Monkee love still flourishes for this 'Believer'

Call me a "Daydream Believer," but I always thought the Monkees eventually would get together for one final reunion tour. I would have taken the "Last Train to Clarksville" to see them.

Now I've learned that their history of "intra-band acrimony" has squelched any hope of a reunion, and all I can say is that's not far-out and groovy.

The band last toured with all four original members about a decade ago. But no more. Davy Jones, the British lead singer of the late 1960s pop band, was quoted in a July 10 Reuters story saying, "I would not work with those guys again if my life depended on it. I can't be responsible for their attitudes and the way they treat people."

Ouch. That's harsh.

Of course the Monkees are no Rolling Stones. Those guys seem to get along fine enough to keep doing concerts, and OK, their music is way, way better. But the Monkees will always have a special place in my musical history. They're the first band I went bonkers over as a preteen.

I was obsessed in only the way a 10- or 12-year-old girl can be. I bought every teeny-bopper magazine I could find that featured the Monkees and hung posters in my room. I bought their singles and LPs (for our young readers, those are the mysterious black round plastic discs that gave us music long before iPods).

My obsession was fueled by the group's weekly television show that aired on NBC from 1966 to 1968. The Beatles may have been the Fab Four and the most successful and influential rock group of all time, but the Monkees were my very fine, fabulous four. I alternated crushes between Peter Tork and Davy Jones, and there may have been a week or so that I was smitten with Michael Nesmith, the one who wore the stocking cap.

In the mid-1980s, when I was a newspaper editor in Sidney (on the eastern border of Montana) I came across a group of four young school teachers - all women, of course - who were still huge fans of the Monkees. They went so far as to sew matching outfits that looked identical to the trademark double-breasted shirts the Monkees wore.

The teachers formed their own fan club and knew all the words to their hit songs and on cue would break into chorus: "Hey, hey we're the Monkees, and people say we monkey around. But we're too busy singing to put anybody down…"

In Sidney, that feature story made the front page.

You'll be relieved to know that my manic love for the Monkees eventually faded and I went on to develop a more respectable pastime of listening to groups such as Chicago, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Fleetwood Mac and, of course, the Rolling Stones.

But anytime an "oldies" radio station plays one of the Monkees' past hits, I feel like I'm 12 again, dancing in my room, wearing my white go-go boots.

Even still, "I'm a Believer."

Features editor Lynnette Hintze may be reached at 758-4421 or by e-mail at lhintze@dailyinterlake.com