Imagining Mike, Al and Bruce on BWPS

[Jim V.]

For some reason before I fell asleep last night, I was thinking about how it would have sounded if they were on BWPS. Not how the group would have sounded like in 1966 and 1967. We can easily imagine that. But this different. The Beach Boys in 2004 doing SMiLE. I even imagined what leads they would sing.

I could imagine Mike on "Child Is Father Of The Man" singing the verse parts of each, in his soft "Kokomo" style voice that he usually uses these days. Plug him in singing "easy my child...." and whatnot, and I see it fit that vibe perfectly. Not that I'd prefer that, but I could see it.

I think on "I'm In Great Shape/I Wanna Be Around/Workshop" you would have "Fresh clean air around my head" by Bruce, "morning tumble out of bed" by Mike, and the last lead by Brian, just like the BWPS version.

Then I think Al could really work with "On A Holiday" on the verse. The rap, I don't know. Let whoever it was keep it.

I also thinks Al's "aw-schucks" delivery could really work on "In Blue Hawaii", both on the beginning "chant", and on the regular body of the song.

And of course, everybody would have the same leads they were originally assigned, so Al would get "Vega-Tables" and Mike would get, well, nothing, besides these.  And Brian would take over "You Are My Sunshine", "Cabin Essence", "Wind Chimes", and "Good Vibrations".

And yes, I know this is a ridiculous thread. But I think the presence of the other current Beach Boys members on BWPS would have been interesting, and if it had been released as a Beach Boys album in 2004, albeit a re-recorded one, I wonder if The SMiLE Sessions still woulda happened.

Lastly, one has to wonder what leads Mike would have sang on SMiLE , because, if one listens to The SMiLE Sessions, his only real standout parts are at the end of "Cabin Essence" and the chorus of "Good Vibrations". Maybe that is why he wasn't so excited about the album. If we go by the 12-track rule, what would Mike have sung? Most likely not "I'm In Great Shape". That sounded just too perfect for Brian's range back then. Maybe the verse of "Child Is Father Of The Man"? Maybe a verse of "Worms"? I could see him doing the "Barnyard" lead, but who even knows if that was even still in contention by 1967.

[PongHit]

Well, maybe something like that will happen for the 50th — like, one or 2 songs, live.

[runnersdialzero]

Penis fencing.

[Emdeeh]

"Good Vibrations" would have used the real lyrics instead of the placeholder ones.

[Jim V.]

It really, really should've been this way. I'm sure it was considered at one point, but likely shot down by a certain person who I shall refer to as "Welinda Milson".

You really think they maybe considered it at one point? Hmm. I don't know. I really don't consider myself a Brianista but I gotta say, maybe it was good that he conquered this one away from The Beach Boys, with the assistance of Van Dyke and Darian. For some reason, even in 2003-2004, I couldn't see the presence of Mike Love being something that would help Brian emotionally.

What I do wonder is if Brian and co. ever considered going back to the original tapes for when they decided to make BWPS. I guess that was the intention during the Landy years. They were apparently really going to have Brian and whoever else sing over the tracks from the '60s. How odd that woulda been, hearing the Brian of 1988/1989 doing the verse of "Do You Like Worms" and then reverting to his '60s voice for "wa-ha-la-lu-lay". I wonder if there was any way they really could have made it work, even this year for The SMiLE Sessions. I don't think they could have done any solo leads convincingly to sit along their 1966-1971 work, but I think they possibly could have done a group vocal for "Worms", and maybe something for "Look" and "Child Is Father Of The Man". But they didn't. And uh....yep.

[Ron]

On "That Lucky Old Sun"... Brian had Carole King punch in and sing "Good Kind of Love".

Soooooo, have Mark Linett take the tapes, have Mike, Al, and Bruce punch in a few places on a few songs and put them up for download on Itunes.  Voila.  I think it would be great to hear. 


IN MY OPINION, and this is only my opinion although others are welcome to agree or disagree.... in my opinion, one of the real great things about the Beach Boys sound was that it was so natural, nobody had any training, and there were mistakes all over all the tapes.  So Mike would sing a bum note here and there, Brian would sing a bum note here and there, the guys would start slightly early, they'd be talking in the background, etc.  the stuff was just sloppy enough to make it sound authentic.  The harmonies were arranged by Brian, but he didn't have any training so he had no notions of what things should and shouldn't sound like, he just went with his instinct and it sounded amazing.

With Brian's new band, they've all got fantastic voices, and they all sound like they record those fantastic voices in a hospital it's so sterile.  Nothing is off note (except Brian), nothing has any grit in it.  Nobody in the band seems capable of anything but perfectly wispy vocals that sound angelic and all, but don't sound real. 

