Ok, so this quicky cash-in from 1967 isn't likely to show up on your local bookseller's shelf. I actually found a copy at the bottom of a box of Monkees 45s at a basement used record shop...but should you encounter it, and it's less than three or four bucks, don't hesitate to snag it.
Culture has come 'round to the side of the original pre-fab four, recognizing the obvious quality of their early bubblegum days (largely masterminded by outside producers and songwriters) and their more multifaceted later records (controlled by the boys themselves – heck, they even play on some of them!). So let's not have that debate. They made some cracking records, and their TV show holds up quite well.
So what's this, then? It's proportedly a collection of real letters sent by fans to the Monkees. I'm no expert in adolescent psychology, so I can't tell if these are real or not, but what they are is hilarious. One sweet young thing threatens to "smash" Davy Jones if he doesn't come to Witchita. Poor Gertrude wants a female character in the show named after her. Another insists on a refund because she's played her Monkees record so much that the wax has melted: "I don't think it's fair that I be punished just for being such a Monkee-lover." She promises to use the money to buy another copy of the record.
It's one corker after another for 127 straight pages, with hilarious illustrations by noted artist Jack Davis (a founding artist at Mad magazine!). As a time capsule into a more innocent era of hysteria, it can't be beat. Throw on a copy of Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn & Jones Ltd. and make an evening of it.
