Latest news with #Monkees
Los Angeles Times
11-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Los Angeles Times
‘American Idol' winner Nick Fradiani channels the gruff brilliance of Neil Diamond in ‘A Beautiful Noise'
'A Beautiful Noise' is a jukebox musical that understands the assignment. The show, which opened Wednesday at the Hollywood Pantages Theatre on the Broadway musical's North American tour, exists to celebrate the rough magic of Neil Diamond's catalog. If glorious singing of American pop gold is what you're looking for, 'A Beautiful Noise' delivers. Diamond's fans will no doubt feel remunerated by the thrilling vocal performance of Nick Fradiani, the 2015 winner of 'American Idol,' who plays the young iteration of the double-cast Neil, the Brooklyn-born pop sensation who went on a rocket ship to fame and fortune that gave him everything in the world but the peace that had always eluded him. Fradiani vocally captures not just the driving excitement of Diamond's singing but the note of masculine melancholy that gives the songs their grainy, ruminative subtext. Jukebox musicals, inspired perhaps by the commercial success of 'Mamma Mia!,' tend to muscle an artist's hits into flagrantly incongruous dramatic contexts. Anthony McCarten, the book writer of 'A Beautiful Noise,' avoids this trap by setting up a framework that deepens our appreciation of Diamond's music by shining a biographical light on how the songs came into existence. The older version of , now the grizzled Diamond burnt out by tour life and desperate not to duplicate the mistakes he made in his first two marriages, is played by Robert Westenberg. He's been sent by his third wife to a psychotherapist to work on himself. As he shares with the doctor (Lisa Reneé Pitts), he's been told that he's hard to live with — an accusation that his long, stubborn silences in the session make instantly credible. Introspection is as unnatural to Neil as it was for Tony Soprano, but the doctor gently guides Neil past his resistance. Intrigued by his remark that he put everything he had to say into his music, she presents him with a volume of his collected lyrics and asks him to talk her through one of his songs. 'I Am … I Said,' which makes reference to a frog that dreamed of being a king before becoming one, cuts too close to the bone. That single will have to wait for a breakthrough in therapy, but he is lured back into his past when the Jewish boy from Flatbush talked his way into a meeting with Ellie Greenwich (Kate A. Mulligan), the famed songwriter and producer, who convinced him not to change his name and gave him the chance that set him down the road to stardom. The production, directed by Michael Mayer and choreographed by Steven Hoggett, marks this therapy milestone by having backup singers and chorus members emerge from behind Neil's chair. Out of darkness, musical euphoria shines through. The show's approach is largely chronological. 'I'm A Believer,' which became a runaway hit for the Monkees, catapults Diamond into the big leagues. Once he starts singing his own material, he becomes a bona fide rock star — a moody Elvis who straddles rock, country, folk and pop with a hangdog bravura. Neil's first marriage to Jaye Posner (a touching Tiffany Tatreau) is an early casualty after he falls in love with Marcia Murphey (Hannah Jewel Kohn, spinning a seductive spell musically and dramatically). It's Marcia who coaches him into playing the part of front man. The hits come fast and furious after that, but the frenzy of tour life exacts a severe toll. Of course, everyone at the Pantages is waiting impatiently for 'Sweet Caroline,' the anthem that never fails to transform into a sing-along after the first 'bum-bum-bum.' The performance of this ecstatic number is powerfully mood-elevating. Fradiani's character work is most impressive in his singing. That's when the inner trouble Neil has been evading since his Brooklyn childhood hauntingly resounds. 'America,' 'A Beautiful Noise,' 'Song Sung Blue,' 'Love on the Rocks' and 'You Don't Bring Me Flowers,' songs heard countless times, take on more weight as the circumstances of their creation are revealed. The therapy gets a little heavy-handed in the protracted final stretch. But Westenberg, who's a touch too emphatic early on, lends poignancy to the cathartic release that ushers Neil into a new place of self-understanding. By keeping the focus where it should be — on the music — 'A Beautiful Noise' thrives where more ambitious jukebox musicals stumble. This is a show for fans. But as the son of one who remembers the songs from family road trips, even though I have none of them in my music library, I was grooving to the sound of a bygone America, high on its own unlimited possibilities. At the curtain call at Wednesday's opening, Katie Diamond came on stage and video-called her husband as the Pantages audience collectively joined in an encore of 'Sweet Caroline.' It wasn't easy to hear Diamond sing, but it hardly mattered. Fradiani had supplied that dopamine rush for more than two hours with his virtuoso musical portrayal.
