"99 Pounds"

I just figured out a couple parts for "99 Pounds," and in doing so, I noticed something about the lyrics.  The second line is "There's a little devil livin' under all that powder and paint."  Because "powder and paint" are alliterative, there's a poetic sense of the artifice that's plainly detailed in the line.

"Kellogg's Jingle"

Yester-day I was thinking about the "Kellogg's Jingle" (included as a bonus track on the deluxe edition of The Monkees).  I recently came across some notation for it (vocal melody, bass, and finger snaps) that - as far as I can tell - I wrote out in late January 2017 when I figured out those parts.

Anyway, I realized a small thing about the vocal melody:

The text here is "K E double L / Oh double good / Kellogg's best to you."  Each "double" is sung to a pair of eighth notes, so - compared to the surrounding quarter notes - there are double the number of notes for the beats in which "double" is sung.

"As We Go Along"

I happened to think about "As We Go Along" yester-day, and I realized that "Get up" in the line "Get up off of your chair" is sung to an ascending interval (I think it's a whole octave: Bb to Bb).  Musically, this gives a sense of that "get[ting] up."

"The Chaperone"

Yester-day I watched My Fair Lady for the first time in years (and I think for only the second time ever).  I think I was dimly aware that The Monkees episode "The Chaperone" spoofed some elements from the movie (the trivia on The Monkees DVD briefly mentions as much), but since I'd just watched the movie, I also watched "The Chaperone" to see what specific elements are borrowed or parodied.

After Davy has the idea to employ Mrs. Weefers as the chaperone for the Monkees' party, the show cuts to a scene where he and Peter are dressed to resemble Henry Higgins and Colonel Pickering, and Davy tries to teach Mrs. Weefers the correct pronunciation of the sentence "The dance in France is mainly in the stance," which is similar to a sentence whose correct pronunciation Henry Higgins tries to teach Eliza Doolittle:  "The rain in Spain stays mainly in the plain."

Davy then says, "I tell you, Peter, give me six months, and I could pass her off as a duchess at an embassy ball."  This is nearly verbatim what Higgins claims:  "In six months, I could pass her off as a duchess at an embassy ball."

In a later scene, Peter tries to teach Mrs. Weefers to speak clearly.  He puts marbles in his mouth, and - increasingly impeded - says, "The idea is to put as many of these marbles into your mouth as you can and still...."  In My Fair Lady, Higgins puts six marbles in Doolittle's mouth, with the aim to teach her to speak clearly:  "I want you to enunciate every word just as if the marbles were not in your mouth."

Next, Davy holds a candelabrum before him as he delivers the line "Huntington Hartford hates pickled herrings."  The reason for the candles isn't explained in the show, but in My Fair Lady, Higgins has Doolittle sit in front of a similar device and tells her, "Every time you pronounce the letter H correctly, the flame will waver, and every time you drop your H, the flame will remain stationary."  To demonstrate this, he speaks into the device:  "In Hartford, Hereford, and Hampshire, hurricanes hardly ever happen."  Davy's sentence - like Higgins' - is formed almost entirely of words that begin with H in order to teach correct pronunciation.

"Tear Drop City" b/w "A Man without a Dream"

According to Andrew Sandoval's The Monkees: The Day-by-Day Story of the 60s TV Pop Sensation, "Tear Drop City" b/w "A Man without a Dream" - the Monkees' ninth single (Colgems 5000) - was released in the U.S. fifty years ago this month (February 1969).  The U.K. release (RCA 1802) was on 28 February.

Instant Replay

According to Andrew Sandoval's The Monkees: The Day-by-Day Story of the 60s TV Pop Sensation, the Monkees' seventh album - Instant Replay (Colgems COS-115) - was released fifty years ago this month (February 1969).  The U.K. release (RCA 8016) was on 6 June 1969.

Side One:

1. "Through the Looking Glass"
2. "Don't Listen to Linda"
3. "I Won't Be the Same without Her"
4. "Just a Game"
5. "Me without You"
6. "Don't Wait for Me"

Side Two:

1. "You and I"
2. "While I Cry"
3. "Tear Drop City"
4. "The Girl I Left Behind Me"
5. "A Man without a Dream"
6. "Shorty Blackwell"

"The Kind of Girl I Could Love"

Last month I figured out the bass part for "The Kind of Girl I Could Love."  I notated it, but then I sort of forgot about it.  I finally got around to scanning it last night.  As always, there's the disclaimer that I might have something wrong:

Like I mentioned last month, I don't think the bass plays in the first measure of the bridge.  The notes I have there in parentheses are extrapolated from two measures that appear later in the bridge.

"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).