Brian Reimagines Gershwin

[brother john]

Oh my god, BWRG is so fodaing brilliant, I am literally pissing my balls inside out this typing this, I've had so many orgasms out the ears, I might have permanently lost control of my parts...

You beautiful man. Thank you so much for that. Day considerably brightened, thank you.   

[Don_Zabu]

I stand by it.

[hypehat]

Hot damn! Whilst not quite the sucker punch I was expecting after the first listen, it's pretty amazing. Love the little bits of Rhapsody sprinkled in. Love his vocals, except on Summertime, where they are perhaps slightly too shouty. The best I've ever heard his old voice, for sure. The other 'original' is also rather fantastic.

One quibble I have is with the mix - The backing vocals are mixed WAY too low, and it's all slightly 'watery'. Or maybe it's my speakers.
The other is that there simply aren't enough of them in the fades!

I would also humbly admit that this review pales in comparison to Mr. Zabu's... 

[HighOnLife]

Could somebody help me?

[Amy B.]

I can't stand it anymore. Will someone Please Make me aware of what you're talking about?

[Jonas]

Give the PM replies a rest guys, seriously.

[Don_Zabu]

You could say it's a nasty case of PMS. 

[Amy B.]

Sorry-- I got caught up in all the excitement.

[Paulos]

A good idea would be to see who has heard it and PM them rather than beeing a wee bit to obvious.

[Wylson]

First impressions....

- Sounds absolutely nothing like a Brian/Beach Boys album to me. Much more in the school of Rod Stewart's American Songbook, Robbie Williams Swing When You're Winning etc.
- Brian sounds good
- I enjoy the arrangements
- Most enjoyable songs are the 'collaborations'.
- Production sounds much more Mertens/Bennett et al than Brian to me. i.e. veers much more to the obvious than the subtle.
- Do Brian's band feel that an album is no good unless all of the songs segue into one another?

Overall, I like it, but not blown away.

Should add, I love Plenty o' Nuttin. Might add it into my Pet Sounds album on my mp3 player!

[Ron]

Rather depressing take on the NY listening event:

http://nyconversation.com/2010/08/07/of-talent-lost-and-found/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=of-talent-lost-and-found

I mean, I appreciate the guy's writing, but does he even know that Brian released an album of originals less than two years ago?

At this point isn't it obvious enough that Brian just doesn't like doing publicity of any kind? He makes music. Everything else about the music -- its promotion, its distribution, and so on -- are probably kept in his mind, but no great weight is placed upon them. I don't think he really cares; in fact, it seems like he never has and proudly continues this tradition today. You know the Randy Newman song "Simon Smith and the Amazing Dancing Bear"? Brian is the very talented bear. To be less flippant, I am reminded also of the bit in Carlin's book where Brian is in the studio and his accountants are calling him, but distressingly they cannot reach him. They want to give the man thousands of dollars, and he's too busy making music to care. That seemed like 'Brian Wilson' in a nutshell to me, and something he has more or less kept up to this day, it seems to me.

I'm with ya.  I think Brian gets pleasure out of simple things, not saying he's a simple person but he wants the album to do good, and he wants people to like it, but when you get down to numbers I don't think he gives a sh*t.  I honestly think if you told him "Brian, it went GOLD! GOLD!" he'd be happy as hell, and if you said "Brian, it sold 500,000 copies!" he wouldn't be as happy.  Not that he's an idiot or a simpleton, just that he thinks a little less businessminded than most of the people around him. 

[Ron]

(The band is essentially an extension of Brian's mind these days. I talked to a band member, and he said most of them know what Brian likes -- instrument choices, how he generally wants the parts to sound -- without him having to specify every detail. And that's not a bad thing when you have someone as mercurial as current-day BW.)

Still, this feels like a BW project through and through,

Yes, I feel he worked with the studio musicians in the mid 60's the same way.  Not instructing every note (although of course often he did)... but open to suggestions and improv.

Hell, Motown worked that way.  I've never recorded but I'll bet dollars to doughnuts that Nashville works that way right now. 

[Ron]

http://smileysmile.net/board/index.php/topic,122.0.html

Pay close attention to #3. Don't make me get all ghetto...

Please get all ghetto.  LOL  That would be interesting.

[Curtis Leon]

First impressions....

- Sounds absolutely nothing like a Brian/Beach Boys album to me. Much more in the school of Rod Stewart's American Songbook, Robbie Williams Swing When You're Winning etc.
- Brian sounds good
- I enjoy the arrangements
- Most enjoyable songs are the 'collaborations'.
- Production sounds much more Mertens/Bennett et al than Brian to me. i.e. veers much more to the obvious than the subtle.
- Do Brian's band feel that an album is no good unless all of the songs segue into one another?

Overall, I like it, but not blown away.

Should add, I love Plenty o' Nuttin. Might add it into my Pet Sounds album on my mp3 player!

Yeah, I love Plenty o' Nuttin' too. Reminds me of SMiLE somewhat... and Little Bird, even though that wasn't written by Brian.

The production is something I expected from the start. After all, this /is/ a Disney album. Brian is really just the interpreter of the material, and the performer. Not that I'm underrating his role at all.  I will say it sounds a bit too lounge-y at points. Specifically, the opening to "'s Wonderful". It's also a bit short, but I've pretty much grown to expect anything to come out of the Beach Boys not to be a 55 minute prog rock fest.  

[Amy B.]

I love the references to Farmer's Daughter in I Got Rhythm, and the unexpected turn the song takes to get to the second reference.

[Curtis Leon]

I love the references to Farmer's Daughter in I Got Rhythm, and the unexpected turn the song takes to get to the second reference.

It's a very unexpected reference, but it's really welcome. I think Farmer's Daughter was the best song on the Surfin' USA album, so this is quite warm to me.

[Shady]

For anyone who is lucky enough to have the physical copy already, is their lyrics in the booket?

[summerinparadise.flac]

Listening to about half of it so far and I've only been struck by the Like in I love you and Plenty O Nuttin. Hopefully it will grow on me...

[37!ws]

Ho-lee crap...how can anybody listen to this stuff and not be blown away!?

(Scavenger hunt suggestion: can you spot "Hey There Momma"?)

[Margarita]

"Someone to Watch Over Me" got me all teary...that is a lost Pet Sounds track, for sure.

[phirnis]

First impressions....

- Sounds absolutely nothing like a Brian/Beach Boys album to me. Much more in the school of Rod Stewart's American Songbook, Robbie Williams Swing When You're Winning etc.
- Brian sounds good
- I enjoy the arrangements
- Most enjoyable songs are the 'collaborations'.
- Production sounds much more Mertens/Bennett et al than Brian to me. i.e. veers much more to the obvious than the subtle.
- Do Brian's band feel that an album is no good unless all of the songs segue into one another?

Overall, I like it, but not blown away.

Should add, I love Plenty o' Nuttin. Might add it into my Pet Sounds album on my mp3 player!

I'd like to hear at least one last genuine Brian Wilson production, so I really hope you're wrong about that. 

By the way, Swing When You're Winning? Ouch...

[Andrew G. Doe]

For anyone who is lucky enough to have the physical copy already, is their lyrics in the booket?

Nope. Fairly blah puff piece, pix of Brian in his 'serious arranger's' suit, track-by-track credits, page of musician credits and thank-yous.

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

Sometimes, that's all you need

[Wirestone]

I'd like to hear at least one last genuine Brian Wilson production, so I really hope you're wrong about that.  Smiley

I think this is as close as we're going to get. It's very special.

[Jay]

I was rather surprised with how short of a time period it seems to have taken. The sessions ended almost before they began. At least, that's the feeling I get about it.