The Advertiser
07-07-2025
- Entertainment
- The Advertiser
Can AI really write music you might want to listen to?
This is a sample of The Echidna newsletter sent out each weekday morning. To sign up for FREE, go to I want to disagree with Garry Linnell. In his last Echidna, he was of the opinion that music generated by AI was fine. "If a song created by an algorithm can break your heart or, better still, heal it, perhaps music and anything else we consider art still has a future after all in this increasingly artificial world of ours," he concluded elegantly but, in my opinion, wrongly. To my mind and ear, you can't divorce music from the human experience. It has to be authentic. A machine might write a love song, and it might be a sweet sound - but it will fall on my deaf ears. I'm not interested. Good music isn't just a string of notes. It has context and history. As an analogy, I think of the singer Joss Stone. She is phenomenally successful and belts out a good sound. She has her fans (in their millions) but soul music demands, well, soul - and that comes from an upbringing and a background. I met her as a sweet English teenager (her, not me) when she was starting out and trying to make a name for herself. It struck me then that she had a fabulous voice, throaty and growly, similar to Aretha Franklin's. The resonance was with the great soul singers of that black America where soul came from suffering. But Joss was a nice white girl from middle-class England. Aretha Franklin was born in a wooden shack in Tennessee in 1942 when black people risked death if they displeased a white man by, say, looking at him the wrong way or, even worse, at his wife. Soul music came from Aretha's experience. So, what has that got to do with artificially generated songs? The essence of music is that it needs to be authentic. It needs to reflect the human condition. It has to ring true. The Beach Boys were authentic. The Monkees were an inauthentic creation. AI does inauthentic creation at warp speed. It relies on copying the past. It relies on seeing what love songs have said and done and then varying it and replicating it. The result may be tuneful but it has no human resonance - no meaning, in the broad sense. Tell AI to write a new Bob Dylan song and the result would fool the ear - but not the mind. Musicians have always taken music from the past and developed it. Mozart did it. So did the Rolling Stones. All that is fine and creative. But AI doesn't quite do that. In a way, it mimics. It creates a kind of muzak. I'm not sure that AI could have created punk - or the later Beatles stuff, because they were both too different from previous music. One day, probably soon, someone will ask AI to create a Beethoven symphony, and the result will sound like a Beethoven symphony - but it won't be a Beethoven symphony, coming from that time, from Ludwig van's human experience. Listening to it might pass a pleasant hour but no more than that. It would be shallow. Take another example. If you were getting married and your best friend wrote an emotional, moving poem for the wedding, would it be just as moving if you found out later that it had been generated by AI in a machine? HAVE YOUR SAY: So, it's a choice. Is Garry right or am I right? Send your thoughts to echidna@ . By the way, I'm writing the Echidna for Tuesday but I promise to be fair-minded in selecting your views. SHARE THE LOVE: If you enjoy The Echidna, forward it to a friend so they can sign up, too. IN CASE YOU MISSED IT: - Australian actor Julian McMahon, known for his roles in Nip/Tuck, Charmed and Home and Away, has died aged 56 after a private battle with cancer. - Israel will send a delegation to Qatar for talks on a possible Gaza hostage and ceasefire deal. - US President Donald Trump says he will start talking to China about a possible TikTok deal, saying the United States "pretty much" has a deal on the sale of the short-video app. THEY SAID IT: "Don't look at me in that tone of voice." - Dorothy Parker YOU SAID IT: Rick said: "AI music is entirely about making money. Therefore, I believe it to be unnecessary. The Monkees may have acted (it's a stretch to call them actors), but they were actual musicians." Susan was more open to AI-generated music: "My eclectic music education began when I was very little, and my likes have few boundaries. My response is visceral. If it appeals, terrific. If not, I move on." Alex was worried about the implications of AI for human music-makers: "One big reason for concern about AI composition is that companies have trained their AI on songs written by humans, without compensation: AI developers have consistently massively infringed intellectual property rights, and that is not fair." Elaine said: "AI does not 'float my boat' and reading how much water (which is vital for our existence} is needed to generate this device is very worrying. With