Smile discredits Brian's genius

[Newguy562]

Smile is better than Pet Sounds.

Because Dennis Wilson said so.

in your own opinion what do you prefer?

[XXXCD]

Again, what's the alternative? You want this sh*t to just remain rotting in the vaults as it has for the last 45 years?

No- I want all of the material released because it's great.
But I don't want the unfinished stuff to be considered the "real" Smile album. I'm conviced that it would have been so much more than we have now.

[Tristero]

I think that Mike Eder and Magic Transistor Radio have done a good job of debunking the idea that we have no idea what a finished Smile would have sounded like.  In fact, several tracks were quite near completion and while others are missing lead vocals/lyrics (Worms and Child, for example), we at least have some idea how they might have turned out.  Take a case like Surf’s Up:  We’ve been treated to several different versions over the years from more stripped down ‘demo’ takes (like the ’66 version we all know and love, still my personal favorite) on up to the fuller versions from Surf’s Up and BWPS.  While we can speculate a bit about how the additional instrumentation from Part 2 might have sounded back in the day, that likely would have just been icing on the cake.  We know the core of this song and it stands as a masterpiece.

And this gets to a broader point:  This material has already thrived throughout a wide range of different presentations, from Smiley Smile on up through subsequent releases like 20/20 and the GV Box, BWPS and now TSS.  I think this speaks to the fundamental strength of this material, its modular versatility.  It holds up through stripped down approaches and more elaborate arrangements.  Knocking it for not being completed on schedule almost seems beside the point.  In a way, Smile is more about the journey, even with all the unfinished experiments and blind alleys, than it is about a final product.

I’ve long gotten past the old “things would have been so different if only Smile had been released” trap, the album that might have been.  Things happened the way that they did for a range of complicated reasons, but there’s really no point in beating one’s head against that wall anymore.  While other conceptual masterpieces from the era got a normal release, Smile has experienced this extraordinary subterranean existence, a protracted release that’s taken different forms over the years, including the vital ‘do it yourself’ interactive component which still carries on today.  Sgt Peppers’ is done, iconic and dead in a way, while Smile maintains so much more of its mysterious power and intrigue.  It’s unfinished, yes, impossible to pin down and it refuses to die—I continue to learn new things about it after all these years.  It’s an unprecedented arc for this one of a kind piece of pop art and at this point, I wouldn’t have it any other way.

[runnersdialzero]

Again, what's the alternative? You want this sh*t to just remain rotting in the vaults as it has for the last 45 years?

No- I want all of the material released because it's great.
But I don't want the unfinished stuff to be considered the "real" Smile album. I'm conviced that it would have been so much more than we have now.

Thus why it's called The Smile Sessions.

[Bicyclerider]

Again, what's the alternative? You want this sh*t to just remain rotting in the vaults as it has for the last 45 years?

No- I want all of the material released because it's great.
But I don't want the unfinished stuff to be considered the "real" Smile album. I'm conviced that it would have been so much more than we have now.

Thus why it's called The Smile Sessions.

But they still attempted to recreate a mono "complete Smile" on CD 1.

While the BWPS sequence worked brilliantly with the addition of the link sections and the pauses between movements, the BWPS model doesn't work as well for me for presenting the original sessions.  For one, I don't get the "happy happy" Mission Pak sound that Brian was after on what would be "side 1" - the Americana songs are "heavy" and not light or amusing the way Brian apparently wanted the album to come across.  I have to think that the Americana songs would have been mixed in with the lighter songs like Veggies, Wind Chimes, Wonderful, Child.  Of course I don't have a sequence that's perfect but some of the track sequences posted in another thread I suspect would work better as a total listening experience and be closer to what might have come out in 67.  All speculation of course.

[Newguy562]

i guess another thing i liked about "bwps" is all how all the songs flow 2gether. it's like the album is one song.
(idk if any of u understand what i'm saying.)

[Heysaboda]

I don't think the half-finished versions of "Smile" that have been circulating over the years are a fitting testament to Brian's genius.

Only ONE track was ever completed for the album and that was Good Vibrations.  You could never tell what it would have sounded like from all the fragments of music and vocals that were recorded  (which is what most people try and do with the other Smile tracks).

The tracks reconstructed by the Beach Boys in later years were not Smile-era edits. From what I have read, Brian's days as a serious producer were pretty much over by the end of 1967. What would these tracks have sounded like if they were finished by Brian during the smile recordings? No one knows. But it's safe to say that they would have been different than the released versions.

Three of the tracks printed on the album sleeve (the Old Master Painter,  I'm in Great Shape and the Elements) are so incomplete they don't even feature on the Smiley Smile Message Board's 2011 box-set discussion. As for "Holidays" and "Look" etc... it's debateable if they were even intended for the album.  

