The Monkees - More of the Monkees (1966)

The Monkees' first self-titled album was released in October 1966 through Colgems Records, a month after the debut of the TV series of the same name, and two months after the release of the hit single "Last Train to Clarksville". When released, the music from the TV show became a bigger success than the show it was created to promote, with more people buying the records than watching the show on NBC. In a move controversial to this day, the band members themselves were not allowed to contribute instrumentally to the album, and while Monkee Mike Nesmith produced a couple of sessions, and even used Peter Tork as a guitarist on the sessions, the group was mostly left to contribute only vocally, with most of the playing and writing coming from the Boyce & Hart duo and their backing band, the Candy Store Prophets. This displeased the band to some extent, as they were led to believe they were to be making instrumental contributions to the band's recordings, especially the two musicians of the lineup, Peter Tork and Mike Nesmith. This arrangement, which was chalked up to the hectic schedule they were subjected to in order to make an album as fast as they could, was however maintained when the time came to record their second album, which would be titled More of the Monkees and was also to be the source of much discord between the band and their management.

A rushed release, released quickly in order to capitalize on the massive and surprising popularity of their first record, the four Monkees weren't even aware that the album had been released, let alone been given any say on the sequencing or artwork of the album. The band learned that MoTM had been released while on tour, when they saw copies of it on a record store window, and were furious with it's artwork, a promotional piece for a department store which saw them wearing their clothes, as well as its self-congratulatory liner notes, courtesy of musical director Don Kirschner, which lathed praise onto the songwriters involved while only mentioning the Monkees in passing. Even more egregious in fact was Kirschner's job at song selection: such horrible schlock as "The Day We Fell in Love" was selected for the album while much stronger material was left in the bin, which even lead Mike Nesmith to call the album "probably the worst album in the history of the world". It was this incident and the horrible job their management did at creating a sophomore album that infamously led Nesmith to punch his fist into a hotel room wall and together with the other three members basically demand artistic control over the Monkees, which gave us such great albums as Headquarters and Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn and Jones, where they played their own instruments themselves and were allowed to produce their own albums.

That leaves us with the question: what if the Monkees' second album was better? Considering the fact that the album was so badly compiled it lead to the revolt that yielded the Monkees' most creative and free period, you'd think the sheer lousiness of the second LP was the price to pay for it. However, the sheer amount of quality material left in the cutting room floor practically begs us to improve on it, and I believe that the key to better quality control could be following the TV show's musical choices. A whole four songs from the mid-to-late 1966 sessions that gave us MoTM appeared on the series without making it to the album, while conversely three songs that did appear on the album were nowhere to be seen on NBC. That's pretty counter-productive, as you'd think promoting a song on national television without it being released anywhere is a waste of resources, especially when you consider all but one of the songs from the debut album were used in the show. That means only songs that were part of the show or strongly considered for it will be included, with us only subbing in the new songs where the more subpar tracks are removed. There's also no problem with adding songs that were later re-recorded for future albums, with those re-recordings simply being substituted by different songs further down the road. Without further ado, here's what our revamped sophomore album looks like:

She (More of the Monkees)
When Love Comes Knockin' (More of the Monkees)

Mary, Mary (More of the Monkees)

Words (More of the Monkees)

You Just May Be the One (The Monkees)

I'm Not Your Steppin' Stone (More of the Monkees)

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Look Out (More of the Monkees)

The Kind of Girl I Could Love (More of the Monkees)

I'll Be Back Up on My Feet (More of the Monkees)

Sometime in the Morning (More of the Monkees)

Valleri (More of the Monkees)

I'm a Believer (More of the Monkees)

Bonus tracks:
Laugh (More of the Monkees)

Your Auntie Grizelda (More of the Monkees)

I Don't Think You Know Me (More of the Monkees)

The Monkees performing live for the first time in Honolulu, December 3, 1966

Side one starts as usual, with the 1-2-3 punch of "She", "When Love Comes Knockin' (At Your Door)" and "Mary, Mary". Of those, "She" and "Mary Mary" were both featured in a couple of episodes of the TV show, while "Knockin'" was meant to be featured in the "Monkees at the Movies" episode of the series, but was replaced at the last minute by "A Little Bit Me, a Little Bit You", which means it also qualifies by our parameters of following the TV show, or at least makes for a sensible exception, since it's a pretty good song. Speaking of which, "Words", which was featured in the TV show in its original version, replaces "Hold on Girl", which wasn't featured at all and frankly isn't very good. As for the fifth track, we could keep "Your Auntie Grizelda", as it was featured in the TV show a couple of times and even is a fan favorite. However, since in my opinion, it's a pretty mediocre novelty track, and Peter already has a lead vocal spot on the LP in "Words", I decided to replace it with a second Mike Nesmith lead vocal, the original version of "You Just May Be the One", which was even featured with more prominence on the show than "Grizelda" ever was. Finally, side one ends as it usually does, with "(I'm Not Your) Steppin' Stone", one of the most prominently featured songs on the TV series, and the b-side to the "I'm a Believer" hit single, closing out the first half of the album.

Side two still opens with "Look Out (Here Comes Tomorrow)" and "The Kind of Girl I Could Love", as the two songs were featured in episodes of the series. However, we use an extended mix of "Look Out", which brings its length to 2:50 due to an instrumental bridge and was the version of the song that was used in The Monkees, to begin with. Following that, we substitute the hideous "The Day We Fall in Love", which thankfully wasn't used in the show, with "I'll Be Back Upon My Feet, which was. And curiously enough, those two songs were written by the same two people! Who knows what accounted for the gap in quality between those two. The fantastic "Sometime in the Morning" still has the same spot as it did before, being used in a couple of episodes, and it's followed by Boyce & Hart's "Valleri", the greatest omission of the original album. The song was featured in the TV show, and was so popular in that, that DJs started taping the song straight off the TV and playing it on air, making it one of the few songs to become a radio hit without even being released! It replaces the very weak novelty track "Laugh", which despite being featured twice in the TV show, doesn't hold a candle to "Valleri". It's followed by album closer and hit single "I'm a Believer", which was featured more than five times on the series and is quite literally the only song you cannot remove from this album.

Clocking in at slightly shorter than 30 minutes, this revamped version of More of the Monkees presents a considerable upgrade in quality and consistency, feeling much more cohesive and whole. A duo that definitely benefits from these swaps is Boyce and Hart, who go from a measly two songs on the record to a more respectable four. Still a far cry from the seven they got on the debut, but already much better. This album also features three Nesmith songs, of which he sings two, which I would mirror in my alternate The Monkees album, by substituting "I'll Be True to You" with "All The King's Horses", and making three songs per album his standard quota. Besides the tracklist, the other main objection of the band with the album was its artwork, which we fix using a still photo from the "Find the Monkees" episode, to which we add their logo. We also get a second single off it, with "Valleri" backed by "Mary, Mary" getting released right after "I'm a Believer". Also, as bonus tracks, we have the aforementioned "Laugh" and "Your Auntie Grizelda", as well as "I Don't Think You Know Me", which was meant for the "One Man Shy" episode but left unused. It's a shame The Monkees were kept from releasing the best of what they had available due to external influence and band politics, since we would all have benefited if the best-selling album of 1967 was of better quality than it ended up being.

Sources:
- The Monkees - More of the Monkees

- The Monkees - The Monkees

- The Monkees First Season Episode Index