Where's That Sound Coming From Presents: Questions But No Answers with Brian Marchese

I decided to sneak one more in before my summer break! It's short, like the episodes were supposed to be when I started this series.....What a perfect little power folk pop song this is,  and the first song on the legendary Headquarters album (Nez thought up that title, ya know).  The four Monkees, plus Chip Douglas, jangleburst their way through the door into real band-ness, saying "here we come, but FOR REAL this time!!". More Beatles talk on this episode, and if you know this song, you might be able to guess why. Plus I'll play and discuss the wacky Wichita Train verson and live versions recorded four decades apart. 
Unless I get inspired to to a summer episode or two (you never know with me), see you this fall! 

A song described as “A Breezy Little Pop Tune” by its author, Michael Nesmith, “The Girl I Knew Somewhere” was too poppy for Jon Herald, too sloppy for Don Kirshner, but just exactly perfect to be the world’s first taste of The Monkees performing as a real band when it was released on March 8, 1967, as the B-side to “A Little Bit Me, A Little Bit You”. The A-side represented the past, the B-side, the future (at least the very near future).  Did it change all the haters’ and skeptics’ opinions? I mean, shoot, this is a well written song, super catchy, with some literate lyrics and clever changes and played real well by Mike, Peter, Micky and Davy (with Nez pal John London on bass). That’s the proverbial real deal right there. How’s about some respect? Well, maybe your average critic or hippie turned their nose up, but some key members of rock royalty knew a good song when they heard it. In the second half of this lengthy episode I talk about all sorts of stuff with the super cool host of the super cool podcast, RANKING THE BEATLES, Mr. Jonathan Pretus. Our conversation goes to some wild places so hold on to your wool hats, cats and kitties (to quote Ben Fong Torres). Also, this might be the start of a summer hiatus, but I’m not positive. I might need to focus on some other stuff for a bit. But you’ll be hearing from me one way or another and in the meantime I’ll be scripting out the next few episodes. 

Where is Mary going to? Is she safe from the persistent creepo who won't leave her alone? Is this the same Mary as in "Walkin' the Dog"? Was Michael Blessing much more of a manufactured image than Monkee Mike? Is Bloomfield's guitar solo the best part of the Butterfield version? Why isn't Micky ready? How great of a live band were The Monkees on the 1968 fall tour? When is the only time that Nez seriously pissed off your host, Brian? Did Nez try to make "Mary, Mary>Circle Sky", The Monkees' version of "China Cat Sunflower>I Know You Rider"?  And finally, WHY YA BUGGIN'????

Q: What happens when the most stubbornly independent Monkee is forced by a man he dislikes to do something he dislikes, such as co-write a song with strangers who happen to be one of the most successful songwriting teams of the century? A: We get a great song with a lot of versions to hear and discuss. What we don't get is a lot of facts, so this episode, while guest-free, does have some voice-acting and creative nonfiction. I try, semi seriously, to suss out who wrote what in the song. This episode also features lots of good music and two eye-opening interview clips. I hope you dig. 

"Papa Gene's Blues" is one of Michael Nesmith's most endearing and enduring songs. I didn't set out to make this a 90 minute episode, but it's an important song with a lot of history; plus I had two guests and they were both full of so much insight. Firstly there's Lynda Wiles of Cornwall (UK), a Nezhead since the BBC debuted the Monkees television series on New Years Eve 1966. She runs multiple Nez-related web destinations that everyone should check out. Then there's Ryan Quinn, a Massachusetts-based singer songwriter and band leader (Salvation Alley), who gives some professorial insight into the nuts and bolts of "Papa Gene's Blues" as a musical composition. Along the way we'll listen to six or seven different versions of the song, from 1966 to 2018. Enjoy!  

