The Monkees - The Birds, the Bees and the Monkees (1968)

The Monkees released their fourth album, Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn & Jones, Ltd., on November 6, 1967, through Colgems Records. The second album in which the band exerted creative control, it marked a departure from its predecessor Headquarters by featuring hired studio musicians in a more prominent role, with drummer Eddie Hoh playing on nearly every single song on the album. The band still performed the majority of the instruments, with Mike Nesmith's guitar and Peter Tork's keyboards prominently featured in the album, but that move signaled that the group was losing interest in playing in their own records a mere six months after they began to do so. This loss of interest became apparent as, when sessions for a new album started the very next month, producer Chip Douglas was gone and the band had diverted to their old method of recording: completely performed by studio musicians, and with a single Monkee coming in to record lead vocals. The only difference was that before, those sessions would be produced by Boyce & Hart or somebody like Jeff Barry or Carole King, and this time around they were produced by the band members themselves. Sure, they still retained the creative control Nesmith and Tork so yearned for, but the togetherness and unity of something like Headquarters was long gone. And with the TV show coming to an end, the writing seemed on the wall.

And with the ease of recording by themselves and with the best musicians in town, the floodgates opened. More than forty songs were recorded, with each Monkee essentially recording a solo album without any input from the others. From that, we got many great songs, many awful songs, and just about anything in between. And then, there came the challenge of turning this diverse and often disjointed batch of songs into an album. Executive producer Lester Sill put together a provisionary tracklist for the album in March 1968, and such was the diversity of tracks available to him, that it featured three songs that wouldn't make the cut and excluded other three songs that would. And that was weeks away from release! That alone shows that the task of turning those 40+ songs into an album was a demanding one, especially given what was at risk. The album was the last released while the TV show still existed, their only chance at creating some kind of post-TV career, and they blew it by not making the best possible record. They could very well have released another psychedelic pop classic in the vein of PAC&J with the material they had available, but simply didn't, a missed opportunity that hurt them a great deal in the long run. But what if the Monkees had managed to assemble a great album, and create the version of The Birds, The Bees, and The Monkees that should have been?

This post is an update to my The Birds, the Bees, and the Monkees reconstruction from February 2019. This time, we will simply try to make the best possible album out of the songs that we know were shortlisted for inclusion on the album, walking the line between our meddling and the artists' intention. That means that for a song to be included it needed to, at the very least, have been seriously considered for the album at one point. We will do that as an abundance of songs were recorded for BB&M and it would be nearly impossible to listen to every single song and decide if it's worthy of inclusion or not, and even if I did, we'd end up with a record that was really far from what could sensibly be released back in 1968, and even further from what the band intended. Nothing included on my previous Changes reconstruction is considered, for consistency's sake, but songs included on post-Head albums that hail from the BB&M sessions will be considered, to give us a wider net to cast. Our reworked album will feature twelve tracks and a spoken word segment, just like Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn & Jones, Ltd, and "Daydream Believer" is retroactively added to that album in "Hard to Believe"'s place, meaning we will only be using songs from the main November 1967/April 1968 sessions the other eleven songs hail from. Without further ado, here's what our updated reconstruction looks like:

Through the Looking Glass (The Birds, the Bees, and the Monkees)

We Were Made for Each Other (The Birds, the Bees, and the Monkees)

Writing Wrongs (The Birds, the Bees, and the Monkees)

I'll Be Back Upon My Feet (The Birds, the Bees, and the Monkees)

Valleri (The Birds, the Bees, and the Monkees)

Lady's Baby (The Birds, the Bees, and the Monkees)

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Magnolia Simms (The Birds, the Bees, and the Monkees)

P.O. Box 9847 (The Birds, the Bees, and the Monkees)

Tapioca Tundra (The Birds, the Bees, and the Monkees)

Auntie's Municipal Court (The Birds, the Bees, and the Monkees)

Alvin (The Birds, the Bees, and the Monkees)

The Girl I Left Behind Me (The Birds, the Bees, and the Monkees)

Zor and Zam (The Birds, the Bees, and the Monkees)

Download link:
The Monkees - The Birds, the Bees, and the Monkees (1968)

Nesmith, Jones, Tork, and Dolenz on the set of HEAD, February 1968.

