Probably just about every songwriter out there has dreamed of penning a hit song in mere minutes, but that kind of musical magic doesn't come along very often. And even when it does, there might be other challenges to face.
That's what John Phillips of the Mamas & The Papas discovered when he wrote the group's first and only #1 hit, the 1966 classic "Monday, Monday."
It was 1965 and the Mamas & The Papas were recording their debut album, If You Can Believe Your Eyes and Ears, with producer Lou Adler at Western Studios in Hollywood, per American Songwriter. John was being pressured by Adler and the other members of the band to write something with the same level of commercial appeal as "California Dreamin'" (released as a single earlier that year). As a result, he reportedly came up with "Monday, Monday" In just about 20 minutes.
In her autobiography California Dreamin’: The True Story of the Mamas and the Papas, John's ex-wife and bandmate Michelle Phillips opened up about how "Monday, Monday" came to be.
"John came out of [our friend’s] bathroom with his guitar strapped on as usual. ‘I wanna write a song that has absolute international appeal.’ Well, good luck, good luck to you, we said. ‘A theme that has something in it that everyone can relate to.’” Then, he sang one line for the group: Monday, Monday, can’t trust that day," she wrote.
Alas, the rest of the band didn't think the song had hit potential (or any potential). According to Michelle, she and Cass Elliot were the first ones to tell John they thought "Monday, Monday" was "so pretentious" and "just about the worst song we've ever heard."
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Adler convinced the group the song was worth recording, though Denny Doherty later recalled being relieved when they were done with the tune.
“I liked the opening background vocals, the ‘bah-da-da-da-da-dum,’” he told Matthew Greenwald, author of Go Where You Wanna Go: The Oral History of The Mamas & The Papas. “I thought that was cool. But nobody likes Monday, so I thought it was just a song about the working man. Nothing about it stood out to me. It was a dumb f—kin’ song about a day of the week. By the time the rehearsals were over for the vocals, I thought, ‘Thank god that’s over!’”
Of course, as it turned out, thousands of listeners disagreed with (most of) the Mamas & The Papas. "Monday, Monday" sold 160,000 copies on the first day of its release and shot to #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 — the only time the group ever went to the very top of the charts.
Related: 1975 Hit Was Written in Five Minutes and Shot Up the Charts Decades Later
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