Alan's Album Archives: University Dissertation: "The Monkees In Relation To Postmodernism"

In-depth reviews of classic or neglected albums, mainly from the 1960s and 70s, now a 30 volume e-book series.Artists covered include Beach Boys, Beatles,Byrds, CSNY, Dire Straits, Grateful Dead, Hollies, Jefferson Airplane/Starship, Kinks, Monkees, Moody Blues, Pink Floyd, Rolling Stones, Searchers, Simon and Garfunkel, Small Faces, 10cc, The Who+Neil Young.Sister site to https://kindredspiritbooks.blogspot.com/ (scifi novels) and https://alonsyaliensdrwho.blogspot.com/ (Dr Who episode reviews)

Thursday, 5 September 2013

University Dissertation: "The Monkees In Relation To Postmodernism"

Note: a little something extra for you this week, which I thought had been lost, my university dissertation on The Monkees in relation to postmodernism. It was posted at our old site (www.alansalbumarchives.moonfruit.com) but I've developed quite a lot more readers since being here at blogspot so didn't want you to miss out! This dissertation was submitted as part of my English/History degree. (for those who are interested, it was marked as a 2:1 qualification with a mark of 66/100!)Fans of the ‘Head’ film and soundtrack should enjoy it – the rest of you might find it a bit, shall we say, ‘monkeynuts’!!

“Demonstrate the Principles of the Postmodernist Genre, Using the Musical Band ‘The Monkees’ as Reference”
Introduction:

One of the key factors in postmodernism is that there are no boundaries between art-forms and that all culture - ‘high’ or ‘low’ - is deserving of study. With the breaking of traditional borderlines between what constitutes television, music or literature I felt that the greatest way to get to the heart of such a complex and ambiguous movement was to look at an area that dealt with all these genres. I am fully aware that The Monkees may seem like a strange choice for a dissertation subject. However, they represent the pivot of several postmodernist concepts, as at various times television, music, consumerism and the sixties have all been called postmodernist. The Monkees were pioneers in all of these areas and by blurring the boundaries between art and business, television and music, and fantasy and reality they showcase several postmodernist principles that should prove my case that The Monkees is a fully deserving subject for analysis. As the first multimedia experiment to explore Butor’s ideas that man is now surrounded by conflicting information from birth and by creating programmes on the boundaries between reality and fantasy, The Monkees developed several postmodernist ideas.

Before I show this, though, a brief outline of postmodernism is essential. However, there is no one over-riding concept to discuss. Also the definition of postmodernism has changed from the 1960s idea of rejecting ideas of advancement, through the 1970’s notion of revisiting the past with irony to the modern concern of societal collapse and fragmentation. Certainly postmodernism is a response to modernism, a movement of fragmentation following technological advances and social changes such as two world wars and an increased role in the media. Postmodernism builds on modernism, rejecting meta-narratives such as religion and science and emphasising the dislocation in a society now more dependent on media and the impact this has on ‘abstract’ ideas like ‘meaning’ and ‘identity’. “Reality is a description; this was the discovery average Americans made in the 1960s” (Klinkowitz) which led to other concepts like multiple perceptions, truth and distortion that analyse how we view the world. Postmodernism links to anti-essentialism, with even the best scholars failing to re-create the depth of their feelings and experiences in words, so that any text is always open to ambiguity and different interpretations.

Yet “whereas modernism wished but failed to abolish the past, postmodernism revisits it, at any historical time, with irony” (Eco – Notes). Realising this means that the only reliable source of reference is the source material itself, several postmodernist works display reflexivity where the fictitious world present in the novel is destroyed in order to remind the reader that they are reading a book and not the true answer to life’s questions. With only itself as reference, many books also blur the line between art and criticism - a feature also common to The Monkees’ format. In essence, postmodernism is about disregarding categorisation as all previous rules have been too simplistic, and only by taking into account the multitude of ideas by everybody in existence can we see ‘truth’. In 1966, The Monkees were probably the first TV series to make use of this concept; the use of music breaking the boundaries between genres, as well splicing reality with fantasy and continually self-referencing and parodying its status as a television programme. Whereas modernism wanted to bring order to chaos, postmodernism wants to bring chaos to order as this reflects the fragmentation of life – a concept that fits the anarchic and irrelevant comedy of The Monkees superbly.

In particular, “television has sometimes been seen almost as a symbol for postmodernism itself” (Ward 11), making art easily accessible to all and enclosing everything inside it’s own universe. Whilst many television shows merely present information in a direct manner The Monkees took postmodernist ideas to a logical conclusion, continually trying to fool the eye by means of speeded-up shots, broadcast out-takes and a sense of irony that undermines the whole concept of a make-believe world. Braudrillard believes “we can experience the world only through a kind of filter of preconceptions and expectations fabricated in advance by a culture swamped with images” (Ward 60) and “the distinction between simulation and reality has collapsed” (Ward 66) – a consideration evoked by the Monkees’ re-visitation of past stereotypes with irony. The Monkees were also one of the first programmes to fulfil Saussure’s ideas, emphasising production over product by merging scripts and improvisation and referring to scriptwriters and directors as well as revealing the presence of cameras and microphones. Also, whereas Modernism praises ‘originality’ Postmodernism “devalues concepts of uniqueness” (Bertens) and encourages teamwork – which The Monkees fulfil by encouraging cameramen, assistants and electricians to contribute ideas.

However, The Monkees ultimately balance the concepts of originality and mass-production, being both a synthetic creation intended to make money and pioneers in being the first to use interaction between media. Perhaps even more than television, music is integral to The Monkees’ format and works by quite different means. More serious issues could be raised away from the comedic scripting, dealing with self-criticism and the absence of centre crucial to postmodernism. Whilst harder to pinpoint than television scripts, I will also be analysing relevant lyrics and during section one will be combining the two fields where appropriate before discussing in more detail two examples that concern The Monkees attempting to take control of their own destiny – a common feature in postmodernist works.

As Dumas claims, “The Monkees were the first post-modern rock band. A creation of the media looking for a way to cash in on the emerging counter-culture, The Monkees sang about themselves (‘Hey! Hey! We are The Monkees!’), starred in a self-titled TV show about themselves and the characters in the band had the same names as the actors who portrayed them: Michael Nesmith, Micky Dolenz, Peter Tork and Davy Jones. It was the epitome of self-referential pop art, and back in 1966, people confused the line between fantasy and reality” (Internet One). Yet there is no “unified intellectual movement with a definite goal or perspective” and postmodernism “does not have a single dominant theoretician or spokesperson” (Ward 3). As a result, I shall be looking at several differing and occasionally contradictory arguments put forward by several postmodernist deities, well-known and obscure, as well as comparing examples of the Monkees’ work to novels by established postmodernist authors. Overall, this dissertation is intended to show that postmodernism is not only incidental but integral to The Monkees’ concept and that this could not have taken place without the mind-set of postmodernism philosophers becoming mainstream.

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Section One:

One of the reasons I have chosen to study this particular group is that the Monkees concept addresses two key postmodernist ideas. As “the first time that television and mass industries combined forces in a concerted attack against the American consumer” (Baker 37), The Monkees epitomise the theory of business dictating art. Jameson considers postmodernism to be “a condition arising out of the development in the sixties of a late, consumer phase of capitalism” (Rice/ Waugh 290) and the influence of businesses on the art-world has changed our perceptions of abstract principles like ‘beauty’ or ‘identity’. Best even takes this further and sees consumerism as a deliberate ploy of societal control, a form of brainwashing by marketing majority groups and acceding to their needs at the sake of individualism (Chaos and the Void Web-site). By creating it’s own musical group, the music and television industries at first held a greater control over their ‘product’ than at any time previous and were able to maximise their profits by having the one genre encourage the sales of another. However, The Monkees also fit a second concept as “Like an actor playing Hamlet who suddenly refuses to die at the end of the play, The Monkees wanted to become what they’d been hired to portray” (Dumas – Internet One). By taking control of their own products, The Monkees mirror the attempts of characters to escape authorial control in the works of Vonnegut and Gray. “The concern of many postmodern novels is precisely this: the simultaneity of power and subversion” (*Hagemann?!*) and can be seen in the allegory of the institute for capitalism in ‘Lanark’. Generally postmodernism is concerned with the individual attempting to determine their place in a consumerist society and The Monkees can be seen as a microcosm of this, trying to establish their own identities and musical ideas despite the ‘demands’ of business practices.

Another major concept is that The Monkees were an early experiment in multimedia. Mass media plays a key role in postmodernism, as the information current generations receive comes less from first-hand experience and more from that given to us by a mediator – bringing up the debates of bias and interpretation. By working in multiple genres, The Monkees also demonstrate the inability of any one strand to show the whole meaning of life as that has to be viewed from a number of different perspectives. Returning to Butor’s idea that media have surrounded mankind with multiple ‘voices’, we have also seen the difficulty in determining fact from opinion. Previously the arts have been seen as an alternative to this, for the main part spreading fantasy not reality, but now the genres have become confused with authors such as Banville and Capote creating novels from their own re-visitation of real-life murder cases. “Once upon a time there were the mass media, and they were wicked of course, and they were a guilty party. Then there were the virtuous voices that accused the criminals and art (ah what luck!) offered alternatives, for those who were not prisoners of the mass media. Well, it’s all over. We have to start again from the beginning, asking one another what’s going on” (Ward 29). By providing information from two areas, The Monkees more closely relate to the border between media and art-form, reject rigid genre distinctions and demonstrate the interaction between two separate sources.