AI entering so many aspects of our lives, which is most important - humanity or AI?" This is a sample of The Echidna newsletter sent out each weekday morning. To sign up for FREE, go to I want to disagree with Garry Linnell. In his last Echidna, he was of the opinion that music generated by AI was fine. "If a song created by an algorithm can break your heart or, better still, heal it, perhaps music and anything else we consider art still has a future after all in this increasingly artificial world of ours," he concluded elegantly but, in my opinion, wrongly. To my mind and ear, you can't divorce music from the human experience. It has to be authentic. A machine might write a love song, and it might be a sweet sound - but it will fall on my deaf ears. I'm not interested. Good music isn't just a string of notes. It has context and history. As an analogy, I think of the singer Joss Stone. She is phenomenally successful and belts out a good sound. She has her fans (in their millions) but soul music demands, well, soul - and that comes from an upbringing and a background. I met her as a sweet English teenager (her, not me) when she was starting out and trying to make a name for herself. It struck me then that she had a fabulous voice, throaty and growly, similar to Aretha Franklin's. The resonance was with the great soul singers of that black America where soul came from suffering. But Joss was a nice white girl from middle-class England. Aretha Franklin was born in a wooden shack in Tennessee in 1942 when black people risked death if they displeased a white man by, say, looking at him the wrong way or, even worse, at his wife. Soul music came from Aretha's experience. So, what has that got to do with artificially generated songs? The essence of music is that it needs to be authentic. It needs to reflect the human condition. It has to ring true. The Beach Boys were authentic. The Monkees were an inauthentic creation. AI does inauthentic creation at warp speed. It relies on copying the past. It relies on seeing what love songs have said and done and then varying it and replicating it. The result may be tuneful but it has no human resonance - no meaning, in the broad sense. Tell AI to write a new Bob Dylan song and the result would fool the ear - but not the mind. Musicians have always taken music from the past and developed it. Mozart did it. So did the Rolling Stones. All that is fine and creative. But AI doesn't quite do that. In a way, it mimics. It creates a kind of muzak. I'm not sure that AI could have created punk - or the later Beatles stuff, because they were both too different from previous music. One day, probably soon, someone will ask AI to create a Beethoven symphony, and the result will sound like a Beethoven symphony - but it won't be a Beethoven symphony, coming from that time, from Ludwig van's human experience. Listening to it might pass a pleasant hour but no more than that. It would be shallow. Take another example. If you were getting married and your best friend wrote an emotional, moving poem for the wedding, would it be just as moving if you found out later that it had been generated by AI in a machine? HAVE YOUR SAY: So, it's a choice. Is Garry right or am I right? Send your thoughts to echidna@ . By the way, I'm writing the Echidna for Tuesday but I promise to be fair-minded in selecting your views. SHARE THE LOVE: If you enjoy The Echidna, forward it to a friend so they can sign up, too. IN CASE YOU MISSED IT: - Australian actor Julian McMahon, known for his roles in Nip/Tuck, Charmed and Home and Away, has died aged 56 after a private battle with cancer. - Israel will send a delegation to Qatar for talks on a possible Gaza hostage and ceasefire deal. - US President Donald Trump says he will start talking to China about a possible TikTok deal, saying the United States "pretty much" has a deal on the sale of the short-video app. THEY SAID IT: "Don't look at me in that tone of voice." - Dorothy Parker YOU SAID IT: Rick said: "AI music is entirely about making money. Therefore, I believe it to be unnecessary. The Monkees may have acted (it's a stretch to call them actors), but they were actual musicians." Susan was more open to AI-generated music: "My eclectic music education began when I was very little, and my likes have few boundaries. My response is visceral. If it appeals, terrific. If not, I move on." Alex was worried about the implications of AI for human music-makers: "One big reason for concern about AI composition is that companies have trained their AI on songs written by humans, without compensation: AI developers have consistently massively infringed intellectual property rights, and that is not fair." Elaine said: "AI does not 'float my boat' and reading how much water (which is vital for our existence} is needed to generate this device is very worrying. With AI entering so many aspects