It's so bad, that my favorite part of most of Brian's new music, is ALWAYS when you can hear him sticking out of the harmony slightly off key, or slightly early or late, etc.  Midnight's Another Day was a perfect example.  Listen to the backing vox.  Everything's perfect, and Brian's the only one that sounds like he has an ounce of passion about what they're singing.  He sticks out like a sore thumb, in a good way.

Sprinkle the untrained, old, past their prime Beach Boys on one of his compositions and you may get something magical. 

[roll plymouth rock]

I heard there's a Mike Al and Bruce Reimagines BWPS coming out just as soon as ppl are ready to buy more smile music

[cablegeddon]

Al Jardine on H&V
Mike Love on Wonderful

[runnersdialzero]

Penis fencing.

You really think they maybe considered it at one point? Hmm. I don't know.

How seriously it was considered, it's impossible to say, but I'm sure at some point someone running the show behind the album/behind Brian brought it up, however briefly.

[Wirestone]

It really, really should've been this way. I'm sure it was considered at one point, but likely shot down by a certain person who I shall refer to as "Welinda Milson".

That is a truly addled scenario. No one, and I repeat, no one in Brian's circle at the time would have suggested this. It was sequenced as a concert performance for BW and his band. It was recorded in the same way, with a few tweaks.

[MBE]

I would have liked it better, but with no Carl and Dennis and the vocal changes since their youth it still wouldn't be what the Smile Sessions box is to me.

[Tristero]

It really, really should've been this way. I'm sure it was considered at one point, but likely shot down by a certain person who I shall refer to as "Welinda Milson".

That is a truly addled scenario. No one, and I repeat, no one in Brian's circle at the time would have suggested this. It was sequenced as a concert performance for BW and his band. It was recorded in the same way, with a few tweaks.

Given the exceedingly complicated interpersonal dynamics involved with all of this, I think it would have been a disaster to invite Mike and the Boys in for BWPS in 2003.  It was difficult enough for Brian to come to grips with all of this--I can't imagine that it was seriously considered at all and if it was, 'Welinda' was correct.  Having a positive, supportive band behind him (whatever their shortcomings) must have made it easier for him. 

That said, I would certainly welcome hearing the Boys have another crack at this material now, if they were up for it.  I'd particularly like to hear them try some of the less finished songs like Worms, Child and Dada.  It's just a shame that Carl and Dennis aren't around for this.

[runnersdialzero]

It really, really should've been this way. I'm sure it was considered at one point, but likely shot down by a certain person who I shall refer to as "Welinda Milson".

That is a truly addled scenario. No one, and I repeat, no one in Brian's circle at the time would have suggested this. It was sequenced as a concert performance for BW and his band. It was recorded in the same way, with a few tweaks.

I'M TIRED OF YOUR ANALYTICAL SHIT AND I WANT YOU TO START LIVING YOUR LIFE AS A WOMAN. I'm saying it could've went as far as them recording, and John Joeogjwe saying, "Hay, wat if we had Mike, Bruce and Al do backup vocals?" and someone else said, "No." I'm not saying there were secret beach boyz meetingz and plans and schemes.

<3 <3 <3

[Tristero]

Why would Brian suddenly want to rejoin with the group that he's claimed didn't get this difficult project in the first place, a group that he's still apparently reluctant to get back together with?  It sounds like you cooked up an unrealistic, unworkable scenario and then laid the blame at Melinda's feet.  Sure, it would be nice to hear the Boys singing this stuff, but that wasn't in the cards in 2003.

[hypehat]

To be honest, I do blame Melinda for most things. The cover on ITKOD. Brian's ambivalent stance to touring. The world debt crisis. The fact I'm out of cigarettes. She's why I can't find a copy of T.S Eliots 'Elizabethan Essays' online. And so on.

[Andrew G. Doe]

How seriously it was considered, it's impossible to say, but I'm sure at some point someone running the show behind the album/behind Brian brought it up, however briefly.

Nope. Topic was never even considered, much less raised.

[Dr. Tim]

OK people - step away from the Prozac.

I know this whole thread is fun speculation but, as Graham Chapman would say, it's gone silly.

Aside from AGD being right (of course), remember Peter Carlin reached the same conclusion in Catch A Wave: there was no way Brian would have approached the task if he'd had to get the others' approval.  He could only do it when enough time had gone by, and he had seen the response to the Smile music his band did, and others did at the tribute concert.  (With no former cohorts claiming veto power).  Brian himself has endorsed this narrative in his TSS essay.