The album, as first compiled sometime in March 1968 by executive producer Lester Sill, consisted of "Through The Looking Glass", "We Were Made For Each Other", "Writing Wrongs", "I'll Be Back Up On My Feet", "Valleri" and "Long Title: Do I Have To Do This All Over Again" on side one, with "Dream World", "P.O. Box 9847", "Tapioca Tundra", "The Poster",  "Alvin", "Daydream Believer" and "Zor and Zam" making up side two. We can follow through with our new first side pretty easily in this reconstruction, as even the original March 1968 mixes of "Through the Looking Glass" and "Do I Have to Do This All Over Again" were featured in the Deluxe edition of BBM. However, since the latter was held over and used for the Head soundtrack, I felt using it would mess with our timeline too much, so I decided to substitute it with another Tork song, "Lady's Baby". It's a fair inclusion, in my view, as Sill expressed the desire to include the song on the album. The only reason why the song wasn't included in the first place is that Peter notoriously wasn't able to finish the song to his liking, creating just about a billion mixes and different arrangements, only to end up dissatisfied. We'll use the fourth mono mix with the baby noises in the intro and outro, as to me it sounds like the most finished version of the song, and it's a great addition to the record, and one that nearly happened at that.

It's side two that's going to need the most work, however. The two main offenders of the original album in terms of quality are the two Davy originals, "Dream World" and "The Poster". They stand out negatively among the nicely crafted psychedelic pop of the other ten tracks, and that's made worse by the fact that the LP actually starts with "Dream World"! If we actually want to improve on the album, we'll have to replace the two with superior songs. Thankfully, there are two songs that made it to the final album but are nowhere to be found in this alternate tracklist: "Magnolia Simms" and "Auntie's Municipal Court". They fit into the vacant spots left by the other two rather nicely, and "Magnolia Simms" in all of its lo-fi glory especially works pretty well as an opener, with its popping and clicking sounds, stuttering, and 1920s vibe. Sure to many many-a listeners check their stereo for issues! Finally, another controversial choice is removing "Daydream Believer" from the album, as it comes from the PAC&J sessions. I know it's probably the best song on the record, but it sticks out like a sore thumb among the rest of the album. I decided to replace it with a different song from the sessions that were similar in tone, if not in quality, and that could also be released as a single: "The Girl I Left Behind Me". A downgrade to be sure, but one that strangely enough benefits the album in terms of cohesion.

37 minutes long with a slightly longer side two, our revamped The Birds, the Bees and the Monkees is not as good as the two albums that came before it, but the substitutions we've made have helped create a much better album than we'd originally had. It now sounds like the logical next step for a band that was slowly going back to using studio musicians in their songs and moving away from working as a band, but still maintaining a more cohesive sound than what we got back in 1968. One flaw with this album is that it features a measly three songs sung by Davy, who was used to a much bigger share of the pie by then. However, I do consider this quota to be a fair representation of how much quality material he was able to contribute, and we can even have "Me Without You" as a non-album b-side to compensate. One thing this does have going for it, however, is that it doesn't mess much with their discography at all, as only "Through the Looking Glass" and "The Girl I Left Behind Me" were featured in any post-Head album, and they can both be easily replaced with period-accurate tracks. "I'll Be Back Up on My Feet" b/w "The Girl I Left Behind Me" would make a much better follow-up single to "Valleri", another song promoted by the TV show and a ballad with commercial potential. All in all, this makes for an album much more in tune with what the Monkees stood for in 1968, at the tail end of their golden era.

