when Brian and Landy are working on Let's Go To Heaven In My Car

That song was referenced? I don't remember that.

Just got home. Wow. That's all I have to say.

Wasn't VDP and BDW photographed with Randy Newman backstage somewhere in 2011?

If he started to receive auditory hallucinations in mid-'65 and they only occurred once in a while (did he say once every few weeks?) you also have to take in account all the confusion of that era, the obvious stresses he had, and also the stigma of mental illness. So, about three years seems like just enough time to procrastinate.

It may have been more important to BW that he fulfill his obligations to Capitol and not get hung up in psychiatric care. Of the Smiley Smile era, he said that he believed he had no more paranoia feelings left. He may have been proved wrong by the early months of '68.

It's easy to assume that he waited until '68 to figure out where the voices in his head were coming from.

Is it known if VDP himself ever used heroin, or had reason to be around it?

There are at least two interviews I've seen/heard where VDP admits to having a substance addiction during the latter half of the 1970s but I'm not sure if anything specific was named beyond 'prescription drugs'. Heroin? Who knows. None of us were there. It doesn't matter anyway.

http://www.rollingstone.com/music/features/being-brian-wilson-john-cusack-paul-dano-wilson-on-beach-boy-biopic-20150604?page=2

"Now, the Beverly Hills hotel meeting room is mostly empty, and the 72-year-old is playfully leading an impromptu doo-wop rendition of "Surf's Up" with the two actors who portray his story of triumph and shattering life struggles."

How the hell do you adapt Surf's Up into doo-wop?

New poster propped up on the Rotten Tomatoes page. Don't know what its context is. Looks terrific for what it is. I like it better than the illustration.

That probably deserves a thread of its own. No need to pollute this thread with sensationalist glimpses into these peoples' private lives. Still, lots of cool unseen photos in that link.

Brian on VDP in the NPR interview posted today: "I haven't see him in years. Not since we did the Smile album."

This movie looks insanely badass, especially when it kicks to Dano behind the control desk listening to the GV verses

Cool video, but is Brian singing underwater or something?   Try getting through That's Why God Made the Radio or No Pier Pressure with that awful vocal effect in place.

It doesn't even sound like autotune anymore, more like a Leslie filter. There's no logic for why it's there. Everything else in the arrangement is fairly dry and straightforward.

An orchestral keyboard... y'know... like a symphonic ukulele... or a classical guiro...

edit: Wikipedia says the whole band is present, vocally. Hmm...

All of the credits on Wikipedia that aren't sourced to anything should be removed since they're wrong 90% of the time

I didn’t think that the term “good vibrations” was yet a part of the vernacular at that time.

But I too wonder, had the term GV ever been used at an earlier date? I'm going to guess the answer is yes. It just probably wasn't common. "Good Vibes" probably was more common than anyone saying "Good Vibrations" prior to the song being released. Anyone know more?

'Good vibrations' was definitely a term.

Is this true? I've heard it before but I have a hard time believing it. It fits Brian so well.

Nobody who was there has denied it while VDP alluded a confirmation in a tweet. https://twitter.com/thevandykeparks/status/557757246361583618

I can't recall where I heard, read, saw this, but I swear I did. 

It's on the session tape.

Wow. If you believe laryngitis is a cause (or even a major contributor) of Brian's change in vocals you must have stone ears or have never heard what a person with laryngitis sounds like.

So it's not beyond our imaginations to conceive of a time in the 70s where Brian totalled his voice through smoking of all kinds, but told the media his new voice was down to laryngitis.

Laryngitis usually lasts a few days, not years. If it were laryngitis, Brian would have waited a few days for the laryngitis to go away, like a cold, before recording 15 Big Ones. And then a year later Beach Boys Love You? Naaaahhhhh

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GSLclEJ0IAQ

Sure, he doesn't have laryngitis here, he's only pretending to have it, or whatever. And it's only a coincidence that he sounded much more nasal after this date.

Now, after doing a quick Google on whether laryngitis can cause irreparable damage: http://ehealthforum.com/health/topic11838.html
"I'm having the same vocal chord problems right now. I am an alto and used to have a wide range being able to sing to high E. After a bout with bronchitis in September and being on 2 rounds of antibiotics and steroids, and an inhaler,my cough is still there and I cannot sing."
"i had brochitis when i was 19. I coughed so hard my vocal cords where damaged.  My voice still has a raspy quality and i still have to be careful anytime I get a cough."

More research: http://ent.nm.org/uploads/2/4/3/7/24375049/otolaryngology.voice.laryngitisfromreflux.pdf
"This kind of acute laryngitis rarely causes any long-term problem unless the vocal folds are damaged by overuse during the illness."

