Do you prefer SMiLE as a 3 movements piece or as 12-14 tracks?

[Andrew G. Doe]

Yet, still, there were to be twelve tracks or chapters or movements, blended and blurred.  That's what I believe was the concept -- and so did Brian...

That's really all we know.  Or I know.

Not according to VDP when I asked him back in... oh, late 90s/early 00s. Granted time and inhaling can powerfully modify memory but he was most insistent, when I asked him about the possibility of it being a double album (as was current back then amongst the likes of us), that it was set to be a single album, 10/12 tracks individually banded with no links, crossfades or segues between them (yup, I know that flatly contradicts Brian saying there might be talking between the tracks - in Melody Maker, I think, early 1967 - and that illustrates nicely the problem of who to believe and when). Dilemma. 

[Phoenix]

It does seem like at least some of the tracks would have consisted of multiple sections that blurred the lines of traditional song structures. I don't know how else you explain a track being called I'm In Great Shape when all it is a snippet really. It's logical that the track would have been a combination of things (God only knows what).

It's pretty evident to me that it would have been exactly what it was "revealed" to have been: I'm In Great Shape/I Wanna Be Around/Workshop.  As I said earlier in this thread, it not only makes sense to me but also shows an example of the kind of humor Brian referenced in relation to the album back then.

[Micha]

Thought I'd post this in this thread since it seems to be where the Smile obsessives are posting recently. I've never heard this before. What do you think?

Good Vibrations Part C-

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/52684612/GV%20Part%20C.wav

I think it's a fan mix. Both parts that are blended are well known.

[SenorPotatoHead]

Yet, still, there were to be twelve tracks or chapters or movements, blended and blurred.  That's what I believe was the concept -- and so did Brian...

That's really all we know.  Or I know.

Not according to VDP when I asked him back in... oh, late 90s/early 00s. Granted time and inhaling can powerfully modify memory but he was most insistent, when I asked him about the possibility of it being a double album (as was current back then amongst the likes of us), that it was set to be a single album, 10/12 tracks individually banded with no links, crossfades or segues between them (yup, I know that flatly contradicts Brian saying there might be talking between the tracks - in Melody Maker, I think, early 1967 - and that illustrates nicely the problem of who to believe and when). Dilemma. 

I'm nearly positive though that the exact quote is, "somebody might say something between verses."   So he wasn't really indicating linked songs, but rather "funny" stuff within individual songs.   

[Cabinessenceking]

Thought I'd post this in this thread since it seems to be where the Smile obsessives are posting recently. I've never heard this before. What do you think?

Good Vibrations Part C-

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/52684612/GV%20Part%20C.wav

I think it's a fan mix. Both parts that are blended are well known.

sounds logical that there would be vocals on top of that section. I can't see it making sense otherwise. Cool find!

[Andrew G. Doe]

Yet, still, there were to be twelve tracks or chapters or movements, blended and blurred.  That's what I believe was the concept -- and so did Brian...

That's really all we know.  Or I know.

Not according to VDP when I asked him back in... oh, late 90s/early 00s. Granted time and inhaling can powerfully modify memory but he was most insistent, when I asked him about the possibility of it being a double album (as was current back then amongst the likes of us), that it was set to be a single album, 10/12 tracks individually banded with no links, crossfades or segues between them (yup, I know that flatly contradicts Brian saying there might be talking between the tracks - in Melody Maker, I think, early 1967 - and that illustrates nicely the problem of who to believe and when). Dilemma. 

I'm nearly positive though that the exact quote is, "somebody might say something between verses."   So he wasn't really indicating linked songs, but rather "funny" stuff within individual songs.   

That sounds better than my recall. "You're under arrest !", anyone ?

[soniclovenoize]

Clearly the only correct answer here is 12 separate 3-part movements

[Nile]

Clearly the only correct answer here is 12 separate 3-part movements

I think you´re right! 12 songs, each made of 3 movements!
This is getting to silly as would Graham Chapman say!

[ESQ Editor]

What we know, is they didn't know.  To me, that's one of the main reasons why Van Dyke left the project.

Mike Love did object to a lot of the content, but that conjecture was because it was incomplete.  Mike and the other guys participated on those sessions.  They got behind the project.  Then, the project unravelled.  Why?  It was too hard to figure out where to begin, segue, end, blend all the tracks together.  Brian and Van Dyke KNEW they had something special, but the idealism of their vividly imagined song cycle hit the wall.

Darian Sahanaja had to pour over those sessions with Brian, just to make sense of what should go where, just to get BWPS released.  That is what was needed back in 1967.  If Brian, Van Dyke, Mike Love and Chuck Britz had sat down together (after all the sessions…with the idea that there was an actual stopping point) they could have come up with something.  Unfortunately, Brian kept going, beyond the original (incomplete) vision.

