BWPS: which of the new lyrics were actually old lyrics?

[The Song Of The Grange]

I know we have hashed this out before, but I am still unsure about the topic.  It came up again while reading David Hajdu's review of BWPS in the Oct 25th 04 issue of The New Republic.  He speculates on the new lyrics being either reconstructions, from old notes, or newly written.

We pretty much know that the new Do You Like Worms lyrics are vintage '66, and I think we can say with certainty that the lyrics from On A Holiday are new (the part about the pirate for instance).  But what about the rest?  Darian suggested in the newer Priore book that the "Rock Rock Roll" chant in On A Holiday was vintage, but I don't buy it.

Any of you have insight on the matter?  (As always, thanks to the sharp minds on this board for all their wisdom.)

[Jason]

Regarding the "rock rock roll" vocals on On A Holiday, that reminds me of a comment Al made back in the days of the Good Vibrations box regarding Do You Like Worms.

"They used the wrong one!"

[juggler]

Yeah, as far as I know, the only "old" new lyrics are the "Do You Like Worms" verses that had been saved from oblivion by Frank Holmes.

Song for Chlldren - New
CIFOTM - New
Holidays - New
Blue Hawaii - New

I enjoy all of the new lyrics, but I was disappointed a bit with CIFOTM.  It's such a great track, and I'd always imagined that great verse lyrics existed at one time and would eventually turn up.  The 2004 CIFOTM lyrics are a bit underwhelming.  Here's hoping that some long lost CIFOTM tape or acetate with different lyrics eventually surfaces...

[Mr. Cohen]

Wow, putting the Al comment in that context really opened my eyes! Was "Roll Plymouth Rock" recorded to replace "On A Holiday"? After all, both songs had nautical/explorative theme. Perhaps Brian wanted a song that was more modular to fit with his muse? I have a similar theory about "Song For Children", that it was effectively scrapped once part of it's melody was used in the "Good Vibrations" single, replaced by the more modular "Child is Father of the Man" (he would later try to make "Wonderful" more modular, too, with that strange jazzy version). I believe in '66 Brian was going for a particular balance in songwriting: he needed only one nautical song, one childhood/spirituality song ("Song for Children" vs. "Child is Father..."), etc. I doubt he was  going to make an album over 30-35 minutes long.
 
Later, I could see Brian replacing "Roll Plymouth Rock" with the return of "On A Holiday", for these two reasons:

1. The '66 "Roll Plymouth Rock" was a mess. The vocals did not mesh well with the instrumental tracks, particularly the "Bicycle Rider" part, which Brian never seemed to finish, making at" least a dozen versions of it. Brian even admitted later on that during the making of SMiLE some of the songs that he thought sounded great instrumentally didn't always work so well with vocals. And truly, "Roll Plymouth Rock" has a brilliant song structure, quite amazing for '66, but it never works as well as I think it should, IMO anyway.
2. "Bicycle Rider", the heart of the song, got ransacked for "Heroes and Villains".

Supporting this, possibly, is the fact that "Do You Like Worms?" (perhaps the working title of SMiLE's nautical song) was purported to have an alternate lyric that went something like "West or East Indies? We always got them confused!", which would have fit in well the Carribean influenced musical elements of "On A Holiday". The "once upon the Sandwich Isle" lyric may have been a replacement lyric written for the more tribal sounding "Roll Plymouth Rock".

Personally, I love the '66 "On A Holiday" instrumental and I don't think it gets the credit it deserves. It's ingenious in ways.

[A Million Units In Jan!]

You know, for an album that Brian worked for months on, there really doesn't seem to be that many lyrics-either written or recorded....

[juggler]

You know, for an album that Brian worked for months on, there really doesn't seem to be that many lyrics-either written or recorded....

I disagree completely.  While it's true a lot of new lyrics were added to BWPS, Smile 1967 would likely have been about 15 minutes shorter!  By early '67, Brian and Van Dyke almost certainly had enough lyrics for an album of that era.

