SMiLE Boots - How did they evolve, and how many are there?

[smile-holland]

Once again on the topic of the 3LP version, at the end of side 3, there is a DYLW segment with vocals I've never heard, sound very bad quality. Are they Beach boys, as they do sound questionable, and do they exist in better quality?

nope, that's a cover by Ant-Bee

[Freddie French-Pounce]

Once again on the topic of the 3LP version, at the end of side 3, there is a DYLW segment with vocals I've never heard, sound very bad quality. Are they Beach boys, as they do sound questionable, and do they exist in better quality?

nope, that's a cover by Ant-Bee

I see. I had heard of this but forgot about it! Why is the quality so bad them?

[smile-holland]

Once again on the topic of the 3LP version, at the end of side 3, there is a DYLW segment with vocals I've never heard, sound very bad quality. Are they Beach boys, as they do sound questionable, and do they exist in better quality?

nope, that's a cover by Ant-Bee

I see. I had heard of this but forgot about it! Why is the quality so bad them?

No clue, to be honest.

[Mikie]

This one's for AGD:
I don't have a bleg called SMiLE on the Chapter One label. IIRC (am not at home now) the cover features Brian sitting in a pool, holding up a Gold Disc Award. Is this one a copy of that Japanese ST2580 disc?

Since AGD is more than likely going over Carol Kaye's recent interview about the 'Smile Sessions' with a fine toothed comb, I will take the liberty to answer this question.

The CD "SMiLE"  (Chapter One - CO 25145) doesn't have anything out of the ordinary on it. The cover artwork replaces the familiar "The Beach Boys" with "Brian Wilson". It has the released "Cool, Cool Water" and "Can't Wait Too Long" on there (which really don't belong) in addition to versions of songs already legitimately released. The sound quality is mediocre at best.

[guitarfool2002]

This one's for AGD:
I don't have a bleg called SMiLE on the Chapter One label. IIRC (am not at home now) the cover features Brian sitting in a pool, holding up a Gold Disc Award. Is this one a copy of that Japanese ST2580 disc?

Since AGD is more than likely going over Carol Kaye's recent interview about the 'Smile Sessions' with a fine toothed comb, I will take the liberty to answer this question.

The CD "SMiLE"  (Chapter One - CO 25145) doesn't have anything out of the ordinary on it. The cover artwork replaces the familiar "The Beach Boys" with "Brian Wilson". It has the released "Cool, Cool Water" and "Can't Wait Too Long" on there (which really don't belong) in addition to versions of songs already legitimately released. The sound quality is mediocre at best.

I think the main reason "Can't Wait Too Long" was included on sets like this was because it was put on the "Preiss Tape" back in the 70's, surrounded by tracks which *did* belong on Smile, and CWTL just got lumped into that era. So whoever was making those early albums which were mostly based on the Preiss tape just included it, obviously it wasn't a part of Smile as we know.

[Andrew G. Doe]

Since AGD is more than likely going over Carol Kaye's recent interview about the 'Smile Sessions' with a fine toothed comb, I will take the liberty to answer this question.

Nope - not paying six bucks to have my blood pressure elevated to dangerous levels. When it's public domain, then I'll have a look.

[Mikie]

 

[Mikie]

This one's for AGD:
I don't have a bleg called SMiLE on the Chapter One label. IIRC (am not at home now) the cover features Brian sitting in a pool, holding up a Gold Disc Award. Is this one a copy of that Japanese ST2580 disc?

Since AGD is more than likely going over Carol Kaye's recent interview about the 'Smile Sessions' with a fine toothed comb, I will take the liberty to answer this question.

The CD "SMiLE"  (Chapter One - CO 25145) doesn't have anything out of the ordinary on it. The cover artwork replaces the familiar "The Beach Boys" with "Brian Wilson". It has the released "Cool, Cool Water" and "Can't Wait Too Long" on there (which really don't belong) in addition to versions of songs already legitimately released. The sound quality is mediocre at best.

I think the main reason "Can't Wait Too Long" was included on sets like this was because it was put on the "Preiss Tape" back in the 70's, surrounded by tracks which *did* belong on Smile, and CWTL just got lumped into that era. So whoever was making those early albums which were mostly based on the Preiss tape just included it, obviously it wasn't a part of Smile as we know.

Yeah, that and Cool. Cool Water and other already-released versions of songs. It all started with that early cassette tape.

[Jay]

I remember Belmo's Beatleg News and the 910. I still have an old "pamphlet" of Belmo's Beatleg News. It was badically about 5 or so pieces of paper stapled together, and the graphics were terrible, like they were printed from an ancient 1980's computer.  

