Rant #1,612: It's "Good Times!" For the Monkees

I have held off on putting up anything here about the Monkees' plans for their 50th anniversary because the news has been reported all over the place, but I think the time is right now to go over all of this for those who have been living in a cave since the beginning of this year.

Yes, it will be 50 years ago in September 1966 that the Monkees TV show premiered on NBC in the U.S., predated by their initial single release, "Last Train to Clarksville," which charted in August of the very same year.

Fifty years later, in 2016, you didn't think that anybody would let such a marketing opportunity pass by without at least something doing, but when it is the Monkees, it will apparently be more than just "at least something" doing.

Not only will there will be a countrywide tour with just Micky Dolenz and Peter Tork on board--although I will bet that Michael Nesmith will be there for at least the last concert in California--but the boys will be releasing a brand new, or somewhat brand new, studio album in June called "Good Times."

This album, which will also be available on vinyl, will feature not only older, reworked tunes, but brand new music written specifically for the band by a whole host of newer, younger, more recent, popular songwriters, including Weezer's Rivers Cuomo, XTC's Andy Partridge and the Jam's Paul Weller.

Davy Jones will actually be on the album in a reworked and updated version of Neil Diamond's "Love to Love," an old chestnut that sat in the vault for years before being released in the late 1970s. The latest version will be updated and feature some new instrumentation and backing vocals.

And yes, Mr. Nesmith will be on the album, contribute one song, and will be involved in the background with production of the record, we are being told.

One reviewer noted that with all the promotion and star power going into the recording, it could actually debut at No. 1 on the Billboard album charts, which, if it does happen, would give the Monkees the title of having the longest gap between their first LP (1966's "The Monkees") and this new recording.

Let's not put the cart before the horse, though. Let the LP come out, and then see if people take to it like that reviewer believes they will.

Several other releases are planned around the 50th anniversary, including releasing the entire series--and then some--on Blu-ray for the first time in a boxed set to end all boxed sets, from what I have read.

Just about everything will be in this boxed set, everything from the show's 58 episodes to their movie "Head" to their TV special "33 1/3 Revolutions Per Monkee" to clips from other variety shows of the time ... it is supposedly going to be something spectacular.

Other things have already been released, such as all of their LPs on one CD boxed set, including a separate CD of their 45s, and an two oddball releases: a limited edition release of action figures of the boys which is greatly overpriced, yet is selling out from what I hear, and of some of their tunes on retro-cereal box records.

A few books are also planned, and Micky, in particular, has had a busy past few months, with a release of his solo singles on an LP and a release of a CD where he speaks with fellow pop legend Peter Noone, of Herman's Hermits fame.

You can bet that there will be other things happening over the course of the next few months, but during this time, the focus will be on the concert tour and, in particular, on the new album.

That's a lot for a franchise that really was supposed to be a short-lived one when originally conceived, has outlived any possible prediction that anyone had about the foursome that was derisively called "the Pre-Fab Four," and how many acts have the gusto--and the fan base--to celebrate 50 years ... and to have at least some of its members interested in actually getting out there and playing to that fan base?

As a Monkees fan since the very conception in 1966, I have to say that there may be no loyaler fans than Monkees fans. We were with them at the outset, with them during the lean years, with them through all of the reformations, and we are with them now.

And the fan base keeps on growing, and will probably outlive the principles, who are all either approaching or are in their 70s.

Two interesting backdrops to all of this is that 2016 is the first year we can rightfully acknowledge the anniversary of the passing of Davy Jones. Since this is a leap year, and he died in a leap year on Feb. 29, 2012, 2016 is the first year that we can actually remember him on his date of passing.

I think if he would have still been here, he would have loved everything about the 50th anniversary, because more than his bandmates, he WAS the Monkees and what they stood for.

And almost as eerie is that on the Chinese calendar, 2016 is the year of the monkey.

So all of the cosmos seems to be in line with this celebration.

I eagerly await the Blu-ray set to come to my door, I eagerly await the New York City concert on June 1, and I eagerly await the delivery of their new album to my place of residence.

Of course, back in 1966, when I was barely nine years old, I could never have imagined 50 years in the future, and I certainly could not imagine that the Monkees would still be here, and still be a major "fun" point in my life.

When I interviewed Mike Nesmith some years ago, he asked me my age and when he quickly figured out that I was nine years old upon the Monkees' entrance into the world, he blurted out--

"The Monkees were made for YOU!"

And boy, was he right!