Sources:

- The Monkees - The Birds, the Bees, and the Monkees [Deluxe Edition]

- The Monkees: The Day-By-Day Story of the 60s TV Pop Sensation

Neil Young - Mediterranean (1974)

Neil Young released his sixth studio album, On the Beach, in July 1974. The third chapter of the so-called Ditch Period, it was released right before Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young's 1974 Reunion Tour, which reunited Young with his estranged bandmates for the first time in four years. During this period of his career, his now-infamous relationship issues with his partner Carrie Snodgress were beginning to show, with these issues becoming a strong source of inspiration for him, and the main focus of the latter period Ditch albums's songwriting. This can be clearly seen by the fact that, despite him having just finished recording a full studio album mere months ago, he spent the rehearsals for the tour (held at his own Broken Arrow Studios, no less!) writing and recording some new songs. The seven sparsely-arranged songs he recorded during these sessions divided themselves into happier songs, with lighter themes, and moodier, more depressed about his failing marriage and infidelity. The tour itself saw the live debut of three of those songs, and the writing and incorporation into CSNY's live set of a couple other tour-written songs as well. By the tour's end in August, he had about enough material for a good studio album in the can, but had no plans of recording in the near future. Instead, ahead of CSNY's planned London concert at Wembley Stadium, he traveled to Amsterdam with a couple of friends and a Dutch journalist named Constant Meijers, who documented the whole trip for a piece he would be writing on Neil,  where he got a closer look into Neil's creative process than anyone ever before. 

A new writing spree in September gave birth to some brand new songs, with most of them having two things in common: their aquatic theme and sad, brokenhearted nature, due to the state of his relationship with Snodgress. He claimed to have already written fourteen songs based on this theme and to have 37 new songs in total, with nine of those being discussed by them, with some of them already recorded before the tour started and others in the can and ready to be recorded. The common themes of those new songs made it so that Young decided to put them all together in an LP, to be titled Mediterranean. Those nine songs were its' prime contenders, and the album would be recorded on an island (it seems that Neil wanted to record it in Ibiza, Italy), and produced by Elliot Mazer. Of course, as we all know the rather volatile nature of Mr. Bernard Shakey, "technical problems prevented such sessions from ever happening. By the first few days of October 1974, he was already back home, and by November, was already recording a wholly different batch of songs, which obviously went on to become Homegrown. These new songs abandoned the slightly more positive water-themed aspects of the Mediterranean material in favor of diving face-first into his separation, with some of the most personal writing of his career. When he didn't release Homegrown either, it became a much more famous Lost Album than its immediate predecessor, which besides a passing mention in Johnny Rogan's Sixty to Zero book, is still pretty much unknown. But what if Neil Young had released Mediterranean?

This is an update to my reconstruction of the unreleased Mediterranean album, from the middle of the pandemic in November 2020. This time, we will try to create the most faithful version of the album we possibly can, no matter the overlap with Homegrown or any other issues it could present to us. That way, we are able to present as closely as possible Neil's state of mind during his ill-fated trip to Europe following the end of CSNY's 1974 tour. The songs we know to be a part of the Mediterranean or water album concept album are "Star of Bethlehem", "Mediterranean", "Vacancy", "Daughters", "Love/Art Blues", "Hawaiian Sunrise", "Frozen Man", "Deep Forbidden Lake" and "Through My Sails", will make for the core of the album, which will feature at least a couple of other songs as well. Neil has issued nine-song (or less!) albums before, so that would be fine. However, the real issue is that together, those nine songs amount to a paltry 28 minutes, pretty far from your average 1970s NY album. These new additions need to have some kind of connection to the album's concept or songs themselves, and they must fit in well period-wise and musically with the main nine in order to create a cohesive whole. Also, nothing written after September 1974 will be considered, as that's the main cut-off date to when Young abandoned the album's concept, making our selection period from May 1974 to September 1974. Four months sound like very little time, but considering the creative streak he was on during this part of his career, we'll have more than enough songs to consider. Here's what the album looks like:

Star of Bethlehem (Archives Vol. II)

Mediterranean (Archives Vol. II)

Vacancy (Archives Vol. II)

Daughters (Archives Vol. II)

Barefoot Floors (NYA Outtake)

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Love/Art Blues (Archives Vol. II)

Hawaiian Sunrise (Archives Vol. II)

Frozen Man (Archives Vol. II)

Deep Forbidden Lake (Archives Vol. II)

Bad News Comes to Town (Archives Vol. II)

Through My Sails (Archives Vol. II)

Download link:
Neil Young - Mediterranean (1974)

Neil performing with CSNY at Wembley Stadium, September 14th, 1974.