From the very beginning, The Monkees displayed its postmodernist philosophy. Unlike standard productions, there is no introduction of The Monkees to the audience, no ‘block characterization’ in a move that enables them to be seen more as people and real life, or perhaps that their ‘world’ existed long before a television crew ever arrived there. This mirrors the works by most postmodernist authors, who introduce their characters by their actions and thoughts, not their setting – although notably Caryl Churchill creates this effect by parodying traditional works and having her characters introduced by descriptions from the others – only for these descriptions to be laughably false. The first scene ever broadcast follows this strategy by setting up what appears to a factual genre of an interview with a member of the public, before breaking our illusions and our concept of reality when The Monkees finally appear :
Reporter: Welcome tonight to our man-in-the-street interview. It’s a wet night tonight, but we’re going to ask you a few questions. Now, sir, do you mind if I ask you a few questions please?
Man: Why surely
Reporter: Your name please?
Man: Dr. Turner. Lionel B Turner
Reporter: Dr. Turner, I see. Recently in our fair city there have been many acts of violence committed right here on the streets in full view of people like yourself
Man: Disgusting
Reporter: They have just stood by and watched people being brutally attacked
Man: Deplorable
Reporter: How do you feel about that sir?
Man: Disgusting. It is each man’s solemn duty to protect his fellow citizens
Reporter: If you saw a fight or a man being beaten, what would you do?
Man: I would involve myself physically. I would come in fist and feet flying. I would…
[Monkees arrive with DJ being attacked by other three]
DJ: Help! Oh, will some innocent by-stander please help me? How about you sir? [points to Turner who then runs off screaming, protecting his dignity by helping a little old lady cross the street; After they have crossed she then charges him $15 and places the change into a mini-cash till she is wearing]

In common with postmodernists, The Monkees also disrupt impressions of traditional story-telling, such as plot, narration and linear time development to better represent fragmented modern life with it’s randomness, biased outlook and memories. Both Vonnegut and Gray reveal their plots early on, as if to degrade our notions of what ‘answers’ the conclusion might reveal. Many television series – including The Monkees – dispense with a narrator, with the audience witnessing the characters first-hand, but here also there are a series of captions that comment on the action taking place challenging the ‘naturalness’ of the action taking place. One particular example, ‘episode #781’ (TX: 1/ 1996) , has the network return to The Monkees in 1996 as if the television series has never finished. By imprinting our linear time on a make-believe world, the episode - scripted by Nesmith – plays around with our concept of time. The plot also mirrors ‘The Man In The High Castle’ where “there is no plot, but only a great many characters in search of one” (Notes) by having the cast reject plot-lines they have already used before deciding their programme is better without one:
DJ: Hey guys, you don’t think that we really need a story-line?[…]
MN: Not really, not as long as we’re having a good time
DJ: You mean you think that it’s perfectly alright to have no visible means of support?
MD: Who says our means have to be visible?
DJ: Don’t you think we should have some dramatic tension, some drama, some distress, some…some…
MN: Why? I mean, we’ve been hanging around like this for years. I mean, once in every five years a good story comes along but other than that…On the beach, life is a bowl of oysters, what could be better?[…]
DJ: I’ve got it, alright, the landlord, he comes to the door to demand the last rent, right? And all of a sudden, we’re on a desert island, and we’re the other side from some buried treasure
MN: No, I mean we probably own the house by now and besides, who wants to do a story just for the sake of doing a story?

By using actors to effectively play themselves and by utilising improvisation over scripts, the television series emphasises postmodernism’s “ major pre-occupation… with the question, ‘what is reality?’ (Phillip Dick, net 3). “It is often through an internal boundary between art and life that the novel develops the self-commentary that gives it critical self-consciousness” (Currie 4) and this pull between the two is a chief concern here too. The interplay between real and imaginary also creates a self-conscious element that we are watching a television programme and makes us question the role such media play in our lives. Several postmodernists have studied this concept; Saussure has claimed that in a society of mass-production, production has replaced product as a source of originality, and by including interruptions from the director or by inserting interviews into the finished product, the Monkees could be said to do this. Ward further decrees that as reality now exists only by ‘codes’ or symbols, there is no boundary between the two. Freud also studied the concept of ‘under erasure’ and how mistakes still have an imprint on the finished product. In a way, the use of outtakes and improvisation on The Monkees resemble this with elements of ‘production’ permeating the final product, especially interviews with the cast that feature on half-a-dozen episodes and break the illusion of a fantastical world. One example in particular deflates the image of The Monkees as a carefree fantasy and reveals the ‘real’ work behind the series:
BR: Hey, Davy, tell me more about the pressure that builds up at the end of the day
DJ: Well, everybody’s tired, and they get irritable, y’know, and everybody starts getting mad and y’know everybody wants to go home, man. (Tears up paper, jumps to feet and kicks staircase in mock-anger) It’s a drag sitting here talking to you!

The producers may also have been trying to create a contrast to the imaginary sequences, as Sarup has claimed “When the borderline between the real and imaginary is eroded, reality is no longer checked, called to justify itself. It is ‘more real than real’ as it has become the only existence” (166) or ‘hyperreal’. The interjections of the director also mirror the author’s position as a character in the works of Vonnegut and Gray. Like the two authors, the directors are not fully in control as whilst they have the final say, the characters have a habit of improvising and partly escaping their director’s control. This technique means we are reminded that the work cannot ‘hold all the answers’ because we see it in process with all the mistakes and are reminded it is being made by ordinary people who have no more answers to life’s problems than we do.

This thin line between reality and invention is a key aspect of The Monkees’ concept that continues through each member’s respective solo careers, such as Nesmith’s album “Pretty Much Your Standard Ranch Stash” which has Nesmith reaching out and physically merging with a painting so that the audience cannot tell where one ends and the other begins. (Appendix One). The Monkees was not a ‘programme’ in the traditional sense but a compromise between a ‘closed’ imaginary world and an ‘open’ live show that blended scripts and improvisation. “Complete scenes were sometimes discarded in favour of ad-lib conversations conceived on the set, often captured when actors presumed that the cameras had stopped rolling” (Baker 41). All characters used their own names and had a number of similarities to the past they played, as the producers “wanted four guys who could play themselves” (Reilly 3-4) – although the characters could also be very much separate from the actors’ characteristics, especially Tork’s. This fits a postmodernist viewpoint, as particularly Vonnegut felt that “there are no longer characters [in fiction] because people are the playthings of such enormous impersonal forces they defer representation within the conventions of traditional liberal bourgeois fiction” (Waugh 60s 70-71). The various script-writers also demonstrate this merging of a real and make-believe world, as from one week to the next they could be dealing with realistic issues like fighting over the same girl or losing a fixed talent contest before intercepting spy missions or meeting pirates . We also see ‘romp scenes’ where The Monkees temporally become super-heroes, gangsters, bull-fighters or any number of universally recognised symbols, with the camera presenting their imaginations to us rather than ‘real life’.

This point can be discerned by some examples from the televised output. In ‘The Picture Frame’ (TX: 18/9/67) The Monkees are deluded into thinking they have been cast as gangsters in a film, only to discover that they are taking part in a genuine robbery. The episode continually debates the differences between reality and creation, as for example The Monkees criticise a genuine policeman for not looking the part or performing in the right way. ‘Art for Monkees’ Sake’ (TX: 9/10/67) has Tork discovering that his paintings are so detailed that they resemble real objects and throughout the episode has characters mistaking his artwork for reality. This episode also closely resembles a plot feature of Phillip K Dick’s novel, “The Man In The High Castle” as Tork is forced to copy famous paintings to be sold which makes the original with it’s un-seen historical value even more valuable. A final example, ‘The Monstrous Monkee Mash’ (TX: 22/1/68) sees The Monkees entering their traditional fantasy sequence, only to find it manipulated by a vampire who wants to make their imaginations become real. The issue is further confused by having The Monkees call out to the director and their make-up man, making the audience believe that this is ‘genuine’ rather than scripted:

DJ: Hey someone’s coming, someone’s coming
MD: Don’t be silly, this is a fantasy sequence!
Vampire: I see you are already dressed, straighten up Davy Jones you have much to be proud of!
MD: What are you doing in here? This is our fantasy!
DJ: Yeah we’re the Monkees, you see in every show we do a fantasy sequence where we romp around, jump and do funny things and nobody interrupts us, nobody!
Vampire: It seems this show is different.
MD: Look, I’m warning you, get out of our fantasy sequence
DJ: Yes, ours
Vampire: You say in this fantasy sequence you can do whatever you want…is that so? [both agree] then perhaps you try to take off your monster make-up ha-ha-ha
MD: Of course I can get off this…[tugs] Make up! Make up!
DJ: Pops! Jack Williams! Ok, that’s enough, cut that camera, we are through, we are leaving
[camera cuts to reveal another camera which appears to have been filming last scene and a director’s chair…only in it is the vampire]
Vampire: You are wrong my friends if you think this is a fantasy. This is reality – and you are not in charge here, I am and I can control you any time I want simply by thinking about it. Wolfman, chain these two up. The fantasy is over, This is for keeps!

