The Smiley Smile Message Board

.....fit on pet sounds?

So im just done giving a listen to the latest pet sounds podcast, and bruce is sad sloop got on pet sounds..

I love this song and i belive im one of the few who think it fits fine.

What are your thoughts?

It's always worked for me.  Musically it fits, and lyrically it's justifiable.  Bruce-smuce.

If it's good enough for Brian, it's good enough for me.  And now we have him saying in his own words that he wanted it on there, on camera.

I think it fits well on there and is as fine as any song on Pet Sounds.  The production is masterful.

wasnt sure at first...but i love it on there now...

no others fit in that position...not t-bone dixie, not the little girl, not how deep is the ocean...hehe

It definitely fits.  Brian has said that Pet Sounds was a production concept album, and the production on Sloop is nothing short of spectacular.  As Josh said, if Brian was happy to have it on the album, I am too. 

Fits perfectly. I get so tired of people saying it doesn't simply because it eventually became a hit single and is a cover instead of an original. I love Sloop's place in the sequence too. The rev-up from Let's Go Away for Awhile...I love it.

What does Bruce know anyway? If I remember correctly, he also wanted Good Vibrations on Pet Sounds, the nutbar.

A few days ago I tested playing Pet Sounds without Sloop John B. The transition from Let's Go Away For A While straight to God Only Knows feels awkward. Sloop is perfectly knit together and completes the album.

I agree with the masses on this thread.  I love the song and the arrangement on it.  It's one of the instrumentals I enjoy most off of the box set.  I think this anti-John B sentiment is a product of Rolling Stone wanting to hang on to one last bit of animosity towards the Beach Boys, but no longer able to fully express their hatred, Brian being acknowledged as a genius and all.

I agree with everyone else. And I'll just add that Bruce's beef with 'SJB' only shows, yet again, how the other BB's often don't have the slightest idea what's going on on their own albums. See also: the related BB grumbling about how 'GV' should have been on 'PS.' Which is such hogwash, given how its production and feeling bear virtually no relationship to the rest of 'PS.' Jardine, I think, went on to say that if 'GV' had been on 'PS,' thereby elevating that album to smash-hitdom, Brian would have had the momentum to finish "Smile," and etc. etc. etc. To which I say: more hogwash. Because 'GV' did come out, and was a huge hit, and subsequently gave Brian the momentum to fall apart completely. The BB's being uniquely torn asunder by their own success, whenever it happened.

Count me in as one who loves it right where it is, mainly because it belongs there. It comes after a song called Let's Go Away For Awhile and it's a song about a trip, albeit a bad one. Also the keys of each song on PS rise sequentially, if you take Sloop out it's an awkward transition to God Only Knows, as someone already pointed out.

I think I'm with Bruce, as big a fan as I am I don't think I've ever liked Sloop. Maybe it's because I've heard it too many times, I don't know, but I just have a phobia of that song. I always skip it when I have Pet Sounds on... ???

Musically: yes.
Lyrically: no.

I agree with every word of this.

I love "Sloop" but don't believe it fits here. I believe a BB's version of "Guess I'm Dumb" would have fitted better -  it's lyrically sound and, production-wise, a match for the rest of the album. And I can't dispute Jardine's assertion that Brian might have finished Smile if GVs had turned Pet Sounds into a big hit album. Seems logical to me.

I don't think that GV should've been on Pet Sounds, for the simple reason that it just wasn't ready in time. The Pet Sounds era backing track of GV isn't nearly as good as the final one. So if Brian would have been forced to finish GV before the deadline for Pet Sounds, we probably never would've had the GV we have now.

Just to clarify, the verses from the "Pet Sounds"-era version of the "GV" backing track WERE included in the final edit...but I agree with you, the final edit is what "made" the production what it is.  I wouldn't have wanted any other version out at the time.

Then why didn't he complete SMiLE because GV was such a big hit single?  Wasn't it considered the biggest single of all time, at the time?  You can't get much more successful than that. 

Artistically maybe, but not commercially. It was #1 for just one week.

I'm sad that Bruce produced the 'LA Light album' and 'Keeping the Summer Alive'  :(

I can hear "Good Vibrations" as the opening song on Pet Sounds, FOLLOWED by "Wouldn't It Be Nice". Doesn't the backing track for "Here Today" slightly resemble "Good Vidrations"? The cello on "Good Vibrations" could fit in with "Don't Talk" and "Let's Go Away For Awhile", and the theramin could coordinate with the instrument (I don't know what it is- a moog?) on "I Just Wasn't Made For These Times".

Regardless if "Good Vibrations" fits on Pet Sounds production-wise, what if it would've been included? Pet Sounds in its existing form tops many "greatest albums" polls. With "Good Vibrations" on that album, it would top ALL of 'em!

