More of the Monkees output, since this album and their debut, "The Monkees", featured them limited to just vocals with scattered instrumental contributions. Kirshner had a strict rule that the Monkees were to provide only vocals on his productions, though separate sessions produced by Michael Nesmith himself usually featured Peter Tork on guitar. "More of the Monkees" has Nesmith limited to one song as lead vocalist. Within weeks of the release of "More of the Monkees", Nesmith lobbied successfully with the group's creators, Bob Rafelson and Bert Schneider, for the Monkees to be allowed to play their instruments on future records, effectively giving the
The Monkees it was the antithesis of "The Monkees" television show, intended to comprehensively demolish the group's carefully groomed public image. Rafelson and Nicholson's "Ditty Diego-War Chant" (recited at the start of the film by the group), ruthlessly parodies Boyce and Hart's "Monkees Theme". A sparse advertising campaign (with no mention of the Monkees) hurt any chances of the film doing well, and it played briefly in half-filled movie theaters. In the DVD commentary, Nesmith said that everyone associated with the Monkees "had gone crazy" by this time. They were each using the platform of the Monkees to push their own disparate