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Check out this fantasy album artwork that appeared in the Live Almanac's Facebook feed today, courtesy of Frank Jason Rhoden. Inspired by the cover of the Live 1967 LP, Frank took a shot at creating album art for a Live 1968 release, which would have documented a 1968 Monkees concert in Japan. Here's what Frank wrote on Facebook: I have great nostalgia for the "Live 1967" album, and its cover that just screams 1987 retro reissue. I never liked the commonly seen low-res yellow cover for the 1968 Japan boot, so I decided to use the 1967 album as a template to make something that looked like 1988 vomited all over 1968 - a tacky explosion of color and neon using images from that tour. I’m mostly happy with it, so I thought I’d share.  Take a moment to listen to The Monkees live in Japan in October 1968, courtesy of the Live Almanac's YouTube channel:
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 By Justin RakowskiSalt Lake City – December 6, 1969. As The Monkees walked off stage, nothing would ever be the same. At least in terms of their original run as a quartet, that was unceremoniously reduced to a trio earlier in the year. Apart from a few contractual obligations, Michael Nesmith was no longer a Monkee. This left Micky Dolenz and Davy Jones to continue on in some capacity. In addition to making a few promotional appearances under the guise of The Monkees throughout 1970, Micky and Davy undertook what would be the final Monkees album of the original Colgems era. Released in June of 1970, Changes unfortunately did nothing to bolster their fading popularity. While the single "Oh My My" barely cracked the Billboard Hot 100, Changes failed to grab the attention of what remaining fans they had and did not chart in its initial production run. As decades passed and different waves of Monkees reunions cropped up, leading to more positive reevaluations of their career and musical output, Changes still held a somewhat “black sheep” quality when compared to The Monkees' other Colgems records. Growing up in the 1990s, I was too young to remember the massive resurgence in popularity the group experienced during their 20th Anniversary in 1986. Luckily, I discovered the "Pre-Fab Four" through Nick at Nite reruns during the mid-90s, leading me to hunt down every album released through the Rhino Records reissues on CD. Even as a young Monkees fan, Changes carried a stigma like no other Monkees LP had and initially I barely gave it a listen. Over the course of the ensuing years, my appreciation of the album grew slightly, but it still never reached the level of importance as their other albums.  In 2012, I met the woman who I would fall in love with and ultimately marry a few short years later. On one of our first dates, I discovered that she was quite familiar with a good number of Monkees songs, albeit the ones that were featured on the show, as she too watched the Nick at Nite reruns. Naturally, I gave her copies of all their albums, excited to see which one she would hold dear to her heart. After making her way through everything, I was shocked to find that she adored Changes and had memorized the lyrics to every song featured on the album in only a few short days. Her love for the album was contagious and I now started to listen with a different set of ears and appreciate it for what it was – a solidly written and performed set of catchy bubblegum songs that acted as a perfect bookend to a period that started with an album (The Monkees) that was essentially a solidly written and performed set of catchy bubblegum songs.  (From the June 13, 1970 issue of Billboard) Through all of this, as many Monkees fans know, the multitrack recordings for all of the Jeff Barry-produced songs from the 1970 sessions are missing. Unfortunately this also includes two tracks, "Which Way Do You Want It" and "Ride Baby Ride," that were recorded but ultimately left off the final pressing of Changes. Given all these facts, we’ve been told time and time again that a Super Deluxe set of the album would be impossible given the lack of content. Once a Super Deluxe set of Headquarters and Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn & Jones, Ltd. is released in the coming years, the journey that Monkees archivist Andrew Sandoval started nearly a decade ago will have ended. As a fan of both The Monkees and Andrew, I am incredibly grateful for the amount of dedication from them to bring us such wonderful sets