These examples demonstrate some very specific areas of postmodernism. However, The Monkees also fulfil much of the general philosophy of postmodernism, as “if there is a summarising idea it is the theme of the absent centre. The post-modern experience is widely held to stem from a profound sense of ontological uncertainty” in the midst of nuclear warfare, the Holocaust and two World Wars, making mankind re-evaluate all he has striven for in the name of progress (Seldon and Widdowson, Notes). Mass media and education have led to people being less convinced by concepts that had previously been taken for granted - for example religion or capitalism. Lyotard has called these concepts ‘meta-narratives’; “grand theories that attempt to define the world using a certain range of absolute values and ideas”(Internet Three). In the modern age, nothing is certain any longer and the individual is now caught in a ‘postmodernist void’ because he now has no guidelines for his existence. Postmodernist texts such as Lanark have dealt with this ‘void’ and the linked concept of the ‘logocentric myth’ or the need to have a purpose despite the knowledge that no one system can provide one. The main example of this in The Monkees’ output are Nesmith’s sleeve-notes again from ‘Pretty Much Your Standard Ranch Stash’ that discuss these twin concepts before down-playing the role art plays in the world, as no one human can hold the answer to life and art is ultimately a further ‘meta-narrative’ unless it recognises this fact:
“[my life]has been built on logic, which is probably one of the subtlest traps going…that whole 2+2 trip…the logical development that leads to fear of anything outside itself […] I never could understand why, just about the time I would get it all together, all of a sudden the whole thing would vanish…just disappear…leaving me exactly where it found me…peering out from a column of numbers. Looking for the six that followed the five that followed the… I kept waiting for the song which would correct our foreign problems with Paraguay, cure cancer, or make everybody dress and talk like me. Instead I got love songs…I love you, loved you, will love you, was to have loved you, maybe won’t love you[…] And if I come to a fork in the road I don’t panic anymore, I just assume that one is the road and the other is a road off to the side”

Perhaps because of this lack of order, we crave for the logic that numerology represents, at the same time we know that logic cannot by rights exist. Numbers solve a lot of problems, but they do not reveal the reasons for our existence and on that level logic cannot provide us with order – we need art to complement logic. Another postmodernist concept is Saussure’s idea that words are ambiguous and have no fixed meaning -rather like colours exist along a spectrum and only gradually alter. In this sense language is forever evolving and in turn we can only identify ourselves by what we are not rather than what we are. Nesmith’s solo composition ‘I Am Not That’ deals with this concept, waving goodbye to ‘the iron world’ and embracing the ambiguities of life by determining what he is not:
I am not a poet, I cannot make a rhyme
I do not know the big words like ‘sprits’ and ‘paradigm’
I am not an artist, I could not paint my house
I cannot chisel marble, I do not twist and shout

I am not a Yankee, I have no nation state,
No cosmic star connection, I cannot get a date
I am not a crook, I am not a thief
To be for me is not to be, not to see to see

Goodbye, goodbye the iron world
Goodbye, goodbye so long
Farewell adieu, adieu farewell
I have not sung this song

This concept of interpretation also means that there is no such thing as ‘truth’, postmodernists preferring the expression ‘truths’ as this better expresses the idea of perspective. All knowledge passes through a medium – be it a writer or film director who - with all the best intentions in the world - must offer their own selection of what they mean. As Neitzsche concluded, truth is now “a sum of human relations which became poetically and rhetorically intensified, metamorphised, adorned, and after long usage seem to a nation fixed, canonic and binding: truths are illusions of which one has forgotten they are illusions; worn out metaphors which have become powerless to affect the senses”(Notes). A re-occurring theme in many works – notably those of Vonnegut and Gray – is of social truth and how mankind protects himself from the indignities of life. It may seem strange to link a ‘manufactured’ band to this image, but once The Monkees became committed to destroying their artificial image they destroyed other societal un-truths too, such as in Dolenz’s composition ‘Mommy and Daddy’. The originally un-released version demands children not to take the censorship of the world around them for granted, but look for themselves what the state of the world really is :
Ask your mommy and daddy what happened to the Indians
Ask your mommy and daddy to tell you where you really came from
Your mommy and daddy will probably quickly turn and walk away
Then ask your mommy and daddy “who really killed JFK?”

Ask your mommy if she really gets off on all her pills
Ask your daddy “why doesn’t that soldier care who he kills?”
After they’ve put you to sleep and tucked you safely down in your bed
Whisper mommy and daddy would you rather if the bullet went through my head?

If it was my blood spilling on the kitchen floor
If it was my blood mommy would you care a little more?
Don’t be surprised when they turn and start to cry
And tell your mommy and daddy, tell your mommy and daddy,
Screaming to your mommy and daddy, they’re living in a lie lie lie
It’s all a lie it’s all a lie lie it’s all lies lies lies………..

As Gray concluded, “the truth, you know, isn’t black or white. It’s black and white” (302). One song, ‘Shades of Gray’ (Mann/ Weil) fits this idea that life cannot be sorted into categorisations, that concepts of ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ are not fixed and like many postmodernist novels yearns for a time when life was simplistic and ordered – the logo-centric myth discussed earlier:
When the world and I were young, just yesterday
Life was such a simple game a child could play
It was easier than to tell right from wrong
Easier than to tell weak from strong
When a man should stand and fight or just go along
But today there is no day or night
Today there is no dark or light
Today there is no black or white
Only shades of gray

Another resulting feature of multiplicity is that authority simply cannot exist, because it is dependent on people acclaiming one rule to be superior to all others, a fact that postmodernists simply cannot acknowledge. Whilst not anarchistic, there definitely seems to be a theme running through most postmodernist novels that authority figures are not to be trusted – in ‘Cloud Nine’ heroes are cowardly, in ‘Waterland’ teachers make mistakes and in ‘Lanark’ Thaw is miss-handled by all his elders. In postmodernist eyes there are still certain rules one should follow, but positions granted by other humans whether by age or status are ultimately flawed as no human is closer to the answers of life. The Monkees fit this concept, by showing law to be corrupt, policeman to be fallible and parents to be oppressive. In many ways, this was the first ‘teenage’ programme where young adults were seen without a parent figure - rejecting the idea that one person is above the others. They also parody such institutions as the law, capitalism, religion and even parenthood, by easily imitating and pastiching authority figures. From the beginning this ‘freedom’ was integral to The Monkees’ success; the Radio Times entry for transmission of the first episode in Britain read, “What do The Monkees want? To be free, to make every day Saturday night, to climb impossible mountains. To take a trolley car to the moon. To deflate stuffed shirts” - Monkees Documentary R2 8/3/97).

Just as no human holds more answers than any other, postmodernists no longer see boundaries between what constitutes ‘high’ or ‘low’ culture. Two philosophers from different eras, Foucalt and Ward, have studied this concept. Foucalt believes that everything in the modern age is a form of discourse and as most of us have access to them equally, they deserve equal concentration. Ward further believes “postmodern arts have their feet more firmly on the ground and recognise that they share the same world with all other aspects of cultural life” (15), rather than being worshipped as the answers to life. The Monkees often sought to lampoon classic literature largely of the modernist period, yet merged this with attacks on popular culture, such as ‘beach’ movies common to the 1950s or advertisements that would often be parodied side-by-side.

Another defining feature of postmodernism is the idea of individuality in the wake of mass consumerism. Several writers have questioned what characteristics help us to tell people apart from each other, as “identity is purely relational” – and depends on the on-lookers’ perspective – (Culler 101) Works like ‘Lanark’ and ‘Cloud Nine’ have characters change their mannerisms with alarming regularity, whilst ‘Beloved’ shows whites successfully subduing slaves by denying them names. In The Monkees, all four ‘characters’ met their physical doubles that are almost completely different in character to the original and this makes us question how we differentiate between people by character as well as appearance. Another major point is the opening credits to the first season of the television programme, that is intended to copy several other programmes by featuring photographs of the four members with their names – only The Monkees get this wrong and continually list Peter’s name for the other three. A final item concerning identity is ‘The Point’, a play written by longstanding Monkees collaborator Harry Nilsson for two of The Monkees. In a universe where everyone is born with points on their head, Davy is ostracised by society for being born without one. This is a pun on the word ‘pointless’, as if Davy is worthless in a society where people believe they must all be the same. This categorisation is shown by postmodernists to be futile, as everybody has their own unique characteristics and perspective on life. Gray writes that “Compared with his phone number, our closest friend is shifty and treacherous” (Lanark 108) and The Monkees frequently disrupted the stereo-types they otherwise perhaps portrayed by performing actions atypical to their character. For example, ‘It’s A Nice Place To Visit’ (TX: 11/9/67) features Nesmith, Dolenz and Tork as Mexican bandits, trying to impress rebel leader El Diablo. As Nemith and Dolenz in vain try to twirl their guns in an impressive manner, Tork amazes them all by beating them to it:
MD – How’d you do that?
MN – That’s very good. I didn’t know you could do that, you usually play the dummy!

One definition of postmodernism is “a mood or condition of radical indeterminacy, and a tone of self-conscious, parodic scepticism towards previous certainties in personal, intellectual and political life” (Notes). The Monkees demonstrate this by undermining themselves and “burlesquing the very shows that glue Mom and Dad to the set during prime time. Spoofing the movies and the violence and the down-heavy-conflict-emotion themes that fascinate the middle-aged” (Baker 45). This reflexivity is because “The only point of reference for postmodernism, in the absence of anything else, is itself, as self-reference” (Wain - Notes) so that writers cannot be sure of interpreting any source accurately except their own.

