Artist · chart history · #384 in indie & aaa artist polls
The Monkees
Band Los Angeles United States Active 1966–1970
The Monkees formed in 1966 in Los Angeles, United States and was active until 1970. The Monkees has 16 chart appearances on 8 radio countdowns from 4 stations on RockLists, spanning 2001–2025. The most successful song on radio countdowns is “I'm a Believer”, which appears on 5 lists with a best position of #72. The station that charted The Monkees most often is WFPK (Louisville, KY), with 6 appearances.
The Monkees started life as an idea rather than a band: TV producers Bob Rafelson and Bert Schneider dreamed them up in 1965 for an NBC sitcom, and cast Micky Dolenz, Davy Jones, Michael Nesmith and Peter Tork to play a group on screen. At first the four mostly just sang, with a few of their own songs slipped in; the rest came from professional writers and session players like the Wrecking Crew, under Don Kirshner's supervision, with Boyce and Hart, Jack Keller and Jeff Barry producing.
And the hits came in a torrent. Between 1966 and 1967 they topped the album chart four times running, with The Monkees, More of the Monkees, Headquarters and Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn & Jones Ltd., and scored number-one singles with "Last Train to Clarksville", "I'm a Believer" and "Daydream Believer", bright, bouncing pop that jumps right out of the speaker.
The members wanted the reins, and after a short power struggle in 1967 they got them. Headquarters, made with producer Chip Douglas, is mostly the four of them playing as a group, with guitars, keyboards, banjo and drums shared out among them, and the oddball "Randy Scouse Git" on board. By The Birds, The Bees & The Monkees each man was chasing his own ideas under the group's name, and the 1968 film Head, meant as the anti-TV-show, landed with a thud. Plenty of the public still thought they couldn't play, the show was cancelled, and they came apart in the early '70s. A revival of the series in 1986 brought reunions on and off until 2011, and Dolenz and Nesmith made a last farewell tour in 2021.
Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.
Songs by The Monkees on radio countdowns
| # | Song | Strength | Lists | Best | #1s | Peak year |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | I'm a Believer | 5 | #72 | – | – | |
| 2 | Daydream Believer | 2 | #160 | – | – | |
| 3 | Randy Scouse Git | 2 | #978 | – | – | |
| 4 | Steppin' Stone | 1 | #420 | – | – | |
| 5 | She | 1 | #607 | – | – | |
| 6 | Daily Nightly | 1 | #808 | – | – | |
| 7 | Pleasant Valley Sunday | 1 | #388 | – | – | |
| 8 | Last Train To Clarksville | 1 | #491 | – | – |
Albums with charting songs
Where each song was first released, from MusicBrainz.
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