and can’t wait to have a shelf with all the Super Deluxe sets next to each other, providing us with perhaps the most complete auditory history of a band’s output. But, the set will feel quite lonely if Changes isn’t there in some capacity to bookend everything as it did almost 50 years ago when it was first issued. With all of that in mind, I propose a solution. When the time comes to make a decision on the merits of a Super Deluxe set of Changes and the missing tracks that still have not been found, here is a track listing that could fill three CDs and properly tell the story of The Monkees' Colgems-era output, including Davy’s final contractual obligation for Colgems that resulted in his self-titled album released on Bell Records in 1971. With that being said, I present you with… CHANGES (SUPER DELUXE EDITION)
RARITIES 23. Oh My My (Mono Promo Film Mix) 24. 99 Pounds (Stereo Remix) 25. Midnight Train (Demo) 26. I Never Thought It Peculiar (No Strings and Backing Vocals) 27. I Never Thought It Peculiar (Mono Mix without Overdubs) 28. I Never Thought It Peculiar (Mono Mix with Overdubs) 29. I Never Thought It Peculiar (Stereo Remix) OUTTAKES 30. Time And Time Again (Take 1) 31. Time And Time Again (Mono Mix) 32. Time And Time Again (Stereo Mix) COMMERCIALS 33. Post Cereals "Monkees Cereal Box Records" Commercial 34. Kool-Aid "Nerf Ball" Commercial 35. Kool-Aid "Buzzer" & "Snake In A Can" Commercial LIVE 36. Together (Davy Jones With Sam & The Goodtimers - Live on Music Scene - December 22, 1969) 37. Interview With Davy Jones on Music Scene (December 22, 1969) 38. Oh My My (Live At The Palace Theater - Cleveland, Ohio - July 27, 1997) 39. Midnight Train (Live At The Mayo Performing Arts Center - Morristown, New Jersey - Aug. 27, 2015) NON-ALBUM SINGLES
BONUS VINYL 45 "Acapulco Sun" EP by The Monkees RCA #MKE-1310 1970 (Mexico) Oh My My Do You Feel It Too? Acapulco Sun Midnight Train  (Courtesy of Monkee45s.net)  Thank you very much to Justin Rakowski for submitting his essay to The Monkees Live Almanac! I would also like to acknowledge John McCutcheon's wonderful website Monkee45s for some of the scans seen above. While prepping this piece for the Live Almanac's blog, I contacted longtime Monkees fan, collector, and author Ed Reilly to see if he could share some unique Changes-era pieces from his collection to complement Justin's work. The items below come from Ed's collection - thanks, Ed!  Cashbox magazine - June 1970  "Oh My My" picture sleeve - Turkey (Click for label)  Japanese issue of "Changes" on RCA Records (Click for Side 1 label)  Colgems cassette and 8-track  "Oh My My" picture sleeve - Australia (Click for label) Bell Records released the original Monkees albums in Japan throughout 1973 and 1974:
 "Oh My My" picture sleeve - Germany (Click for label)  "Oh My My" picture sleeve - France (Click for label) Thanks a lot to SirQ for sharing his fantasy album artwork and track listings for the first eight original Monkees LPs with The Monkees Live Almanac. Alternate reality Monkees albums are always a lot of fun to think about, especially since there are so many gems in the group's catalog that never made it on to their albums in the 1960s. "I’ve spent an absurd amount of time cleaning up my album collections, fixing slight syncing issues, stereo imaging for the later stuff, and EQ problems that usually come with older tape-based music," SirQ told the Live Almanac. "The Monkees’ releases have definitely been a great exercise in detecting and cleaning such problems. I’m particularly happy with the custom edits of 'Carlisle Wheeling' and 'Mommy and Daddy' (uncensored) that I have now. "On the album covers side, that Pisces cover took far longer than I thought it would to clean up. I used my own LP copy as a reference to fix the highest resolution version I could find online. I was getting tired of it by the end, so I added the red to the guitar logo to make it look interesting to me again! "I don’t know entirely why I like doing this stuff, but it sure is a lot of fun to listen to and look at."  The Monkees (mono)
 More of The Monkees (mono)
 Headquarters (mono)
 Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn & Jones Ltd. (mono)
 The Birds, The Bees & The Monkees (mono)
 HEAD (custom cleaned up stereo)
 Instant Replay
 The Monkees Present
This is the eleventh in a series of guest articles (and in this instance, a podcast) that have been submitted to The Monkees Live Almanac in celebration of the group's 50th Anniversary.
