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TL;DR:
- Peter Tork wrote material for The Monkees’ “Last Train to Clarksville.”
- He was surprised when he was not allowed to play on the song.
- “Last Train to Clarksville” was not as popular in the United Kingdom as it was in the United States.
One of the writers of The Monkees‘ “Last Train to Clarksville” revealed the song is about a soldier. Peter Tork wrote new material for the song. Subsequently, he was “mortified” when he couldn’t play on the track.
A songwriter loved a lyric from The Monkees’ ‘Last Train to Clarksville’
Tommy Boyce and Bobby Hart wrote The Monkees’ “Last Train to Clarksville” under the name Boyce & Hart. In his 2015 book Psychedelic Bubble Gum: Boyce & Hart, The Monkees, and Turning Mayhem Into Miracles, Hart discussed the creation of the song. “We fashioned a storyline about a soldier heading off to face combat and an uncertain future,” he wrote. “Frantically, he was trying to arrange train transportation for a rendezvous to see the girl he loved for what could very well be the last time.
“That night, we came up with one of my favorite lines from all the songs I’ve co-written: ‘We’ll have time for coffee-flavored kisses and a bit of conversation,’” he added. “The next morning, we called the musicians and booked the studio.”
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Peter Tork was surprised by The Monkees’ modus operandi
During a 2016 interview with CBS News, Tork said he didn’t initially understand why other musicians were in the studio. “I thought they wanted me to play for them,” Tork said. “No, I was mistaken.”
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Tork was asked about not being allowed to play on one of the group’s songs. “I was mortified,” he recalled. “They were doing ‘Clarksville,’ and I wrote a counterpoint — I had studied music. And I brought it to them, and they said, ‘No, no, Peter, you don’t understand. This is the record. It’s all done. We don’t need you.’”
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How ‘Last Train to Clarksville’ performed on the charts in the United States and the United Kingdom
“Last Train to Clarksville” topped the Billboard Hot 100 for one week, staying on the chart for 15 weeks in total. The tune appeared on the album The Monkees, which was No. 1 on the Billboard 200 for 13 weeks. The album spent 102 on the chart altogether.
According to The Official Charts Company, “Last Train to Clarksville” reached No. 23 in the United Kingdom and lasted seven weeks on the chart. Meanwhile, the group’s self-titled album was No. 1 for seven of its 37 weeks on the chart, becoming the Prefab Four’s most popular album in the U.K.
“Last Train to Clarksville” was an international hit even if Tork did not get to play on it.
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