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Michael Nesmith
Robert Michael Nesmith (December 30, 1942 – December 10, 2021) was an American musician, songwriter, and actor. He was best known as a member of the Monkees and co-star of their The Monkees (TV series), TV series of the same name (1966–1968). His songwriting credits with the Monkees include "Mary, Mary (song), Mary, Mary", "The Girl I Knew Somewhere", "Tapioca Tundra", "Circle Sky" and "Listen to the Band (song), Listen to the Band". Additionally, his song "Different Drum" became a hit for the Stone Poneys featuring Linda Ronstadt. After leaving the Monkees in 1970, Nesmith continued his successful songwriting and performing career, first with the seminal country rock group the First National Band, with which he had a top-40 hit, "Joanne (Michael Nesmith song), Joanne" (1970). As a solo artist, he scored an international hit with the song "Rio (Michael Nesmith song), Rio" (1977). He often played a custom-built Gretsch 12-string guitar, 12-string electric guitar both with the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tapioca Tundra
"Tapioca Tundra" is a 1968 song written by Michael Nesmith and originally performed by the Monkees. Lyrics The lyrics of "Tapioca Tundra" poetically describe how a writer of poetry or prose loses control of a work's meaning and impact once consumed by its audience. Michael Nesmith described his songwriting style for "Tapioca Tundra" as poetry set to music. "One of the ways I got into songwriting was to find poems by great poets and see if I could put them to music," he said in an interview. "At the time that 'Tapioca Tundra' and 'Daily Nightly' came along, I had been writing my own poetry for a while. ... They weren't really designed as songs at all." A handwritten early version of the poem on which the lyrics were based was printed in the July 1967 issue of ''Tiger Beat'' magazine, for which Nesmith served as guest editor. The Monkees Released as the B-side of "Valleri", "Tapioca Tundra" was the first of the Monkees' singles to feature a lead vocal by Nesmith and it was h ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Circle Sky
"Circle Sky" is a song written by Michael Nesmith which appeared on The Monkees' sixth album, the ''Head'' soundtrack, and also in the film ''Head'' as a live concert performance. Background and inspiration The song is written and performed in style reminiscent to the work of musician Bo Diddley, staying mostly on a single chord (A Major), while strumming barre chords (from B Major to E Major) down the guitar neck for the intro, outro, and breaks, and from B minor to D minor for the bridge. The lyrics are impressions of sights and sounds on a Monkees tour, while "Hamilton's smiling down" refers to a Hamilton music stand, used for rehearsals and recording. Release While the movie included the song performed live by the Monkees in Salt Lake City, Utah on May 17, 1968 during a free show at the Valley Music Hall, the original soundtrack album instead substituted a studio recording, made by Nesmith and session musicians (an unexplained decision that became a major source of tension ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
PopClips
''PopClips'' is a music video television program, the direct predecessor of MTV. Former Monkee Mike Nesmith conceived the first music-video program as a promotional device for Warner Communications' record division. Production began in the spring of 1979 at SamFilm, a sound-stage built and operated in Sand City, California by Sam Harrison, a Monterey Peninsula College instructor with a motion picture background. The series was produced by Jac Holzman. With an infinity cyclorama as the background, set flats were made from the Styrofoam packing used to ship laserdisc players and 3/4" video decks. The first " VeeJay" was Jeff Michalski. The director was William Dear. Besides Harrison, the production team was made up of Bruce "Buz" Clarke, Keith Cornell, Marybeth Harris, and Leslie Chacon. The program was broadcast weekly on the youth-oriented cable television channel Nickelodeon in late 1980 and early 1981. The channel's owners at the time, Warner Cable, wanted to buy the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Elephant Parts
''Elephant Parts'' is a collection of comedy sketches and music videos made in 1981 by Michael Nesmith, formerly of the Monkees. Nesmith produced the video through his company Pacific Arts. ''Elephant Parts'' is one-hour-long with parody commercials and comedy sketches, and features five full-length music videos, including the popular songs "Rio" and "Cruisin'", which featured wrestler Steve Strong and Monterey-based comic "Chicago" Steve Barkley. Overview There are various comedy sketches between musical numbers: The most notable sketches are "Elvis Drugs", "Neighborhood Nuclear Superiority", "The Tragically Hip" (which was the inspiration for the Canadian band the Tragically Hip and was featured as a pretaped sketch on a season six episode of ''Saturday Night Live''), "Large Detroit Car Company", "Mariachi Translations", recurring comic blackouts that ended with the catchphrase "Just to prove a point!" and several series of bits with a lounge singer and a pirate, as well as ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Grammy Award For Video Of The Year
The Grammy Award for Video of the Year was an honor presented to recording artists at the 24th Grammy Awards in 1982 and the 25th Grammy Awards in 1983 for music videos. The Grammy Awards, an annual ceremony that was established in 1958 and originally called the Gramophone Awards, are presented by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the United States to "honor artistic achievement, technical proficiency and overall excellence in the recording industry, without regard to album sales or chart position". First presented in 1982 to Michael Nesmith for '' Elephant Parts'', the award was reserved for quality "video cassettes or discs in any format created specifically for the home video market". In 1983, Olivia Newton-John was presented the award for ''Olivia Physical''. Beginning with the 1984 Grammy Awards, the Video of the Year award category was replaced with the categories Best Video, Short Form and Best Video Album (now known as Best Music Video and Best Musi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Grammy Award
