Artist: Tommy Boyce & Bobby Hart
Album: Test Patterns
Appears On (Mixes): The Boys And Girls Are Lifting Up Their Plates
Song Notes: I'm a huge fan of Boyce & Hart; I think everyone pretty much knows that. "I Wonder What She's Doing Tonite" is one of the greatest pop singles ever recorded, and they've written loads of other great ones like "(I'm Not Your) Steppin' Stone" by the Monkees. Unfortunately, none of their stuff is in print anymore in the US, but this weekend, I found a copy of a UK best-of, compiling a bunch of their singles and album tracks. This is an album track from their first record Test Patterns. Boyce & Hart had an interesting career; they started as in-demand writers, had had a lot of Top 10 hits -- "Come A Little Bit Closer" was one of theirs (by Jay & The Americans, later by Johnny Lee and Janie Fricke), as was "Last Train To Clarksville" and the theme to Days Of Our Lives. After a while, they broke out and started performing their own songs, and had a string of minor hits, but broke through with "I Wonder What She's Doing Tonite". To help promote themselves they appeared on Bewitched, although that probably did more to damage their credibility than sell records. They never reached the same level of success, and after the third record, broke up and parted ways. In the 1970s, they reunited for Dolenz, Jones, Boyce & Hart, featuring two of the Monkees, but that was just for a one-off album and tour. In the late 1970s, Bobby Hart released a solo record with Warner Brothers, but they never worked together again, and in 1994, after battling depression (though not over his career—he was successful as a producer, songwriter, and had lined up a DJ gig and was working on a book at the time), Tommy Boyce killed himself. If you can find the CD, I really recommend it—pretty much everything they wrote was gold; just some really magnificent songwriting, and this is one of my favorites. - Rev. Syung Myung Me
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