Me & Magdalena - The Monkees

Flaneur

Very late at night, and within the last 12 months whilst browsing internet radio stations, I clicked on Radio Paradise (the Mellow channel, not the main one), and just lifted the volume a notch.

Playing mid-song was this particular one. "Sounds nice" I thought, piano, some brush on a snare, sparse bass, acoustic guitar and nice harmonies. Then the couplet of;

"But know everything lost will be recovered
When you drift into the arms of the undiscovered"

...poured out of my speakers and into my ears.

"When you drift into the arms of the undiscovered" How comforting and clever is that. Let alone the previous line.

"Who's this?" I thought and fired up Shazam on my phone.

The Monkees.

Eh? Is it old? is it new?

Well it's from 2016 and formed part of an album created and recorded to commemorate the band's 50th anniversary, titled 'Good Times'.

It's an heavily contributed album, featuring artists such as Andy Partridge, Neil Diamond, Paul Weller, Noel Gallagher, Harry Nilsson, and this song by Ben Gibbard (of Death cab for Cutie). No, me neither.

I'm not a real fan of the album, but I really like this song. The Monkees - the band that (despite having one of the coolest band logos ever) wasn't even real (once), bringing broader dimension and range to my rigid pigeonholing of them, but still retaining their amazing harmonies.

It's folky melancholia, centred (to me) around an account of an older couple, very late in their years, extremely comfortable with each other and still so very much in love - and being grateful for that.

My wife's sister's funeral is on Monday, and that space between the first seconds of hearing about a devastating loss and the ceremony of saying goodbye, does throw you around, but playing this song, and hearing that particular couplet has helped.

Do play it a couple of times, at least, and maybe that piano and voice(s) will hook ya.

Here's the song:

There's a faster version of it (Version 2) that gets some plaudits and is preferred by some:

And here's Nesmith and Dolenz, bringing both their fragility and magic in a live setting:

Harvest

I listened to this a lot at the time, the speedier version, - lovely tune from a band who produced plenty of those.

cordshoes

This is a superb song.
Paul Simon could have written it.

I have heard it a few times, mainly when in America, by acoustic singers in bars.

And I would have bet money it was featured in a film as a backdrop to a non-speaking sequence of visuals whilst travelling, in something like Little Miss Sunshine.
It hasn't though, so just in my head.🙃

I prefer the slower version, it has a great laid-back California vibe.

Raposa

Forgotten how good a tune this was.
Prefer the speedier version but both really good in their own way.

Placid

Never heard it before, a lovely tune both versions. Great write up.

👍

EEPW

first time for me loved it. That piano hook is in my head now lovely and superb choice

gives me chance to air my Monkees joke

My wife said she was leaving me because of my obsession with the 60s boy band the monkees
I thought she was kidding but then i saw her face,

Im here all week

Cooley

I dig this. Lovely song - beautiful in a way.
Thank you.

Raposa

Cooley
You feeling ok ?

Odd_Job

Beautiful tune with a write up to match Flan. Lovely stuff.

hendersonjones

This and the Tim Buckley choice , Squires been all over them

fuzzy

Lovely song, I'd never heard it. Thanks for posting.

That line is so good. It's like something Matt Johnson would write.

space

This is very Grateful Dead/American Beauty sounding blue grass/soft rock.

Which is good.

CharlieG

Know this one we'll. Top marks @Flaneur

Travis_Bickle

CS was on to something with that image. A couple in a '68 Cutlass Convertible crossing the Golden Gate bridge. She's in an oversized turtle-neck. Long black hair cascading in the wind as she throws her head back and laughs. He's in a suede jacket and a button-down chambray. Smiling as life has never felt better than that moment. The scene cuts to a winding road in Nor Cal. As the sun fades they're both lost in thoughts.

I think I prefer the up-tempo version. I'd like the slower one to be even slower. But neither grabbed me if I'm being honest. I think the images conjured up are better than the tune.

This is one of those songs that sums up the whole concept. A song that triggers a myriad of emotions in one of us can wash over another. It stays with one and becomes an old friend they return to. Someone else forgets it as quickly as they heard it.
It's not offensive. But, for me, it hasn't got that something that would make me come back to it

cordshoes

Travis_Bickle Monterey and the 17 Mile Drive

Harvest

I did three days work in Sausalito when travelling and made a massive thing about telling mates back home that I had to cross the Golden Gate Bridge every morning to go to work. Like a dick.

Misura

Harvest the thought of going to work in a morning was probably sufficient to blow their minds. The GGB was just the cherry on the icing on the cake. 😉

Travis_Bickle

Harvest went there one day on our honeymoon. You could smell the money in Marin County in the mid-00s.

Jon

Not doing it for me. Like something you’d hear on an easy listening radio station three times a day.

Misura

I like the song a lot. I think it’s beautiful. It’s evocative and it’s one that I listen to quite regularly. In fact I reckon that I’ve posted on here prior to Flaneur hearing it elsewhere.