My Top 2000 Songs #1185: (I'm Not Your) Steppin' Stone

It's always hard to pick a Monkees track for the list, as they had so many great ones. "(I'm Not Your) Steppin' Stone" was the flipside to 1966 single "I'm A Believer"--making for yet another all-time double-A-Side singles--with both appearing on their eponymous debut album, and it's a particularly durable track. Like a lot of their biggest hits, it's probably held back a bit by decades of classic rock (and tv rerun) saturation, and one I tend to delegate to the list of songs I associated with the band as a kid before I discovered the quality of their deeper-cut album tracks later in life. (Plus, it gets docked another point for being one of the early fake-tv-show-band tracks performed by session musicians with the guys just supplying vocals.)

But the Boyce & Hart-penned tune gets a boost as a gnarly garage band, almost proto-punk trailblazer (as later validated by the Sex Pistols and early hardcore band Minor Threat), from its killer riff to Micky Dolenz's fierce delivery. I think the chord progression alone (simple and memorable enough that my college band was capable of covering it) guarantees it some measure of rock & roll immortality.

Dolenz & Nesmith live:

Dolenz/Tork/Jones live on Jay Leno 2001:

Sex Pistols cover:

Minor Threat cover:

1990 Britpop-era cover by The Farm:

60s garage band version by The Flies:

Ditto, Paul Revere & The Raiders: