I wish someone would ask him more questions about Smiley Smile and Wild Honey. What did he think of "Gettin' Hungry", for example? He wrote the lyrics, after all. To me, "Gettin' Hungry" is one of the more fascinating, unexplored aspects of the Boys fall from fame. "Heroes and Villains" may not have performed up to expectations, but it stayed at #12 for 2 weeks. Had Brian kept things in perspective, he'd have realized it was only a minor commercial setback.
To follow it up with "Gettin' Hungry" almost smacks of deliberate sabotage, or a conscious decision to be less commercial. It's not actually bad song, but it has such a bizarre, minimalist production, recorded at the last second in one day. He'd spent way more time on "Vegetables", even during the Smiley Smile sessions, and that song was originally conceived as a single. In fact, he'd experimented with a piano arrangement quite a bit during the SS sessions and had apparently considered adding in "With Me Tonight". The extended mix of the song includes a bridge that basically sounds like an adaptation of the "With Me Tonight" theme.
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I'm not sure how Mike could've been happy with Brian releasing "Gettin' Hungry" as a single, even if it featured his lyrics.
Perhaps Mike was okay with its release since it's credited to him and Brian on the single/sleeve.
You could view it as a stab against Mike - you want to wirte with me? This is the best you can come up with? OK, I'll release it as a single by Brian & Mike . . . and when it fails miserably maybe you'll get off my back about collaborating with others.
I agree though the Smiley era and Wild Honey and even Friends is very underrepresented in interviews. Mike did some great lyrics for Wild Honey. And I would love to learn more about She's Goin' Bald - here's a Smile era pice written with Van Dyke that Mike gets to rewrite the lyrics to, like he wanted to do with Smile to make them more accessible. But what a weird result, less accessible than Van Dyke IMO. It makes you wonder what Mike would have done with the task of crafting lyrics to the SMile music if he'd been given the chance. Love for someone to ask him about that possibility . . .