I include Mike Love in this statement, because Mike was the most "dialed in" when it came to the group's stage persona.  His input during the sequencing process would have been great.  It would have also been great if Mike, and Van Dyke saw eye to eye, but they didn't.

The drugs helped during the creative part of the Smile album, but they hindered the project to the point of incompletion.

To this day, I am a Smile addict. 

[JK]

Brown Shoes Don't Make it is also one of the earliest examples of modular recordings (recorded in November 66'). There's also a parody of the Beach Boys in there!

Yep, "Little Deuce Coupe" (here starting at 4:52), followed briefly (in Zappa's doo-wop bass voice) by what seems to me to be not a million miles away from the riff in "Help Me Rhonda":

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EZLWD75KKGA

The "Help Me Rhonda" riff is also played on the bass under the "Little Deuce Coupe" chorus melody - and it works really well.

This is Zappa on "LDC" in The Real Frank Zappa Book (1990, p. 187). Quite an accolade!

"One of the most exciting things that ever happened in the world of 'white-person music' was when the Beach Boys used the progression V-II on 'Little Deuce Coupe.' An important step forward by going backward."

Curiously, Zappa himself introduces a IV into the chorus----to make it sound even cheaper, perhaps?

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

What we know, is they didn't know.  To me, that's one of the main reasons why Van Dyke left the project.

Mike Love did object to a lot of the content, but that conjecture was because it was incomplete.  Mike and the other guys participated on those sessions.  They got behind the project.  Then, the project unravelled.  Why?  It was too hard to figure out where to begin, segue, end, blend all the tracks together.  Brian and Van Dyke KNEW they had something special, but the idealism of their vividly imagined song cycle hit the wall.

Darian Sahanaja had to pour over those sessions with Brian, just to make sense of what should go where, just to get BWPS released.  That is what was needed back in 1967.  If Brian, Van Dyke, Mike Love and Chuck Britz had sat down together (after all the sessions…with the idea that there was an actual stopping point) they could have come up with something.  Unfortunately, Brian kept going, beyond the original (incomplete) vision.

I include Mike Love in this statement, because Mike was the most "dialed in" when it came to the group's stage persona.  His input during the sequencing process would have been great.  It would have also been great if Mike, and Van Dyke saw eye to eye, but they didn't.

The drugs helped during the creative part of the Smile album, but they hindered the project to the point of incompletion.

To this day, I am a Smile addict.  

Me too, man. And I'm not seeking rehab, either

I think you raise an interesting point here, and to build unto it, I think part of the "problem" is that Brian had become too powerful, too unquestionable, by this time. He could literally order the Boys to get on their hands and knees and squeal like pigs. And when they expressed resentment and humiliation over it, he could tell them to quit complaining, squat down, flap their arms and be chickens. And they did it, because it was Brian motherfuckin' Wilson commanding them to. And who is Al Jardin or Bruce Johnston to question the methods of the one man hit machine?

I'm slightly exaggerating, but I think Brian--much as he deserved it--maybe let the "genius" label go to his head. He needed someone to tell him "no" or focus his muse, or tell him "that's enough H&V segments. Let's record those CIFOTM vocals and the backing track for the second half of Surf's Up." Problem is, while he was too sensitive to confront him directly about it, I don't think he trusted Mike's creative judgment anymore. Or at least, he'd want a third opinion. And based on what I've heard on this forum recently about them not getting along particularly well, I think he had come to doubt Van Dyke as well. I think it's possible he set up the "fight" between him and Mike as a way to test him. To see if he really believed in his work enough to defend it to a "critic." To let the metaphorical battle of his muses play out physically.

Anyway, once VDP was gone there was no one else who had any concept of the initial idea. Of course, you could argue VDP never had a clue. You could argue Brian didn't either, but I give him more credit than that. I've come to believe there was at least some vague outline or general plan but it was lost come the new year. Without someone he respected (artistically) around to reign him in, Brian lost his way with obsessive tinkering and second guesses. Years later, it all worked itself out because Brian was not the same man anymore. He was humbled by age, experience, and suffering. He was no longer trying to prove himself, trying to make the best album ever, trying to test the creative instincts of the people around him. He was just trying to put together a kickass live show consisting of some old material. Different project with a different vibe, different goals and a different Brian.

