[Erossycuc]

Boy, do I feel old.

I used to get a real kick out of watching the Monkees when I was younger. Rest In Peace.

February 29, 2012

Monkees Singer Davy Jones Dies in Florida at 66

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) — Davy Jones, the lead singer of the 1960s group The Monkees, died of a massive heart attack Wednesday in Florida, his spokeswoman said. He was 66.

His publicist, Helen Kensick, confirmed that he died in Indiantown, where he lived.

Jones rose to fame in 1965 when he joined The Monkees, a popular rock group formed for a U.S. television show. Jones sang lead vocals on songs like “I Wanna Be Free” and “Daydream Believer.”

Jones was born Dec. 30, 1945, in Manchester, England. His long hair and British accent helped Jones achieve heartthrob status in the United States.
According to The Monkees website, Monkees.com, he left the band in late 1970. In the summer of 1971, he recorded a solo hit “Rainy Jane” and made a series of appearances on American variety and television shows, including “Love American Style” and “The Brady Bunch.”

Jones played himself in a widely popular Brady Bunch episode, which aired in late 1971. In the episode, Marcia Brady, president of her school’s Davy Jones fan club, promised she could get him to sing at a school dance.

By the mid-1980s, Jones teamed up with former Monkee Peter Tork, Micky Dolenz and promoter David Fishof for a reunion tour. Their popularity prompted MTV to re-air The Monkees series, introducing the group to a new audience.

In 1987, Jones, Tork and Micky Dolenz recorded a new album, “Pool It.” Two years later, the group received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
In the late 1990s, the group filmed a special called “Hey, Hey, It’s the Monkees.”

He is survived by his wife, Jessica.

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2012...gewanted=print

[Caliwany]

That is a total bummer. He didn't seem like anything was wrong & I even saw him in a "Profiles" interview on WNYE. He'd been in the middle of a tour & looked really healthy.

[duribass]

Bright happy bubblegum pop. I adore this one:

[HottBrorb]

Fabs, we certainly agree on that one! A classic.

[feseEscaple]

Davy Jones’s New York

By MICHAEL WILSON



Davy Jones performing “I’d Do Anything” with the cast of “Oliver!” on the Ed Sullivan show in 1963.

“The four young men were finally unveiled here, on the stage of the Forest Hills Stadium,” The New York Times reported on July 17, 1967. “The setting on Saturday night was almost perfect. The rain had stopped and almost all of the 14,000 seats were filled, mainly with girls in their early teens.”

The four young men were the Monkees, and one of them was Davy Jones, who died on Wednesday at the age of 66. The article was mistaken on one count: Mr. Jones had already been unveiled here.

In 1963, at age 17, he played the Artful Dodger in the Broadway production of the musical “Oliver!” at the Imperial Theater on 45th Street. “The Jones lad has played this role in London,” The Times had noted in anticipation of its arrival, apparently mistaking his age for 14.

The newspaper’s unenthusiastic review of the show — “easy laughs,” “facile” — nonetheless praised the Jones lad’s “impudent and genial” reading of his character. He was nominated for a Tony award.

Mr. Jones and his colleagues also performed on the “Ed Sullivan Show” at CBS’s TV Studio 50 on Broadway at 53rd Street now known, of course, as the Ed Sullivan Theater.

A lot changed in four years, by the time of that rainless evening in Forest Hills. An indication of how huge the Monkees had become can be seen in its opening act, the Jimi Hendrix Experience. This legendary mismatch lasted for several concerts that year and ended abruptly in Forest Hills as Mr. Hendrix, sick of the bedsheets hanging from the stands reading “Monkee Power” and hearing those teenage girls scream for the act to follow, left the stage with an obscene gesture for them.

The Monkees played three nights in the stadium during that festival. On July 15, the middle night, they took the stage at 9:15 p.m. and played for an hour. Those in attendance seemed to take this on faith, however, as the screams drowned out much of the playing. The Times sent the great reporter Murray Schumach to cover the show, but by then he was in his mid-50s, and his impatience with the wacky youngsters showed in his copy.

“They had enormous energy as they jumped up and down like human pogo sticks or threw themselves in amusing dance steps that allowed their collar-length hair to flap like wings,” the review stated. “The Monkees spoofed the audience, taking pictures of one another in weird poses, waving, jumping and feigning screams of ecstasy.”

A ticket to the show cost $6.50. Ticket stubs have appeared on eBay from time to time, fetching far more for these rare mementos from a wild weekend in Queens.

http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/20...ness-new-york/

[twiffatticy]

^ That lovely scene from Oliver was broadcast live on the Ed Sullivan Show in 1964... not 1963. Other guests on the show included a band called "The Beatles".