Brian Wilson

[Loz]

There's quite a big interview with Brian Wilson in Future Music this month. The guy is a musical genius, really getting into Smile, but he's a complete nutbar.

Poster Child for not doing a load of LSD and pot.

Completely and utterly insane.

[WON'T DO IT]

as in the beach boys? I thought he'd be dead by now...

[Lady E]

i didnt enjoy 'smile' at all. maybe needs another listen or 5...
i really love 'pet sounds' though.

[Loz]

listen to it loads, it's a big grower

I hated the majority of Pet Sounds for weeks before I finally 'got' it

[Lady E]

hmm. i liked pet sounds pretty much immediately.

i will listen again.

[Hagbard]

I've not heard the new Smile, not in a rush to hear it either..

But the original Bootleg 'Smiley Smile' is a great selection of tracks I think.

[content]

smile is fucking great. it is kind opf like a day in 1st grade. surf's up is a classic. one of my top 3 songs. you have to listen it all at once too. it is definitely not a singles album

smiley smile isn't a bootleg. it was the normal album he made after he scrapped smile. he used bits and pieces of it but isn't anywhere near smile. it works as a work in three parts. fuck singles

[gypsy_cream]

love "this old world"

[gypsy_cream]

or whatever its called

[thembuzz]

i only ever owned a bunch of beach boys greatest hits records. i've got a fuckload of them, though, and i still count the beach boys among my favouritest ever bands ever

[bitch one]

the documentary was excellent, really uplifting. anyone see it? was as much about overcoming mental health probs as about making music.

[V Knid esq]

Smile as it was re-recorded is not as great as it should be... best to download as many bootlegs as you can get and piece together your own version. There's a stunning rendition of Surf's Up solo with piano by Brian. I saw the first of the 'Smile' shows at the Royal Festival Hall last year - it was just unbelievably good.

[Hagbard]

Yeah the documentary was great, it was really edgy though.. he seemed so close to just flaking out.. I guess the way it was edited did emphasise that aspect though. Still, it felt like a great victory for him to walk out on stage, I'd have loved to go to those gigs.. but I'm not in any rush to hear the new album. Like Knid says, check the bootlegs.. I have a great version of the fire song somewhere (can't remember the real title).

[Boing!]

I wouldn't say he was a genius. Pet Sounds is an utterly remarkable LP, but his relative lack of output from the Smile sessions onwards for obvious reasons limits me from using that overused phrase.

[kams]

a bunch of people at Hippocamp.net are currently bastardising accapella's from pet sounds to remake the album.


I've got Wouldn't it be nice..
I'll post the link whens its finished.

[Loz]

God Only Knows is one of my favourite love songs ever.

[May Kasahara]

God Only Knows is a lovely song (as are many Beach Boys tunes) but I'm not on board with the Beach Boys cult of appreciation I'm afraid. They made excellent pop music, not in itself enough to make me especially interested in them over any other purveyor of excellent pop.

Still, you can never get enough sweet vocal harmony in life.

[V Knid esq]

No no NO! The arrangements and structure of the tracks on Smile are something else all together. Listen to a full 10-minute version of Good Vibrations, it's structured like a techno tune!

[Loz]

Pet Sounds and Smile are not pop records. Wouldn't It Be Nice is a fantastic pop song, but the rest, especially in the ways that they were written and structured, were years ahead of their time.

[cut out]

i don\t think they were years ahead of their time at all... just that they were more popular so more people copied it. and wilson was just trying to outdo the beatles anyway...

[V Knid esq]

Ahead of their time is not how I'd put it... though the influence on the lush production values of much 70s music is undeniable, I think that, say, the Beatles' White Album was much more important in that way. I would say that Wilson's songwriting and arrangements were more a culmination of a strain of 20th century songwriting that recognised the sophistication of innocent, naive or 'schmaltzy' (now we'd say 'cheesy') elements of music that had been sidelined in popular culture since the rise of rock'n'roll. It's almost exotica, dream music, like the fantastical exploitation film type soundtracks of Les Baxter and others. But like I say there is great sophistication to it and such subtlety to the melodies. Not for nothing did Leonard Bernstein call Brian Wilson one of the greatest composers of the 20th century.

[bitch one]

knid what is this 10 minute version of good vibrations? do you have it on slsk?

[V Knid esq]

Damn no I used to have it on a cassette booty of Smile... can't vouch for it being a full 10 min but it was long, with loads of big builds and drops.

[May Kasahara]

Originally posted by Loz
Pet Sounds and Smile are not pop records. Wouldn't It Be Nice is a fantastic pop song, but the rest, especially in the ways that they were written and structured, were years ahead of their time.

I can't speak for Smile as haven't heard it, but Pet Sounds is certainly a pop album, just a very sophisticated one. Nowt wrong with being pop, you know.

[Hagbard]

Originally posted by V Knid esq
Damn no I used to have it on a cassette booty of Smile... can't vouch for it being a full 10 min but it was long, with loads of big builds and drops.

That sounds like it might be the Good Vibrations outtakes that are on the extended version of Smiley Smile?

Where every so often you hear Brian say 'stop! stop!' and then give instructions and they all start playing again? It's cool, he so knew what he was doing.. the music was written in his head before he even got in the studio it seemed.

There's also an alternate longer version of Heroes and Villians.

[terminal viscosity]

Originally posted by gypsy_cream
love "this old world"


im a fan of "this ol'house"

canny whack shaky

[big raff]

i prefer green door