When looking through the May to September 1974 period for inclusion-worthy songs, I decided on including "Bad News Comes to Town" and "Barefoot Floors" as our two new additions. Bottom Line debuts "Long May You Run" and "Pushed it Over the End" aren't considered as there aren't any period-accurate studio versions of both available to us. That's a shame, as "Pushed it Over the End", with its mentions of ocean floors and whatnot, would actually fit in pretty well within the water concept of the album. "Pardon My Heart", "Homefires", and "The Old Homestead" are other songs from the June 1974 solo sessions that were considered, but that were excluded since they didn't fit the concept of the album too well and would sound shoehorned. Included instead of all of those, the gorgeous "Barefoot Floors" is finally given a home, as it is a very similar song to "Hawaiian Sunrise" in its themes of maternity and raising a child, fitting in like a glove concept-wise and sonically. Also included is "Bad News Comes to Town", which thanks to the photos folder of the Neil Young Archives we know to have been written in the same manuscript of the original "Star of Bethlehem" lyrics, the two of them sharing the same piece of paper. That means it can be included as well, being from the same timeframe as the Mediterranean concept, and I personally find it to be a great fit both in sound and theme. We have two additions that don't mess with the concept too much, and are good enough songs to enhance what already was an impressive collection of songs, all while managing to give a great unreleased song an album. Not bad!

Our album begins with the closest the nine-song list has to a strong album opener, "Star of Bethlehem". Since a studio version of it with the "The answer is no one in this room" bridge, as it was performed in the CSNY 1974 Tour, doesn't exist, we will have to settle for the regular studio version, as I believe the former is the way it would be featured in this album. Ironically enough, the title track "Mediterranean" was only recorded in the studio two years after the project was shelved, but its importance to the album's concept and being part of the original nine-song list means it stays on the album regardless, slotted in as track two on side one. Taking a cue from Homegrown, "Vacancy" is next, featured in its acoustic version from November 1974, slotting in much better as the solo, paranoid song it began as rather than the aggressive, electric version it would become further on up the road. "Daughters" is its regular studio version in the lack of a solo acoustic take, and "Barefoot Floors" is the gorgeous solo outtake released as an NYA exclusive a while back. "Love/Art Blues" is also featured in a late 1974 version, the middle ground between the solo version from June 1974 and the highly inebriated version from the following January, serving as a good opener for side two. "Hawaiian Sunrise" is the June 1974 take with the outro chatter edited out, and "Frozen Man", "Deep Forbidden Lake" and "Bad News Comes to Town" are their regular studio versions. Finally, we end on a similar note to Zuma, with the alternate version of "Through My Sails", as found on the Archives box set.

A 35-minute album with roughly similar sides, Mediterranean is a nearly full-on acoustic album with very little in the way of band tracks, a departure from the more diverse albums Neil would put out at the time, and maybe even a predecessor to Hitchhiker in scope and general mood. Eleven songs is an odd number, but it surely works for our purposes. And hey, After the Gold Rush is a short eleven-song album too, so we're in good company in that department. There really aren't any potential singles to be found on the album, with maybe "Star of Bethlehem" coming closest. We're firmly in Ditch territory, this is an uncompromising, uncommercial album concerned with his failing relationship, fatherhood, and the pressures of fame. When sequencing this, I took some cues from the albums some of these songs were actually released on, such as "Vacancy" in the middle of the side or "Through My Sails" as the closer, but for the rest of them, I simply worked out where they fit best and put them there. As an album, it fits in pretty comfortably within Neil's 70s discography, being as good and consistent as something like the original Homegrown, all while being different enough to stand up on its own. The album cover is my creation, a picture of him with his vintage Rolls Royce in Amsterdam, in September 1974 during the trip that inspired the Mediterranean concept itself, with some nice typography added on top. The 1970s saw the height of Neil Young's talent and some of the most complicated times he'd ever faced, with the combination of those two quite evident here, in his self-imposed holiday from fame.

Sources:

- Neil Young - Archives Vol. II (1972-1976)

- The Lost Pair: Mediterranean & Homegrown