Belmo's Beatleg News (67 issues) was available between 1987 and 2001. Most of those issues were between 8 and 12 pages long, sometimes up to 20, and came out usually 4-5 times a year. He complied them all in a book called "The Beatles - Not For Sale". Beatleg News was a VERY informative newsletter at the time and I use to look forward to every issue with the latest news.

Perhaps I was wrong about it being "Belmo's Beatleg News". I'll have to dig it out. Actually, I didn't subscribe to it, but I was sent a "teaser", I guess you'd call it. It might have been only a smal sample of what one might find in an issue. I remember there was a decent review of the unreleased "Can't Fight Lightning" Ringo Starr album.

[Mujan, 8@$+@Rc| of a Blue Wizard]

This one's for AGD:
I don't have a bleg called SMiLE on the Chapter One label. IIRC (am not at home now) the cover features Brian sitting in a pool, holding up a Gold Disc Award. Is this one a copy of that Japanese ST2580 disc?

Since AGD is more than likely going over Carol Kaye's recent interview about the 'Smile Sessions' with a fine toothed comb, I will take the liberty to answer this question.

The CD "SMiLE"  (Chapter One - CO 25145) doesn't have anything out of the ordinary on it. The cover artwork replaces the familiar "The Beach Boys" with "Brian Wilson". It has the released "Cool, Cool Water" and "Can't Wait Too Long" on there (which really don't belong) in addition to versions of songs already legitimately released. The sound quality is mediocre at best.

I think the main reason "Can't Wait Too Long" was included on sets like this was because it was put on the "Preiss Tape" back in the 70's, surrounded by tracks which *did* belong on Smile, and CWTL just got lumped into that era. So whoever was making those early albums which were mostly based on the Preiss tape just included it, obviously it wasn't a part of Smile as we know.

Yeah, that and Cool. Cool Water and other already-released versions of songs. It all started with that early cassette tape.

I suppose Little Red Book got its reputation as a SMiLE track in a similar manner?

When it comes to CCW though, I thought it was legitimately SMiLE? It evolved from the Water Chant and "Undersea Skits" on the Psychedelic Sounds sessions that were recorded at the same time. And if it turns out that Dada was really Air and not Water (or part of the Innocence Suite, and therefore not an element at all) then what could the water element be if not CCW?

[UK_Surf]

A whole lotta 'ifs' there. The whole 'suites' concept pre-supposes pre-existing and consistent categories. Certainly, Smile has themes, but distinctions between 'suite' and 'track' are by no means as clear cut as some Smile lore purveyors would have us believe. As the sessions progressed, the borders between suite/track and even themes, became increasingly unclear and porous. So bits of the barnyard theme might be reconstituted elsewhere, and the Americana bits yoinked from one track to another, or shared amongst several (see DYLW/Wonderful/H&V/CIFOTM).

For the elements, we know that, for a certain period of time, Part 1: Fire was Part 1: Fire. The chant demos certainly suggest 'sketchpads' and themes, but no more than that. Nothing definitively links Dada to the elements. But it works very nicely, as does Fall Breaks from SS. Again, there is nothing to suggest that anything other than Fire was recorded for The Elements. Therefore, everything else is speculation. Nothing wrong with that, and it's great to see how that puzzle has evolved in the hands of Smile fan mixers, but as an idea, it's very probable that this was just abandoned and unfinished.

[Mujan, 8@$+@Rc| of a Blue Wizard]

Yes, the elements are one of SMiLE's biggest mysteries.

I have never heard what Brian intended for Earth. I've heard fans argue that Vega-Tables is earth, that DYLW was supposed to bridge Americana and the Elements together and that Look was supposed to bridge Innocence with Elements, as a sort of earth instrumental. None of these ideas sounds definitive (because they almost certainly aren't). In every SMiLE related work I've ever read, there's always some speculation on what Air and Water were supposed to be, but Earth is always completely glossed over.

I've read that Brian's original intentions for Air were to be a "flighty" piano solo. The piano exit of Wind Chimes (which was omitted in TSS version) seems to fit that description, and with fans speculating that Wind Chimes itself was the air track, it kinda makes sense. You could also say Holidays is the air track (at least the second part anyway) but nothing really backs that up. Then Dada has recently been proposed as the Air track. It has woodwinds, which are an "airy" instrument, and its alternate title (Second Day) is an obscure reference to air just as "Mrs. O'Leary's Cow" is an obscure reference to fire.