(Banner designed by Al Bigley)
Earlier this year, the host of the Where's That Sound Coming From? podcast, Brian Marchese, contacted me after I had solicited contributions from guest authors to celebrate The Monkees' 50th Anniversary. Brian was knocking around a few ideas, and after several starts and re-starts, he settled on a podcast presentation that proposes an "alternate" history of The Monkees, largely centered around the group's fifth LP, The Birds, The Bees & The Monkees. Here's Brian's description of the podcast:
Truth is at least as strange as fiction. Fact intertwines with my flights of fancy in this episode. At its core is an analysis of the fifth album The Monkees SHOULD have released. I was asked to contribute something to the excellent blog, Monkees Live Almanac, back in May of this year to help celebrate the band's 50th Anniversary. I thought about it intermittently for two months, wrote it sporadically over the course of the next two months, and recorded/produced it in fits and starts over the last two months. And here it is.
Monkees fans are really going to enjoy this podcast, and the Live Almanac would like to say a big thank you to Brian for all of his hard work and dedication in presenting this project!
Be sure to visit the Where's That Sound Coming From? podcast on Facebook, too!
Thanks a lot to SirQ for allowing the Live Almanac to share these images! The first two designs are for albums that didn't originally exist, and the last three are reimaginations of the LP covers for Head, The Monkees Present, and Changes. Enjoy, and look for more of SirQ's work here on the blog.      For years it has been debated whether or not a concert from the 1969 Monkees tour was recorded. Conflicting reports and recollections from members of The Monkees, their backing band from that era, and others have added to the intrigue. All this time later, however, no tapes have ever surfaced. One concert, thought to be the May 10, 1969 performance in Wichita, Kansas does exist as a bootleg, but it’s an absolutely horrible recording usually sought after for historical purposes only. Both Micky Dolenz and Monkees archivist Andrew Sandoval have seemingly confirmed that there is no audio to be heard from the 1969 tour. "We never recorded that," Micky Dolenz said in a 2005 online interview. "I recorded Sam & The Goodtimers [the supporting band on the 1969 tour] as an act, and was trying to sell them to a record company. But we never recorded - I wish we had, it was funny, it was really great having that band, they were a great band." Sandoval agreed with Micky about the nonexistence of 1969 live audio. "Certainly there’s no tape of a 1969 show in the Monkees vault. What Micky says…that he taped them (The Goodtimers) at that Souled Out Club in Los Angeles…makes a lot of sense," Sandoval said in a 2005 interview. "I tried to do research about that club. I found out where it was but there were never any advertisements or listings of who played there in that time period, so it was hard to say when the Goodtimers played there or when The Monkees might have come to see them. It seems more and more that if there had been a recording it would have shown up by now. It’s been a long time, you know?” Even with these statements, curiosity still surrounds potential live recordings from the 1969 tour today. The year, after all, was more than challenging for the group, who were now a trio after the departure of Peter Tork. With their weekly television series off the air (but revived in syndication in the fall of '69), along with the disastrous box office returns of their feature film Head, and the lukewarm reception to their 1969 NBC television special, The Monkees' concert show proved a hard sell to ticket buyers. To their credit, The Monkees were experimenting with new sounds in their music as well as in their live performances, developing an act that was revue-like in its presentation and supported onstage by Sam & The Goodtimers, a seven-piece rhythm and blues band. Despite some positive vibes from the critics, the 1969 tour, Micky later said, "was like kicking a dead horse. The phenomenon had peaked." "We all had a good time on the tour," Michael Nesmith told Sandoval in the 1990s, but "it was tough out there." Documentation of The Monkees in concert from this era would reveal a unique period in the history of the group like never before, and is a main factor in why fans still hold out hope that tapes will materialize. Historical evidence survives to keep those hopes alive. Below is a radio spot that was aired in Oakland, California in advance of The Monkees' appearance there on November 30, 1969. You'll note that the advertisement mentions the fact that the concert will be recorded for "their next album," but once again, no tapes seem to exist. Monkees fan Justin Rakowski decided to create his own album artwork for such an LP as if it had been released in the aftermath of The Monkees' 1969 tour. Check out Justin's creations below!  (Click all images to enlarge)   Great job, Justin! Fantasy artwork like this and others are always a lot of fun to examine. Now if only those tapes would emerge! Here's the promotional handbill for the Oakland Coliseum concert that Justin used on the back cover of his LP:  A big thanks to Derek Miner who shared his awesome reimagination of The Monkees' last original album Changes, based on the premise that Michael Nesmith was still a member of the group at the time of its release in June 1970. Before you check out the images below, there is some backstory about the photo used for the cover of Changes, and the fact that Michael was cropped out of it: Here's Derek's take on the front cover:  The back cover, complete with Derek's own track listing for a Nesmith-infused Changes:  (Click to enlarge) Derek's artwork without the title treatment:  And finally, the actual cover art for Changes as released on Colgems Records in 1970. "There is the theory that the color background image was done with Mike originally and he was just cropped off," Derek said, adding that "the evidence being a small purple spot on the left that could have been Mike's guitar headstock."  This is the seventh in a series of guest articles that have been submitted to The Monkees Live Almanac in celebration of the group's 50th Anniversary.  Banner designed by Al Bigley When the Missing Links albums appeared in the late 1980s and 1990s, showcasing songs The Monkees recorded during their original incarnation but were never issued, it baffled me how many great tracks were left in the Monkee vaults in the 1960s. And although we've now heard all of those songs thanks to subsequent archival releases through the years, I was still inspired to take another look at the 1969-1971 era of The Monkees' recorded history and put my own spin on it. Having been pleased with Instant Replay (the first post-Peter Tork Monkees album), I constructed a new version of The Monkees Present (the second LP issued after Peter's departure) in Part 1 of this series. In doing so, I created a track listing that combined songs which appeared on the album in its original form in 1969, but then substituted some of what I considered to be weaker tracks with those that were available at the time, but remained unreleased. With a revamped Present LP now complete, I proceeded to tackle Changes in Part 2 of this series. And now, I will submit the third and final edition of this "fantasy album" examination. Perhaps it is the most unique of the bunch because the album profiled below never actually existed. Let me explain. By all accounts Davy Jones strongly disliked the experience of recording the real Changes LP in New York City in early 1970, and was critical of its producer, Jeff Barry. "That was not an album," Davy said about Changes to Andrew Sandoval in 1994. "It was just Jeff Barry and Andy Kim doing an Andy Kim album. Andy Kim couldn't get it sold, so they took his voice off it, and they put us on it. That's how that came about. That was such a con. That was a way of keeping Micky Dolenz and me out of the studio so they could sell Partridge Family albums. I have very bad memories about that trip to New York." Micky expressed a different point of view to Sandoval. "By that time it was pretty obvious that The Monkees were over. Davy and I were still getting along, but we were mainly fulfilling a contractual obligation to the record company – that's what Changes is all about. I was quite happy to do it as long as somebody wanted to record me." Before the end of 1970, Micky and Davy conducted one more recording session in September with Jeff Barry. The bubblegum-esque single "Do It In The Name of Love" (backed with "Lady Jane") would be credited to Dolenz & Jones and not to The Monkees. Issued in April 1971 on Bell Records (which had absorbed Colgems, The Monkees' now defunct record label), the single failed to make a dent in the charts. So, in keeping with my fantasy Changes LP and its track list, what if Barry used both sides of the one-off Dolenz/Jones '71 single, picked through "leftovers" from the Changes sessions, utilized his unfinished Davy Jones productions recorded pre-Headquarters, and turned it into the last original Monkees album sometime in 1971? Throw in a couple of Boyce & Hart goodies and boom! I call this LP Do It In The Name Of Love. It's mostly pure Scooby Doo bubblegum (but I'm not saying that's a bad thing). And here goes: Side 1: Do It In The Name Of Love1. Do It In The Name Of Love (Written by Bobby Bloom & Neil Goldberg / Produced by Jeff Barry) 2. It's Got To Be Love (Written by Neil Goldberg / Produced by Jeff Barry) 3. You Can't Tie a Mustang Down (Written and Produced by Jeff Barry) 4. Acapulco Sun (Written by Steven Soles & Ned Albright / Produced by Jeff Barry) 5. 