"Pleasant Valley Sunday" is a song by Gerry Goffin and Carole King, most famous for the version recorded by the Monkees in 1967. Goffin's and King's inspiration for the name was a street named Pleasant Valley Way, in West Orange, New Jersey where they were living at the time. The road follows a valley through several communities among the Watchung Mountains. The lyrics were a social commentary on status symbols, s, life in suburbia and "keeping up with the Joneses". It became one of the Monkees' most successful singles.
Production
, producer of the Monkees' music during 1967, also played bass guitar on some of their recordings. He showed lead guitaristMichael Nesmith the lead riff used throughout the song. Nesmith doubletracked the lead guitar riff, while Peter Tork and Davy Jones added piano and maraca parts. "Fast" Eddie Hoh, a session musician, played drums. Micky Dolenz sang lead vocals, and was the only member of The Monkees who did not play an instrument on the track. For an ending, Douglas and engineer Hank Cicalo decided to "keep pushing everything up", adding more and more reverberation and echo until the sound of the music became unrecognizable, before fading out the recording. Separate mono and stereo versions were mixed for single and album records. The single peaked at No. 3 on the Hot 100 and was featured in the second season of their television series. The song also appeared on the fourth Monkees album, Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn & Jones Ltd., in November 1967. While mono copies of the album had the same version heard on the single, stereo copies had a version using a different take of the first verse and an additional backing vocal during the break. In February 1986, MTV featured a marathon of episodes of the series titled Pleasant Valley Sunday, which sparked a second wave of Monkeemania. The reunited Dolenz, Tork, and Davy Jones, already on tour, went from playing small venues to playing arenas and stadiums in the following weeks. The B-side to the single, "Words", was written by Boyce and Hart. On the Pisces album the song is introduced by Tork's brief spoken-word track "Peter Percival Patterson's Pet Pig Porky". An early demo version of the song with vocals by Carole King was released on her 2012 compilation, The Legendary Demos.
Interpretation of lyrics
In a 1978 interview with Blitz Magazine, Mike Nesmith jokingly corrected the interviewer who regarded the song as being about suburban America: "I hate to pop your balloon about 'Pleasant Valley Sunday'. That song was actually written about a mental institution."
Grand Funk Railroad's 1970 song "I'm Your Captain " opens with a guitar intro played by Mark Farner that borrows directly from "Pleasant Valley Sunday's" guitar hook.
The pop punk band The Mr. T Experience covered the song on their 1986 debut album Everybody's Entitled to Their Own Opinion.
