The Smiley Smile Message Board

Just curious if Mike has ever spoken about this song? we all know how how truly incredible it is, arguably his great composition..

I remember being shocked it wasn't included on the "Warmth of the sun" compilation since the whole band got together and chose songs for the album, also it's was never done live during the Mike and Bruce tours and now the 50th reunion..

It must be because he thinks he can't sing it live, has it ever been done live?

Loaded question  ;D

What kind of processing is used on the lead vocal?  In fact, all the vocals sound processed.  Maybe that's why, because it's more of a record production and perhaps he doesn't think it would work as a live song.  It's also really slow.  Mike likes the up tempo numbers for himself.

It was on a commercially unsuccessful album. For that reason alone, Mike might not like it now. He's always emphasised how important commercial success is to him.

Tragic

Yeah, but they do "Add Some Music" and sometimes "This Whole World" from SF in their sets now.  I'm sure those were at Brian's request, but Mike gave approval.  Since they already do as many as two songs from the same non-hit album that may be more than enough.

Are you saying Brian was not involved in writing the song?  The official credits do read "Wilson/Love" - is that inaccurate?  If so, what is the source of that information?

I have seen similar assertions about "Meant for You" - that it is solely a Mike composition, even though Brian's name is on the credit.

AGD's book has no information suggesting that Mike was the sole author of either song.

If they did All I Wanna Do, Foskett would have to sing it!

They put Our Sweet Love on Summer Love Songs, so the commercial success thing falls apart. I'm sure Mike had a hand in choosing the tracks for that compilation.

Not sure about all of those, but certainly "Let the Wind Blow" is an example of something like that. Mike wrote the song on his own, then brought it to Brian, who revised it. The revisions then get Brian a co-writing credit.

He doesn't like it because of the racy lyrics and dirty sex sounds.



































 ;D

Mike could write  some good music in brief spurts.  His vocal bass lines were musical hooks in some songs such as the "Get around, round" bit and "I'm picking up good vibrations, she's giving me excitations."  A lot of people couldn't come up with things that good as variant riffs on main themes, let alone people with almost no musical training like Mike.  I mean, the lines are brief, and it's only couple of songs, and his BB songs where he was believed to have written chords or melody in near-entirety are few, but pretty good.  

Would love to more about the genesis and production of this song too.  It's gorgeous, and pretty much no other Beach Boys song sounds like it.  I would love to know where those proto-shoegaze dreamy keyboard sounds came from.

Also the great descending bassline in the bridge...I've always thought of those chromatic basslines as being quintessential Brian touches, but one of the other big ones is "Let the Wind Blow", another Mike song.  Pretty sure Mike didn't come up with the Surf's Up coda bassline though...

Counting Forever, they do three songs from Sunflower.  Add in Cottonfields and they do four from the British release of the album. 

The Beach Boys were considered uncool by so many people in the US in 1970 that it is no wonder that Sunflower fared poorly on the charts back then.  But great music endures and Sunflower is now considered one of the band's finest achievements.  Had Crosby, Stills, and Nash (with or without Young) released Sunflower in 1970 it would have gone to number one.  They were considered cool back then, but unfortunately a ton of people in the US deemed the Beach Boys irrelevant and passé, mainly because of their old car and surf songs.

I love the song.

But can't help noticing that loving it has become as fashionable as hating Jeff Foskett.

This song has always been a favorite of mine. I really thought it had a good chance of being performed on this tour since it's a bit obscure (to the average joe) and a Mike lead vocal.

I think the vocal effect is a Dolby Stretch - where you record with the Dolby noise reduction encoding ON then play back with the encoding OFF - you get this kind of hyper-bright compression which is pretty extreme and kind of beautiful. I've sometimes used a similar effect with tascam noise reduction too. Sounds spooky and cool...

Not sure about that. In '73 (Hampton roads?) Mike introduced the song as a prayer Brian put music to.

No, he was thinking of making a joke. *whoosh*

Whoops. Missed the smiley.

 :-[

Tape delay and mild phasing, also some Moog widgetry. SWD could give us chapter & verse. I'll dig out his book.

BTW, you should hear this over 4 channels.  :o  :thud :brian

I wonder what'd it be if AIWD was sung by Bruce? I'm dying to hear that! In my book he'd be good! [ :tiptoe and flees from others...]

Wish he'd reprint that book, I'm dying to read it.

Don't you EVER question the Desper.

But seriously, I'd love to get a copy as well. Mr. Desper, if you're reading, you've got another sale here for whatever it's worth.

When Mike writes a song, what does he write it on? Piano? Guitar? Sax? Tambourine?

he tunes the bass after Brian played Back Home on that 1977 live vid. I guess he watched Brian compose on piano so many times that he did it that way. Same story with Dennis.

Years ago Desper explained on another board that the keyboard from the intro was not a Mellotron or Chamberlin -like many of us thought- but a processed Rhodes

Yeah i've thought about creating a thread to talk about this the other day, what did he wrote on which songs, cause i don't know much about his parts except for the lyrics he's famous for, so does he comes up with melodies? i know he does, he did that Brian's Back song.. but as for the instruments??

The tunes that lead singers of bands usually write are ones where the guitarist/pianist finds the chords that naturally fall behind the vocal melody. If Mike sang the vocal melody of All I Wanna Do acapella, you'd find most of the chords by just following his notes.

True, but Mike knows how to play basic chords on the piano. Desper said it on this board a couple of years ago.

OK, then he found the chords to go along with his vocal melody.

I sort of wish they'd do this song instead of Kokomo. I thought Kokomo was sort of slow and plodding at the show I went to--it really failed to take off like it should have.

Yeah, but there are people waiting in the crowd to hear that song.  Mike is right about that.  The soccer moms would want his head on a platter if they didn't do Kokomo.  It's bad enough those soccer moms don't get Stamos at every show.

I think everyone onstage dislikes it except Mike ...

Best song EVER!!!!

....and Brian

All 4, at the same time.