Let's look at the 12 tracks on the handwritten list:

Do You Like Worms - Full set of lyrics
Wind Chimes - Full set of lyrics
Heroes and Villains - Full set of lyrics
Surf's Up - Full set of lyrics
Good Vibrations - Full set of lyrics
Cabin Essence  - Full set of lyrics
Wonderful - Full set of lyrics
I'm in Great Shape - At least partial lyrics
Child Is Father of the Man - verse lyrics unknown
The Elements -  lyrics unknown
Vega-Tables - Full set of lyrics
The Old Master Painter - Full set of lyrics

And it wouldn't surprise me if complete lyrics once existed for "Child Is Father of the Man," but were lost.

[runnersdialzero]

What's with all this talk of "nautical" Smile tracks? I don't really hear it at all on "Look".

[Mr. Cohen]

By nautical, I was talking about "Roll Plymouth Rock" (the lyrics mention ocean liners, European sailors were the first Westerners to visit Hawaii, naming it the Sandwich Isles, and Plymouth Rock is where the pilgrims first landed) and "On A Holiday" (the BWPS lyrics clearly have a nautical theme, with the Pirate shanty rap and what-not). I would consider "Look" and "Child is Father" to be about the link between spirituality and childhood, obviously. I didn't mean to lump all four together thematically. The similarity is in the fact that "Look" and "On a Holiday" were some of the earliest SMiLE era recordings and are not modular. "Child is Father..." and "Roll Plymouth Rock" were recorded later on using the modular style Brian developed during the production of "Good Vibrations", and I believe were intended to replace the earlier two songs, having the same themes as their predecessors.

[Rocker]

Regarding the "Rock, rock, roll" vocals, I asked myself a few days ago if the Smile-project was the beginning of Brian's, let me call it "obsession", of putting those words into his rock-songs. I mean you here it everywhere, "Rock and roll music" right through "Proud Mary" and even finding it's way onto "Goin' home". He did it in the hotel-jam from the early 90s and probably other times that I don't remember or don't even know of

[Jason]

Van Dyke said years ago that he wrote lyrics for Child Is Father Of The Man and that it was a "cowboy song". Read into that what you will.

[punkinhead]

What does that quote by Al even mean?

[variable2]

Regarding the "Rock, rock, roll" vocals, I asked myself a few days ago if the Smile-project was the beginning of Brian's, let me call it "obsession", of putting those words into his rock-songs. I mean you here it everywhere, "Rock and roll music" right through "Proud Mary" and even finding it's way onto "Goin' home". He did it in the hotel-jam from the early 90s and probably other times that I don't remember or don't even know of

what is this hotel jam you speak of.. pm country?

[runnersdialzero]

What does that quote by Al even mean?

I believe it was a Dennis quote, and I don't think anyone here knows because it probably refers to a set of lyrics that we don't have.

[Andrew G. Doe]

What does that quote by Al even mean?

I believe it was a Dennis quote, and I don't think anyone here knows because it probably refers to a set of lyrics that we don't have.

A Dennis Wilson (1944-1983) quote about a track on the 1993 box set ? 

[punkinhead]

that's what i was thinkin

[Mr. Cohen]

I did think it was Dennis that said "Child Is Father" was a cowboy song, though.

[hypehat]

I did think it was Dennis that said "Child Is Father" was a cowboy song, though.

I think the gist was 'There's a song on the new album called Child Is The Father To The Man, it's a cowboy song, and here's the prayer i'm writing for it!'.... or something

[A Million Units In Jan!]

Page 27 of LLVS, As follows:

I got a sneak preview of one of the tracks the previous night when Dennis played me a piano version of one track, 'Child Of The Man', a cowboy song, and then gave me the throwaway line of the year-'And this is a prayer I'm working on for it!!'

So either Dennis was wrong, or the reporter got things messed up, or both. Or, CIFOTM was a cowboy song early on and changed later, which I don't believe, IMO.

[Rocker]

Page 27 of LLVS, As follows:

I got a sneak preview of one of the tracks the previous night when Dennis played me a piano version of one track, 'Child Of The Man', a cowboy song, and then gave me the throwaway line of the year-'And this is a prayer I'm working on for it!!'

So either Dennis was wrong, or the reporter got things messed up, or both. Or, CIFOTM was a cowboy song early on and changed later, which I don't believe, IMO.

