Brian's Five Best Ever Compositions

[Awesoman]

"Occasional" being the key word there...

[hypehat]

Yeah, Brian was obviously writing a single, and I'm not trying to suggest H&V should have been anything but one. At the same time, he recorded about 25 minutes worth of music for a three minute single, and you could have had a side of Smile devoted to Heroes & Villains.

What I maybe should have mentioned is that Brian was trying to get lightning to strike again, as Good Vibrations (a flat out masterpiece) was constructed in a similar fashion. But H&V just went skyward with the ideas, writing, instrumentation, and basic logic of songwriting. Upthread I talk about how Good Vibrations is insane, but for the most part it still follows a verse/chorus/verse/chorus/bridge trad pop thing. 
The Cantina Version has Verse/Verse(Wordless acapella)/Different Verse/Bridge/Reprise of 1st Verse/Noise/Fade. In an experiment, he stops the verse stone dead with the Bridge To Indians. In the demo, he has two separate songs in there, abruptly changing into completely different keys and tempos (and animal noises).

Maybe I'm approaching this all wrong, and the sheer wealth of material recorded for Heroes & Villains betrays the lack of a master plan or grand compositional vision rather than it's presence. Then, at the same time, you wonder what the hell Dada is doing in there, or Vege-tables...

[jimmy1949]

You were incorrect. But at least we're talking substantively rather than just listing things. Though if you want my top five reasons that lists are occasionally acceptable, I would be glad to provide it.

I will pass.

[Fall Breaks]

Hadn't it been for this thread we would not have had hypehat's lovely and informative breakdown of his favorite BW compositions, and my life would have been a little bit grayer.