"Success Story"

I watched "Success Story" a couple days ago.  I've been thinking about the Beatles' movie A Hard Day's Night quite a bit recently, so I may be making too much of this, but I think the film's influence on The Monkees could be evident in that it's Davy's grandfather who's one of the main characters in this episode, just as Paul's grandfather is one of the main characters in the Beatles' movie.

This may have been noted before, but it also occurred to me that the ending credits of The Monkees use the same style as those of A Hard Day's Night; both show a sequence of still photos of the band members in various poses and with various expressions.

"Your Auntie Grizelda"

Recently, I read the entry for 14 October 1966 in the 2021 version of The Monkees: The Day-by-Day Story.  The backing track for "Your Auntie Grizelda" was recorded on this day, and Jack Keller, who co-wrote the song with Diane Hildebrand*, comments:  "The truth of the matter is that it was inspired by the Rolling Stones' Mick Jagger singing '19th Nervous Breakdown.'"  I hadn't know about the connection between these two songs, but in thinking about them and figuring out some parts for both, I discovered that they do have a number of musical similarities.

The first line of each verse of "Your Auntie Grizelda" is sung to a phrase something like this:

(The first half of each of the next three lines is the same, although one is a fourth higher.)

The title line of "19th Nervous Breakdown" ("Here comes your 19th nervous breakdown") is sung to a phrase something like this:

Both phrases begin in the same way:  with a pick-up on the fourth beat of the bar and two pairs of notes of the same pitch.  Generally, both phrases descend but end with a small ascent (a half-step in "Your Auntie Grizelda" but a whole step in "19th Nervous Breakdown").  Additionally, both phrases have a flatted seventh, although they occur in different places.

I figured out the chords for both songs, and although they're in different keys ("Your Auntie Grizelda" is in D major, and "19th Nervous Breakdown" is in [a slightly flat] E major), the verses have the same structure:  eight measures of the tonic, four measures of the sub-dominant, four measures of the tonic, two measures of the dominant, two measures of the sub-dominant, and then back to the tonic (which lasts for six measures in "Your Auntie Grizelda" but which merges into the chorus in "19th Nervous Breakdown").

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*In the book, it's spelt "Hildebrand," but in the credits of the deluxe edition of More of the Monkees, it's spelt as "Hilderbrand."  I'm not sure which is correct.

"Monkee Vs. Machine"

I recently started re-watching The Monkees series.  When I started reading the re-written version of Andrew Sandoval's The Monkees: The Day-by-Day Story, I decided to watch the shows and listen to the albums after I read about their broadcast or release.  I'm also using this as an opportunity to watch the series on Bluray.  I got The Monkees: The Complete Series on Bluray years ago, but I've watched only select episodes, not all of them.

Last week, I watched "Monkee Vs. Machine" and noticed a subtle reference to Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho.  Near the end of the episode, when Mike leans out the window to throw what is essentially a boomerang, one of the buildings in the background seems to bear the name "Hotel Bates":

(This is a screenclipping from the DVD.)

The famous location in Psycho is the similarly named Bates Motel.