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The Monkees were a rock and pop band, formed in Los Angeles in 1966, whose line-up consisted of the American actor/musicians Micky Dolenz, Michael Nesmith and Peter Tork alongside English actor/singer Davy Jones. Originally a fictional entity, the group was conceived in 1965 by television producers Bob Rafelson and Bert Schneider for the situation comedy series of the same name. Music credited to the band was released on LP, as well as being included in the show, which aired from 1966 to 1968.
For two albums, the Monkees mostly performed as a group, but within a year, each member was pursuing his own interests under the Monkees name. By the end of 1968, they were once again a group in name only, the show had been canceled, and their motion picture, Head, had flopped. Tork left the band soon after, followed by Nesmith a year later, and the Monkees officially broke up in 1970. A revival of interest in the television show came in 1986, leading to a series of official reunion tours, a television special, and four new full-length records, spanning the next 35 years (though these rarely comprised all four members performing together). With Jones' death in 2012 and Tork's in 2019, Dolenz and Nesmith were left to embark on a farewell tour in 2021, finishing shortly before Nesmith's death at the end of the year.
Spurred by the success of the show, the Monkees were one of the most successful bands of the 1960s. The band sold more than 75 million records worldwide[6][7] making them one of the biggest-selling groups of all time with international hits, including "Last Train to Clarksville", "I'm a Believer", "Pleasant Valley Sunday", and "Daydream Believer", and four chart-topping albums. Newspapers and magazines falsely reported that the Monkees outsold the Beatles and the Rolling Stones combined in 1967,[8][9] a claim that originated from Nesmith in a 1977 interview.[10]