I remember reading in the Catch a Wave biography that Brian's original idea for Water was to record different bodies of water like rivers flowing and waves breaking and edit it together into a type of track, or at the very least use it for inspiration. I've always thought Dada was water, and it seems to be the defacto water track in most fan mixes. But, assuming the "In Blue Hawaii" lyrics were written at the time, was it actually supposed to be part of Americana? Maybe it was the bride between those two suites? Then there's Cool, cool water, a song that while not recorded during the SMiLE sessions, it has its roots there. It's an entire song about water, so that makes sense as the water track. The only problem is it isn't an instrumental, but then neither are Vega-Tables and Wind Chimes and they're usually used as placeholders for Earth and Air so who knows.

Fire is Mrs. O'Leary's Cow. No argument there. But what I'm curious about is, if it turns out NONE of my suggestions were really elements, did Brian abandon the entire concept of an Element Suite after he got scared of Fire? Or was he just going to leave fire out of it? I know he rewrote fire as Fall Breaks for Smiley Smile, but if he was willing to do that why was no work done on any other element?

I really wish somebody, Brian or Van Dyke preferably, would just come forward and say "Yes, Dada was a working title that would've been changed to Second Day and stood as Air, the first element, which would lead into a Diamond Head type instrumental for Water, which would lead into Fire, then go into Look which would transition into the Innocence Suite" or something. Even just say "Fire was the only element worked on. We could never decide what to do for the others." I just want some kind of answer to this

[PaulTMA]

I'm calling the police.

[Mujan, 8@$+@Rc| of a Blue Wizard]

I'm calling the police.

You're under arrest!

[AllIWannaDo]

Just had a listen to Purple Chicks SMiLE,
really good job this - i do like the use of the link in pieces of music between the songs, really harmonious
this and the Fast Eddie are the 2 boots i always turn to outside of TSS

I'm going to try and do a mix of TSS & Purple Chick, but using the TSS track listing (not a literal mix but try a comulative approach but just using the best sounding tracks we now have since TSS Boxset)
Think i might have a go at singing the missing L.voc's too ha ha, yes i know it may go tits up but as it's for me i'll gamble

wish me look

[jeffcdo]

Good look.

[Freddie French-Pounce]

Good look.

 

[UK_Surf]

Yes, the elements are one of SMiLE's biggest mysteries.

I have never heard what Brian intended for Earth. I've heard fans argue that Vega-Tables is earth, that DYLW was supposed to bridge Americana and the Elements together and that Look was supposed to bridge Innocence with Elements, as a sort of earth instrumental. None of these ideas sounds definitive (because they almost certainly aren't). In every SMiLE related work I've ever read, there's always some speculation on what Air and Water were supposed to be, but Earth is always completely glossed over.

I've read that Brian's original intentions for Air were to be a "flighty" piano solo. The piano exit of Wind Chimes (which was omitted in TSS version) seems to fit that description, and with fans speculating that Wind Chimes itself was the air track, it kinda makes sense. You could also say Holidays is the air track (at least the second part anyway) but nothing really backs that up. Then Dada has recently been proposed as the Air track. It has woodwinds, which are an "airy" instrument, and its alternate title (Second Day) is an obscure reference to air just as "Mrs. O'Leary's Cow" is an obscure reference to fire.

I remember reading in the Catch a Wave biography that Brian's original idea for Water was to record different bodies of water like rivers flowing and waves breaking and edit it together into a type of track, or at the very least use it for inspiration. I've always thought Dada was water, and it seems to be the defacto water track in most fan mixes. But, assuming the "In Blue Hawaii" lyrics were written at the time, was it actually supposed to be part of Americana? Maybe it was the bride between those two suites? Then there's Cool, cool water, a song that while not recorded during the SMiLE sessions, it has its roots there. It's an entire song about water, so that makes sense as the water track. The only problem is it isn't an instrumental, but then neither are Vega-Tables and Wind Chimes and they're usually used as placeholders for Earth and Air so who knows.

Fire is Mrs. O'Leary's Cow. No argument there. But what I'm curious about is, if it turns out NONE of my suggestions were really elements, did Brian abandon the entire concept of an Element Suite after he got scared of Fire? Or was he just going to leave fire out of it? I know he rewrote fire as Fall Breaks for Smiley Smile, but if he was willing to do that why was no work done on any other element?