Sorry, but I don't understand the line "...this is a prayer I'm working on for it". What's that about? Dennis writing stuff for Smile?

[runnersdialzero]

Wasn't it said that "On a Holiday" was an instrumental until 2004, though? I'm with the folks who say "Rock, rock, roll" existing in '66 was just the part of "Do You Like Worms?" that we all know about, not the '66 version of "On a Holiday". I don't think "Worms" was recorded to replace "Holidays", as the 'nautical'ness is just something being read into it.

Same goes for the part of "Look" that appears in "Good Vibrations" - this was all part of Smile, there were sort of motifs occuring everywhere in the form of recurring melodies and ideas. The melody from "Look" also being in "Good Vibrations" is just the same as the similarities between "Bicycle Rider" and the "Vegetables" tag or the melodies that occur in both "Heroes and Villains" and "Vegetables", etc.

What does that quote by Al even mean?

I believe it was a Dennis quote, and I don't think anyone here knows because it probably refers to a set of lyrics that we don't have.

A Dennis Wilson (1944-1983) quote about a track on the 1993 box set ? 

Ah damn it my bad, should have specified that I was talking about the "Cowboy song" quote regarding "Child is the Father".

[runnersdialzero]

Page 27 of LLVS, As follows:

I got a sneak preview of one of the tracks the previous night when Dennis played me a piano version of one track, 'Child Of The Man', a cowboy song, and then gave me the throwaway line of the year-'And this is a prayer I'm working on for it!!'

So either Dennis was wrong, or the reporter got things messed up, or both. Or, CIFOTM was a cowboy song early on and changed later, which I don't believe, IMO.

Why is this so hard to believe, though? We don't have the original CIFOTM lyrics nor do we have any indication as to what they could have been.

[A Million Units In Jan!]

I didn't say it was hard to believe, just that I personally don't believe it.  For some reason I've always believed that CIFOTM was going to be a song that wasn't really tied into the 'Americana' theme. I've always believed-again, no hard facts, just opinion-that it was sort of a companion piece with 'Wonderful', as in they would both touch on innocence, and/or innocence lost.

[Mr. Cohen]

...as in they would both touch on innocence, and/or innocence lost.

It could do that and still be a children's song, kind of like the Nancy Sinatra/Lee Hazlewood song "Bang Bang" (I know they didn't write it). Kids, after all, love to play cowboys and Indians. It could've been the rocking horse to the iron horse. For some reason, I've always felt like the image of a rocking horse really fits in with Smile. Anyway, it's just an idea I like, and like you, I have no reason to believe it's true.

[Roger Ryan]

The clippety-clop rhythm and chord changes during the verses of CIFOTM, not to mention the use of harmonica, suggest it could have been a "cowboy" song. The "wah-wah" of the harmonica, of course, suggests a baby crying. The spooky piano part (which was used to transition to "Surf's Up" on BWPS) does not sound like a "cowboy" song, however, and neither does some of the other backing track sessions featuring vibes and that "fluttering" cello. Perhaps like almost every other SMiLE track, CIFOTM went through a number of major revisions before being abandoned...until 2003.

Thought: Are "Cabin Essence" and "Surf's Up" the only full songs from SMiLE that didn't undergo significant rewrites/re-recordings during '66/'67?

Regarding Dennis' prayer: given that both Carl and Brian talked alot about praying for inspiration, or what-have-you, during the PET SOUNDS sessions, I'm thinking that Dennis was responding in a similar fashion by coming up with a prayer or blessing to elevate CIFOTM.

When Alan claimed they "used the wrong one" when "Do You Like Worms?" came out on the GV box set, did he mean they used the wrong tape in his mind; meaning that, to Al, DYLW needed verses and the "Bicycle Rider" chorus to be the "right one"?

[Andrew G. Doe]

When Alan claimed they "used the wrong one" when "Do You Like Worm?" came out on the GV box set, did he mean they used the wrong tape in his mind; meaning that, to Al, DYLW needed verses and the "Bicycle Rider" chorus to be the "right one"?

Might be me, and please correct me if I'm wrong... but I thought Alan's comment was something like "That's not "Do You Like Worms"".