Every Friday, the pop culture website Pop-A-Looza runs a post from my vast 'n' captivating Boppin' (Like The Hip Folks Do) archives. This week's shared post is a rumination about my wish for the surviving members of The Monkees--Michael Nesmith and Micky Dolenz--to record a new studio album.
Over the course of several decades freelancing and blogging, I believe I've written more about The Monkees than I've written about any other act. When I was freelancing for Goldmine, I wrote a cover story about the group's '80s reunion (a piece I really oughtta go back and preserve here on the blog). I reviewed the CD reissues of their '60s library and their 1996 album Justus. For the book Bubblegum Music Is The Naked Truth, I collaborated with Gary Pig Gold for a debate about whether or not The Monkees were ever really a bubblegum act.
For Boppin' (Like The Hip Folks Do), I went all in for The Monkees' fantastic 2016 album Good Times!, with separate pieces about "She Makes Me Laugh," "You Bring The Summer," and "Me And Magdalena," followed by a review of the album, my first (and only!) album review since leaving Goldmine in 2006. I also did a supplemental piece about the Good Times! bonus tracks.
2016 was indeed a year of The Monkees here. I set myself the task of compiling some hypothetical Monkees compilations: the 4-CD Rows Of Houses That Are All The Same, the 3-CD Only True In Fairy Tales, the 2-CD Walking Down The Street, and the single-disc Hall Of Fame. Naturally, I also needed to write the speech I would give if I were to induct The Monkees into The Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame.
But still there was more! Batman Meets The Monkees! A Virtual Ticket Stub Gallery look back at seeing The Monkees in concert in 2012! Retrospectives of Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn & Jones, Ltd., Monkeemania, and Headquarters/The Birds, The Bees & The Monkees! I celebrated individual Monkees tracks "The Girl I Knew Somewhere," "Porpoise Song (Theme From Head)," and "I Never Thought It Peculiar," and crafted a fictional 45 release of "For Pete's Sake"/"You Just May Be The One." I talked about my 25 favorite Monkees tracks, listed my 40 next-favorite Monkees tracks, and recounted the tale of how I became a Monkees fan. When Peter Tork passed in 2019, I wrote a heartfelt eulogy, and I wrote a piece about the night I met Peter Tork. Hell, because it's my blog, I wrote a pie-in-the sky wish for Micky Dolenz to record an album with The Flashcubes, my favorite power pop group. And even that's not all I've written about The Monkees here.
My friend Rich Firestone likes to say that The Monkees have been good to him. They've been good to me, too. I betcha I'll keep writing about them. For now, you can read all of the above. And you can head over to this week's Boppin' Pop-A-Looza to read my hope for what they do next.
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This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio with Dana & Carl airs Sunday nights from 9 to Midnight Eastern, on the air in Syracuse at SPARK! WSPJ 103.3 and 93.7 FM, and on the web at http://sparksyracuse.org/ You can read about our history here.
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