The Emigration Playlist: 64 years of songs. #6 I'm a Believer - The Monkees 1966

I've changed the title of this blog series. The previous one has felt melancholy and possibly off-putting. As yet, I'm getting very little interest from others in this list. So be it - I am writing it for me principally - though I started to wonder if people don't really know how to take it if they think I'm having some kind of grief-stricken breakdown about all this. Leaving England is very hard after all these years (though its behaviour to someone of my background month after month has made it easier), and this is part of my process. It's helping. I'm writing about myself, who and where I was as these songs emerged, or when they entered my life. But I am also writing about music and my love of it. So maybe a little less self-indulgent pain in the title and a bit more focus on the memory of these great tunes?

Which makes sense for this song especially because, alongside pointing out that Mourning England in songs didn't preclude me from adding bands that weren't British, I added that I experienced them whilst in the UK. This one would stretch that protocol however. Because this was a band invented by a US TV studio and they hit the screens in a year I wasn't even living in the UK, but Singapore - where my Dad has been posted by the army. Yes I know elsewhere I have talked about living in the UK my whole life - technically I have lived in this country for 61 of my 64 years. That's just over 95% of it.

I was four in 1966 and I can't even remember what kind of TV we got over there. If any. I do know that by 1968 I was back in the UK and The Monkees were on our screens playing stuff like this. Four 'zany kids' recruited through an ad, we all know the story that followed them around - they didn't play their instruments, they didn't write their songs, they were the 'Prefab Four' to the Beatles' real deal. In fact, two of them - Pete Tork and Michael Nesmith could play perfectly adequately and had had careers as musicians. Mickey Dolenz (the drummer) taught himself to play and by 1967 had pretty much mastered his kit. It was only Davy Jones, the Brit, who didn't do much. Their songs were mostly recorded by session musicians at least until 1967 - scandal - until you realise that producers routinely filled studios with sessions musicians to play most of a track for, or even instead of, the band back them. It's reported that Mr Tambourine Man by The Byrds had just one actual Byrd playing on it when they recorded it.

Of course six year old me, newly back from The Tropics, knew nothing of any of this. I just knew that these guys were fun, they made me laugh and that I really loved their music. Which wasn't so surprising as the studio was spending big money on getting front rank writers like Gerry Goffin and Carole King or Neil Diamond, who wrote I'm a Believer, on board. The Monkees had a unique sound - bright, pacey, upbeat, polished. In this massive hit of 1966, the distinctive Hammond organ 4 note hook structures the song, with a solid bass underneath and relentless, simple drums. The lyric draws you in, the verses are in tbe past tense, the choruses move to the present, resolving the narrative tension. 'I'm a Believer' sounds fresh each time as it's the answer to a question. And Mickey Dolenz's vocal is just sufficiently casual, even a bit raspy, to stop it sounding cheesy.

None of which I thought of back then, but this song has stayed with me all my life - easy and joyous. As have many Monkees songs, including my absolute favourite - Goffin and King's Pleasant Valley Sunday.  

Approaching 1966 was the hardest year yet. There were an insane number of world class songs out that year - almost all of which still get regular airplay. I could have chosen from: 

For What It's Worth – Buffalo Springfield

Alfie – Cilla Black

Paperback Writer – The Beatles

Substitute – The Who

Hey Joe – Jimi Hendrix

Sunny Afternoon – The Kinks 

River Deep, Mountain High – Ike & Tina Turner

Paint it Black – The Rolling Stones

Good Vibrations – The Beach Boys 

God Only Knows – The Beach Boys 

Eleanor Rigby – Beatles

Reach Out I'll Be There – Four Tops

When a Man Loves a Woman – Percy Sledge

Summer in the City – The Lovin' Spoonfull

Wild Thing – The Troggs

These Boots Are Made for Walkin' – Nancy Sinatra

The Sun Ain't Gonna Shine Anymore - The Walker Brothers

There are many songs on this list that are definitely greater than I'm a Believer. I mean River Deep, Mountain High is there, Eleanor Rigby is there. So are Good Vibrations and God Only Knows from Pet Sounds by the The Beach Boys, one of the most influential albums ever made. Jimi Hendrix appeared in '66. The Stones sang Paint It Black. Any one of these could have made it to my selection and they've all been in my life for 60 years now. But thinking back to the late sixties, who I was, and the laughter I got from watching these four on TV, lacing their songs into the comedy-japes they got up to each week, I went for The Monkees. I loved them then, I love them now... 

Till next time...

Readying myself for an emigration, I didn't chose, I am putting together the soundtrack of a whole life spent in England. It's part saying goodbye, part reconnecting with memories of 64 years spent here. You can read more about the background to this project here:

https://kierkegaardslunch.blogspot.com/2026/08/mourning-england-in-song-part-1.html