The Monkees, Good Times!, 2016

I Was There, and I'm Almost Sure I Had a Good Time

by Vera Hough

My daughter is going to college in four weeks, and we are spending a lot of time together. For one thing, there’s a lot of shopping to do. The other day, on the way to buy dance tights, we were playing WBJB (having finally become slightly, slightly tired of Hamilton) and a song caught our attention. “Me and….Magdalena…” the excruciatingly slow crawl of the RDS told us, “...The…Monkees.”

“The actual Monkees?” I asked in wonder and excitement, but the radio could not answer.

I kind of imprinted on the Monkees. In fact, I’m pretty sure when I really discovered the Beatles around fourth grade, sitting on the floor of the den poring over the album covers of Sgt Pepper and Magical Mystery Tour, I gave my father indigestion by saying, “The Beatles are kind of like The Monkees!” It’s backwards, but it wasn’t entirely my fault. WPIX was broadcasting many, many Monkees episodes on weekday afternoons in the early 70s -- which is when I was at my Grammie’s house a lot, watching the big cabinet TV in her pristine living room. I was so little when I watched those shows that I don’t remember much about them, except that Mickey Dolenz was my favorite.

When I was in high school, MTV gave the Monkees (minus Michael Nesmith, see below) a new lease on life.

Five years ago, I almost literally stumbled upon a Davy Jones concert at Epcot. I found it unexpectedly moving, and hundreds of women about ten years older than me were finding it expectedly moving:

Jones died less than a year later, and by then I expected to be moved. (Monkees+Brady Bunch)/nostalgia=tears.

Now, I learn, in recognition of their 50th anniversary, Rhino records has released Good Times!, produced by Adam Schlesinger of Fountains of Wayne. Good Times! features a mix of unreleased songs and new ones created by contemporary Monkees-adjacent artists.  It’s a good summer record, fun to spin in the car, and even offers some food for thought. Oh, and the CD comes with stickers!

The title song, and the opening cut, is a Harry Nilsson song out of the vault and features a Natalie / Nat King Cole-style (or Justin Timberlake / Michael Jackson-style) “duet” between Nilsson’s demo vocals and a new Mickey Dolenz track. It has a fun, frug-y vibe and an irresistible beat.

Schlesinger contributed “Our Own World,” a seamless Monkees / Fountains hybrid; and “I Was There (And I’m Told I Had a Good Time),” maybe the most psychedelic song and, as the last song on the CD, a fitting commentary on the project.

After we’d listened to the whole album (which isn’t very long) quite a few times, I mused, “I think this is my favorite. It’s track 11, ‘Wasn’t Born to Follow.’ Can you look at the liner notes and see who wrote it?”

“Carole King.”

Of course. Of course my favorite is a Carole King / Gerry Goffin number. And it turns out not only did The Byrds record it in 1967, but it’s also been covered by Dusty Springfield, The Sadies, and Tracy Grammer. How did I miss this? Well, now I know.

My daughter’s favorites are the aforementioned “Me and Magdalena,” penned by Ben Gibbard and sung by Mike Nesmith, and “I Know What I Know,” Nesmith-written and sung. One is always learning new things about one’s children, and now I know that my daughter is the kind of girl who likes Wool Hat best. We can still be friends, I guess. It’s been 30 years since the whole “My mother invented Liquid Paper so I don’t have to be in on the Monkees reunion” thing. And he did write “Different Drum.”

The song I expected to like the best was “You Bring The Summer,” written by Andy Partridge of XTC; and I shouldn’t really be disappointed, because it’s very Andy Partridge, but it just feels a little phoned-in. “She Makes Me Laugh,” contributed by Rivers Cuomo of Weezer, is fun, but my favorite thing about it is what I learned from Rolling Stone: that Dolenz thought the lyrics were a little too young-sounding so Cuomo added in a canoe trip and a Scrabble game.

I don’t know about you, but I find myself continually surprised by the fact that the 90s are now subject to nostalgia. I was trying to explain this to my daughter -- again in the car -- and the best explanation I could come up with is that I view all music from 1994 up to the present time as a single category of “popular music from my adulthood.” Also, I don’t remember there being a lot of “70s Nights” when I was in college. Some, but not a lot.

Anyway, it’s interesting to trace a line from the Monkees and their Brill Building underpinnings to the power pop of Fountains of Wayne, Death Cab for Cutie, and Weezer. I’ll leave it to the CoolDad readership to trace the line forward from there. I recommend Good Times!: it brings the summer.