99 Pounds (Written and Produced by Jeff Barry) 6. Shake 'Em Up (Written by Jerry Leiber & Mike Stoller / Produced by Lester Sill) In the same vein of my fantasy albums presented in this series, Michelle_66 created her very own picture sleeve for "Do It In The Name Of Love" (since it was not issued with a picture sleeve in the United States upon its release in 1971).  (Used with permission of Michelle_66) Side 2: Do It In The Name Of Love7. Lady Jane (Written by Bobby Bloom & Neil Goldberg / Produced by Jeff Barry) 8. Love To Love (Written by Neil Diamond / Produced by Jeff Barry) 9. Ticket On A Ferry Ride (Written by Jeff Barry & Bobby Bloom / Produced by Jeff Barry) 10. Looking For The Good Times (Written and Produced by Tommy Boyce & Bobby Hart) 11. All Alone in the Dark (Written by Steven Soles & Ned Albright / Produced by Jeff Barry) 12. Storybook of You (Written and Produced by Tommy Boyce & Bobby Hart) This is the sixth in a series of guest articles that have been submitted to The Monkees Live Almanac in celebration of the group's 50th Anniversary.  Banner designed by Al Bigley In Part 1 of this series, I constructed a new version of The Monkees Present, the second LP released after the departure of Peter Tork. In doing so, I created a track listing that combined songs which appeared on the album in its original form in 1969, but then substituted some of what I considered to be weaker tracks with those that were available at the time, but remained unreleased. When the Missing Links albums appeared in the late 1980s and 1990s, showcasing songs The Monkees recorded during their original incarnation but were never issued, it baffled me how many great tracks were left in the Monkee vaults in the 1960s. And although we've now heard all of those songs thanks to subsequent archival releases through the years, I was still inspired to take another look at the 1969-1971 era of The Monkees' recorded history and put my own spin on it. Having been pleased with Instant Replay, (the first post-Tork Monkees album), and with a revamped Present LP now complete, next up is Changes, released by Micky Dolenz and Davy Jones in 1970. The sessions for Changes also marked the return of Jeff Barry, the producer of "I'm a Believer" and most of More of the Monkees.  "Changes" album cover When reimagining Changes today, let's say Michael Nesmith decided to soldier on as a Monkees instead of leaving the group as he did in early 1970. Let's also allow the songwriting partnership between Davy Jones and Bill Chadwick to play out, too. (Their songs "If I Knew" and "French Song" appeared on The Monkees Present, and "You and I" on Instant Replay.) Unlike my version of The Monkees Present, the newly retooled Changes is meant to be more rollicking and less serious. Perhaps this mock cover of Changes with Nez included (created by Michelle_66 in her series of Alternate Reality Monkees albums) will help you get ready for a fresh look at an old album.  (Used with permission of Michelle_66 - click to enlarge) Side 1: Changes (Reimagined)1. Oh My My (Written by Jeff Barry & Andy Kim / Produced by Jeff Barry) 2. You're So Good To Me (Written by Jeff Barry & Bobby Bloom / Produced by Jeff Barry) 3. Little Red Rider (Written & Produced by Michael Nesmith) 4. If You Have the Time (Written & Produced by Davy Jones and Bill Chadwick) 5. Down the Highway (Written by Carole King & Toni Stern / Produced by Michael Nesmith) ("Down the Highway" was mislabeled upon its release on Missing Links Volume 2 in 1990 as "Michigan Blackhawk.") 6. Tell Me Love (Written & Produced by Jeff Barry) In the same vein of my fantasy track listings, Michelle_66 created her very own picture sleeve for "Oh My My" (the first and only single from Changes), with Nez still a part of the group at that time:  (Used with permission of Michelle_66) Side 2: Changes (Reimagined)7. I Love You Better (Written by Jeff Barry & Andy Kim / Produced by Jeff Barry) 8. Do You Feel It Too? (Written by Jeff Barry & Andy Kim / Produced by Jeff Barry) 9. Good Clean Fun (Written & Produced by Michael Nesmith) 10. Midnight Train (Written & Produced by Micky Dolenz) 11. Oklahoma Backroom Dancer (Written by Michael Martin Murphey / Produced by Michael Nesmith) 12. Time and Time Again (Written & Produced by Davy Jones and Bill Chadwick) Stay tuned for Part 3 which imagines an album that never existed: a final Jeff Barry-produced Monkees LP featuring Dolenz & Jones that was released in 1971.
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Recap: Monkees Farewell Tour
Dolenz sings Nesmith
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