The Grammy Awards, stylized as GRAMMY, and often referred to as The Grammys, are awards presented by The Recording Academy of the United States to recognize outstanding achievements in music. They are regarded by many as the most prestigious and significant awards in the music industry in the United States, and thus the show is frequently called "music's biggest night". The trophy depicts a gilded gramophone, and the original idea was to call them the "Gramophone Awards". The Grammys are the first of the Big Three networks' major music awards held annually, and are considered one of the four major annual American entertainment awards with the Academy Awards (for films), the Emmy Awards (for television), and the Tony Awards (for theater). The first Grammy Awards ceremony was held on May 4, 1959, to honor the musical accomplishments of performers for the year 1958. After the 2011 ceremony, the Recording Academy overhauled many Grammy Award categories for 2012. The 67th Ann ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Music Video
A music video is a video that integrates a song or an album with imagery that is produced for promotion (marketing), promotional or musical artistic purposes. Modern music videos are primarily made and used as a music marketing device intended to promote the sale of music recordings. These videos are typically shown on music television and on streaming video sites like YouTube, or more rarely shown theatrically. They can be commercially issued on home video, either as video albums or video singles. The format has been described by various terms including "illustrated song", "filmed insert", "promotional (promo) film", "promotional clip", "promotional video", "song video", "song clip", "film clip", "video clip", or simply "video". While musical short, musical short films were popular as soon as recorded sound was introduced to theatrical film screenings in the 1920s, the music video rose to prominence in the 1980s when American TV channel MTV based its format around the medium. Mus ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
12-string Guitar
A twelve-string guitar (or 12-string guitar) is a steel-string guitar with 12 strings in six courses, which produces a thicker, more ringing tone than a standard six-string guitar. Typically, the strings of the lower four courses are tuned in octaves, with those of the upper two courses tuned in unison. The gap between the strings within each dual-string course is narrow, and the strings of each course are fretted and plucked as a single unit. The neck is wider, to accommodate the extra strings, and is similar to the width of a classical guitar neck. The sound, particularly on acoustic instruments, is fuller and more harmonically resonant than six-string instruments. The 12-string guitar can be played like a 6-string guitar as players still use the same notes, chords and guitar techniques like a standard 6-string guitar, but advanced techniques can be challenging as players need to play or pluck two strings simultaneously. Structurally, 12-string guitars, especially those built ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gretsch
Gretsch is an American company that manufactures and markets musical instruments. The company was founded in 1883 in Brooklyn, New York by Friedrich Gretsch, a 27-year-old German immigrant, shortly after his arrival to the United States. Friedrich Gretsch manufactured banjos, tambourines, and drums until his death in 1895. In 1916, his son, Fred Gretsch Sr. moved operations to a larger facility where Gretsch went on to become a prominent manufacturer of American musical instruments. Through the years, Gretsch has manufactured a wide range of instruments, though they currently focus on electric and acoustic guitars and drums. Gretsch instruments enjoyed market prominence by the 1950s. In 1954, Gretsch began a collaboration with guitarist Chet Atkins to manufacture a line of electric guitars with Atkins' endorsement, resulting in the Gretsch 6120 hollowbody guitar and other later models such as the Country Gentleman. Electric guitars before 1957 used single coil pickups that ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rio (Michael Nesmith Song)
"Rio" is a song written and sung by American musician Michael Nesmith. Included on his 1977 album ''From a Radio Engine to the Photon Wing'', it was released as a single. Although the single was not a hit in the US, "Rio" became Nesmith's most successful solo single in other countries. Popular interest in the song's music video rather than the song itself led Nesmith to consider creating television programming consisting of music videos. Nesmith sent a proposal he called "Popclips", which was picked up by then cable television operator Nickelodeon. In a 2013 interview published in ''Rolling Stone ''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. The magazine was first known fo ...'', Nesmith said of the "Rio" music video, "I said to people, 'It's a promotional film' ... The answer was that I simply needed to complet ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Joanne (Michael Nesmith Song)
"Joanne" is a song written and performed by Michael Nesmith, his only Top 40 hit song as a solo artist. The single was issued by RCA Records in mid 1970, from the album ''Magnetic South'', the first album released by Nesmith and The First National Band after he left The Monkees. In the United States, the song peaked at No. 21 on the ''Billboard'' Top 100 on 3 October 1970. It went to No. 4 in Canada, No. 3 in Australia, and No. 1 in New Zealand. In the U.S., it was the most successful solo chart hit for any member of The Monkees. "Joanne" was the second single issued from ''Magnetic South'', following the release of "Little Red Rider" (which did not chart). On the B-side of "Joanne", the track "One Rose" appears. RCA later reissued "Joanne" backed with "Silver Moon", as a single in its 45 rpm "Gold Standard Series". "Silver Moon" was originally issued as a single from Nesmith's next album '' Loose Salute'', released in November, 1970. "Joanne" was a staple on all of Nesmit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Linda Ronstadt
Linda Maria Ronstadt (born July 15, 1946) is an American singer who has performed and recorded in diverse genres including rock, country, light opera, the Great American Songbook, and Latin music. Ronstadt has earned 11 Grammy Awards, three American Music Awards, two Academy of Country Music awards, an Emmy Award, and an ALMA Award. Many of her albums have been Music recording sales certification, certified gold, platinum or multiplatinum in the United States and internationally. She has also earned nominations for a Tony Award and a Golden Globe award. She was awarded the Latin Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award by the Latin Recording Academy in 2011 and also awarded the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award by the Recording Academy in 2016. She was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in April 2014. On July 28, 2014, she was awarded the National Medal of Arts and Humanities. In 2019, she received a star jointly with Dolly Parton and Emmylou Harris on the Hollywood Walk of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
