THE MONKEES

GOOD TIMES! (Rhino)

[rating: 4.5/5]

The Monkees are back with the highly anticipated new album Good Times!, their first new album in 20 years, tied to the group’s 50th anniversary.

All three surviving band members (Micky Dolenz, Michael Nesmith and Peter Tork) have written new songs for the album as well as providing vocals and music performances. The unmistakable voice of the late Davy Jones is also included with a vintage vocal on the Neil Diamond-penned Love To Love.

Sitting nicely alongside the group’s first five ‘classic’ albums, Good Times! features tracks written specifically for the band by some of the music world’s most gifted songwriters, including Rivers Cuomo of Weezer (She Makes Me Laugh – the first single), Ben Gibbard of Death Cab For Cutie (Me & Magdalena – superbly sung by Nesmith with Dolenz offering a close harmony) and Andy Partridge of XTC (You Bring The Summer – perfect pop that would have fit anywhere on their first two albums), as well as a song co-written by Noel Gallagher and Paul Weller (Birth Of An Accidental Hipster).

Produced by Adam Schlesinger (Fountains of Wayne/”That Thing You Do” soundtrack), The Monkees also completed songs for Good Times! that were originally written and recorded for the group during the ‘60s. Harry Nilsson wrote the title track Good Times, which he recorded at a session with Nesmith in January 1968. The production was never completed, so the band returned to the original session tape (featuring Nilsson’s guide vocal) and have created a duet with his close friend Dolenz. Good Times! also includes the Neil Diamond-penned Love To Love, the Carole King and Gerry Goffin collaboration I Wasn’t Born To Follow (sung superbly here by Peter Tork), Whatever’s Right, written by legendary songwriting duo Tommy Boyce and Bobby Hart, who were responsible for many of the classic Monkees hits, and Gotta Give It Time, by Jeff Barry and Joey Levine.

Each of the band have written a song from Tork’s ‘follow-up’ to I Wanna Be Free called Little Girl, to Nesmith’s wistful I Know What I Know to the Dolenz rave-up I Was There (And I’m Told I Had A Good Time).

Only a supreme optimist could have hoped that the Monkees could have come up with an album as good as this. Great songs, wonderful production and the whiff of nostalgia have created a genuine modern classic.

Mitchell Peters