of our lives, which is most important - humanity or AI?" This is a sample of The Echidna newsletter sent out each weekday morning. To sign up for FREE, go to I want to disagree with Garry Linnell. In his last Echidna, he was of the opinion that music generated by AI was fine. "If a song created by an algorithm can break your heart or, better still, heal it, perhaps music and anything else we consider art still has a future after all in this increasingly artificial world of ours," he concluded elegantly but, in my opinion, wrongly. To my mind and ear, you can't divorce music from the human experience. It has to be authentic. A machine might write a love song, and it might be a sweet sound - but it will fall on my deaf ears. I'm not interested. Good music isn't just a string of notes. It has context and history. As an analogy, I think of the singer Joss Stone. She is phenomenally successful and belts out a good sound. She has her fans (in their millions) but soul music demands, well, soul - and that comes from an upbringing and a background. I met her as a sweet English teenager (her, not me) when she was starting out and trying to make a name for herself. It struck me then that she had a fabulous voice, throaty and growly, similar to Aretha Franklin's. The resonance was with the great soul singers of that black America where soul came from suffering. But Joss was a nice white girl from middle-class England. Aretha Franklin was born in a wooden shack in Tennessee in 1942 when black people risked death if they displeased a white man by, say, looking at him the wrong way or, even worse, at his wife. Soul music came from Aretha's experience. So, what has that got to do with artificially generated songs? The essence of music is that it needs to be authentic. It needs to reflect the human condition. It has to ring true. The Beach Boys were authentic. The Monkees were an inauthentic creation. AI does inauthentic creation at warp speed. It relies on copying the past. It relies on seeing what love songs have said and done and then varying it and replicating it. The result may be tuneful but it has no human resonance - no meaning, in the broad sense. Tell AI to write a new Bob Dylan song and the result would fool the ear - but not the mind. Musicians have always taken music from the past and developed it. Mozart did it. So did the Rolling Stones. All that is fine and creative. But AI doesn't quite do that. In a way, it mimics. It creates a kind of muzak. I'm not sure that AI could have created punk - or the later Beatles stuff, because they were both too different from previous music. One day, probably soon, someone will ask AI to create a Beethoven symphony, and the result will sound like a Beethoven symphony - but it won't be a Beethoven symphony, coming from that time, from Ludwig van's human experience. Listening to it might pass a pleasant hour but no more than that. It would be shallow. Take another example. If you were getting married and your best friend wrote an emotional, moving poem for the wedding, would it be just as moving if you found out later that it had been generated by AI in a machine? HAVE YOUR SAY: So, it's a choice. Is Garry right or am I right? Send your thoughts to echidna@ . By the way, I'm writing the Echidna for Tuesday but I promise to be fair-minded in selecting your views. SHARE THE LOVE: If you enjoy The Echidna, forward it to a friend so they can sign up, too. IN CASE YOU MISSED IT: - Australian actor Julian McMahon, known for his roles in Nip/Tuck, Charmed and Home and Away, has died aged 56 after a private battle with cancer. - Israel will send a delegation to Qatar for talks on a possible Gaza hostage and ceasefire deal. - US President Donald Trump says he will start talking to China about a possible TikTok deal, saying the United States "pretty much" has a deal on the sale of the short-video app. THEY SAID IT: "Don't look at me in that tone of voice." - Dorothy Parker YOU SAID IT: Rick said: "AI music is entirely about making money. Therefore, I believe it to be unnecessary. The Monkees may have acted (it's a stretch to call them actors), but they were actual musicians." Susan was more open to AI-generated music: "My eclectic music education began when I was very little, and my likes have few boundaries. My response is visceral. If it appeals, terrific. If not, I move on." Alex was worried about the implications of AI for human music-makers: "One big reason for concern about AI composition is that companies have trained their AI on songs written by humans, without compensation: AI developers have consistently massively infringed intellectual property rights, and that is not fair." Elaine said: "AI does not 'float my boat' and reading how much water (which is vital for our existence} is needed to generate this device is very worrying. With AI entering so many aspects of our lives, which is most