Since Mike tells us he didn't like the words, if approached in advance he might have wanted to force changes, and that would have killed the project.  In my own Prozac moment, I wonder why Mike, who thought BWPS was a BB project stolen by Brian,  didn't try to stop the finished Smile before the first 2004 show, or immediately after it premiered, if he was really serious about it.

And speaking of wise-cracks about "Welinda", is it just me or has Brian conveniently credited/blamed his wife for every move he has made since the Nineties (including the touring, as well as BWPS and TSS)?  Like maybe all those ideas were really his but he prefers to tell the tale he was only following orders?  When we know that if he really doesn't want to do something he won't?  Passive-aggressive much?  Maybe I've been buying into Cam's "Brian is a manipulative super-genius" theory too readily.  Time for another ribeye steak with a side of Prozac.

[runnersdialzero]

How seriously it was considered, it's impossible to say, but I'm sure at some point someone running the show behind the album/behind Brian brought it up, however briefly.

Nope. Topic was never even considered, much less raised.

FINE!

Also, check yer e-mail later

[runnersdialzero]

And speaking of wise-cracks about "Welinda", is it just me or has Brian conveniently credited/blamed his wife for every move he has made since the Nineties (including the touring, as well as BWPS and TSS)?  Like maybe all those ideas were really his but he prefers to tell the tale he was only following orders?  When we know that if he really doesn't want to do something he won't?  Passive-aggressive much?  Maybe I've been buying into Cam's "Brian is a manipulative super-genius" theory too readily.  Time for another ribeye steak with a side of Prozac.

Eh, the truth on several issues is likely somewhere in between, with a few here and there likely being all Brian or being all the folks who run his career. Also, I wasn't necessarily saying Brian wanted them in on the project - I very much doubt that. Also, the "Welinda" thing was very much meant to be a joke.

[Jim McShane]

On "That Lucky Old Sun"... Brian had Carole King punch in and sing "Good Kind of Love".

The voice on the CD is Taylor Mills. The Carole King vocal version was a Best Buy bonus track.

Soooooo, have Mark Linett take the tapes, have Mike, Al, and Bruce punch in a few places on a few songs and put them up for download on Itunes.  Voila.  I think it would be great to hear.  

IN MY OPINION, and this is only my opinion although others are welcome to agree or disagree.... in my opinion, one of the real great things about the Beach Boys sound was that it was so natural, nobody had any training, and there were mistakes all over all the tapes.  So Mike would sing a bum note here and there, Brian would sing a bum note here and there, the guys would start slightly early, they'd be talking in the background, etc.  the stuff was just sloppy enough to make it sound authentic.  The harmonies were arranged by Brian, but he didn't have any training so he had no notions of what things should and shouldn't sound like, he just went with his instinct and it sounded amazing.

With Brian's new band, they've all got fantastic voices, and they all sound like they record those fantastic voices in a hospital it's so sterile.  Nothing is off note (except Brian), nothing has any grit in it.  Nobody in the band seems capable of anything but perfectly wispy vocals that sound angelic and all, but don't sound real.  

It's so bad, that my favorite part of most of Brian's new music, is ALWAYS when you can hear him sticking out of the harmony slightly off key, or slightly early or late, etc.  Midnight's Another Day was a perfect example.  Listen to the backing vox.  Everything's perfect, and Brian's the only one that sounds like he has an ounce of passion about what they're singing.  He sticks out like a sore thumb, in a good way.

Sprinkle the untrained, old, past their prime Beach Boys on one of his compositions and you may get something magical.

It is your opinion and you are indeed entitled to it, but...

I just don't know how anyone who saw a live performance or viewed Phil Solomon's videos of the rehearsals for the DVD of BWPS could think that. Check the videos - look at the faces of the band members when they finish Surf's Up. Watch Nelson Bragg; look at Taylor as Brian starts the "Easy My Child" passage, watch her face as she sings her part; and so on. These people are INTO it - BIG time. You don't suppose Darian had tears in his eyes after the premier in London because he didn't care? Read Phil's notes about what he heard - with no sweetening, touching up, etc.

After hearing and seeing this band perform BWPS (and Pet Sounds a few years before that), I can't fathom how you can mistake great performances with lack of emotion. Those were magical indeed! Do you really think Brian WANTED them to blow a few notes just for some "grit"?

BTW, if you haven't seen Phil's videos look here: http://vimeo.com/user2817877/videos/sort:date

My opinion? I don't think ANY band - including the BBs - could have performed BWPS live like Brian's band did. If you'd have had Brian's present band in the studio with the 20-something Brian back in the 60's - well, I think that would have been magic for sure.

