The Beach Boys on SubPop

[Rocky Raccoon]

I was surprised to find recently that "I Just Wasn't Made for These Times" was once offered as a single on the indie label SubPop Records around the time of the Pet Sounds box.  What was the reason for this distribution?  Was this supposed to be a record deal that didn't pan out?  I don't know, I think the fact that the Beach Boys had a SubPop single is pretty damn cool.  But I also think it's strange that there weren't any other releases of this kind.

[Jason]

It WAS 1996, and SubPop was a highly renowned underground label at the time. Probably an attempt to court the indie crowd.

[ontor pertawst]

Not quite underground by that point. They entered into a joint venture with Warner Bros. in 1995 and started throwing lots of money around with the Warner millions... they got 49 percent of it or something.

[AndrewHickey]

It was supposed to be a promotional tie-in for the PS box, but it came out after the box set was put back a year or so, so for a while it was the only legitimate way you could get those tracks (stereo I Just Wasn't Made For These Times, vocals-only Here Today and instrumental Wouldn't It Be Nice). I remember reading about this and walking a 16-mile round trip to the nearest record shop to order it (I was 17 at the time and could afford *either* the bus fare or the single but not both) and then making the same trip the week later to pick it up. Still got it, though (like a lot of my older records) the cover is smoke damaged from a fire 12 years ago, and not in great shape...

Not only was it an attempt to get a younger, indie crowd, but SubPop were also moving in a more baroque-pop direction at the time, with records like Eric Matthews' first solo album coming out around the same time. It was put out, if I remember rightly, through SubPop's "singles club", which had quite a few odd little releases like that, often from bands who weren't actually signed to SubPop itself.

[DonnyL]

I thought it was really cool at the time. I was trying in vein to get my teenage friends into the Beach Boys ... I had a little ammo. That was the beginning of the mainstream critical re-appraisal.  Then again, 'Stars & Stripes' came out around the same time, so you sure had a lot of explaining to do ...

[I. Spaceman]

That was the beginning of the mainstream critical re-appraisal. 

That happened as soon as Pet Sounds was issued on CD.

[PaulTMA]

Didn't SubPop go a bit Pete Tong for a while, around this time?

[TV Forces]

Six on eBay:

http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_trksid=p5197.m570.l1313&_nkw=beach+boys+sub+pop&_sacat=0

[DonnyL]

That was the beginning of the mainstream critical re-appraisal. 

That happened as soon as Pet Sounds was issued on CD.

not from where I was standing.

[I. Spaceman]

That was the beginning of the mainstream critical re-appraisal. 

That happened as soon as Pet Sounds was issued on CD.

not from where I was standing.

The entire reason the twofers, the GV box set and then the Pet Sounds box set were even considered is because the reappraisal had happened. Done and dusted. All that happened after that was that a bunch of annoying High Llamas and Weezer fans got into them.

[Ed Roach]

1996 was a helluva' year in Beach Boy/Brian days.  Ironically I just came across a program for The Wild Honey Pocket Symphony Orchestra concert, which was held in September of '96.  Seemed like the appreciation for Brian & The Boys was once again kicking into high gear, and it's only built up steam since!
(Was glad to be able to locate a link to info here:  http://members.tripod.com/~fun_fun_fun/9-13-96t.html )

[DonnyL]

That was the beginning of the mainstream critical re-appraisal. 

That happened as soon as Pet Sounds was issued on CD.

not from where I was standing.

The entire reason the twofers, the GV box set and then the Pet Sounds box set were even considered is because the reappraisal had happened. Done and dusted. All that happened after that was that a bunch of annoying High Llamas and Weezer fans got into them.

the twofers and '70s albums were all out of print by the mid-'90s. Pacific Ocean Blue had a 2-star rating is some $hitty Rolling Stone book. Stars and Stripes was chilling on the shelf. I saw the band in '96 and it was a low point i'm afraid. in my opinion, the ball got rolling soon after with the PS sessions box, Endless Harmony, then the '70s twofers and the reissues of the regular ones.

it was just a weird time. my basic point is if you said 'beach boys' to a random hip younger person, they blew you off. or in my case, thought i was some kind of freak. now, most hipsters at least know about Pet Sounds and Smile. Different world. Being into Smiley Smile, Friends and Pacific Ocean Blue was a solitary experience in high school in the mid-'90s.

just my observations from where i was at.