The Monkees certainly seem to bear this statement out, with several references to the Monkees’ status as a group. For example, ‘I was a teenage monster’ (TX:16/1/67) has a professor harness the Monkees’ creative talents into an android, parodying the creation of The Monkees which mirrors the ‘artificial’ creation of The Monkees. Also, ‘The Monkees Paw’ (29/1/68) - which was recorded shortly after the initial outburst of the musical press that the Monkees were not a bona fide group - has Micky wishing he could be quieter in the presence of a magical artefact that grants his wish. After finding their lead singer has no voice, the Monkees lip-synch to a pre-recorded tape and get thrown off by the manager for being ‘frauds’. Lodge believes art in this age is on the boundary between fiction and criticism with examples such as Lanark’s plagiarism index showing that each example of postmodernism is not perfect or complete. Foucalt claims, “the frontiers of a book are never clear-cut: beyond the title, the first lines and the last full-stop, beyond its internal configuration and its autonomous form, it is caught up in a system of references to other books, other texts, other sentences: it is a node within a network” (Hutcheon 127). In Eco’s eyes, “every story tells a story that has already been told” (Hutcheon 128) so that postmodernism owes it to it’s audience to acknowledge this and reveal their inspirations.
This can be seen in the multiple references to The Monkees’ inspirations – especially The Beatles – which are not downplayed or hidden, but exaggerated and celebrated by playing their music, copying their routines or praising them within the programme’s contents.

The Monkees also embody the post-modern stance on history, using the concept of bricolage (borrowing from man’s heritage, but recognizing it’s flaws and re-visiting it largely with irony). Hutcheon believes “we only have representations of the past from which to construct our narratives or explanations. In a very real sense, postmodernism reveals a desire to understand present culture as the product of previous explanations” (Brooker 239). She further argues “to re-write or to re-present the past in fiction and in history is…to open it up to the present, to prevent it from being conclusive and teleological” (net 1 old style). The Monkees continually do this by up-dating traditional story-lines or merging time periods to accentuate the changes that have taken place in modern society. The following is from ‘the Devil and Peter Tork’ and features Mr. Zero as the devil who has made Tork sign a contract forcing him to hand his soul over to the devil:
Zero: Well, Peter, I think we’d better go. You know, according to the terms of the contract your soul must be turned over by midnight
MN: Oh, well, wait a minute, its only 8 o’clock
Zero: Just trying to beat the cross-town traffic
This self-awareness can also be seen in the use of metafiction or in this case frame-breaking throughout the programme. Whilst there are several different interpretations of what this means, it is generally seen as a revelation to the audience that they are watching a ‘programme’ not a realistic world. many of ther above points have hopefully proven that no one definite ‘reality’ can exist and this metafictional aspect is a logical conclusion to this: “illusion is no longer possible because the real is no longer possible” (Brooker 156). Many films now “attempt to make the receiver into a Brechtian, aware participant, self-conscious part of the meaning-making process” (Hutcheon 86), but The Monkees were probably the first television show to do this, frequently referring to their technical crew or occasionally including out-takes in the finished product. This also fulfils Saussaure’s theory that production takes precedence over the final product in the modern age of mass-production. Firstly, an example from ‘Dance Monkees Dance’ (TX: 12/12/66) deflates the concept that the Monkees work on their own initiative by having Dolenz walking off the set to ask the advice of their script-writers. The portrayal of them as elderly Chinese forced to write by galley-slaves also undermine the idea that the writers of the series know any more of life than we do. This is further emphasised by Dolenz screwing up the new script he has been given and exclaiming ‘man those writers are really overpaid, this is terrible’. This idea of integrating the writers as ‘characters’ without using the real ones echoes McHale’s idea that “to reveal the author’s position within the ontological structure is only to introduce the author into the fiction; far from abolishing the frame, this gesture merely widens it to include the author as a fictional character” (Notes).

Other examples playfully explore the constraints of television and deflate the idea that what we are seeing on-screen is occurring in real life, such as this from ‘the Devil and Peter Tork’ where the word ‘hell’ was censored from television networks in the 1960s :
MN: Ooh, so that’s what whistle is all about
DJ: Yeah, whistle It’s pretty scary
MD: You know what’s even more scary?
PT: What?
MD: You can’t say whistle on television

Overall we have seen how both the initial creation of The Monkees project and its eventual forays into television and music have demonstrated several postmodernist theories that were being used by postmodernist writers in roughly the same time period. Several philosophers like Brauillard, Eco, Derrida and Foucalt have presented concepts that have been directly or indirectly present in the Monkees’ productions. However, this section has dealt with postmodernism in a very general sense and whilst it has used a wide range of examples from both the television and records, some episodes admittedly do not fit the postmodernist concept so well. This brings up the idea that only some of the artists involved were aware of the postmodernist principles surrounding the project. However, in the following section, three examples are studied in length and can perhaps prove better that at least some of the participants were influenced by postmodernist theories. The Monkees “return aesthetic production to it’s humble, unprivileged place within social practices as a whole” (Lodge 385) and by a combining tension between realism and fantasy, multiplicity and revisiting universally recognised caricatures with irony the Monkees fill postmodernist concepts well in both the series of programmes and albums. This disruption of traditional television and musical practices appears to be witnessing a whole new postmodernist era of self-awareness and playfulness that will be taken to their logical extreme in the examples present in section two.

Section Two:

In response to criticisms over their musical integrity, the Monkees began to posess greater control over both the musical output and the television programmes, choosing to dissect and criticise their beginnings. This can be likened to previous postmodernist concerns on consumerism and puncturing the myths of the television world through two productions in particular - ‘Head’ a feature film and ‘Thirty Three And A Third Revolutions Per Monkee’ a television special. Both present “a deconstruction of the Monkees and the whole hollywood myth” (Dolenz - MOJO 103) and to my knowledge represent the largest scale-dissection of the ideas and shortcomings of any television programme or musical group. The former is a steam-of-conscious attempt to show the restrictions and reality of the Monkees concept, whilst the latter offers a more coherent plot of The Monkees being ‘created’ by businesses in order to ‘brainwash’ the world. In both cases The Monkees temporarily escape these restrictions and become a fully-realised ‘group’, either by an act of (commercial) suicide or by being granted this freedom only to discover they ultimately have no control. This suits postmodernist ideas of characters being ‘controlled’ by their authors, yet still retaining a degree of freedom such as ‘Breakfast of Champions’ when Vonnegut decides to set Trout free. Yet these examples also deal with a much wider concern about manipulation in music and television circles – deconstructing Hollywood, Rock Music and The Monkees at the same time.

The idea that mankind conceals or protects himself from aspects of life is a key concern of ‘Head’, as are most postmodernist volumes concerned with society. Both the music and scenarios in these two examples are far darker than those in section one, as if the ‘safe’ world of television has been replaced by interjections of reality, such as suicide attempts and stock footage of news-reels featuring nuclear bombs or real prisoners being executed in Vietnam. The title has several meanings, such as being evidence that this is a ‘head’ (i.e. intellectual) movie and the way our senses are not recorded directly but are interpretated by our minds, returning to postmodernist ideas of multiplicity. McGilligan further believes the titles mean “all the rules and straight-laced conventions inside one’s head that inhibit one’s enjoyment of life” (188), as if man has created these himself to give him purpose. Notably postmodernist ‘anti-heroes’ reject these societal constraints in the same way, such as Thaw/ Lanark and Trout. As individuals, the Monkees are trapped in having to conform to this stereotype even more than other postmodernist ‘characters’ because their livelihood depends upon their behaviour. The original cover for the soundtrack album that acted as a mirror also merged reality and fiction, reflecting the art back onto the audience by having their ‘head’ appearing next to the title and equating the film to real life.

In common with other postmodernist methods of representing life in a fictional form, there appears to be no plot at all except for a general outline of The Monkees being attacked by record companies or television networks. This disjointed feel in the film reflects the notion of ‘multiple realities’ prominent in postmodernism and brings up the idea of interpretation and multiplicity. This may be to remind the audience that life is more complicated than they believe and that most of us smooth over contradictions in order to simplify our lives. Multiplicity is also referred to briefly by Micky: “our universe is all trapped away among our heads and we can go in any number of different directions in any direction until infinity…” This theme is central to ‘The Man In The High Castle’ where the ‘plot’ was developed by use of the I Ching and could theoretically have developed in hundreds of different ways in order to represent the modern ‘randomness’ of a world without structure from meta-narratives’.

This theme is apparent from the opening frame of a red cloak moving away from the camera until it comes into focus and we see what it is. The Cloak belongs to a mayor who over the space of three minutes tries repeatedly to read his speech on the opening of a bridge. This sequence is intended to seem laborious and slow in contrast to the later fast-paced imaginative sequences and equates to Sarup’s theory that by contrasting the imaginary to the real postmodernists have invented the ‘hyperreal’. (“When the borderline between the real and imaginary is eroded, reality is no longer checked, called to justify itself. It is ‘more real than real’ as it has become the only existence” 166). The film then presents a parody of the traditional ‘romp’ sequences used in the television series as here The Monkees are fleeing an unseen menace in genuine horror, each in turn committing suicide by leaping off a bridge a mayor wearing the above cloak is attempting to open. One particular website *(InsideYourHead)* has put forward the idea that - as the first Monkee to jump off the bridge – the whole film represents Micky’s perspective on the Monkees as his life passes before his eyes. In this light, we are not seeing the real people or in fact the television characters but an impression of them that has distorted their characteristics – a theme that is common to Gray and Phillip K Dick. This drowning in many ways equates to the psychic re-birth undergone by Lanark, and just as in Gray’s novel the sense of drowning is used to transport characters from the real world to an imaginary one. Drowning is also a metaphor for what The Monkees were doing with this film – commercial ‘suicide’ – as it seems the only means by which the Monkees can truly become themselves.

