Tear Drop City
1969 single by the Monkees
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"Tear Drop City" is a single by the Monkees released on February 8, 1969 on Colgems #5000 recorded on October 26, 1966. The song reached number 56 on the Billboard chart, and number 37 on Cash Box. The lyrics are about a man who feels low because his girlfriend has left him. Written by Tommy Boyce and Bobby Hart, it was the first single The Monkees released as a trio (Micky Dolenz, Michael Nesmith, and Davy Jones; Peter Tork departed December 1968). Micky Dolenz performed the lead vocal. Boyce and Hart produced and arranged the song.
| "Tear Drop City" | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 US picture sleeve | ||||
| Single by the Monkees | ||||
| from the album Instant Replay | ||||
| B-side | "A Man Without a Dream" | |||
| Released | February 8, 1969 | |||
| Recorded | October 26-November 6, 1966 | |||
| Studio | RCA Victor Studios (B) Hollywood, CA | |||
| Genre | Rock[1] | |||
| Length | 2:01 | |||
| Label | Colgems #5000 | |||
| Songwriters | ||||
| Producers |
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| The Monkees singles chronology | ||||
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The flip-side was "A Man Without a Dream", with Davy Jones doing the lead vocal, and it hit no.127 on the Cash Box chart. Both single sides were from the album Instant Replay.
Background
Tommy Boyce and Bobby Hart wrote "Tear Drop City" in a park in Lankershim Boulevard. The song was built around a riff Boyce compared to the one used in "She's About a Mover" by the Sir Douglas Quintet. Boyce recalled the song was about Hart's troubled relationship with his girlfriend. Hart stated that he and Boyce "were experimenting along the lines of the seventh chord again, which The Beatles had used in several songs. We thought there was maybe room for another song besides 'Clarksville' using that seventh kind of progression, going from the fifth to the seventh and back, playing around those notes."[2]
Recording
The basic track was recorded on October 26, 1966 at RCA (B) in Hollywood, California.[2] On October 30, Micky Dolenz added a lead vocal, and Tommy Boyce, Bobby Hart, and Ron Hicklin added backing vocals.[3] The song was completed on November 6, when Dolenz added another lead vocal to the recording, and Boyce, Hart and Hicklin added additional backing vocals. The recording was left unreleased for several years afterwards.[4] The song was originally recorded in "the key of F-sharp near the tempo of 'Tomorrow's Gonna Be Another Day.'"[2]
Release
On January 13, 1969, "Tear Drop City" received new mono and stereo mixes in preparation for its release as a single. According to Andrew Sandoval, this was an attempt by Lester Sill of Colgems and Monkees associate Brendan Cahill to boost the group's declining popularity in the charts. The finished master was sped up by nine percent, "giving it a sprightly pace similar to 'Last Train to Clarksville.'" The single was released in stereo only, although the mono mix was used for promotional copies sent to radio stations.[5]
In a March 1969 interview with NME, Michael Nesmith claimed the release of "Tear Drop City" was "almost a concession on our part to certain people. It's one from the archives of Monkee music, one with Peter. You can call it a corporate swan song. And I'm sure it'll be commercially very profitable."[6] On March 22, The Monkees appeared in a special "Monkee Day" episode of the TV series Happening to promote the single, but did not perform any music.[7]
"Tear Drop City" was remixed in 1991 when it was included on The Monkees' Listen to the Band box set.[8]
Personnel
Credits adapted from Rhino Handmade 2011 "Deluxe Edition" box set.[9]
The Monkees
- Micky Dolenz - lead vocals
Additional musicians
- Wayne Erwin – guitar
- Gerry McGee – guitar
- Louie Shelton – guitar
- Larry Taylor – bass guitar
- Billy Lewis – drums
- Gene Estes – tambourine
- Tommy Boyce – backing vocals
- Bobby Hart – backing vocals
- Ron Hicklin – backing vocals