[Wirestone]

It's complicated. Things were different in the pre-web days, so people in different areas of the country had different perspectives.

All of the twofers and the Warners albums were indeed out of print in the mid-90s, and they were hard to find. Capitol reissued their albums all as single discs in 94 or so, and they were somewhat expensive, not in great quality and still tough to get.

From my perspective in the midwest, the real push came from the 93 box set (Smile tracks!), and the BW doc and BW/VDP project in 95. You had the latest emergence of the Brian Wilson-genius meme. That really seemed to be behind it if you asked me, especially the sub pop stuff. I remember when Don Was appeared on the "Fresh Air" show to promote IJWMFTT -- and he did it by himself! He and Terri Gross were just talking about Brian.

[DonnyL]

It's complicated. Things were different in the pre-web days, so people in different areas of the country had different perspectives.

All of the twofers and the Warners albums were indeed out of print in the mid-90s, and they were hard to find. Capitol reissued their albums all as single discs in 94 or so, and they were somewhat expensive, not in great quality and still tough to get.

From my perspective in the midwest, the real push came from the 93 box set (Smile tracks!), and the BW doc and BW/VDP project in 95. You had the latest emergence of the Brian Wilson-genius meme. That really seemed to be behind it if you asked me, especially the sub pop stuff. I remember when Don Was appeared on the "Fresh Air" show to promote IJWMFTT -- and he did it by himself! He and Terri Gross were just talking about Brian.

i agree with you. i was thinking about how there was no real internet presence, and how that may have affected things.

i remember these things happening, and feeling that something was building in the underground ... but it didn't really seem like a mainstream thing until after Endless Harmony and the PS box.

i remember seeing a review of 15 Big Ones/Love You in Maxim or something in 2000, and really feeling a sense of 'wow' !

[DonnyL]

1996 was a helluva' year in Beach Boy/Brian days.  Ironically I just came across a program for The Wild Honey Pocket Symphony Orchestra concert, which was held in September of '96.  Seemed like the appreciation for Brian & The Boys was once again kicking into high gear, and it's only built up steam since!
(Was glad to be able to locate a link to info here:  http://members.tripod.com/~fun_fun_fun/9-13-96t.html )

wow, that's cool. wish i knew about this stuff when it was happening !

[Mikie]

I was surprised to find recently that "I Just Wasn't Made for These Times" was once offered as a single on the indie label SubPop Records around the time of the Pet Sounds box. 

I picked a couple of these up in '96. Nice addition to the vinyl collection. Didn't have a working turntable to play it at the time. Around that time a couple of other Pet Sounds promo CD's came out with stereo tracks so I listened to those instead until the real box set came out the following year.


http://www.ebay.com/itm/Beach-Boys-Pet-Sounds-Sessions-Sampler-RARE-promo-CD-96-/230786298670?_trksid=p4340.m263&_trkparms=algo%3DSIC%26its%3DI%252BC%26itu%3DUCI%252BIA%252BUA%252BFICS%252BUFI%26otn%3D15%26pmod%3D360148239627%26ps%3D63%26clkid%3D1056526288705153656&_qi=RTM1062687


http://www.ebay.com/itm/BEACH-BOYS-Pet-Sounds-Sampler-CD-Rare-Promo-Box-Set-Sessions-Stereo-Mono-/390445706743?_trksid=p4340.m263&_trkparms=algo%3DSIC%26its%3DI%252BC%26itu%3DUCI%252BIA%252BUA%252BFICS%252BUFI%26otn%3D15%26pmod%3D360148239627%26ps%3D63%26clkid%3D1056546743088049944&_qi=RTM1062688

[MBE]

Cool sleeve on it. I wish they would have put alternate takes on it instead. Anyhow the 1994 Captiols were also vinyl and it's the only way to get an LP of Stack O Tracks on vinyl that isn't in fake stereo. Also the Pet Sounds has the three bonus songs. Too bad the other LP's didn't have the bonus stuff (the CD"s at the time didn't either) but they were a good way for me to improve condition wise on some of my used Capitol albums. They aren't the best pressings but really not too bad at all.