important - humanity or AI?" This is a sample of The Echidna newsletter sent out each weekday morning. To sign up for FREE, go to I want to disagree with Garry Linnell. In his last Echidna, he was of the opinion that music generated by AI was fine. "If a song created by an algorithm can break your heart or, better still, heal it, perhaps music and anything else we consider art still has a future after all in this increasingly artificial world of ours," he concluded elegantly but, in my opinion, wrongly. To my mind and ear, you can't divorce music from the human experience. It has to be authentic. A machine might write a love song, and it might be a sweet sound - but it will fall on my deaf ears. I'm not interested. Good music isn't just a string of notes. It has context and history. As an analogy, I think of the singer Joss Stone. She is phenomenally successful and belts out a good sound. She has her fans (in their millions) but soul music demands, well, soul - and that comes from an upbringing and a background. I met her as a sweet English teenager (her, not me) when she was starting out and trying to make a name for herself. It struck me then that she had a fabulous voice, throaty and growly, similar to Aretha Franklin's. The resonance was with the great soul singers of that black America where soul came from suffering. But Joss was a nice white girl from middle-class England. Aretha Franklin was born in a wooden shack in Tennessee in 1942 when black people risked death if they displeased a white man by, say, looking at him the wrong way or, even worse, at his wife. Soul music came from Aretha's experience. So, what has that got to do with artificially generated songs? The essence of music is that it needs to be authentic. It needs to reflect the human condition. It has to ring true. The Beach Boys were authentic. The Monkees were an inauthentic creation. AI does inauthentic creation at warp speed. It relies on copying the past. It relies on seeing what love songs have said and done and then varying it and replicating it. The result may be tuneful but it has no human resonance - no meaning, in the broad sense. Tell AI to write a new Bob Dylan song and the result would fool the ear - but not the mind. Musicians have always taken music from the past and developed it. Mozart did it. So did the Rolling Stones. All that is fine and creative. But AI doesn't quite do that. In a way, it mimics. It creates a kind of muzak. I'm not sure that AI could have created punk - or the later Beatles stuff, because they were both too different from previous music. One day, probably soon, someone will ask AI to create a Beethoven symphony, and the result will sound like a Beethoven symphony - but it won't be a Beethoven symphony, coming from that time, from Ludwig van's human experience. Listening to it might pass a pleasant hour but no more than that. It would be shallow. Take another example. If you were getting married and your best friend wrote an emotional, moving poem for the wedding, would it be just as moving if you found out later that it had been generated by AI in a machine? HAVE YOUR SAY: So, it's a choice. Is Garry right or am I right? Send your thoughts to echidna@ . By the way, I'm writing the Echidna for Tuesday but I promise to be fair-minded in selecting your views. SHARE THE LOVE: If you enjoy The Echidna, forward it to a friend so they can sign up, too. IN CASE YOU MISSED IT: - Australian actor Julian McMahon, known for his roles in Nip/Tuck, Charmed and Home and Away, has died aged 56 after a private battle with cancer. - Israel will send a delegation to Qatar for talks on a possible Gaza hostage and ceasefire deal. - US President Donald Trump says he will start talking to China about a possible TikTok deal, saying the United States "pretty much" has a deal on the sale of the short-video app. THEY SAID IT: "Don't look at me in that tone of voice." - Dorothy Parker YOU SAID IT: Rick said: "AI music is entirely about making money. Therefore, I believe it to be unnecessary. The Monkees may have acted (it's a stretch to call them actors), but they were actual musicians." Susan was more open to AI-generated music: "My eclectic music education began when I was very little, and my likes have few boundaries. My response is visceral. If it appeals, terrific. If not, I move on." Alex was worried about the implications of AI for human music-makers: "One big reason for concern about AI composition is that companies have trained their AI on songs written by humans, without compensation: AI developers have consistently massively infringed intellectual property rights, and that is not fair." Elaine said: "AI does not 'float my boat' and reading how much water (which is vital for our existence} is needed to generate this device is very worrying. With AI entering so many aspects of our lives, which is most important - humanity or AI?"