I really wish somebody, Brian or Van Dyke preferably, would just come forward and say "Yes, Dada was a working title that would've been changed to Second Day and stood as Air, the first element, which would lead into a Diamond Head type instrumental for Water, which would lead into Fire, then go into Look which would transition into the Innocence Suite" or something. Even just say "Fire was the only element worked on. We could never decide what to do for the others." I just want some kind of answer to this

The thing is, to most of those questions actually, there are no clear answers, there is simply no data available to suggest otherwise, and it's unlikely that any new data will turn up to alter that situation. The elements idea didn't really die, but lingered in a sort of amorphous afterlife, as many tracks with 'elemental' associations floated around until SU.  From the available evidence, it seems that the elements as a unified track, or even loosely existing suite, simply fizzled. Like most of Smile, there's no da vinci code conspiracy to unpack why that's the case (sadly, the only thing approaching those sorts of hijinx are the few reels stolen by bootleggers from the vaults). It's just plain ol' unfashionably boring entropy.

[onkster]

Back to topic, sort of:
How many live SMiLE boots are there?

I recall about 4 circulating in 2004, but have heard there have been a lot more. Which shows?

[Freddie French-Pounce]

Back to Vigotone Boot again. and now I'm onto the Good Vibrations track (on side 4 of the LP). The First one appears to have various single tracked vocals. Is there a complete version of this anywhere, with all the lines, or is that it, and most lines seem to be missng. The Second One is also a 'Fuzz Bass' version with a few bits of vocals from the 'original lyrics' version. Does this also exist with more vocals?

[Andrew G. Doe]

Back to topic, sort of:
How many live SMiLE boots are there?

I recall about 4 circulating in 2004, but have heard there have been a lot more. Which shows?

There are about 10 from the RFH gigs in 2004 alone. Bruce is renowned for expressing a public preference for the Bristol boot.

[Jason]

There's a boot of just about every gig Brian played in 2004. It was also the last year that boots of his gigs were rampant. The well started slowing in 2005.

[soniclovenoize]

Just had a listen to Purple Chicks SMiLE,
really good job this - i do like the use of the link in pieces of music between the songs, really harmonious
this and the Fast Eddie are the 2 boots i always turn to outside of TSS

I'm going to try and do a mix of TSS & Purple Chick, but using the TSS track listing (not a literal mix but try a comulative approach but just using the best sounding tracks we now have since TSS Boxset)
Think i might have a go at singing the missing L.voc's too ha ha, yes i know it may go tits up but as it's for me i'll gamble

wish me look

You mean, like this one?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x5sEhNRsSLE

[zaval80]

The first SMiLE CD boot I remember seeing/hearing was this one:

SMiLE - The Early Years - 02-CD-3317

Anybody else remember this?

http://www.bootlegzone.com/scan.php?scid=44043

http://www.bootlegzone.com/beatleg/discs/scans/02-cd3317-2foldinside.jpg

There was a spoken bit by Brian during one of the Good Vibrations tracks where he said something like "OK, so we have the two chorus's on the one take, now all we need is this little intermediate part" or SOMETHING like that. Does anybody know where that bit of dialog comes from?

That originated in the 1976 "Best Summers of Our Lives" radio special: comes from, oddly enough, a "GV" session.

The Smile CD you're referring to, Smile - The Early Years - 02-CD-3317, came out in the late 80's. Hear the clicks and pops on some of the tracks when you're playing it? Does the artwork look familiar? Notice that "Can't Wait Too Long" was included? Hear the songs on it that were legitimately released in better quality than the rest? That's because some of the tracks were sourced from one of the early vinyl releases. Sound quality ain't so good either. Good thing subsequent boots were much better!

The dialog from one of the Good Vibrations sessions, like AGD says, was first heard on a radio special in 1976. It can also be found on SOT 15 and other boots with the Good Vibrations sessions. Have to look and see, but seems to me it's on a legit release as well - I know some of that session dialog is somewhere.

"Really felt good, let's play it!    OK, we have two four tracks......."

I've stumbled upon the "Early Years" boot by chance - I've noticed that the 2nd edition of the "Brother" LP from 1985 has a variation of "Good Vibrations" not reported anywhere, and looked around for older bootlegs. The "Early Years" CD has the same variation, plus the material from the 1976 broadcast. The variation in question is something intermediate between the "Rarities" version and the 08-24-1966 Alternate Edit (TSS CD 5 Track 24) - it has more vocals than the former but less than the latter. This got me thinking.

Brad Elliott has reported in his book that the "Rarities" version was bootlegged first on the "Hawthorne Hot Shots" EP around 1977, and that the 1976 broadcast had additional vocals not on the official version, the only one widely available back then. And it looks like these additional vocals, which are on the 1976 broadcast as issued on the "Early Years" boot, can be edited onto the "Rarities" version - the result will be the said variation. So what it is, an outfake - or a genuine article? what do y'all think? is there another reason why this variation does not appear on more common CDs?