[Shane]

I'll never forget the time a few years back when I walked into an indie vinyl/CD store.  Front and center as you walked in the front door was a big cardboard display rack with nothing but dozens of CD copies of Pet Sounds.  I suddenly felt a lot less self-conscious about being a Beach Boys fan.  Brian's a genius, and the word was out!

[AndrewHickey]

In the UK, that reappraisal definitely started before the SubPop single I was 16 in 1995 when Mojo voted Pet Sounds the best album ever, and a regular reader of the music press. Before that, I'd seen nothing about the Beach Boys at all in the press. But that year I Just Wasn't Made For These Times and Orange Crate Art came out (and in Britain many of the twofers were still in print and selling quite well), and by the time I started university in September 1997 pretty much every indie band in the UK was publicly singing the praises of at least Pet Sounds, Smile and Friends. Over here, at least, Endless Harmony and the early-2000s CD reissues were a few years past the peak of interest, although Brian's 2002 tour and then Smile gave the band another boost.

[Peadar 'Big Dinner' O'Driscoll]

It's complicated. Things were different in the pre-web days, so people in different areas of the country had different perspectives.

All of the twofers and the Warners albums were indeed out of print in the mid-90s, and they were hard to find. Capitol reissued their albums all as single discs in 94 or so, and they were somewhat expensive, not in great quality and still tough to get.

I spent a summer in Holland in 1998 and rented all the post Capitol album cds from a library. Copied them all onto cassettes. Was so happy to find em, couldnt get them anywhere back then though Im sure there were vinyl copies around If I had thought about it.

Seemed to take an age for the post capitol twofers to be released. I remember ordering them from a company advertising them in the back of record collector before eventually getting a refund as their release was delayed by years I think.

[Steve Mayo]

That was the beginning of the mainstream critical re-appraisal. 

That happened as soon as Pet Sounds was issued on CD.

not from where I was standing.

The entire reason the twofers, the GV box set and then the Pet Sounds box set were even considered is because the reappraisal had happened. Done and dusted. All that happened after that was that a bunch of annoying High Llamas and Weezer fans got into them.

the twofers and '70s albums were all out of print by the mid-'90s. Pacific Ocean Blue had a 2-star rating is some $hitty Rolling Stone book. Stars and Stripes was chilling on the shelf. I saw the band in '96 and it was a low point i'm afraid. in my opinion, the ball got rolling soon after with the PS sessions box, Endless Harmony, then the '70s twofers and the reissues of the regular ones.

it was just a weird time. my basic point is if you said 'beach boys' to a random hip younger person, they blew you off. or in my case, thought i was some kind of freak. now, most hipsters at least know about Pet Sounds and Smile. Different world. Being into Smiley Smile, Friends and Pacific Ocean Blue was a solitary experience in high school in the mid-'90s.

just my observations from where i was at.

think what is was like for us that were in high school in 1970. now that was a ribbin' i'll never forget!

[Wah Wah Wah Ooooo]

When I was a teenager (mid-late 90s), my Beach Boys/Brian Wilson was incredibly unhip.  I just didn't resonate with the current music (though in recent years I've discovered a lot of music from the 90s that I enjoy).  It seemed that I was pretty much alone in my world in my appreciation for this music, as the band was seen mostly through a Full House/Stamos/Kokomo/Hawaiian Shirt kind of lens.   I have slowly watched with great joy as a lot of younger people starting embracing this music that I love in the late 90s-early 00s.  I think it's safe to say that the younger artists really showing their support and how this music influenced them has really bolstered the artistic reputation of Brian and the Boys in the last 10-12 years.

[AndrewHickey]

It seemed that I was pretty much alone in my world in my appreciation for this music, as the band was seen mostly through a Full House/Stamos/Kokomo/Hawaiian Shirt kind of lens.

Possibly it was slightly easier for the band to seem cool in the UK, because we didn't have Full House over here, and Kokomo wasn't a hit. The Status Quo collaboration was a definite misstep though