The Smiley Smile Message Board

I worked with Brian on the ‘Smile’ project. So it was really very nice and companionable. And now The Beach Boys are bringing ‘Smile’ out themselves, the originals. It's a big deal! I held a prototype of the packaging: it's amazing, like a Fabergé egg. Now that nobody can sell a record, you notice how high end it's gotten?

Did it amuse you at all, the legendary status ‘Smile’ attained in the years afterwards? It became the holy grail, the great lost album...
(Laughs) I know! I think that’s a good thing and I take no possession of that. I do ‘Heroes and Villains’ in the show, of course – I do it entirely differently from the way that the Beach Boys would do it. It’s a good song, but all that music that they’re finally releasing – it takes up three LPs, that's a lot of music – enjoys its status, I think, because it's born of a certain innocence and exuberance. I think it's empowering. And it's total technicolour, widescreen technicolour and cartoon consciousness. Maybe there's a brand of courage there, a derring-do. So yes, I learned from whatever mistakes I made. They have an expression in Japan that “the nail that sticks out gets hammered down,” and ‘Smile’ was like that. It was like a rusty nail sticking out. That’s the inconvenient truth, as Al Gore would've called it. I think its status is a product of public imagination more than anything else and I'm delighted to share that moment.

Apologies if this has been posted elsewhere...

Highlights...



Read more: http://www.thisisfakediy.co.uk/articles/interviews/van-dyke-parks-stuff-just-happened-to-me.-i-was-a-fortunate-brunette#ixzz1MidYfkVH

… it (SMiLE)takes up three LPs, that's a lot of music…