That's my opinion anyway.

[Ron]

Well we're all entitled to ours.

What's your point about the Carole King thing?  I was simply illustrating that it's very easy to take a finished track and have somebody else do a vocal on it.  Like Brian did with Carole King, he added her in place of Taylor for the Best Buy track (which is the one I have).  My point is, Mark could easily scrub a couple vocals and add some elderly gentlemen in it's place as a bonus song or something. 

I'm sure everybody in the band is into performing BWPS, in the perfectly wimpy way in which they get into things.  These are all soft, kind, gentle, beautiful people, i.e. the exact opposite of what the Beach Boys were.  The difference between Brian's band and the way they sing and the way the Beach Boys sang, is one is Adult Contemporary, and one is Rock & Roll. 

There's nothing wrong with adult contemporary.  I love Kenny G as much as the next guy.  There's nothing wrong with anybody's voice in Brian's band.  If you read my post you quoted, I said they sound perfect and angellic.  The Beach Boys, however, sounded much better.  They had grit.  They had passion.  They had a natural organic sound that Brian's band does a very good job of imitating, but they still don't pull it off because nobody can. 

All I'm saying is the album would have been better with Mike/Al/Bruce here and there.  If Mike would have sung the famous cornfield line, it would have sounded better.   If Al sang the beginning of "I'm in Great Shape"... the album would have sounded better.  That doesn't slight Brian's band, they're perfect in their wimpy angellic way. 

[Tristero]

   Any more back handed 'compliments' you'd like to offer?  I mean, c'mon, Kenny G.?  How 'gritty' have the more recent Beach Boys offerings been?

[Mr. Cohen]

I agree with Ron. The lives of all the BBs - except maybe Al, whose greatest setback was a failed career in dentistry - were SO messed up. Dennis and Brian had obvious problems. Carl had to live with their personalities, along with whatever craziness Murry added to the equation. Mike went through five billion divorces and seems to suffer from a serious inferiority complex. Bruce has had to live with that extra fat on his thighs, but he's learned to accept that, even to the point of regularly wearing short shorts on stage and at the beach.

But, somehow, you don't get the sense that Brian's current band has dealt with that same level of hardship. Weight gain/loss, receding hairlines, finding enough cool paisley shirts, and bad relationships -  that seems about the extent of their personal difficulties. They can't bring the same pathos to Brian's harmonies that the original group could, and they also lack the clockiness (lol, the filter insists on spelling it with an L!) that producing tons of hit records can give you.  They're humble, inoffensive people.

Maybe if Jeff Foskett had sang on a couple of #1 hit records, taken acid, and gotten screamed at by Murry, he'd bring some pain and sorrow to his falsettos. Instead, you get the sense that the ridiculously unbridled joy he expresses in his falsetto is that same joy he experiences when polishing off another cup of chocolate pudding. Just another ho-hum delight in the workaday world.

No way, man. The Beach Boys lived the music. These guys treat it like a really cool day job. f*ck that.

[Tristero]

   Well played, sir.

[hypehat]

Well we're all entitled to ours.

What's your point about the Carole King thing?  I was simply illustrating that it's very easy to take a finished track and have somebody else do a vocal on it.  Like Brian did with Carole King, he added her in place of Taylor for the Best Buy track (which is the one I have).  My point is, Mark could easily scrub a couple vocals and add some elderly gentlemen in it's place as a bonus song or something. 

I'm sure everybody in the band is into performing BWPS, in the perfectly wimpy way in which they get into things.  These are all soft, kind, gentle, beautiful people, i.e. the exact opposite of what the Beach Boys were.  The difference between Brian's band and the way they sing and the way the Beach Boys sang, is one is Adult Contemporary, and one is Rock & Roll. 

There's nothing wrong with adult contemporary.  I love Kenny G as much as the next guy.  There's nothing wrong with anybody's voice in Brian's band.  If you read my post you quoted, I said they sound perfect and angellic.  The Beach Boys, however, sounded much better.  They had grit.  They had passion.  They had a natural organic sound that Brian's band does a very good job of imitating, but they still don't pull it off because nobody can. 

All I'm saying is the album would have been better with Mike/Al/Bruce here and there.  If Mike would have sung the famous cornfield line, it would have sounded better.   If Al sang the beginning of "I'm in Great Shape"... the album would have sounded better.  That doesn't slight Brian's band, they're perfect in their wimpy angellic way. 

Way to be an arsehole about it.

Your essential problem is, they are not the Beach Boys. How long did you take to think that up? Do you want a f*cking medal?


Or, Dada nails it