Could it have been a major contributor? It's surely possible. I seem to remember that the laryngitis Brian suffered in the 1970s were, in fact, severe cases. Also consider the highly likely possibility that he may have continued to smoke a pack a day while in this condition. What's more?

We were at that Oakland show, sitting out around second base. Long hot day barely describes it. People were worn out by the time the Boys came on, and it didn't help when Brian tried to sing In My Room.  Oh my goodness. Mike made a valiant attempt to blame "cousin Brian's" problems on laryngitis but the crowd wasn't buying it.  It was a little sad, knowing Brian was up there trying his best to please the audience when he probably wanted to be anyplace else at the time.

Obviously, as can be gleamed from the clip, the laryngitis wasn't a fabrication after all. Does this forced-singing count as overuse?

Don't get too excited, there's not much that hasn't been seen already by members of this board. Dominic Priore sells yet another article which contains no new content but merely rehashes the same well-trod ground. Some nice pictures, but again, you've probably seen 'em.

I've seen this same complaint with his 2005 Smile book and when I finally got ahold of it I was pleasantly surprised to find many observations and factoids I had never seen published or talked about ever.

So the Brian Wilson chord is essentially a IV with its 9th on the bass or am I getting this wrong?

Okay, regarding everyone obsessing over the poster:  I used to find this to be ridiculous

It's undeniable that a good percentage of the people who are going to pay to see this picture are going based on how nice the poster looks in tandem with the trailers. (Predicted backpedal: "Who cares about those people? Who cares how well the film succeeds?"

If the board is already picking apart the poster, can't wait to see what happens with the film.

I think the only 'picking apart' will be people here who make innocuous observations of some perceived inaccuracies, or maybe what they believe are weak elements with the film, only to be met with passive-aggressive dismissal and vitriol. The caustic attitudes on here will make 'real discussion' worthless if anything except universal praise is discouraged. Monicker makes a good point about the way BDW is shoehorned. I feel like the man's legacy deserves a better represented summation than what it usually gets. It seems like Love & Mercy succeeds at that for once.

Really glad you started this topic and I hope it leads to something concrete. 48 years of speculation and arguing about Smile is bad enough but this issue should not be so puzzling.

A lot of questions that this board constantly goes around in circles for have been answered many, many years ago if you do some digging into articles and books. Like Brian's voice change: he had laryngitis in 1975 and then again in 1979. Mystery solved. Wish I could remember where I had originally read this. It was probably on here. Though the 1979 instance was documented in an interview that's on YouTube. His voice between 1978 and 1980 is night and day, just like 1974 and 1976.

http://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0071/5192/products/BrianWilson__2011KiiArens_1024x1024.jpg?v=1310399038

I like this! Looks great. Too bad my suspicions were on the dime.

I would imagine the posters' sole purpose is to catch the eye and give the onlooker a glimpse of what the film might be about.  By that measure, it does the job very well.  This poster isn't for hardcore BW/BB fans.

I'm no graphic design major but my first impression was the exact opposite. It's cluttered and excessively niche, like an advertisement for a rockumentary instead of a drama made for musically-unaware mainstream audiences.

Who is Brian Wilson? Why does he matter? Neither of these questions are answered in the poster, just vaguely alluded to -- and only in a way that people who already know the answers would understand. So it fails at an informative level.

There are only a few essential bases to cover with BW: innovative music producer, melancholic singer/songwriter, and founder of a culturally iconic touchstone in modern Americana. None of them were met effectively. Love & Mercy is a very good-looking picture, so I'm amazed at how uninspired and rushed the poster is.

The prominence of the tidal wave should be equal to how much surf is in the film (i.e. barely visible). The bright yellow "LIFE, LOVE & GENIUS OF BRIAN WILSON" is redundant to the Washington Post quote, while the real life Wilson's appearance contradicts the film's meta. If Dano and Cusack are playing him, then they should share the poster. They can be divided in two frames, one with Cusack perhaps sitting in bed with a somber expression, and the other of Dano behind the control board or playing piano in the sandbox.

I dunno, maybe I only dislike it because it looks like it took less than an hour to make in Photoshop. The blue gradient is really off-putting.

http://observer.com/2015/04/brian-wilsons-new-album-is-far-from-essential-listening/

I'm linking this more for the comments section which features none other than R. Stevie Moore.
"Bottom 9th grandslam, Tim. Hilarious & brilliant. It's not even sad anymore. Buy it over at Walmart, Grampuh. Glean. With a period." So he's not a fan either.