Yahoo
15-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Micky Dolenz Making Rare Appearance With 'Legendary' Piece of Monkees Memorabilia
Micky Dolenz Making Rare Appearance With 'Legendary' Piece of Monkees Memorabilia originally appeared on Parade. Drummer is the last surviving member of the hit 1960s group , which started as a fictional band for an NBC sitcom and turned into a music phenomenon. Dolenz still tours, rocking out to his favorite Monkees songs (or other songs that have special meaning to him), and he also does appearances. At one such appearance this summer at Nickel City Comic Con, he will be doing a photo op with the original, iconic, "legendary" Monkeemobile. "Get ready to monkee around with one of the most iconic rides in TV & music history! 🔥," announced Nickel City Comic Con on Instagram. "The legendary Monkeemobile is pulling into Nickel City Comic Con! And guess what? Micky Dolenz himself will be doing photo ops with this one-of-a-kind ride! Don't miss your chance to snap a pic with a music and pop culture legend! Get your tickets now at Nickel City Comic Con is held annually in Buffalo, New York. This year's dates are June 27-29 and celebrities include Danny Trejo, Randy Quaid, Beverly D'Angelo, Jon Heder, Michael Biehn, Gabrielle Carteris, Christine Elise, Ric Flair, "Hacksaw" Jim Duggan, Dolenz and many famous Monkeemobile was used all the time on the show (though there actually two separate Monkeemobiles). It was a bright red 1966 Pontiac GTO modified with special accessories to make it unique for The Monkees. It was made by Dean Jeffries, a stuntman and car customizer who was also the man responsible for The Green Hornet's car Black Beauty, and various futuristic hover cars for Logan's Run. Among the modifications are "a very tall split windshield, a third row of seats where the rear deck was, a T-bucket-type convertible top, large fender flares, exaggerated taillamps, and even a parachute. The show's producers wanted a flamboyant car, and Dean delivered in spades," according to The site also says that over 7 million model kits of the Monkeemobile were sold, a number only surpassed by The Dukes of Hazzard's General Lee. In an interview with the site in 2001, Jeffries said that the producers of the show couldn't decide which kind of car they wanted to use until the last minute and then the customizers worked "around the clock for four weeks to get the cars done in time" — they made two versions of the car, one for use on the show and one for display at car shows and promotional events. 🎬 SIGN UP for Parade's Daily newsletter to get the latest pop culture news & celebrity interviews delivered right to your inbox 🎬 Micky Dolenz Making Rare Appearance With 'Legendary' Piece of Monkees Memorabilia first appeared on Parade on Jun 5, 2025 This story was originally reported by Parade on Jun 5, 2025, where it first appeared.
New York Post
04-06-2025
- Entertainment
- New York Post
The Monkees drummer Micky Dolenz recounts the first time he met Paul McCartney
Micky Dolenz and Paul McCartney came together in the 60s. The Monkees drummer, 80, is looking back at the first time he ever met the Beatle, 82, decades ago. 'The first Beatle I met was Paul [McCartney], the night before at dinner at his house,' Dolenz told People in an interview published on Wednesday. 'I'd gone over to England to do a press junket, just myself. As it turned out, a publicist got involved and made it a 'Monkee Meets Beatle' thing at Paul's house for dinner. Just me, him and Martha the sheepdog.' 6 The Monkees, from left: Micky Dolenz, Mike Nesmith, Davy Jones and Peter Tork get a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in Los Angeles in 1989. AP From what transpired next, it seems like the fellow musicians quickly formed a friendship. 'He invited me to Abbey Road [studios] the next day,' recalled Dolenz. 'I don't even know if he told me the name at the time, but they were working on 'Sgt. Pepper.' I just about peed in my pants, but I'm trying to be cool. I got all dressed up thinking … I don't know what I was thinking.' 6 'The Monkees.' NBCUniversal via Getty Images 6 This June 4, 1967 photo shows The Monkees posing with their Emmy award at the 19th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards in Calif. AP 'I guess I thought it was gonna be some sort of Beatlemania fun-fest freakout psycho-jello happening thing,' the singer confessed. 'So I got dressed up in paisley bell bottoms and tie-dyed underwear and my glasses and beads and hair. I looked like a cross between Ronald McDonald and Charlie Manson.' But when Dolenz got to the session, things weren't what he expected. 'I walk in and, well … there's nobody there! I was like, 'Where are the girls?!'' he shared. 