I reckon up to 50% of Smile vocals are instrumentation were never recorded, let alone assembled into album tracks. I would imagine Brian was aiming for 10 very tightly produced tracks with complex vocal arrangements, and (possibly) ways of flowing the tracks together. But it definately WAS NOT going to be the disjointed bits of music that are passed off as "smile" these days.

a swing and a miss.......

[Magic Transistor Radio]

I would put BWPS in the same category as his PS live tour. Maybe a step ahead because more vocals were added to it. It was GREAT to see live, ok on cd. Despite Brian's vocals, the shows his group have put on in the last decade are the best BB related shows since the mid 70s IMO.

[Summertime Blooz]

[/quote]
While the BWPS sequence worked brilliantly with the addition of the link sections and the pauses between movements, the BWPS model doesn't work as well for me for presenting the original sessions.  For one, I don't get the "happy happy" Mission Pak sound that Brian was after on what would be "side 1" - the Americana songs are "heavy" and not light or amusing the way Brian apparently wanted the album to come across.  I have to think that the Americana songs would have been mixed in with the lighter songs like Veggies, Wind Chimes, Wonderful, Child.  Of course I don't have a sequence that's perfect but some of the track sequences posted in another thread I suspect would work better as a total listening experience and be closer to what might have come out in 67.  All speculation of course.
[/quote]

Well just look at the December 66 tracklist (I always go back to it)- Side 1 would have been Worms, Wind Chimes, H&V, Surf's Up, Good Vibrations and Cabinessence (Good Lord! That would be the greatest side of music ever). Like you say, you mix the Americana theme with something lighter to keep things loose. Side 1 begins and ends with the Americana theme- it's nice symmetry. I  also put bits from George Fell Into His French Horn after H&V as a breather.

As for the original poster's point, I think the body of music that has come to be known as Smile or The Smile Sessions, however incomplete a project it was, can stand toe-to toe with any completed album. In the 60s BW was a musical genius and, far from discrediting that statement, this music is an enduring expression of that genius. It's his great Unfinished Symphony.

[anazgnos]

Well just look at the December 66 tracklist (I always go back to it)- Side 1 would have been Worms, Wind Chimes, H&V, Surf's Up, Good Vibrations and Cabinessence

In general I don't think the 12-song list is considered safe to regard as an actual sequence.  Hence "see label for correct running order."

[Peter Reum]

It's not...if it was, Brian would have considered using it in 2004.

[sidewinder572]

Smile is better than Pet Sounds.

Because Dennis Wilson said so.

in your own opinion what do you prefer?

Pet Sounds is the musical equivalent of someone handing you a million dollars. SMiLE is the musical equivalent of someone handing you a million dollars but some of the bills are torn. Either way it's still a million dollars. SMiLE all the way

[Newguy562]

Smile is better than Pet Sounds.

Because Dennis Wilson said so.

in your own opinion what do you prefer?

Pet Sounds is the musical equivalent of someone handing you a million dollars. SMiLE is the musical equivalent of someone handing you a million dollars but some of the bills are torn. Either way it's still a million dollars. SMiLE all the way

Well Said I Completely Agree With You.

[Summertime Blooz]

Well just look at the December 66 tracklist (I always go back to it)- Side 1 would have been Worms, Wind Chimes, H&V, Surf's Up, Good Vibrations and Cabinessence

In general I don't think the 12-song list is considered safe to regard as an actual sequence.  Hence "see label for correct running order."

Really what sequence is "safe" other than BWPS? I'm just saying that IF one makes a fan version of the album, I have found that the Capitol track list works perfectly fine as a listening experience. In fact there's a lot to recommend it. I know Mr. Reum is in the know about this stuff and far be it from me to argue with him, but fan mixes survived BWPS (which I love) and they'll most likely continue well into the future. I could spend my time shuffling the order of the songs on Pet Sounds but it's not as much fun because Pet Sounds was actually finished back in 1966.

[runnersdialzero]

Well just look at the December 66 tracklist (I always go back to it)-

Why do people continue to take stock in what was merely a list of songs and not a real tracklist? One that Brian didn't even write himself? Why do they continue to ignore "See label for correct playing order"?

Side 1 would have been Worms, Wind Chimes, H&V, Surf's Up, Good Vibrations and Cabinessence (Good Lord! That would be the greatest side of music ever).

The supposed "tracklist" is a total clusterf*ck if actually listened to in this order. Somehow, I can't see Brian following up the basically flawlessly flowing Pet Sounds with what would've been the worst tracklist sequence in the history of the band's career before or after.