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Ok, so obviously not a genuine twofer, but I'm curious to know which of these killer LPs from '77 the board rates higher. I reckon this poll might be the toughest yet ...

abstaining.

Pacific Ocean Blue. By leaps and bounds.

wat

POB over Love You by the length of the (Pacific) Ocean.

No contest POB by miles. An epic feast vs a home made snack. Love You is really cool, and incredibly original, not to mention completely absurd. I love it. But compared to POB it sounds like amateur hour. Its like a unconventionally attractive girl with an oddly unique personality vs a wet-dream sex-bomb tear your soul out passion orgy. I'll take the latter.

Love You has a select few great moments, but one of them is from 1970 and I just don't get the appeal of most of it. POB on the other hand is an amazing piece of work that stands alone from the Beach Boys or anyone.

Not a fan of Dennis' vocals post-60s (with some exceptions). By default, Love You for me.

Awesome summary of both LPs, Jon.  :3d

The dense synthesized counterpoint of Love You is, in my book, just as innovative and engaging as the arrangements of Pet Sounds -- I can never get to the bottom of it.  POB is marked by interesting layers, on top of a band that really cooks, but musically, just doesn't compare.

The wacky vision of Love You on the whole pales in comparison to the soul-baring of POB, but, what can I say, the trilogy of "Night was so Young" "Bet He's Nice" and "Let's Put Our Hearts Together" moves me a whole lot more.  I've been there.  I've never been a Dennis Wilson.

I do love POB but I find it a touch overwrought.  Dennis is really trying for something big.  I can feel the strain.  Love You is effortlessly brilliant.

This poll is unfair, too tough! But, I must follow my heart and choose Love You... But POB is just as good.

I still recall quite vividly purchasing LOVE YOU in April, 1977 and feeling like the album was makeshift and largely uninspired apart from a few shining moments. Four months later I brought POB home and immediately thought that this was the album the Beach Boys needed to make. I hoped that the whole band would deliver an album of similar quality the next time out. Little did I know that it would be the 21st century before Brian and the Beach Boys would put out something that rivaled the quality of POB.

I can't put it any better than Jon Stebbins already has. Love You is a fun, eccentric treat, but POB deserves to win this one by a considerable mile (though i suspect it's going to be a close run...)

That's Why God Made The Radio rivals the quality of POB? No, no, no. It's a nice album - half good-great, half poor-very bad - but it deserves to rank even further behind POB than Love You.

Brilliantly put. There is something endlessly compelling about the sparsity of the production on Love You. I think it really comes into its own on the second side. Solar System through to Airplane is one of the most satisfying runs for me of any BB record. You can definitely hear that this is the same guy that gave us Pet Sounds, although this is Pet Sounds via Wendy Carlos. With the exception of Good Time, I think LY hangs together much better than many other BB albums.

I love POB. I love the cohesiveness of the songs and the sheer depth of emotion and sadness that he expresses in so many of the songs. I think it's such a shame that Dennis couldn't take or didn't want more control of the direction of the group at this point as POB is a much more impressive and mature album than Love You. But Love You is more fun for me.

Actually, I was thinking that TLOS and the Gershwin album were the ones that rivaled POB (which is why I mentioned Brian's name separate from the Beach Boys). About half of TWGMTR rivals POB (the good half, of course!). My point was that nobody in the band came close to delivering material as good as POB for thirty years (remember, LOVE YOU was released prior to POB).

In that case, you're quite right (although i'd argue there's only 3 - arguably 4 - songs on TWGMTR that can seriously be said to rival any of POB).

It's been said before and i'll say it again, if Brian had delivered a song such as River Song, Moonshine or Thoughts of You in '76, we'd all be endlessly discussing how staggeringly amazing it was! There is an undeniable tendency amongst many BB fans to slavishly praise anything and everything by Brian, regardless of quality, and to under-play the contributions of the other band members.

What's the best track on POB?

River Song.

Truer words were never spoken.

I think it's "You and I."

I prefer Love You.

POB should not, by any means, be associated with the likes of Love You. It is an insult to a great album and DW.

My obsession with the Beach Boys was kicked into high gear by POB. Love You nearly killed it. I want POB to be the last thing I ever listen to before I die. I will probably never listen to Love You start to finish ever again.

I voted for Pacific Ocean Blue.

I don't understand how one can be a Beach Boys fan and dislike Love You?  I didn't even realize there were people on this forum didn't like it until today.

It is a close vote at this point, and Brian loyalists can't really be blamed for that. There are some great tunes on Love You that would be even greater if they had been given a fuller arrangement; there are some great tunes that attain that state due to the zany "meta-DIY" approach taken with them.

These have tended to become systematically overrated, however, via the need for a narrative about Brian that elevates the craziness and chaos that he and the band exhibited in the wake of their improbably massive 1974-76 revival. All of that was sad, because in another scenario they could have been something much more than how it turned out. We can thank that chaos for giving us Love You, which subverts so much--but the two or three LPs that might well have followed Holland, works that could have allowed the BBs to have their artistic/commercial cake and eat it too--were rendered stillborn as a result.