Within the film itself are The Monkees acting in several different styles akin to the way the television series would offer a different scenario every week. Watching the masses of different films is a bit like the grand mural Thaw wants to paint in ‘Lanark’; a grand narrative that is attempting to see life from every viewpoint in time as it forever alters and thus write the true representative of life that postmodernists so desire but find so impossible to achieve. There is also the sense that ‘Head’ is trying to deflate the importance we give to television by showing things like behind-the-scenes-footage, arguments between cast and director and shots of the empty sets and studio toilets that ridicule the idea of film as providing any answers to life.

Throughout the film establishment figures pursue The Monkees, attempting to lock them inside a 'black box' - a metaphor for both network’s attempts to restrict The Monkees’ creativity into a marketing image. There are lots of references to the ‘black box’ in Monkee mythology. During concerts The Monkees would leap out of cardboard speakers – as if they had been transported along with the instruments – and during the second season a large room was converted into a ‘cage’ where The Monkees would wait until called by a flashing light on the wall as they had a habit of wandering off! The Monkees try many times to escape but always find themselves led back into the box again until even after their suicide bid they end up in a tank of water that is returned to the studio along with the props for the film. The Monkees attempt to escape it in different ways – Davy by fighting his way out, Peter by thinking his way out, Mike by doing nothing and Micky by taking the leap that signals the end of The Monkees’ career. Many sources have pointed out how these solutions are the antithesis of what the television characters would do further blurring the distinction between actor and character; as in general Davy was romantic, Peter stupid, Mike bossy and Micky carefree.

The Monkees are seen to be a fabrication, forced by the teenage market to forsake their true credentials as musicians and as people. This puncturing of The Monkees is in many ways parallel to Lanark’s plagiarism index or Vonnegut’s revelation of plot and may resemble an attempt to undermine the project and show its faults as this cannot be the answer to life’s questions either. Baker concludes, “scrupulously and callously the myth of rock is laid bare; the seemingly natural exuberance and idealism exposed as a calculated business using craft and cunning to produce a basically worthless image for mass consumption” (95). Twice in the film The Monkees are shown round a factory – possibly an allegory for The Monkees’ project - when a number of accidents occur (such as a man hanging from a cable or a worker drinking from machinery showing people exploiting the system for their own means). Another section has Micky lost in the desert when he spots a modern-day oasis: a Coca-Cola machine that proves to be empty and shows problems exist not only in The Monkees’ family but in other American icons of commercialism. Another scene has Davy deciding to give up the violin and ‘playing two-bit clubs all my life’ after his arm is knocked, revealing that he is miming to a record (a metaphor over the ‘artificial’ music of The Monkees past), in favour of boxing (a metaphor over The Monkees’ future in commercially dead projects such as this one).

One other feature not previously discussed is postmodernism’s general concern with individuals rather than corporations, and whilst not applicable to the television series in ‘Head’ there can be seen friction between the Monkees as individuals and as a group. After the drowning sequence, The Monkees re-appear in their house where June Fairchild kisses each of them in turn, distinguishing between the members who are now competing with each other. She, too, attempts suicide so that it may be this schizophrenia between being yourself and how others see you collectively is a motive for The Monkees’ actions too. This parallels the action of Thaw in ‘Lanark’ who also commits suicide through the paradox between his real and seen self.

Hopefully up to this point the sheer wealth of information has gone some way to demonstrating that my association of The Monkees and postmodernism is not entirely the result of mental delusions caused by over excess in Ted Hughes poetry. If nothing else the following composition written by the two directors of ‘Head’ demonstrates a self-awareness and irony crucial to postmodernism. The lyrics refer to the film, in having no plot but scenes/ perspectives and reiterate the time disruptions that take place. The line ‘we might tell you one thing but would only take it back’ also returns to the theme of multiplicity and how anything can be read in a manner of different ways. The final couplet continue the idea of The Monkees as a ‘product’ rather than as a creative outlet of individuals and the track is cut short as if by realizing their manufactured beginnings The Monkees cannot in fact ‘be here to give you more’. The Monkees’ narration is also speeded up and slowed down causing further time disruptions and accentuate how The Monkees are manufactured and controlled by others:
Hey hey we are the Monkees, you know we love to please
A manufactured image with no philosophies
We hope you like our story, although there isn’t one
That is to say there’s many, that way there is more fun
You’ve told us you like action and games of many kinds
You like to dance we like to sing so let’s all loose our minds
We know it doesn’t matter ‘cause what you came to see
Is what we’d love to give you and give it one two three
But it may come three two one two, or jump from nine to five
And when you see the end in sight the beginning may arrive
For those who look for meanings in form as they do fact
We might tell you one thing but we’d only take it back
Not back like in a [boxstack] not back like in a race
Not back so we can keep it but back in time and space
You say we’re manufactured, to that we all agree
So make your choice and we’ll rejoice in never being free
Hey hey we are the monkees, we’ve said it all before
The money’s in we’re made of tin, we’re here to give you more
The money’s in we’re made of tin we’re here to give you m---

Whereas ‘Ditty Diego’ deals with The Monkees in a superficial sense, other group compositions like Tork’s ‘Can You Dig It?’ deal with The Monkees phenomenon on a much deeper level. This piece deals with growth and how people never stay completely the same but change from day to day. In common with postmodernists, Tork decides life is more fulfilling when one accepts these changes as ‘those who know it use it’ to enhance their life and ‘those who scorn it’ and become stereotyped as The Monkees feared ‘die’ as individua;ls as they cannot be true to themselves. Yet like many (e.g. Herzog) he ultimately fears this change –longing for an ideal of stability he cannot have in the final line:
Some thing doesn’t change, there is only one
Always changing inside, what does it become?
Can you dig it? Do you know? Would you care to let it show?

Those who know it use it, those who scorn it die
To sing that you can dig it is to make your soul to fly
Can you dig it? Do you know? Would you care to let it show?

There is only feeling in this world of life and death,
I sing the praise of never change with every single breath
Can you dig it? Do you know? Would you care to let it show?

Following this sequence, Micky and Mike appear in a Western that is interrupted by Micky criticisng the idea and walks through a painted backdrop, revealing the production of the film through the frame-breaking discussed earlier. Micky speaks to both cast and director as he leaves: “Hey come on lady, quit acting, get up, you’re not dead, come on, I don’t want to do this anymore man, hey come on, it’s all over, it’s all an act, all this junk with the fake trees and the fake arrows. I’ve had enough of all of this, Bob, I’m through!” Elsewhere in the film microphones, lights and cameras are directly visible further breaking the illusion that the characters are real and unaware of the audience. There was in fact a conscious attempt to “grab a little reality and walk through scenes and talk about ourselves and put a little objectivity behind the whole thing, show the people what it’s all been like” (PT - Baker 92). The audience is even given what appears to be documentary footage of the film being shot. At one point Davy is ushered off the set onto another set in order to choose a boxer he wants to use for the boxing scene. However, Davy must presumably have to ‘choose’ the right boxer as Sonny Liston had already been cast for the part Another example of this occurs when in the context of the film Tork is holding a conversation with cross-dresser TC Jones, only to break out of character and hit him/ her. There is then a pause, as the following conversation takes place:
BR: Alright, that’s enough, cut it, print it please
PT: Hey Bob, that’s not right man. I mean about hitting a girl and all, was that alright?
TCJ: I thought it looked great
PT: Well I don’t know, I mean hitting a woman. It’s about the image and everything, it’s not right.
Man: I hate to interrupt and everything [holds out autograph book]
PT: No, it’s for your niece isn’t it? That’s quite alright [signs and gives back book. Turns to waiting make-up man] Was that alright? John, that wasn’t right, It’s a kids…Bob, it’s a movie for kids. They’re not going to dig it man.
This conversation appears to be real and fits the discussion of Tork’s extreme character discussed earlier. However, after walking off the set we see stage-hands backing away from Tork as if they are afraid of him after seeing what his ‘character’ has done – further demonstrating the blend between actor and character.

The film continually tries to undermine the Monkees’ relevance in the music and television industries by means of a barrage of self-criticism in nearly every scene. On entering a café, cries erupt of ‘they’re coming!’ akin to the arrival of a celebrity – only the cry appears to be one of disgust and the patrons quickly exit the café as The Monkees arrive exclaiming “how awful”; “stinking kids all over the place”; “there you are – peace and love”; “what are they?” etc. Whilst inside relations are no better: T C Jones offers the comment “Well look who it is, God’s gift to the eight-year olds. Changing your image darling? And while you’re at it, get a man to give you some talent…[to Micky] are you still paying tribute to Ringo Starr?”

Further criticism appears in the Tork song ‘Long Title: Do I Have To Do This All Over Again?” which expresses anger both at having to readjust material to fit a manufactured image and the fact that the writer cannot deal with bigger questions and the key line here is ‘I know life’s more than just some kind of deal’. Other lines deal with this in a wider sense, the narrator asking ‘can I see my way to know what’s pretty real?’ whilst he is confined in his audience and his material. The answer is ultimately that yes he can and the whole film seems to be the Monkees answer to this debate: they can see their way ‘to know what’s pretty real’ but only by rejecting their status as teen-idols and committing commercial suicide:
Do I have to do this all over again?
Didn’t I get it right the first time?
Do I have to do his all over again?
How many times do I have to make this rhyme?

