The Monkees have announced they are putting together a 12-date U.S. tour titled An Evening with The Monkees starting in November. It is the first tour for the group since Davy Jones passed away from a heart attack at age 66 on February 29.
Kicking off the tour will be a stop on November 8 in Escondido, CA at the California Center for the Arts. The tour wraps up on December 2 in New York at the Beacon Theatre. The group will be performing in Minnesota, Illinois, Ohio, and Pennsylvania in between those dates, along with several other shows in California and New York.
This tour will be the first time that original Monkee Mike Nesmith is performing with the band since 1969. He has done occasional one stop shows with the band, but for the most part has been known to Monkees fans as the “Missing Monkee.”
“He [Nesmith] has always been my favorite Monkee, so the fact that he will be on this tour is definitely going to make me want to see them somewhere in New York,” said Mary Snedeker, a Connecticut resident. “I’ll miss Davy not being there but it should still be a lot of fun.”
While other fans are happy that the band is reuniting, some of them are disappointed about the amount of shows and where they are located.
“It’s great that they are going back on tour and I would love to see them but I do not want to have to travel a few hours to do so,” said Jan Kelley a Connecticut resident. “I really wish they would add more tour dates and travel more across the country.”
Nesmith and Jones along with Mickey Dolenz and Peter Tork were put together for a show named after the band that ran on NBC from 1966-68. However, the band’s music on the show became so popular that they toured together and released new music until 1970.
After the quartet starred in the colossal film flop Head, which had a then unknown Jack Nicholson working on it, Tork left the band quickly followed by Nesmith. Jones and Dolnez released two more fairly unsuccessful albums under the Monkee name before officially disbanding the group in 1970.
In 1986 the band found renewed interest in them after MTV and Nickelodeon began playing reruns of their old television show. Jones, Dolenz, and Tork reunited for a tour which saw them going from playing in smaller venues to larger venues as nostalgia for the band grew. Nesmith opted not to join the band because he was busy working on his production company. Their greatest hits album went platinum that year and the tour became one of the highest grossing in 1986-87.
Pre-sale tickets have already begun for most stops through Ticketmaster. Pre-sale tickets for the shows in Los Angeles and Cleveland begin on this Thursday, August 16.
News of a new tour should be exciting for Monkees fans everywhere. Yet, with Nesmith’s on-again, off-again relationship with the band it could be the final opportunity to see the band as close to its original format as possible.
