The Monkees Davy Jones and Neil Young
The Monkees Davy Jones passed away last week. He was 66.
Jones was a singer in The Monkees, a pop-rock group formed expressly for a television show.
Interestingly, Neil Young performed on a number of The Monkees tracks, including "You And I" (above on YouTube).
Neil Young played on the following Monkees sessions in 1968:
- Carlise Wheeling Version 4 (5/3) (No audio survived)
- You and I, That's What It's Like Loving You (unrel.), Smile (5/10)
- As We Go Along (5/30)
- You and I (6/19) "Double blistering guitar solo"
- You and I (6/21)
And, Stephen Still was once on the short list for being a member of The Monkees. Imagine that...
(Thanks Andrew Sandoval for research and Harold for links!)
Also, see other musicians influenced by Neil Young.
4 Comments:
I'm not ashamed to say that I had just about all the Monkeys albums, even though it was generally understood at the time that most of the music was not performed by the bands members. The music wasn't great, but it was good, and more than a few songs were very good. The show was also very funny. I'll also admit that Davy was my favorite.
I always thought that the Monkeys were looked down upon because of the perception that they were just stand ins for the real musicians behind them, but have since read that not only were they on friendly terms with many of their contemporaries at the time, including the Springfield, but that many of these contemporaries themselves were stand ins to a significant degree, e.g. the early Byrds, and therefore didn't share the commonly held attitude towards the group. David McGowan goes into depth on this subject in his essential series on Laurel Canyon. I never knew Neil was a studio contributor until just the other day reading an obit, and now this post. Who'd a thunk it?
In any event, it sure was a simpler time, and I have a lot of good memories around it all, even if I was part of a demographic targeted by an exploitative aspect of the music business.
RIP Davy, we'll miss you.
A Friend Of Yours
One can certainly hear the Neil sound on this take. I have never heard this. Sounds as though at this point the bubble gum was outta flavor and these boys were reaching for some real sound. The Monkees were a great part of my youth with the show on weekly and the crazy antics which came straight out of the Batman mold as far as it's comic book antics. The music was real though. They have their place among the music history of the 60's and since, and their shows turned Beatlesqe with the screams and the anticipation for a while. They had talent, and they had good writing, including some of their own solid songs. Some Nesmith tunes are still etched on my brain.
MonkEES just to get picky...
Monkey see Monkee do
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