October
15th marks the 25th anniversary of the release of The Monkees 1996
reunion album, Justus. It was instigated as a way to celebrate the 30th
anniversary of the debut of the group’s TV series, which aired for the
first time on September 12th, 1966. It would be the first time all four
members would record together since 1968, and the last time before
Davy’s passing in 2012.
Like clockwork, The Monkees seemed to try
some sort of reunion album every ten years. In 1976, the Dolenz,
Jones, Boyce & Hart album came together, though not officially under
The Monkees banner due to the name being in legal limbo at the time.
It was an album that was, overall, quite successful artistically, but
failed to make much of an impact commercially. In 1987, on the heels of
a hit single, That Was Then, This Is Now, which was spurred on by a
revival of the TV show thanks to an MTV marathon in 1986, Micky, Davy
& Peter put together the Pool It album, which was pretty much
savaged by critics and is considered the group’s all time worst album by
many. The next cycle brought them together in the summer of 1996 to
begin work on Justus.
This time around, it was Mike who got the
ball rolling. After playing his then fiancé, Victoria Kennedy, some
tracks from the Head soundtrack, her enthusiastic response got him to
organize a jam session with Micky on drums, Pete on bass and himself on
guitar. The session went so well that they called in Davy to complete
the group and began working with label Rhino to put together a reunion
album. For this project, the group wanted to go back to one of the best
times of their early career, when they’d broken free from the shackles
of being a “fake” TV band and got control of their music to record their
third album, Headquarters. They wanted to recreate that magic of it
being only the four of them at the helm and they even decided to up the
ante by writing all the songs themselves and producing the album on
their own. As the label says on the tin, it was to be JUST them.
It
was all set about with the best of intentions and approached with the
utmost sincerity, but when it came to what was delivered, something
about the sum of the parts didn’t end up adding up quite to what it
should have been. For one thing, the primary influence of the era was
the zeitgeist of the “grunge” movement, which drove the group to attempt
to update their sound to that contemporary standard and the truth was
that it wasn’t the best fit when they strayed into that territory.
Anger and cynicism weren’t a good disposition for a group who were so
strongly associated with fun and games. Not that they hadn’t offered up
some cynical songs before. Pleasant Valley Sunday was a cutting
commentary on suburban conformity, but it was wrapped in bubblegum pop
sweetness to make its attack one of stealth rather than a full frontal
assault.
The strength of the songwriting wasn’t quite up to par
either. Though they’d all been able to deliver classic songs in the
past, they didn’t seem to come up to scratch this time around. It’s not
that the album is necessarily “bad”, but being “middling” is always a
pretty weak form of praise. Many found the lack of Nesmith’s more
country-rock influence and lead vocals another disappointment. Some
better songs did brighten things up to a degree, particularly Davy’s
pieces as they skewed towards a softer pop sound, but even at their
best, the production still sounds dated today, especially when the songs
try to push into edgier hard rock. The hollow sound of the vocals is
particularly jarring on tracks like Regional Girl. It’s got a thin,
brittle tone to it that doesn’t hold up to contemporary listening and
begs for a modern remix to try to address the gutless feel that pervades
the production.
Critically and commercially, the album failed to
garner a lot of success or praise and lackluster reactions put a damper
on the sense of achievement that should have been present for such a
momentous reunion. The group did also manage to produce an hour long TV
special in February of 1997 to help promote the album, but that too
suffered from the same kind of unsatisfying results. Even with Mike,
who’d pioneered the fusion of music and narrative with projects like his
award winning Elephant Parts video, shepherding the script and handling
the directing, somehow it didn't add up to what it should have. It
all, on paper, should have been a marvelous rebirth for the group, but
somehow the spirit and timing simply didn’t seem to jive.
It
wouldn’t be until 2016’s 50th anniversary reunion album, Good Times, 20
years later, that all the pieces would fall into place to create an
album which truly reignited the group in the right way. It’s an album
that manages to bring their sound into the present without losing the
essence of what made them so appealing in the past. Whereas Justus
tried to bring them into a contemporary landscape where they didn’t seem
to comfortably fit, Good Times manifested in the present without
feeling like it needed to conform to the times to let The Monkees be
what they were meant to be, a rebelliously fun escape from the traumas
of the modern world. Justus, in the end, was an admirable and bold
effort that was, sadly, not yet ready to bring the group to where they’d
eventually end up in these late years of their career, but they would
get there when the time was right.