Can I see my way to know what’s pretty real?
They have time to fix things by themselves
I know life’s more than just some kind of deal
Yeah but won’t you tell me that’s all when my single comes off the shelf?
Oh Didn’t I? Didn’t I?

This point is reiterated throughout the film, most particularly in the speech given by an Eastern philosopher that directly concerns postmodernist ideas. Beliefs are shown to be the result of our perspective or ‘conditioning’ and that history is also open to multiple viewpoints, a debate that is also central to Hutcheon’s arguments of historiographic metafiction: the concept that any use of history must demonstrate it’s shortcomings. The philosopher then claims that there is ultimately no difference between reality and fantasy as our perception of the two is dependent on our head’s interpretation of the messages it receives from our senses. Finally, he makes the point that all he says is only his own opinion and that he is in the dark as much as the rest of us – which fulfils postmodernist ideas that there is no one answer but several conflicting ones to the question of why we are here. When telling his solution to the others, Tork makes some subtle differences to this that relate more directly to The Monkees’ history as a multimedia band, with discussion of the way our mind interprets music and how we place our own perspective on them. Tork also speaks of man’s pre-conceptions that prevent him from embracing the present, like the main character in ‘Herzog’ for example and overall these speeches mirror the plot of ‘The Man In The High Castle’ by saying that “to allow the unknown to occur and to occur requires clarity. Where there is clarity there is no choice Where there is choice there is misery”. This returns to the question of logo-centrism, as the film seems to be saying that without philosophy determining how we act, man is forever unsure what steps to take in his life and suffers through this lack of direction.

When The Monkees return to the same scene as in the opening we see another postmodernist technique as “in postmodernist fiction closure is not only desirable, but also not possible” (Derrida). Towards the end of the film The Monkees temporally do escape the ‘black-box’ and return to the various settings, as if searching their way for an escape, before re-entering the opening scene of the film, again throwing themselves off the bridge. This may be because a representation of life would have no end, except perhaps for Vonnegut’s ultimate closure of death, and in this light the suicide too may be through the inability to find closure.

As a closing point to ‘Head’, even the closing credits are postmodernist in the way they play around with social convention and orthography – printing the cast backwards so that for instance ‘girlfriend’ reads ‘dneirflrig’, a technique consistently used by Gray. This playfulness coupled with a more serious address of what we expect in life features heavily all the way through the film which is postmodernist in several smaller ways but most importantly by dissecting The Monkees and revealing how the whole process has taken place. As for why this experiment in consumerism should occur we turn next to the television special ‘Thirty Three And A Third Revolutions Per Monkee’.

This time there is a ‘plot’, but again not a very cohesive one and consists of having The Monkees developed in test-tubes, stripped of identity, in order to brainwash the world. Yet any attempt at illusion is undermined by the re-occurring phrase spoken by the drummer with guest band Brian Auger and the Trinity ‘I don’t believe it!’ This character has no other lines and his speech here implies that the director was attempting to debase any statements in the script by denying their integrity. Vonnegut too debases what both he and his characters pronounce and overall this is a postmodernist concept because it again shows the belief of authors that they cannot write the answers to ‘life’ from a single viewpoint and must undermine any claims of belief. The mention of the guest band is another point worth noting – as if to say that the Monkees are not a real ‘band’ and need a substitute – as is the fact that The Monkees have comparatively little screen time in the wake of multiple guest stars, challenging what we expect from a ‘Monkees’ show. The first scene brings up the question of identity, with an off-screen voice asking ‘who are you?’ and guest star Julie Discroll warbling ‘I am woman’ in response. Identity is a key consideration of the script, with the two guest actors later draining The Monkees of their names and attempts to create artificial ‘robots’ that are all the same. The script then refers directly to the exloitation not only of The Monkees but of music in general, guest Brian Auger outlining his desire to ‘create’ a group intent on mass destruction:“ We take the means of mass-communication, use them for commercial exploitation. Create a new four-part harmony. Four simple lads with little talent or not and, through this latest fad of rock, conduct experiments in mind control on an un-suspecting public. I’ll brainwash them and they’ll brainwash – the world!”

This stereotypical depiction of a mad genius covers the same ground as much of the television series – presenting universally known symbols with irony – only here it is The Monkes’ own history that is being looked at in this way. The idea of them as ‘robots’ is also a device common to postmodernism, traditionally a paranoid fear suffered by those who feel they are not in control and that they are surrounded by so much artificiality their uniqueness means they feel the only ‘real’ beings alive. This fits several postmodernist ideas of consumerism, reality and control with Vonnegut in particular calling humans ‘meat machines’ that in the modern age is designed to serve a ‘purpose’ not their own desires and needs. In order to distinguish himself from machines, Vonnegut chose to ‘bring chaos to order’ (**) and in a sense this is what the Monkees do, being illogical and silly possibly to escape the logicality of the machinations that surround them.

The next scene has Julie Discroll encouraging The Monkees to use their minds – and their individuality – to escape this control, echoing Wallace’s interpretation of Lanark as “an exploration of, and an imaginative escape from, the systems which serve to entrap and enclose the individual” (Wallace 115). The Monkees disrupt traditional images of them as a group by performing solo and re-inventing the audience’s traditional expectations of them, as well as encouraging us to drop our stereo-types of media creations. Nesmith’s piece ‘Naked Permisson’ in particular highlights many postmodernist elements, in particular the schizophrenia between The Monkees’ commercial and inventive images by having two Nesmith’s alternate performing the song in a rock or country genre. Being pulled in two different directions highlights again the theme of the absent centre and is an important postmodernist theme from Gray to Herzog. During the piece the two Nesmiths sit in front of a wanted poster of Nesmith for fraud – another allusion to the Monkees’ attacks in the musical press - before someone off camera shoots him/them, possibly a further reference to the commercial suicide undergone in ‘Head’. This would equate with the first two verses, which refer both to the Monkees’ declining sales and the greater fulfilment this brings:
Now it’s quite a while ago that I had a strange intuition
Something was wrong with my gold record situation
‘Why?’ they say with so much admiration
Well I can’t say that it makes it right

So for a while I’ll just play my guitar
And I’ll play you a couple of these tunes
And I know that it may not get me too far
But it’s the only thing I believe that’s true

The action then turns to the most explicit reference of manipulation; ‘Wind-Up Man’, where The Monkees are seen as painted clockwork-dolls. The lyrics make references to how they are ‘programmed to be entertaining’ and ‘invented by the teeny-bopper’ before speaking of the much bigger concept of the ‘wind-up world of television’ and the postmodernist principle of media manipulation. A caption, ‘this space for rent’ both underlines the corruption of art by business practices and parodies the use of captions within the television series. The piece then concludes ‘can’t you hear me laughing at you?’ as if the creators of The Monkees are knowingly making profits from misleading their audience:
I’m a Wind-Up man, programmed to be entertaining
Turn the key, I’m a fully automatic
Wind-Up Man invented by the teeny-bopper
Turn me on and I will sing a song about the Wind Up Man

I’m a wind-Up man, programmed to be entertaining
Turn me on and I will sing a song about the
Wind-up world of people watching television
Wind-up man can’t you hear me laughing at you? Wind-Up Man

The next section deals with the concept of evolution which is not a direct postmodernist idea, but is a part of the debates of Swift and Churchill who challenge the nineteenth-century view of humans as always progressing to some higher ideal. Man, they claim, is going round in circles without meta-narratives to guide his way; making progress in one area only to lose this in another. Evolution can also perhaps be seen as the first real challenge to the largest meta-narrative: religion

Over some non-Monkees footage a narrator intones, “awake…creation...awake…and dream…”, which again confuses the idea of fantasy and reality in that the audience is left in confusion as to whether this whole episode is a ‘dream’ or whether this is a more philosophical question to ‘God’ intending mankind to confuse the boundaries between different levels of consciousness. Darwin then introduces The Monkees into the equation, as ‘masterpieces’ of evolution and further parodies commercial exploitation through this introduction: “Here they are with the song of the book of the film of the tram from the telephone directory of the same name”. This challenges what we expect him to say and breaks traditional story-telling conventions as well as highlighting consumerism in the same way that Vonnegut prints the foreword to ‘Breakfast Of Champions’ on a T-shirt. A character named ‘Charles Darwin’ interrupts the last scene to ‘take us back to the beginning’ and we see the Monkees literally as monkeys and it is implied in this scene that mankind has learnt nothing and manipulation and business instincts existed long before he evolved into what exists today. Darwin then says “evolution can do no more, this is where science takes over” – as if to imply that whilst evolution is ‘natural’, science is something man has invented as yet another ‘belief’ system to replace that of religion. Derrida and Foucalt both reject science in their theories, claiming that it is a decoy away from man’s spiritual purpose.

