"Monkees a la Mode"

A couple weeks ago, I watched "Monkees a la Mode" just for the sake of watching that episode.  Coincidentally, it happened to be an episode I was looking for.  I'd previously noticed that Davy does something similar to what Ringo does in the Beatles' Help!

At ~13:50, Davy is shown trying to feed a stuffed animal of a giraffe, repeatedly offering it what looks to be a piece of bread:

When he's unsuccessful, he smacks the giraffe onto the floor:

During the "Ticket to Ride" sequence of Help! (at ~40:01), Ringo is shown holding a small figure sculpted out of snow.  It pokes him on the chest, and he pokes it on the nose:

After a few exchanges, he punches it:

I'm sure this isn't the most interesting or important comparison between the Beatles movies and The Monkees, but since I finally found this specific episode, I thought I'd make a note of it.

"Goin' Down"

I'd forgotten about this until yester-day, but when I listened to the first disc of the deluxe edition of Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn & Jones Ltd. earlier this month (6 Nov.), I noticed that many of the "Goin' down"s in "Goin' Down" are sung to descending phrases, musically illustrating that "down."  I'm not going to go through each instance of that phrase in the song, but most of the "Goin' down"s in the first half are sung to the phrase G G E.

"Daddy's Song"

When I watched Head earlier this month, I noticed that in the second verse of "Daddy's Song," the "away" at the end of the line "And the pain would go away" is sung with a melisma (C C C D C B).  To some degree, this gives a musical sense of the pain's dissipating; it's no longer focused on a single pitch.

When I listened to the soundtrack recently (the 22nd), I noticed that this same melisma (slightly different when repeated) also has significance in two other verses.

In the third verse, "sighs" in the line "That he brought out all his sighs" is sung to the phrase C C D C B, indicating the multitude of "all" via the numerous notes.  In the alternate version (with Mike Nesmith's vocal), the line is different: "That he brought out all his toys."  Here, "toys" is sung with a slightly different articulation; I think it's just C D B.  In any case, the multitude of "all" is still illustrated through the numerous notes.

In the last verse in the soundtrack version (but not in the film version, where Davy Jones sings a cappella and with a different melody), "by" in the line "Let the sadness pass him by" is also sung to the phrase C C D C B, giving a sense of movement (although the "pass[ing]... by" is metaphorical).

While drafting this post yester-day, I also noticed a new thing:  "When I grew up" in the line "When I grew up to be a man" in the first verse is sung to an ascending phrase (C D E E), giving something of a musical sense of that growing up.

"Circle Sky"

I watched Head on 6 November (the fiftieth anniversary of its premiere) and noticed a couple small things about some of the songs, but I waited to write about them until I listened to the soundtrack as part of my project of listening to all of the Monkees albums I have.  That way, if I found more things to write about in the same songs, I could just write a single post.

I'm a bit unsure of my accuracy, but I think one of the lines in "Circle Sky" is "Here I stand, heavy man."  When I watched Head, I noticed that the "heavy man" part of the line descends (E C# B A), almost as if the melody itself bends under the weight.  "Heavy" is even sung with a melisma (E C# B), which emphasizes this descent.

"All of Your Toys"

When I wrote about "All of Your Toys" yester-day, I ended up learning a couple parts.  I got the chords for the verses and the bridges, the piano in the bridge (which I believe is all the piano there is in the song), and the bass in the bridge.

For my recording, I used the second bridge as a template because I'd previously learned parts for the sections that follow.  Last November, I learned the single harpsichord chord (E major) and the bass part for the instrumental section, and last September, I figured out the following phrase in the bass part (which also occurs at the beginning of the song).

 

"All of Your Toys"

Yester-day I listened to the second disc of the deluxe edition of Headquarters, and this morning I realized a small thing about "All of Your Toys," which is included as a bonus track.

Near the end, "toys" is sung with a number of different melismas, all of which illustrate the multitude of "all of."  In Micky's lead vocal, the "toys" at ~2:37 is sung to the notes F C; starting at that same point, but with long, drawn out notes, "toys" in the backing vocals is sung to the notes F E.  In the backing vocals in the section after that (where Peter is particularly evident), "toys" is repeatedly sung to the notes F Eb Db.