POB is unique in the BB extended oeuvre (pardon my French) in that it genuinely straddles the best parts of the band's aesthetic AND overlays something entirely different--something unprecedented and otherwise absent. Yes, it's a bit overwrought in places, but I'm down with Jon S. in stating that it is a masterpiece. Dennis' voice is sometimes a tough thing to love, to be sure, but the songs and production are stellar. It really rewards the listener who becomes intimate with it. I like Love You, but I love POB.

I gave it to Love You but only because it just sounds like nothing else. Neither does Pacific Ocean Blue, but Love You sounds....weirder. I could never tire of either one, though.

POB. No contest. It does lag at times but it's high points (of which there are many) rate as high as anything the Beach Boys have ever done.

'Love You' is more fun and I can listen to it anytime, while 'POB' needs a certain mood to fully be appreciated.

But overall, Dennis' solo album is stronger and more complete.

I love almost every song that Dennis ever wrote for The Beach Boys. The POB LP (before it was reissued) was #1 on my wantlist for years. So this is an album that I really should like. And an album that I want to like. But I just can't get into it. IMO, River Song and Farewell My Friend are the only songs that are up there with his best Beach Boys songs.

So it's The Beach Boys Love You for me.

Love You - is f--kin' cool

But, POB - is f--kin ' SPECTACULAR

Of course it's apples vs oranges

Love You
is made with very intelectual understanding of chords and arrangements, all that magic inside the notes, Brian's style. Yet the production is very basic and raw (and saved, sweetened by Carl Wilson's post production)
I have a theory that Brian wanted to write a whole lp with 'wrong' parallel 5ths,  the last 'wrong' song LIAW is a very good example of these 5ths, gruff vocals on purpose etc. During this free creative process, he gets more serious and the final results are original and magic nonetheless. Musicians can learn from it for ages! example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2IjSHK5QL1A

POB
is a great production. Compared to LY, LY sounds like a demo.
This music is more from the heart than intellectual. The music flows free, and has not always strict measures. If LY is a delicious miniature stamp, POB tries to be a very large romantic painting. It's  like Mozart vs Wagner, apples vs oranges!


I think POB is by far a better production, but Love You is more interesting.

The lyrics, the farting synths (despite their charm) and some really lame songs kill Love You for me. Granted, I really enjoy Good Time, I'll Bet He's Nice and Ding Dang's very fun. Don't get me wrong, I really love the album but those are somethings that let it down.

POB on the other hand is just fantastic. With the glorious River Song, the rocking sound of What's Wrong, the mysterious Moonshine, the beautiful Thoughts Of You, the simply fantastic You And I (my favourite song on the album), the upbeat greatness of Pacific Ocean Blues and the saddening Farewell My Friend and End Of The Show. It's just a far more superior album with great lyrics, a great sound, no farts and fantastic instrumentation.

"ALL THINGS THAT LIVE ONE DAY MAY MUST DIE, YOU KNOW?"

To me, POB is a much better album. But I prefer Love You for its quirkiness. I could make the same comparison between Holland and Friends. As for That's Why God Made the Radio, no its not up to par with POB, but its up to par with the LALA.

POB should be winning this one by a far greater percentage than it actually is. Disappointed. It's just so blatantly the superior album (but then I like Beach Boys 85 so what do i know...)

I'm not voting AGAINST POB, just FOR Love You. :police:

Pacific Ocean Blue is the first and best BB solo album. For me personally, there isn't even a close second. One of the main reasons is because that album IS Dennis, whereas most of the other BB solo albums are anything but solo albums.

That being said, I give the edge to Love You because it has that goofy, fun side and Brian was able to come up with some top-flight post-age 30 rock and roll. While I adore Dennis' ballads (he was a master at them), POB can come off as too maudlin or too melancholy. As much as Dennis had that wild, aggressive side to his personality, it didn't manifest itself in his attempts at rock and roll. His "fast" tunes are OK, but they don't have the same effect as his slower stuff, for me anyway. Love You does successfully cover BOTH sides.

POB hands-down for me.  Love You is an interesting curio but it's closet-listening and too easy to hit 'skip' throughout - POB I can actually play at a party and sway listeners to its charms.

Or, more accurately, what are the two songs on the album that are actually good?

Erm... River Song, Moonshine, Friday Night, Thoughts Of You, Time, You & I, the title track, Farewell My Friend, Rainbows - there's 9 pretty fantastic songs right there, mate! Even the three i've not included, which are my least favourites, are still blatantly not bad songs by any estimation. I could however quite easily name you several bad songs from Love You...

I'll say POB. That is a master work. LY is just a very enjoyable album, but objectively not as good, in any manner, as POB.

I love Dennis' work but this poll is a no-brainer if there ever was one... Love You all the way! Perhaps my favorite pop record by anyone. It sure has its flaws (lots of them actually!), but like its own creator once famously said, it just hits the spot. The pleasure, the pain, and the Moog!