I'd like to learn also more about this 1976 broadcast, "Best Summer Of Our Lives". Brad Elliott says in his book that it had, among other things, one lengthy track, theremin-organ-drums interplay, of 3:05 duration. I've listened to my only source, "The Early Years" CD, and it is a sequence of tracks faded in and out, but of much shorter time. Evidently the bootleggers have edited out the voiceovers. Was there a fuller source on a bootleg or a tape?

BTW, this dialog ""OK, so we have the two chorus's on the one take, now all we need is this little intermediate part" or SOMETHING like that" - is not on SOT15 IMO, and some music tracks sound like they are mixed differently. Anyone knows, are there more surprises like this on old SMiLE bootlegs? I've investigated the common ones (Archaeology, SOT, Vigotone, Heroes & Vibrations) - it looks like all of them have something valuable, like unique mixes - also Pocket Symphony (this one looks more like a copy from other releases) and Deep Sea Treasures Vol. 1 (this one also has a variation, the Hawthorne version slightly cut).

[DanCiTi]

Yes, the elements are one of SMiLE's biggest mysteries.

I have never heard what Brian intended for Earth. I've heard fans argue that Vega-Tables is earth, that DYLW was supposed to bridge Americana and the Elements together and that Look was supposed to bridge Innocence with Elements, as a sort of earth instrumental. None of these ideas sounds definitive (because they almost certainly aren't). In every SMiLE related work I've ever read, there's always some speculation on what Air and Water were supposed to be, but Earth is always completely glossed over.

I've read that Brian's original intentions for Air were to be a "flighty" piano solo. The piano exit of Wind Chimes (which was omitted in TSS version) seems to fit that description, and with fans speculating that Wind Chimes itself was the air track, it kinda makes sense. You could also say Holidays is the air track (at least the second part anyway) but nothing really backs that up. Then Dada has recently been proposed as the Air track. It has woodwinds, which are an "airy" instrument, and its alternate title (Second Day) is an obscure reference to air just as "Mrs. O'Leary's Cow" is an obscure reference to fire.

I remember reading in the Catch a Wave biography that Brian's original idea for Water was to record different bodies of water like rivers flowing and waves breaking and edit it together into a type of track, or at the very least use it for inspiration. I've always thought Dada was water, and it seems to be the defacto water track in most fan mixes. But, assuming the "In Blue Hawaii" lyrics were written at the time, was it actually supposed to be part of Americana? Maybe it was the bride between those two suites? Then there's Cool, cool water, a song that while not recorded during the SMiLE sessions, it has its roots there. It's an entire song about water, so that makes sense as the water track. The only problem is it isn't an instrumental, but then neither are Vega-Tables and Wind Chimes and they're usually used as placeholders for Earth and Air so who knows.

Fire is Mrs. O'Leary's Cow. No argument there. But what I'm curious about is, if it turns out NONE of my suggestions were really elements, did Brian abandon the entire concept of an Element Suite after he got scared of Fire? Or was he just going to leave fire out of it? I know he rewrote fire as Fall Breaks for Smiley Smile, but if he was willing to do that why was no work done on any other element?

I really wish somebody, Brian or Van Dyke preferably, would just come forward and say "Yes, Dada was a working title that would've been changed to Second Day and stood as Air, the first element, which would lead into a Diamond Head type instrumental for Water, which would lead into Fire, then go into Look which would transition into the Innocence Suite" or something. Even just say "Fire was the only element worked on. We could never decide what to do for the others." I just want some kind of answer to this

The Elements thing has been getting to me lately too. Love to Say Dada/In Blue Hawaii is interesting - it works as Water but as well as a sort of coda for the album (going through 3 movements and ending with an "Our Prayer"-like vocal bit), and I just think the title "In Blue Hawaii" is a simple Elvis reference, just like the Plymouth Rock roll over lyric is a riff on a line from Cole Porter's "Anything Goes".
Air is strange, recently I heard this thing on YouTube (I cannot find any longer) where Mrs. O'Leary's Cow was Fire, Dada was Water, and this more ambient track was Air, and the video did not include Earth and I have not been able to track down this cool Air track used, but it sounded pretty authentic.
Oh yeah and "Look" always irked me as its place among all SMiLE songs seems weak, and how it would be as a bridging track or a piece of something else feels so up in the air (hah!). It doesn't feel totally right between Wonderful and CIFotM on TSS, because the whole "Cycle of Life" suite has a metaphorical growth going on in it, which is musically represented by the trumpet in Wonderful, Child Is..., and Surf's Up. In comparison to the other tracks which are so much more full (at least Wonderful and SU) it just seems like a bridge of something, almost like another "Three Blind Mice" situation (though I don't know much about the history of that track).