"The Kind of Girl I Could Love"

When I listened to the second disc of the deluxe edition of More of the Monkees a couple days ago, the bass part in the bridge of "The Kind of Girl I Could Love" sounded easy to figure out.  It was a bit more difficult than I expected, but this evening I figured out all of the bass part.  In doing so, I discovered a couple interesting features about the bass part in the bridge:

I should note that I don't think the bass plays at all for the first measure.  I extrapolated those notes based on the first two measures of the second line.

The lyrics here are:

You do something to my soul
That no one's ever done
If you're looking for to love
Then let me be the one

The bass part musically represents two ideas in these lyrics.

The song is in A major, but there are two accidentals (F natural and Bb), which represent the foreignness of "something... that no one's ever done."

After the line "Then let me be the one," the bass repeats a single pitch (an E), representing that idea of singularity.

"I'll Be Back up on My Feet"

Yester-day I listened to the second disc of the deluxe edition of More of the Monkees, and I noticed a couple small things about "I'll Be Back up on My Feet" (the first recorded version, which is included as a bonus track).

There's quite a musical leap at the end of the line "Maybe I will meet a girl who'll try to keep me down" in the second verse.  "Try to keep me" ascends (C# C# D E), but then there's a drop of almost an octave for "down," sung to an F#.  This descent musically represents the "keep[ing]... down" in the lyric.

The other thing I noticed is that the "go" in the last "When I find my boots, I know I gotta go" is sung with a melisma (D A F#), musically giving a sense of that movement.

"Pleasant Valley Sunday"

I have an-other project with the same format as this one but focused on the Beatles.  A couple days ago, I figured out some of the piano in "I Want to Tell You," so - just for fun - I started playing the guitar phrase, which I'd figured out in January.  Yester-day morning, I discovered that the guitar phrase in "Pleasant Valley Sunday" is very similar to the guitar phrase in "I Want to Tell You."  Both are in A major, employ glissandi, alternate between an open A string and notes on the D string, and use only six pitches: A, D, E, F#, G, and A an octave higher.

In both songs, there are sections where these phrases are repeated over and over again, but here's a single instance of each (give or take a few notes) in tablature (I use tildes [~] to indicate glissandi):

"I Want to Tell You"

D|-7~5---2---5-0---4-0---|
A|-----0---0-----0-----0-|

"Pleasant Valley Sunday"

D|---7---5~4-0---2---0-4~5-0---|
A|-0---0-------0---0---------0-|

While they're obviously different, they use something of the same musical vocabulary.

According to Mark Lewisohn's The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions, "I Want to Tell You" was released on Revolver in August 1966 [on the 5th in the U.K. and on the 8th in the U.S.], and according to Andrew Sandoval's The Monkees: The Day-by-Day Story of the 60s TV Pop Sensation, "Pleasant Valley Sunday" was recorded in June 1967 [the 10th, 11th, 13th, and "possibly other dates in June"], so it's certainly possible that the guitar phrase in "I Want to Tell You" influenced the guitar phrase in "Pleasant Valley Sunday."

Head

According to Andrew Sandoval's The Monkees: The Day-by-Day Story of the 60s TV Pop Sensation, fifty years ago to-day (6 November 1968), the Monkees' film Head premiered at the Columbia Pictures studio in New York City.

"Look Out (Here Comes Tomorrow)"

Yester-day (after long neglecting my project of listening to all of the Monkees' albums I have), I listened to More of the Monkees and noticed a small feature in "Look Out (Here Comes Tomorrow)."  "Sorrow" in the line "I see all kinds of sorrow" is sung with a melisma (D C C).  Because it's sung with an extra syllable, there's a musical sense of the multitude of "all kinds of."

Head Soundtrack

According to Andrew Sandoval's The Monkees: The Day-by-Day Story of the 60s TV Pop Sensation, the Monkees' sixth album - the soundtrack to Head (Colgems COSO-5008) - was released fifty years ago this month (November 1968).  The U.K. release (RCA 8050) was in "late 1969."

Side One:

1. "Opening Ceremony"
2. "Porpoise Song (Theme from 'Head')"
3. "Ditty Diego - War Chant"
4. "Circle Sky"
5. "Supplicio"
6. "Can You Dig It"
7. "Gravy"

Side Two:

1. "Superstitious"
2. "As We Go Along"
3. "Dandruff"
4. "Daddy's Song"
5. "Poll"
6. "Long Title: Do I Have to Do This All over Again"
7. "Swami - Plus Strings (Ken Thorne), Etc."