I don't think GV would fit on there, the mood of PS is a very particular one and I think that it might disrupt what is a perfect album. As for not having Sloop on there, I think it might make PS a bit too heavy, its light relief, and a great start of side two track.
As for the post about putting Guess i'm dumb on there, I can see why it would but that would be better placed on Summer Days to give it a bit more weight IMO.
GV is good as a Smile song, but works better having it in the middle of the album like Smiley Smile rather than at the end like BWPS.

Word!  I slipped in the 'Mints cover instead of Sloop and i think it sounded great, but i am great with sloop oon as well, guess im dumb is jsut such a great song.

If I'm not mistaken, I believe the actual tracking ID number for the original "Good Vibrations" became the tracking number for "Here Today" (once GV was discarded from consideration?). It's because the verse melody/arrangement is so similar between the two songs that they wouldn't have fit on the same album. Had "Good Vibrations" been completed to Brian's satisfaction, it probably would have replaced "Here Today" which would have been a bummer.

I don't think GV would have fit musically or lyrically on Pet Sounds.  Not in it's earlier form neither in the finished version. And I think it's sad that "Pet Sounds" has the status of being "the album that came before GV" for many people (not to talk about the McCartney-shadow). Both should be seen as separate works from the same artist.

Good Vibrations doesn't really fit on any BBs album; it's stand alone, to me.
It would've been an odd fit on Pet Sounds because it doesn't really sound like anything else on there (even Here Today, arguably)
It would've been out of place on Smile because of it's commercial appeal and full group sound (whearas the boys seem all over the place on Smile...which is cool)
It surely doesn't fit on Smiley Smile because it dwarfs everything else on that record in terms of brilliance.

As for Guess I'm Dumb, I don't think it would fit on Pet Sounds, either. I adore that song and it sounds more akin to the Today! ballads to me. Take off Bull Session and put on a BBs recording of Guess I'm Dumb instead (but have the album end with In The Back of My Mind; I love the idea of the record ending with those strings going off in different directions....it's a discordant vibe).

I totally agree.  I've never thought that Good Vibrations fit anywhere.  Doesn't fit Pet Sounds at all, and it is radically out of place within the production style of Smiley.  It might have fit on Smile but I don't like it there either.  I think its best fit is as one of the best singles of all time, and that's it. 

Brian left GV off Pet Sounds because, I assume, he felt it didn't fit in with the flow of the album. Sloop, however, DID fit in according to him. Pet Sounds' songs are of a piece! The over-all tone is melancholia. Sloop is a momentary diversion, a lighter mood, but still the subject is a bad trip. Plus it rises one key from Let's Go Away For Awhile, which GV does not do! How many ways can this be put?!!

Sloop John B is one of my all-time BB favorites and I put it right up there with GV and GOK in the greatness category.

How could Brian include GV on Pet Sounds when it wasn't even finished. One of the reasons Brian left GV off Pet Sounds is because he wanted to work on it more, and it evolved into the masterpiece we all love. GV was still a work in progress when Pet Sounds was released in May 66.

Oh, yeah and I love Sloop John B and it couldn't be more appropriate for Pet Sounds. Perfect sequencing.

What's Rolling Stone been saying about Sloop John B?

"Three cuts are impossibly dated and don't even enter into consideration: a boring cover of "Sloop John B." that had some success as a single (with all the genius on this record, Capitol Records chose this as the single because it probably sounded truest to preconceptions about the Beach Boy "formula"). The two instrumentals, "Pet Sounds" and "Let's Go Away For Awhile," are pretty mood pieces and that's all."

http://www.rollingstone.com/reviews/album/112386/pet_sounds

That's one I remember reading, but I feel like there's been more.

That's not all to me, Rolling Stone. Let's Go Away For Awhile especially is one of the best examples why Brian Wilson is a master composer. Dear listener, while you're out one day, at work or where ever, try to whistle this song.
....Yeah. I got lost too. Yet it's still immensly memorable.

And since WHEN is Sloop John B. BORING? This is one of the most exciting backing tracks of Brian's and the vocals (especially the break) are outta sight. It's especially interesting to note that most people I think don't entirely recall any earlier Sloop versions than the Beach Boys' cover. Music nuts certainly know all about the Kingston Trio's (and others') version of it, but it can't be nowhere near as popular as the Beach Boys' version; I doubt that writer at Rolling Stone ever heard another version of this song. Heck, I haven't!
Sloop John B. may as well be an original BBs song, especially since Brian's arrangement is so....him.
Brian brought it back to public consciousness, and there it has stayed...the BBs version of it, that is.