After being created inside test-tubes, The Monkees are now ready to perform – only they seem here to be an allegory for music in general as they are introduced on ‘December 7th 1956’, a full decade before The Monkees and approximately the start of rock and roll. The compere’s introduction also reiterates the manipulation aspect of The Monkees:“And here they come. Idolized, plasticised, psycho-analyzed, sterilized, the Monkees!’ Their story then comes full circle, with Auger interrupting the show and breaking the illusory structure of the programme by referring to both the director (this time Jack Good) and the real names of the guest cast. McHale claims, “the author occupies an ontological level superior to his world; by breaking the frame around his world, the author foregrounds his own superior reality” (**Notes I think**) and in a sense this is what occurs here, with the actors attempting to debase all we have just seen in order to show how The Monkees are now ‘hyper-real’. The brainwashers then relinquish their control of the project and give the Monkees their freedom – only to undermine this happy ending by Discroll’s derogatory comment that without being controlled The Monkees cannot survive:
BA: “Wait a minute Jack, hold on a minute, stop the show and all that. This brainwashing business has got completely out of control. My name’s Brian, this is Julie Discroll, you are Stuart Gilbey a famous Carlisle centre-forward, Judith’s a carrot and we don’t want any more of this brainwashing business. What we want is complete and total freedom. Do you know what this means?!
JD: Yeah, utter bloody shambles”

This is very important to the next work, Nesmith’s ‘the Garden’ which continues the Monkees television-music experiment by combining text and music designed to be used simultaneously. Nesmith’s sleeve-notes read “as the two media converge one tends to charge the other with meaning… So that taking the two together is a dual assault on the senses rather than either the eyes or the ears and bringing us a step closer to the imaginative becoming real”, relating multimedia practice to other postmodernist concerns over reality and fantasy. The ‘plot’ is probably the most conventional so far, but through use of symbols for wider concepts than telling a straightforward story. Ex-prisoner Jason is visited by a succession of characters that sense his boredom on release and has him enter their world to turn on a waterfall and replenish his ‘garden’. In common with other postmodernist works by Gray and Bradbury, ‘the garden’ also uses a subtle form of self-reference in the use of imagery, with windows existing as metaphors for enlightenment and vision and doors as pathways to another world: “Jason paused at each window to enjoy the ever-widening view” (40).

Yet in common with those works, this view of the outside world surrounds a very inward story that is primarily concerned with identity. Taking the earlier discussion a step further, several characters radically alter their appearance such as these two descriptions of a character called Muriel: “today she had chosen to express beauty with long honey-coloured hair and grey eyes. While this was not her favourite appearance, she too had felt Jason’s presence and knew the time was at hand for her to meet him.” (13). Whilst Muriel is very much a fantastical creation that one supposes could be adverse to man’s logic, even amongst ‘reality’ Jason has trouble distinguishing his friends because they all wear the same uniform of ‘the prison’ and lose their differentiating characteristics. One interpretation of ‘the prison’ is that it is man’s social prison where he has been restricted and in many ways controlled as to what to be (“They dressed alike, walked alike, talked alike, even laughed the same way” 2).

Another topic broadly covered is that of control, and this piece perhaps most perfectly matches postmodernist criteria in that the controllers have only a limited say in what happens. Throughout the text it is made clear that Jason is intended to make most of the moves he does, but we are frequently told that he does things earlier or later than expected (eg “Johnson is with him. He’s earlier than I thought he would be” 13). This equates to Gray or Vonnegut’s characters who have their characters ‘brought’ to a certain place only to find that they are not completely in control eg a bar-room brawl that injures the author in the former example and the is/ is/ is/ if/ is/ is element to life debated in the latter (**).

Perhaps the most important area of ‘The Garden’ is its dealings with the concepts of truth and perception. When Jason first notices the ‘other’ world and asks why he could not see it before he is told “It’s kind of a prison thing. You know, you don’t see it then you do see it. Like that” (5). The idea is pushed further into ideas of right and wrong, as all good postmodernists agree that there are several different perspectives on life and an individual’s concept of right and wrong is far from universal. In one section, Jason is gripped by fear and –without knowing what it is – reacts to what his senses tell him and tries to pull himself and the nonchalant Muriel away from it. His companions then tell him he is wrong “because you are trying to use your thinking to distinguish right from wrong. That’s not what your thinking is for. It’s to distinguish the real from the unreal,” (28?**). A character named Salizar later concludes, “We must all know right from wrong. But how do we know? How do we avoid the sea of gossip, opinions and fashion? Only by learning more of what is true do we know more of what is right, and gain a standard to live by. This is the genius of life” (52). This fits in perfectly with postmodernists who are trying to discover not whether something is right – as that is open to opinion – but whether we are simply having problems communicating what we want to say. Yet in common with ‘thirty three’ we see the desire for these notions even while we have to disregard them: “Without a sense of right and wrong [Jason] would be a moral wreck, ethically adrift, and he could think of many things that were both quite real and as awful as they were real, but he decided to keep quiet about them for now” (27).

Without black-and-white definitions of the world around us, it is ultimately hard to communicate our true thoughts and emotions. Muriels’ speech consists of several attempts to pinpoint meaning and often contain ‘…’, a postmodernist tool used especially by Vonnegut to show that what we mean can have no definite meaning. Another passage confirms “Her eyes emphasising unspoken words, trying to communicate until, finally frustrated, she started walking again” (27). Another reason communication is difficult is because none of us are static and are continually evolving so that ideas of ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ at one time might not hold for every situation. ‘The Garden’ deals with this by referring not to people but to the allegory of the ‘garden’:“each of these lovely plants had grown from a seed utterly unlike what was on display now. A seed, if held in the hand, that shows nothing of its promise, yet contains all that it needs for it’s full and final expression” (53).

When Jason completes his task of having a hermit switch on the waterfall, he is amazed by the enthusiastic reception her receives on his return. He asks them why this should be so when he has done nothing extraordinary and on replies, “Only the world likes miracles and heroes. Forget the world. it is a web of deceit and lies” (52). This mirrors postmodernist worship of not a ‘hero’ but arguably an ‘anti-hero’ such as Kilgore Trout or Lanark that are a mixture of good and bad – better representing life.

So far I have not talked about the music as until this last chapter it is instrumental and hard to analyse. However, ‘Life becoming love’ seems to offer a solution to postmodernist complications, by saying that mankind should see life through one overall viewpoint after all: that of ‘love’ - a concept he already holds the keys to and do not need and ‘Gods’ or social systems to discover:
Right remaining right remaining right becoming wrong
Truth remaining truth remaining truth becoming song
Song becoming soul and soul coming from soul
Knowing from the garden all there is to know
Love [that’s born of will and all] the things that will become known

Life becoming life becoming wise becoming love

This spiritual awareness may be our ‘garden’; something we all have but must nurture in order to fully realise ourselves. Finally, we return to the concept of abandoning our ideas of ‘right’ for what is ‘true’ and by doing this we can finally put an end to our divided, postmodernist selves. As the book concludes: “Whatever had created him, created them, and cared for all like a gardener for flowers. In the garden, from bud to blossom the flowers grew, not by gathering but by becoming” (55?*):

A NOW COMPLETE List Of Top Five/Top Ten/TOP TWENTY Entries 2008-2019

143) How Every AAA Band Got Their Name (News, Views and Music 155...

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144) AAA Top 10: The Motor Car (News, Views and Music 156)

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145) AAA Singles With The Most Weeks On The US Billboard Charts (...

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146) AAA Albums With The Most Weeks On The USA Billboard Charts (...

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147) AAA Songs Featuring Whistling (News, Views and Music Issue 1...

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148) The Session Musicians Who've Played On The Most AAA Albums (...

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149) Top 10 Silliest AAA Album Titles (News, Views and Music Issu...

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150) A Short Guide To 10 AAA Spin-Off Bands (News, Views and Musi...

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151) Martin Kitcher "The ATOS Song (You're Not Fit To Live)"

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152) AAA Songs (More Or Less) Exclusive To Film Soundtracks (News...

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153) AAA Alcohilic-hic! Songs (Top 10 News, Views and Music 164)

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154) The human singing voice carries with it a vast array of emotions, thoughts that cannot be expressed in any other way except opening the lungs and...

156) AAA Songs About Carlisle (News, Views and Music Top Five Iss...

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157) AAA Songs About Children Being Born (News, Views and Music I...

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158) The Best AAA Outtakes (News, Views and Music Issue 168)

Some artists just have no idea what their best work really is. One thing that amazes me as a collector is how consistently excellent many of the...

