the first time I'd ever get to see them at long last -- and the Monkees down in Monterey, where Nesmith joined them since he lives in Carmel Valley. Ah well.
― Ned Raggett, Saturday, 17 September 2016 01:04 (seven years ago) link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T7rphYKTmI8
this song pretty much rules. love the part where he's not singing any words and they play w the echo on his voice. Nirvana would've done done an amazing cover of this.
― AdamVania (Adam Bruneau), Friday, 6 January 2017 06:02 (seven years ago) link
i love that album
― maura, Friday, 6 January 2017 17:36 (seven years ago) link
yes! me too!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=80dnoJZqYgE
― AdamVania (Adam Bruneau), Friday, 6 January 2017 17:45 (seven years ago) link
Putting it on today for the first time in ages. Ehhh..... nice recordings, but maybe a little too much gentle twee dream-boy stuff for my taste (why the fuck is Davy going on and on about this stupid circus poster?), even if Nez's moves towards West Coast freakout stuff are much appreciated. "Daydream Believer" is obv a towering all-time classic, and "Valleri" rocks despite a pretty underwritten lyric, but the non-pro-written, non-Nesmith material is kinda generic. "P.O. Box 9847" has a decent enough hook. I miss the token Peter "Monkees antics" type song, too!
― mega pegasus for reindeer (Doctor Casino), Friday, 6 January 2017 18:44 (seven years ago) link
I always wondered if The Monkees were just doing their own circus poster song in homage to "Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite."
― Snorting and all (Dan Peterson), Friday, 6 January 2017 19:14 (seven years ago) link
"The business is changing, boys! If you want to make it with the kids in today's musical landscape, it's posters they want! Have you seen how the Beatles are selling? It's not all 'woo woo woo' and 'she loves me,' nosirree, they're selling big and what they're selling is circus posters!"
― mega pegasus for reindeer (Doctor Casino), Friday, 6 January 2017 19:31 (seven years ago) link
I think it's a transitional album where you've still got some of the old Monkees methodology and sound on the singles tracks and the re-recording of "I'll Be Back up on My Feet" and then the more singular directions emerging for Jones, Dolenz, and Nesmith.
There's a Tork track called "Lady's Baby" that didn't make the album but is widely available.
― timellison, Friday, 6 January 2017 19:41 (seven years ago) link
The business is changing, boys! If you want to make it with the kids in today's musical landscape, it's posters they want
lol what a crazy time the 60s were - made-for-TV cash grabs exploiting lite garage psych and victorian whismy.
there are definitely stronger Monkees albums and i agree w Dr. C's assessment on a little too much dreamy twee but i dig it. "Magnolia Simms" has them effortlessly drifting close to Tiny Tim's comedic old-timey orbit.
― AdamVania (Adam Bruneau), Friday, 6 January 2017 19:48 (seven years ago) link
Instant Repay is even more of a hodgepodge. The Monkees Present gives more of a sense of where they were at that particular time. Shame that Tork was gone and the original plan of a double album didn't pan out.
― timellison, Friday, 6 January 2017 19:54 (seven years ago) link
It's a bonus track on the 90s CD of the album. Tork also cut "Long Title...." at this time, but it was held back for Head. It's interesting that he was using Buffalo Springfield guys on those recordings--in their own way they are as much B.S. tracks as anything on Last Time Around.
I heartily recommend that Monkees Day-By-Day book Andrew Sandoval did awhile back--a surprisingly fascinating look at the L.A. Studio scene in that post-Spector/pre-Mellow Mafia era.
― "I must believe that my charm was not in my ass." (C. Grisso/McCain), Friday, 6 January 2017 20:09 (seven years ago) link