Lucky Old sun review thread!

[LostArt]

The original "TLOS" was featured very early in the piece. As for how it came to be what it is (which is very fine to these ears)... now is not the time. Later. It's an interesting tale.

Damn it, Andrew.  Sometimes you piss me off. 

[SloopJohnB]

I'll do a full review tomorrow, but I just wanted to add this:

In the first minutes of TLOS, you can hear (twice) a few bars from an unreleased song of the seventies called " Walkin' " - the lyrics are different, but the notes and tempo are exactly the same.  It seems like very few people have noticed that.

[SurfRiderHawaii]

Mahalo AGD!  Cool that Brian did, in-fact, play a bit of the original.

[Wirestone]

So, as far as I know, this hasn't been answered yet. Is "Goin' Home" in TLOS the Paley sessions tune?

[eden]

So, as far as I know, this hasn't been answered yet. Is "Goin' Home" in TLOS the Paley sessions tune?

Not sure, is 'Going Home' doing the rounds with a different title, it's not on Paley Sessions bleg?
Parts of it were also very similar to "Rollin' up to heaven", minus the filthy lyrics!

[Pretty Funky]

Screw the fans...From the Blueboard 

 
The great RFH merchandise rip-off...

(posted by John Etherington on September 12, 2007 at 4:01 am)

Message:

Take note everyone...the "Lucky Old Sun" programmes were £10 on Monday, then increased by fifty per cent to £15.00 last night. The explanation given by a guy on the stall was "we sold a lot yesterday, so we might run out"! Now the programmes are well-designed but flimsy in comparison to the excellent "Smile" and other recent tour programmes (all of which originally sold for about £10). This is pure exploitation of fans who have already spent a fortune on tickets for Brian's shows. Who's responsible for making this decision, I wonder?

Love & mercy (to everyone else) John E
 

[pixletwin]

Wow that kind of whineeness is worthy of a Star Wars fan. 

[brother john]

The original "TLOS" was featured very early in the piece. As for how it came to be what it is (which is very fine to these ears)... now is not the time. Later. It's an interesting tale.

Oooh! You're such a tease!

[brother john]

Screw the fans...From the Blueboard 

 
The great RFH merchandise rip-off...

(posted by John Etherington on September 12, 2007 at 4:01 am)

Message:

Take note everyone...the "Lucky Old Sun" programmes were £10 on Monday, then increased by fifty per cent to £15.00 last night. The explanation given by a guy on the stall was "we sold a lot yesterday, so we might run out"! Now the programmes are well-designed but flimsy in comparison to the excellent "Smile" and other recent tour programmes (all of which originally sold for about £10). This is pure exploitation of fans who have already spent a fortune on tickets for Brian's shows. Who's responsible for making this decision, I wonder?

Love & mercy (to everyone else) John E
 

Yeah, but they did have PROPERTY OF BRIAN WILSON bath robes at £50! Fab! I nearly bought one!

I looked at the programme and thought it was a crock of sh/t. I wouldn't pay £5 to be honest. It was pants (US trans: shorts) to say the least.

[Malc]

Yeah, but they did have PROPERTY OF BRIAN WILSON bath robes at £50! Fab! I nearly bought one!

Reduced to £40 last night ... guess these AREN'T shifting ! 

[absinthe_boy]

Lovely review from the Daily Telegraph

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml?xml=/arts/2007/09/12/bmwilson112.xml

Just to quote one paragraph...

Then came the new stuff. I was trepidatious about this bit, Wilson having written barely a half-decent tune in decades, but That Lucky Old Sun was proper music, beautifully arranged, lyrically a little gauche (the words were by band member Scott Bennett), but memorable, sweet, rich and touching.

[absinthe_boy]

From The Times (London)

http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/music/live_reviews/article2431906.ece

A quote from the review:

There was no getting around a communal sense of trepidation. No-one expects a new masterpiece from a 65 year-old Brian Wilson. Yet, first impressions of songs such as Going Home and Good Kind Of Love suggest he may have delivered one.

[absinthe_boy]

I'm sure there are more reviews but I shall leave it with this from Variety

http://www.variety.com/review/VE1117934679.html?categoryid=1266&cs=1

One quote from the review:

A much-deserved standing ovation greeted the conclusion of "That Lucky Old Sun" a sense of relief filling the audience that Wilson's new work had delivered so much.