169) The Last 10 AAA Songs Listed Alphabetically http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/the-last-10-aaa-songs-listed.html%20%0d170

170) Tributes To The 10 AAA Stars Who Died The Youngest http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/the-10-youngest-aaa-stars-at-time-of.html%20%0d171

171) The 10 Best Songs From The Psychedelia Box-Sets ‘Nuggets’ and ‘Nuggets Two’ http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/the-best-of-two-nuggets-psychedelia.html%20%0d172

172) The 20 Most Common Girl’s Names In AAA Song Titles (With Definitions) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/girls-names-in-aaa-song-titles-from.html

17 3) NME/Melody Maker Questionairres Filled Out By AAA Bands http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/nmemelody-maker-questionairres-filled.html

174) Top Ten AAA Bootlegs http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/top-10-aaa-bootlegs-news-views-and.html

175) Days Of The Week AAA Style http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/days-of-week-aaa-style-news-views-and.html

176) AAA Musicals http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/aaa-musicals-news-views-and-music-issue.html

177) Interesting AAA Line-Ups That Were Or Nearly Were http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/ten-interesting-aaa-line-ups-that-were.html

178) The 101 Greatest AAA Songs Of All Time (Maybe?!) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/the-greatest-101-aaa-songs-well-ish-see.html

179) Mrs Thatcher Meets The Devil http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/mrs-thatcher-meets-devil-plus-intro-for.html

180) First Recordings By Future AAA Stars http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/first-

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181) The Ten Oldest AAA Songs http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/the-ten-oldest-aaa-songs-news-views-and.html

182) AAA Artists (Books Of Paintings) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/05/aaa-artists-books-of-paintings-news.html

183) AAA Appearances on TV Show 'Colour Me Pop' http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/05/aaa-appearances-on-colour-me-pop-tv.html

184) AAA Years In Song http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/05/aaa-years-in-song-news-views-and-music.html

185) A Tribute To Storm Thorgerson Via The Five AAA Bands He Worked With http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/05/a-tribute-to-hipgnosis-via-five-aaa.html

186) Five Top AAA Apps http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/top-five-aaa-apps-news-views-and-music.html

187) The Ultimate Grateful Dead Concert Setlist http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/the-ultimate-grateful-dead-concert-top.html

188) Surprise! Celebrating 300 Album Reviews With The Biggest 'Surprises' Of The Past Five Years Of Alan's Album Archives! http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/celebrating-300-album-reviews-10.html

189) Top Ten Dave Davies Songs http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/top-ten-dave-davies-songs-news-views.html

190) Comparatively Obscure First Compositions By AAA Stars http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/07/comparatively-obscure-debut.html

191) Famous AAA Fathers: http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/07/famous-aaa-fathers-news-views-and-music.html

192) The Best Five AAA Re-Issue CD Series http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/07/the-best-five-aaa-re-issues-series-news.html

193) Evolution Of A Band: Comparing First Lyric With Last Lyric: http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/07/evolution-of-band-comparing-1st-lyric.html

194) Ten Of The Best AAA Riffs http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/07/ten-of-best-aaa-riffs-news-views-and.html

195) Twenty AAA Milestone Moments Part One 1956-66 http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/08/twenty-aaa-milestone-events-part-one.html

196) Twenty AAA Milestone Moments Part Two 1967-80 http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/08/twenty-aaa-milestone-events-part-two.html

197) Eleven Random Recent Purchases http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/08/eleven-random-recent-purchases.html

198) Five AAA Outcasts Who Know More Than They Let Onhttp://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/08/five-aaa-outcast-characters-who-know.html

199) That's Why They Call It The (Top Ten) Blues! http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/thats-why-they-call-it-bluesaaa-top-ten.html

200) The Monkees In Relation To Postmodernism (University Dissertation) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/university-dissertation-monkees-in.html

201) The Music Never Stopped: AAA Youtube Video #5 http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/the-music-never-stopped-alans-album.html

202) Carly Simon's 'You're So Vain': Was It About One Of The AAA Crew? http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/carly-simons-youre-so-vain-was-it-about.html

203) Ten AAA Stars In Further Education http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/aaa-stars-in-further-education-top-five.html

204) AAA Dramas and Plays http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/aaa-dramas-and-plays-news-views-and.html

205) Abandoned AAA Album Covers http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/abandoned-aaa-album-covers-top-ten-news.html

206) Chinese Horoscopes AAA Style http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/10/chinese-horoscopes-aaa-style-top-twelve.html

207) Top Ten Songs The Beatles 'Gave Away' http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/10/top-ten-songs-beatles-gave-away-news.html

208) AAA Song Titles That Are The Same As Other AAA Songs http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/10/aaa-songs-with-same-titles-as-other-aaa.html

209) Updates to Our 'Special Editions' #1 http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/10/updates-to-our-special-editions-on.html

210) Most Parodied AAA Albums http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/the-most-parodied-aaa-album-covers-news.html

211) Longest Average AAA Songs Per Album http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/the-longest-average-aaa-songs-per-album.html

212) Shortest Average AAA Songs Per Album http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/the-shortest-average-aaa-songs-per.html

213) An AAA Guide To The Twenty Best Dr Who Stories http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/the-20-best-doctor-who-stories-aaa.html

214) AAA Songs and Albums Based On Books http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/12/aaa-songsalbums-based-on-books-and.html

215) Top Ten AAA Concert Quotes http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/12/top-aaa-quotes-from-concerts-top.html

216) Top Ten Surrealist AAA Lyrics http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/12/top-ten-sureallist-aaa-song-lyrics-news.html

217) AAA 'Christmas Presents' we'd most like to have next year http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/12/aaa-christmas-presents-wed-most-like-to.html

218) Review Of The Year 2013 http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2013/12/review-of-year-2013-news-views-and.html

219) Nominate This Site For A Shorty Award 2014 http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/01/nominate-this-site-for-shorty-award-2014.html

220) A Tribute To Phil Everly http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/01/a-tribute-to-phil-everly-everly.html

221) Dr Who and the AAA (Five Musical Links) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2014/01/dr-who-and-five-musical-links-to-alans.html

222) Five Random Recent Purchases http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2014/01/five-random-recent-purchases-news-views.html

223) AAA Grammy Nominees http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2014/02/aaa-grammy-nominees-top-twelve-news.html

224) Ten AAA songs that are better heard unedited and in full http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2014/02/ten-aaa-songs-that-are-better-unedited.html

225) The shortest gaps between AAA albums http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2014/01/the-shortest-gaps-between-aaa-albums.html

226) The longest gaps between AAA albums http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2014/02/the-longest-gaps-between-aaa-albums.html

227) Top ten AAA drummers http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2014/03/top-ten-aaa-drummers-news-views-and.html

228) Top Ten AAA Singles (In Terms of 'A' and 'B' Sides) http://www.alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/03/top-ten-aaa-singles-and-b-sides-news.html

229) The Stories Behind Six AAA Logos http://www.alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/03/the-stories-behind-six-aaa-logos.html

230) AAAAAHHHHHH!!!!!!! The Best Ten AAA Screams http://www.alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/04/the-best-aaa-screams-top-ten-news-views.html

231) An AAA Pack Of Horses http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/04/aaa-songs-about-horses-top-ten-news.html

232) AAA Granamas - Sorry, Anagrams! http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/04/aaa-anagrams-news-views-and-music-issue.html

233) AAA Surnames and Their Meanings http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/04/aaa-surnames-and-their-meanings-news.html

234) 20 Erroneous AAA Album Titles http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/twenty-erroneous-aaa-album-titles-news.html

235) The Best AAA Orchestral Arrangements http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/fifteen-great-aaa-string-parts-news.html

236) Top 30 Hilariously Misheard Album Titles/Lyrics http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/top-thirty-hilariously-misheard-aaa.html

237) Ten controversial AAA sackings - and whether they were right http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/ten-controversial-aaa-sackings-news.html

238) A Critique On Critiquing - In Response To Brian Wilson http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/06/a-critique-on-critiquing-in-response-to.html

239) The Ten MusicianS Who've Played On The Most AAA Albums http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/08/the-ten-musicians-whove-played-on-most.html

240) Thoughts on #CameronMustGo http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/11/thoughts-on-cameronmustgo.html

241) Random Recent Purchases (Kinks/Grateful Dead/Nils Lofgren/Rolling Stones/Hollies) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/12/six-random-recent-purchases-kinksg.html

242) AAA Christmas Number Ones http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/12/aaa-christmas-number-ones.html

243) AAA Review Of The Year 2014 (Top Releases/Re-issues/Documentaries/DVDs/Books/Songs/ Articles plus worst releases of the year) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2014/12/aaa-review-of-year-2014.html

244) Me/CFS Awareness Week 2015 http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2015/05/mecfs-awareness-week-at-alans-album.html

245) Why The Tory 2015 Victory Seems A Little...Suspicious http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2015/05/why-tory-victory-seems-deeply.html

246) A Plea For Peace and Tolerance After The Attacks on Paris - and Syria http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2015/11/a-plea-for-peace-and-toleration.html

247) AAA Review Of The Year 2015 http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2015/12/the-aaa-review-of-year-2015.html

248) The Fifty Most Read AAA Articles (as of December 31st 2015) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2016/01/the-fifty-most-read-aaa-posts-2008-2015.html

249) The Revised AAA Crossword! http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2016_07_10_archive.html

250) AAA Review Of The Year 2016 http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2016/12/the-aaa-review-of-year-2016.html

251) Half-A-Dozen Berries Plus One (An AAA Tribute To Chuck Berry) http://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2017/03/an-aaa-covers-tribute-to-chuck-berry.html

252) Guest Post: ‘The Skids – Joy’ (1981) by Kenny Brown https://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2017/06/guest-post-skids-joy-1981.html

253) AAA Review Of The Year 2017 https://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.co.uk/2017/12/the-aaa-review-of-year-2017.html

254) Guest Post: ‘Supertramp – Some Things Never Change’ by Kenny Brown https://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2018/06/guest-review-supertramp-some-things.html

255) AAA Review Of The Year 2018 https://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2018/12/the-aaa-review-of-year-2018.html

256) AAA Review Of The Year 2019 plus Review Of The Decade 2010-2019 https://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2019/12/the-alans-album-archives-review-of-year.html

257) Tiermaker https://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2019/06/alans-album-archives-on-tiermaker.html

258) #Coronastock https://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2020/04/coronastock.html

259) #Coronadocstock https://alansalbumarchives.blogspot.com/2020/05/coronadocstock.html

Thursday, 5 September 2013

University Dissertation: "The Monkees In Relation To Postmodernism"

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