Davy Jones of the Monkees, Dead at 66

Hey, hey, it's the Monkees. Image from source, NYTimes

The Monkees debuted the year I was born, along with a strange number of initially short-lived, but iconic shows (Batman, Star Trek, The Munsters and The Addams Family are among them). I may be the first generation of "rerun babies." Sure, there were reruns before, but we got more of them. And my generation was responsible for the cult status of the shows above, and many others. With our early cable TV (channels 2-13, woo-hoo!), we became aficionados. So, I'm not sure if I was first familiar with Davy Jones from The Monkees, or if it was his appearance on The Brady Bunch as Marcia's crush.

But Davy did make an impression on me. Even as a pre-teen, I could tell he was the cute one. And even though I was more drawn to the sarcastic (and as it turns out, very talented) Mike Nesmith, Davy had something special.

I listen to KTLK-AM out of Las Angeles on my computer, and they've been playing a commercial for a touring concert series. In the mix is Sha Na Na, Chubby Checker and Davy Jones. I've been hearing the spot for weeks, and in fact heard it minutes before the death was announced. They'd already removed him an hour or so later. Acts like Davy's seem to appear every month here in Las Vegas. But rarely to the big names disappear. RIP, Davy.

[Excerpt]

Davy Jones, Monkees Singer, Dies at 66 

Davy Jones, a singer and, by long-held public consensus, the handsomest and most popular of the Monkees, the collectively young, longhaired, wildly famous and preternaturally buoyant pop group of the 1960s and afterward, died on Wednesday in Indiantown, Fla. He was 66. . .

Read more at: New York Times