'It was just the four guys sitting there under fluorescent lighting, like my high school gymnasium, in the middle of the day. John Lennon looks up and says, 'Hey Monkee Man, you want to hear what we're working on?' From then on he called me Monkee Man.' Along with McCartney, the Beatles included the late John Lennon and George Harriso and Ringo Starr, 84. 6 The Beatles. Bettmann Archive Dolenz rose to fame after being cast in the 1966 television sitcom 'The Monkees' before landing the role as the drummer and lead vocalist in the band that was created for the series. The performer is the only surviving member of the group after Michael Nesmith died in 2021. Peter Tork passed in February 2019, and Davy Jones died in 2012. The show ran for two seasons from 1966 to 1968. 6 The Monkees perform live. Splash News Looking back at what he would tell his younger self when first being cast in 'The Monkees,' Dolenz told the outlet, 'Get a good lawyer. I am not kidding. I won't say much more except this: Have you heard the term 'unconscionable bargain'? How about the phrase 'pact with the devil'? Faust? You know the musical 'Damn Yankees?' I'm doing one called 'Damn Monkees!'' Now, this summer, the performer is set to tour the country and sing those Monkees classics. 6 Davy Jones, Peter Tork, Micky Dolenz, Mike Nesmith. AP 'I've tried so much different material over the years. It's all about the audience, as far as I'm concerned … You know, I'm not the kind of artist who's gone down the path of reinventing,' Dolenz said about what fans can expect. 'At least musically. We've all seen it happen with big acts. I've been to concerts for big acts who have a lot of nostalgic hit tunes and they don't do 'em. Or if they do, they do it with some contempt. Like, 'Oh, I guess you want to hear this piece of s–t.''
Yahoo
26-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Sole Surviving Member of The Monkees 'Still Monkeeing Around' Has Fans Saying the Same Thing
The last surviving member of the hit 1960s group made a huge announcement on Thursday, May 22, that left his fans all saying the same thing. , 80, shared on Instagram and Facebook that he would be adding some performance dates in August in Cleveland. "🎶 Cleveland! I'm coming your way for two nights - August 13 and 14 - and I promise to bring all the hits, all the stories, and at least 70% of the dance moves I had in 1967. Now, you could stay home and rewatch old Monkees episodes… but where's the fun in that? Join me live instead - no laugh track required. 😉 🎟️ Tickets are on sale now, and you'll find the link in the first comment. Get yours before they're gone - because I'd hate for you to hear all about it from your neighbor who did go. MickyDolenz #TheMonkees #ClevelandConcerts #StillMonkeeingAround #TourLife," wrote Dolenz on social media. Tickets can be purchased here. Fans are super excited, with one writing, "You have no idea how excited I am to see you!!! I missed it when you were relatively close by, and I thought I missed my chances, but this just made me feel incredible, I knew that I had to see you at some point, and finally, I shall have that chance, love you Micky, you still sound amazing!! ❤️." Another added, "It's one of my venues that I have been lobbying to have you play here in my backyard for years.! Finally , @micky_dolenz@musicboxcle 😁." "Just got tix!!! So excited," wrote a third fan, and a fourth fan wrote simply, "My favorite Monkee ❤️." The Monkees burst on the scene in the late 1960s. They were a fictional band for their eponymous NBC sitcom, but they became such a hit that they turned into a real band, recording several albums and going on tour. However, when the show was canceled in 1968, the group only lasted two more years together, though they have reunited periodically over the years. 🎬 SIGN UP for Parade's Daily newsletter to get the latest pop culture news & celebrity interviews delivered right to your inbox 🎬 However, in the last 15 years, three of the original members have sadly passed away. Lead singer Davy Jones died in 2012, and bassist Peter Tork died in 2019. In 2021, drummer Dolenz and guitarist Michael Nesmith went on a farewell tour, and Nesmith tragically passed away from heart failure just weeks after the tour concluded, leaving Dolenz as the last surviving member of the group. In a recent interview with The Observer-Reporter, Dolenz acknowledged that it is both hard to get older and hard to watch your friends pass on, saying that at this point, he's just "glad to be above ground." "The travel is tough, but the shows are easy. That's why they call it playing," added Dolenz. Sole Surviving Member of The Monkees 'Still Monkeeing Around' Has Fans Saying the Same Thing first appeared on Parade on May 23, 2025