On an unrelated note: I think it's really funny that Frank Zappa got brought up here. I actually just discovered We're Only In It For the Money right around the end of last summer. With all the spoken word bits and comedy skits and how everything is so disjointed yet inexplicably cohesive...I just kept thinking "This is what SMiLE was supposed to be. This erratic, beautiful, purposeful mess. Not a simple, banded pop album. Not a pretentious 3-Movement "symphony." Just an unapologetically bizarre, psychedelic freak-out." Something that goes against every established custom of what a pop album should be while still being recognizable as one. What Pet Sounds paved the way for. What Sgt Pepper pretended to be. That would've been quite something. Coming months before Zappa, and by the Beach Boys, such a release would've been absolutely mind blowing. I'd give anything to visit that alternate reality where this happened. I absolutely agree--Frank Zappa was the one man on Brian's level that could've help finish SMiLE. He was the collaborator Brian needed for this project--no offense to good old Van Dyke.

AND FURTHERMORE, SHAMELESS SELF PLUG AHOY... Not sure if this is appropriate, and right now it's unnecessary since i made a separate post that's currently on the front page. But anyway, I spent a great deal of time and energy in this thread describing my specific idea of what (I believe) SMiLE would have been. I just wanted anyone who stumbles here weeks/months/years from now to know that I got around to finishing it finally. The link to preview it on YouTube is the second one in my signature. From there, the link to download FLACs, MP3s, and detailed liner notes can be found in the video description. Just wanted people who read this thread later to be aware.

Here's the exact tracklist I went with. Psychedelic Sounds and unlisted tracks are in parentheses:
Side 1
(Basketball Sounds)
Good Vibrations
(Smog)
The Elements [Fire/Water Chant/Workshop/Breathing]
Wind Chimes
(Moaning Laughing)
Wonderful
(Ice Cream Man)
Child is Father of the Man
(George Fell)
Surf's Up

Side A
(Prayer)
Do You Dig Worms?
(Taxi Cabber)
I'm in Great Shape
(Beets and Carrots/Big Bag of Vegetables)
Vega-Tables
(Vegetable Fight)
Heroes and Villains
(Bob Gordon's Real Trip/Psychedelic Talk)
Cabin Essence
(Torture)
My Only Sunshine

It clocks in at 43 minutes, both sides are just about perfectly balanced in terms of time. Songs are from the Capitol list, but grouped in the same 2-suite structure as in Aquarian. I based the 1 & A labelling on a SMiLE Shop essay which suggested doing so to illustrate that the sides can go in either order. I think there's solid arguments for either Worms or Vibes being the first track, as well as Surf or Sunshine being the last. This way it can be either, but for the video and files I put Side 1 first just because every other mix has always put the Americana tracks first and we could all use a change.

[Cam Mott]

In the albums through Friends, the albums produced and reportedly or arguably fully under control of Brian, is there any discernible convention as to track order? For instance, I've seen it claimed that Brian followed a convention of putting the next single as the album A side lead with the current or past single as the B side lead. Is there any other detectable habit of some sort like that or fast/slow or based on keys or whatever?

[Lee Marshall]

My first time in here.  WAY too much to read in one sitting.  I'll just say I prefer Smile finally realized, finished and released.  37 years after the fact Brian was encouraged to wrap it up and tour it and he did so...successfully.  REALLY successfully.  That they then used the Brian presentation to wrap up the original version and get it out 7 years later...with all the 'extras' included for those who enjoy constructing jig-saw puzzles...was a gigantic surprise MOST here KNOW was NEVER GOING TO HAPPEN... ... ...EVER.

But it did.   Excellent.

[Bubba Ho-Tep]

Darian Sahanaja had to pour over those sessions with Brian, just to make sense of what should go where, just to get BWPS released.  That is what was needed back in 1967.  If Brian, Van Dyke, Mike Love and Chuck Britz had sat down together (after all the sessions…with the idea that there was an actual stopping point) they could have come up with something.  Unfortunately, Brian kept going, beyond the original (incomplete) vision.

All they really needed to do was tell him to consider what was in the can "done", add lead vocals where needed, and just give up trying to make "Heroes and Villains" better than "Good Vibrations". It was the "Heroes and Villains" black hole that sucked the rest of the album into it.

Since the box set came out and I rolled my own Smile sounds like this to me:

Prayer
H&V (cantina)
Wonderful
Holidays
Cabin Essence
The Elements: Fire
Child (2:50 acetate edit)

Good Vibes
Wind Chimes
Look
Vegetables
Worms
Surfs Up

No fly-ins (well, okay, I kept the BWPS tag on "Wind Chimes"), no cross-fades, no link tracks, no fan editing, no Barnyard, no Gee, no nonsense. If Brian went along with this lineup he wouldn't have had to scrap it. He had a solid 12 track album pretty much ready to go. Why did he keep tinkering and following false leads?