Monkees Singer Davy Jones Dead at 66 From Heart Attack

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54. I remember when they cobbled that band together.

Davy Jones actually had musical theater experience. Michael Nesmith was a musician in his own right and later became the father of the music video - he produced the first one ever. Peter Tork was a folkie, friend of Steven Stills, who'd actually auditioned for the job and was told he was too old - so he recommended his friend. Mickey Dolenz had been a child actor.

I remember when I first heard "Last Train to Clarksville" the summer before "The Monkees" hit the airrwaves. We'd all read about the upcoming TV show, and we all knew this was a TV show about fictional rockers who really weren't musicians. I remember marveling that they'd all learned to play so quickly to have a hit on Top-40 radio so soon! "Whaaa? By 'The Monkees'? Gee, I thought they didn't know how to play..." I think it was Tommy Boyce and Bobby Hart and friends who were actually on the record.

They did soon become a band because they had to be able to tour and play live. So they learned. "The Monkees" TV show paved the way for a lot that MTV later did. It was a riff on "A Hard Days Night" and "Help," taking the same kinds of wild, fun, madcap romps set to music that those films did, and put them on the small screen. Silly little bit of cultural fluff that actually turned out to be something of a pioneering effort for rock on video.