Still I Dream Of It..

[smilethebeachboysloveyou]

I've always loved this song, and I've honestly wondered whether it wouldn't have had reasonable commercial potential.  I'm not an expert on what makes a hit, but I've always thought that even though Adult/Child certainly contained its share of quirky songs, it would have been a much more commercial album than Love You because of this song, "It's Over Now," and maybe "It's Trying to Say" and because of the big-band style production without being a transparent sell-out.  It's a shame, as M.I.U. is much worse and didn't sell particularly well anyway.

Thanks for posting the lyrics; I don't think they're bad at all, but I do share in the puzzlement as to why Usher or anyone else decided it was a good idea to write new lyrics in the first place.

[37!ws]

I know there's an explanation in The Wilson Project (not able to access my copy right now), but off the top of my head I think he thought the lyrics were too colloquial. He didn't like the mention of supper or the maid, I recall...

[punkinhead]

I don't mind those lyrics, wasn't any worse than any of the lyrics released on any other Gary Usher/BW releases (ie Heavenly Bodies, Black Widow, Walkin the line, Just say no, Christmas Time, etc).
As to why revise and rerecording this song and who's idea it could have been, I point at Landy. Landy wanted Brian to get back into the old days of writing, thus bringing Usher in and perhaps Landy remembered Brian writing SIDOT and not releasing it. I don't know, just a shot in the dark.

[Paulos]

I don't mind those lyrics, wasn't any worse than any of the lyrics released on any other Gary Usher/BW releases (ie Heavenly Bodies, Black Widow, Walkin the line, Just say no, Christmas Time, etc).
As to why revise and rerecording this song and who's idea it could have been, I point at Landy. Landy wanted Brian to get back into the old days of writing, thus bringing Usher in and perhaps Landy remembered Brian writing SIDOT and not releasing it. I don't know, just a shot in the dark.

It was Gary Ushers idea, he says so in The Wilson Project.

[punkinhead]

I don't mind those lyrics, wasn't any worse than any of the lyrics released on any other Gary Usher/BW releases (ie Heavenly Bodies, Black Widow, Walkin the line, Just say no, Christmas Time, etc).
As to why revise and rerecording this song and who's idea it could have been, I point at Landy. Landy wanted Brian to get back into the old days of writing, thus bringing Usher in and perhaps Landy remembered Brian writing SIDOT and not releasing it. I don't know, just a shot in the dark.

It was Gary Ushers idea, he says so in The Wilson Project.

Yeah, I think I read one of the posts after I posted that that says it was Usher's idea.

I will say The Wilson Project is one of the few BB books I've not read.

I say there's a rerelease of the book, what's the difference besides pricing drastically different?

[Myk Luhv]

I think "It's Over Now" is a better song, especially the second piano demo, though I suppose "Still I Dream Of It" is more obviously a Brian Wilson composition.

[doc smiley]

I also don't think those lyrics are that bad.. it was just a unnecessary rewrite as the original were decent and had that BW charm to them.

[punkinhead]

I also don't think those lyrics are that bad.. it was just a unnecessary rewrite as the original were decent and had that BW charm to them.

I agree.

The Usher lyrics are just really bland and un-Brian-y.

[37!ws]

I will say The Wilson Project is one of the few BB books I've not read.

I say there's a rerelease of the book, what's the difference besides pricing drastically different?

Dunno...except it has a lot of extra stuff the original didn't have, like photocopies of letters from Gary Usher (I remember one in particular in which he said working with Brian again was like 1963 all over again, except this time Landy is Murry) and sets of lyrics. I don't think those were in the original. Also, the book covers all ten tapes, which the original didn't, IIRC. Anyway, I've been wanting this book for years, and when I heard a few months ago that it was reissued earlier this year I hauled ass to amazon.com and ordered it. I found it to be one of the most interesting BB reads EVER; I couldn't put the book down. Didn't find it nearly as depressing as a lot of people make it out to be.

[HeyJude]

I will say The Wilson Project is one of the few BB books I've not read.

I say there's a rerelease of the book, what's the difference besides pricing drastically different?

Dunno...except it has a lot of extra stuff the original didn't have, like photocopies of letters from Gary Usher (I remember one in particular in which he said working with Brian again was like 1963 all over again, except this time Landy is Murry) and sets of lyrics. I don't think those were in the original. Also, the book covers all ten tapes, which the original didn't, IIRC. Anyway, I've been wanting this book for years, and when I heard a few months ago that it was reissued earlier this year I hauled ass to amazon.com and ordered it. I found it to be one of the most interesting BB reads EVER; I couldn't put the book down. Didn't find it nearly as depressing as a lot of people make it out to be.

I agree, I just got this book, and it's *intensely* interesting. I'm putting a review up on my blog shortly. One thing I didn't do was pull the Usher recordings out and listen them while I read the book. That is, I had heard them in years past but hadn't dug into them much in quite some time. I wasn't until after I read the book that I listened to what circulates of those demos with Usher. While Usher is a truly sympathetic character in the book, the actual songs and demo recordings are the only things that don't reflect super well on Usher. Like the "Still I Dream of It" lyrics, a lot of the songs are pretty bland. Usher clearly was trying to make a "1986 hit." Brian at that stage may have been completely oblivious to what a hit would sound like in 1986, but it seems like Usher was completely obvlivious to how the opposite of "timeless" anything they were cutting was. "Heavenly Bodies" sounds like a bad 80's movie theme, with cheesy 80's saxophone. "The Spirit of Rock and Roll" and "Let's Go to Heaven In My Car" probably actually are the strongest things that came out of those sessions, and even those tracks are kind of 80's cheese. 

The one thing that also made me question the musical sensibilities was the summation near the end of the book of what the BW '88 album ended up being. I'm not sure how much of the analysis of the '88 album in the book is the opinion of McParland versus Usher, but I thought it was telling that most of the '88 album is kind of derided, with "Night Time" of all songs being held up as one of the few positive moments. They seem to suggest "Let It Shine" was a travesty in that it sounded more like Jeff Lynne than Brian. I would agree with that, but it's a good song, and stuff like "Heavenly Bodies" sounds even *less* like Brian.

[Nicko1234]

I agree, I just got this book, and it's *intensely* interesting. I'm putting a review up on my blog shortly. One thing I didn't do was pull the Usher recordings out and listen them while I read the book. That is, I had heard them in years past but hadn't dug into them much in quite some time. I wasn't until after I read the book that I listened to what circulates of those demos with Usher. While Usher is a truly sympathetic character in the book, the actual songs and demo recordings are the only things that don't reflect super well on Usher. Like the "Still I Dream of It" lyrics, a lot of the songs are pretty bland. Usher clearly was trying to make a "1986 hit." Brian at that stage may have been completely oblivious to what a hit would sound like in 1986, but it seems like Usher was completely obvlivious to how the opposite of "timeless" anything they were cutting was. "Heavenly Bodies" sounds like a bad 80's movie theme, with cheesy 80's saxophone. "The Spirit of Rock and Roll" and "Let's Go to Heaven In My Car" probably actually are the strongest things that came out of those sessions, and even those tracks are kind of 80's cheese. 

Yep, a bad 80s porno movie theme.