"All The King's Horses" seems like a song that Mike Nesmith would've written specifically for a Season One Monkees TV show romp (and indeed it was used as such), but in fact, he wrote and recorded it during the Mike and John and Bill period. It also seems like an instant bubblegum pop classic that Don Kirshner would have wanted to include on either of the first two Monkees albums, but it never found its way onto an album until 1990's rarities compilation Missing Links Vol 2 (one of the best rarities compilations by anyone ever). Joining me to talk about "All The King's Horses" is my good friend,  singer-songwriter etc etc Jason Bourgeois. Or I should say, joining me to EVENTUALLY talk about "All The King's Horses" is my good friend, singer-songwriter etc etc Jason Bourgeois. I had to describe the first part of our conversation because the recording didn't save, or did save but vanished...I dunno. When we actually DID start recording, we were recounting amazing shared memories of Monkees/Nez experiences over the last dozen or so years. THEN we finally get to "All The King's Horses". So this episode is not as much "Nez Class With Professor Marchese" and a bit more "Brian and Jason hang out and tell some stories". But they're good stories and I hope you dig hearing them. In the accompanying photo, Jason and I are at Canter's Deli after having witnessed Nez's last ever performance at the Greek Theater on November 14, 2021. 

Use two four-syllable words that each contain a "q" in a sentence. Oh, that's easy. Ready? 
Michael Nesmith's composition "Propinquity" is one of the most ubiquitous in his catalog. 
How ubiquitous? There are three studio versions, five live versions and many cover versions. I don't cover them all in this episode but I do my best to play and discuss most of them. The first version of it that I ever heard gave me a very misguided picture of what Nez's solo career was all about.
Propinquity was one of Nesmith's earliest compositions as well as one of the first (of many) to which he gave a title that never appears in the song's lyrics. Though one seldom finds quotes by any of Nez's contemporaries singing his praises as a songwriter, I also briefly bring up two artists who put out well-known songs in the early/mid 70's that to my ears might owe a little something to Propinquity. But I'll never know for sure, because this is Questions But No Answers. This one is for those of you who wrote and told me that 30 minute episodes are too short. 

Happy 2024 and welcome to the first episode of Questions But No Answers. Before he auditioned for, and got the part on The Monkees television series, thus altering the course of his music career and indeed his life, Michael Nesmith was an ambitious, industrious and prolific new singer-songwriter trying to make a name for himself, first as a folkie on the San Antonio, TX scene and then as a "folk n' roller" in his new home of Los Angeles. This episode is focused on the catchy, danceable 1965 single by Mike and John and Bill called "How Can You Kiss Me" but also backtracks to young Mike's first recorded efforts from 1963-4 and discusses how quickly he started writing, performing and getting his name and his songs out there barely a year after getting his first guitar. How would his career have progressed had he never answered that fateful ad in Variety? Not to disappoint, but that alternate universe scenario is one question with no answer that I don't discuss. Maybe in a future episode a round table can muse about that. But I've no plans for that at the moment. For now, I hope you enjoy this episode while you consider your new years resolutions. Mine is to keep this series going and growing. Thanks for all the kind words upon the launch. I'm not kidding when I say that knowing you're our there digging this is my fuel to keep on keeping on. I think this is going to be a lot of fun. Listen for a cameo by super musician Ken Maiuri! 

Dateline December 30 2023. The spinoff is now the main event. Welcome to Where's That Sound Coming From Presents: Questions But No Answers! Yes, WTSCF has become what might be the only podcast centered on the musical career of a person whom I consider to be one of the most creative, if underrated and misunderstood, musical minds of the mid-late 20th Century: the late, great Michael Nesmith. I made a list of 75 songs he recorded between 1965-2016 which I feel support my opinion (mostly original, but I had to include a handful of wonderful cover versions) and I intend to devote a 30-60 min episode to each song (though if appropriate I might clump two together in one episode). True to Nez's own philosophy of letting ideas unfold in time and space to allow for growth, I only have a general idea of what I want these episodes to be like. More details to be found in this episode. I hope you dig. And Happy Nez, er New Year!