Published: May 24, 2008 11:18 pm         

Davy Jones thrills riverfront crowd

TERRE HAUTE — Baby boomers and their younger cousins were bouncing to their feet as Davy Jones showed Terre Haute he was still a believer Saturday night.

“The greatest tambourine player alive … the King Kong of the Monkees,” the announcer said into the microphone as Jones danced onto the stage in a Hawaiian shirt to a standing ovation.

“I know most of you thought I was dead,” Jones, 62, joked after finishing “I’m a Believer,” one of many hit songs performed by The Monkees on their television show between 1965 and 1970.

But even 38 years later, Jones had the women dancing in front of the stage — and a couple up with him — before long.

The outdoor theater was filled well before 9 p.m. at the Fairbanks Park Arts and Music festival, and the Terre Haute Parks and Recreation department chalked up a success as young and old cheered on the week’s national act to concert-perfect weather.

The Wabash River’s treeline shone bright green against a baby blue sky, just beginning to embarrass the white clouds pink when show time kicked off at 9 p.m.

“They don’t write songs like that anymore,” Jones noted after singing “She Hangs Out,” adding with a boyish grin, “thank God…She hangs out?”

Jones said the rest of his bandmates from The Monkees were back at the “old actors’ home” that night, but he’d pass on the audience’s regards.

“They’re actually much older than I am,” he said to laughter, claiming that the last time he saw Peter Tork he asked him if he knew who he was.

“Micky [Dolenz] said, ‘Ask the nurse, she’ll tell you’,” he said.

The sweet smell of fair food was strong enough to clog an Olympian’s arteries, but Jones still gave a jig to “It’s a little bit me, it’s a little bit you,” a song Neil Diamond wrote for their band, as he paid tribute to the songwriters of the 1960s and early ‘70s like Tommy Boyce and Bobby Hart.

The famously 5-foot-3-inch singer said he most recently toured in Japan, a place he liked because “in Japan, I’m buff.”

One audience member who said he “born in the ’80s” noted his parents listened to The Monkees when he was a kid and that he enjoyed the performance.

“It brings back the old classics,” he said.

Jones, a native of Manchester, England, complimented Terre Haute on being “very homey,” saying he likes small towns and family-oriented venues.

“This is for all you girls who kept those Monkees pictures up on your walls,” he said taking an acoustic guitar in hand and singing his pledge to “love you forever.”

And those girls, women and grandmothers now, clapped along in appreciation for a time when rock ’n’ roll was fun, glad that the last train to Clarksville stopped by Fairbanks Park on Saturday night.

Brian Boyce can be reached at (812) 231-4253 or brian.boyce@tribstar.com.