[peeping tom]

Pictures and a link to a videoclip can be found on the messageboard of brianwilson-fans.com:
http://www.brianwilson-fans.com/forum/index.php?topic=1837.30

[LostArt]

Pictures and a link to a videoclip can be found on the messageboard of brianwilson-fans.com:
http://www.brianwilson-fans.com/forum/index.php?topic=1837.30

Wow.  There are a couple of rather eye opening revelations written in the pages of that thread.

[Ron]

Yeah, my favorite is somebody mentioned that the 'midnight' or whatever part starts with Brian saying "I have a dream, and I'm singing with my brothers"  I imagine it would be impossible not to tear up watching him say that with a picture of the Beach Boys on the screen behind him. 

[Malc]

Yeah, my favorite is somebody mentioned that the 'midnight' or whatever part starts with Brian saying "I have a dream, and I'm singing with my brothers"  I imagine it would be impossible not to tear up watching him say that with a picture of the Beach Boys on the screen behind him. 

That's the final part of the 'suite' - and although Brian messed up the words on Wednesdays performance, stopped the band, and started again (showing just how wonderfully professional those musicians are - not a beat missed or an eyelid batted) - it is just an amazing moment indeed ...

[PMcC]

 "....All of which compounded the surprise when Wilson returned for the encore and declared his intention to play She’s Leaving Home. That said, some baggage may remain. When Wilson got around to singing it, his inexplicably jaunty treatment of the song amounted to an act of sabotage. "


                            OUCH!

[brother john]

"....All of which compounded the surprise when Wilson returned for the encore and declared his intention to play She’s Leaving Home. That said, some baggage may remain. When Wilson got around to singing it, his inexplicably jaunty treatment of the song amounted to an act of sabotage. "


                            OUCH!

'Sabotage' is a little unfair, I think, given that the original arrangement was pretty insipid. SLH was no Eleanor Rigby, after all.

[Rocker]

I love Brian's version of "She's leaving home". It kinda sounds like a BW-song with that arrangement imo. But I can live with some people not liking it....


EDIT: Have heard the whole thing now and I think it's great ! Can't say much more at this point but there's a lot (!) of good BW-music on this.

BTW there's a small melody from "Rio grande" in "Morning beat". The "guitars are gently strumming"-line

[Ron]

Somebody mentioned why it sounds 'jaunty' is because he added some "getting better" stuff to it.  I kind of like it like that, it'd be kind of boring if he just covered it and didn't brianize it a little bit. 

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

I love Brian's version of "She's leaving home". It kinda sounds like a BW-song with that arrangement imo. But I can live with some people not liking it....


EDIT: Have heard the whole thing now and I think it's great ! Can't say much more at this point but there's a lot (!) of good BW-music on this.

BTW there's a small melody from "Rio grande" in "Morning beat". The "guitars are gently strumming"-line

There's also parts of "Bells of Madness/Fantasy is Reality" in it also and parts of "Let's Go to Heaven in my car"...very small snippets that only a keen ear can pick up. Considering that this piece is semi-autobiographical, in this case it works.

[Wirestone]

Some quick thoughts.

1.) "Morning Beat" and "Goin' Home" have absorbed the "Shortnin' Bread" riff. Thankfully, they both have more going on than that.

2.) "Live Let Live" has entirely different lyrics than the soundtrack version. They sound considerably less Parksian.

3.) "California Role" is an unexpected delight. Definitely a song Van Dyke would appreciate.

4.) "Goin Home" is practically a different song from the Paley sessions version. One line of melody and lyric are carried over -- "I'm Goin' Home." Otherwise, the underlying riff, lyrics and bridge sections are new.

5.) Someone needs to give Paul Mertens some props. The string and horn charts for the work are spot-on.

This is really a substantial work. It ties together so many thematic strands of Brian's music. It touches on autobiographical concerns. It has some "day in the life" songs. And, of course, it embraces California mythology whole-heartedly.

Someone get Paul Williams on the case.

[the captain]

Does the program include writing credits to each song? Because we know most of the songs are Wilson/Bennett, but do we know they ALL are? I know Live Let Live has different lyrics, but presumably some of it remains Parks. ("Live Let Live," for example.) And other songs, just here and there, sound as if they may have a dash of VDP in them. I'm curious.

[STE]

No, the program doesn't mention the individual songs at all, just refers to the TLOS as whole.
Regarding the lyrics it says "Lyrics by Brian Wilson, Van Dyke Parks & Scott Bennett".
The introduction by Brian says something like "I asked VDP to write some narratives about LA then I asked Scott to incorporate the lyrics VDP had written for the songs we (Brian & Scott) had written"