I Love "Love you" but "POB" is IMO a far better album,better production,better lyrics and sung with more passion and pain,I mean there's nothing on Love You that is as heart felt as "Thoughts of you" and "you and I"..

Love You is in my Top 5 albums of all time, so easily that one for me.

I'll take the former, haha! Both in metaphor and in actuality. I don't think, in any of these threads, that I have voted for the winning album.

100 percent agree. I will say Honkin' and Airplane were far better live (at least when Brian was in half decent voice on the latter or not at the show).

Seconded.

Love You is what I'd put on before going out for the night, singing along to Mona and Johnny Carson and laughing through I Wanna Pick You Up and Solar System.

Then I'd get home, turn the lights down, get myself a drink and dig out the 2LP POB set and just listen to one man opening up to whoever is listening.

Two records for two different moods but I tend to put Love You on more than POB so my vote is for Love You

Now I'm gonna preface this by saying I really like Dennis and his music a lot, but with that I gotta say that I do get a certain nauseous feeling from his "super romantic" material like "Make It Good", "Cuddle Up", "Barbara", "You and I", and a lot of Carli Munoz written material.

I read one time about how Elvis Costello called a certain type of music based on the sentiment "f*** me I'm so sensitive"'. And some of Dennis' music seemed to be more about presenting some type of super romantic sensitivity than having any kind of substantial message. It was very meandering, and only when he finally put his romantic side more into focus did it truly come together in my opinion, on cuts like "Baby Blue" and "Love Surrounds Me", which I think are commercial yet emotional.

But even before those, when truly inspired he did some great stuff. "River Song", "Tug of Love", "Steamboat", and "Pacific Ocean Blues" are all great tunes.

Oh yeah, I'll take Love You. For the reason that Brian didn't try quite so hard as Dennis.

And I don't understand the obsession with some people to make The Beach Boys "cool". They are who they are. They made more good music than nearly any other group I can think of, but still people have to make an excuse for them. Shame.

The Beach Boys' uncoolness is what made them cool. Same with ABBA, Carpenters, etc.

I love most of Dennis's songs in the period from Friends through Holland.  But I haven't been able to get into POB deeply -- though I intend to try again.   A lot of my favorite LPs have worked that way ("Pet Sounds" and "Forever Changes" to name two took years) and I've only owned POB for about a year and a half now.  But sometimes I find Dennis's overwrought vocals off-putting, and though I hear interesting things going on musically even brain-fried Brian on "Love You" has loads more hooks and I'm a hooky kind of guy.   Also, I prefer the catharsis of a "Let's Put Our Hearts Together" to Dennis just spilling it all over the place.  But again I will admit I need to give POB another shot -- it's on the docket now.

Both top-notch albums, but as a proud Dennis Fan and the fact it's a masterpiece and one of the greatest albums ever made, and one of the few albums that are equal to or greater than fucking Pet Sounds, Pacific Ocean Blue!!!!!!!!!!

Love You, because as good as POB is I find myself listening to tracks off of LY a lot more.

PACIFIC OCEAN BLUE no doubt about it  :listening

With all these new votes for POB, how the hell is Love You still ahead by one vote?!

I wonder if it was Pet Sounds vs Party, Party would be ahead by one vote too  ::) hmm

I voted Love You.
It's a wonderful, quirky record.

I've tried to like POB, but I just can't find myself really getting into it.
However, I do like both "River Song" and "Pacific Ocean Blues."


That isn't even remotely similar.

Vote for POB, then at least it would be a tie!

And as I said on Today's Mainstream Music, Love You is still a great album, and Party! is awful.
It would be more appropriate to compare Love You with Smiley Smile.


That part I agree with.

I was being sarcastic  :lol but you guys are right

I love Love You, but POB takes it easily for me.

As much as I do love Love You, POB definitely takes the cake; it's nothing short of a masterpiece.

Pacific Ocean Blue is a wonderful record but doesn't hold a candle to Love You - the latter is possibly my favourite Beach Boys release; certainly the one I listen to most. There's never been time where I've felt burned out by Love You,  something I can't say is the same for any other Beach Boys related record.

The magnificent POB gets my vote. Like Friends, Love You is an album I fail to "get". Perhaps I need to work on both...

Pacific Ocean Blue because of River Song. It's that great of a song.

 Pacific Ocean Blue over Love You. For all the group's problems during this era, fans got two very good albums in 77.

I like three songs on Pacific Ocean Blue and I like fourteen songs on Love You, so I vote for Love You.

i just like Brian's style of music so much more than Dennis's. I give up on pointing out what I perceive as the fault's of Dennis's songwriting. I don't like POB very much, but Love You is one of my favorites.

It's a crime to compare these two. I can't vote.

I love both, but no contest. Love You got my vote.  Love You is one of my most played Beach Boys' albums.

As much as I love POB, my vote goes to Love You.


But as others have already pointed out, comparing these two directly really is absurd. If it weren't another dumb poll thread, anyway. :)

I voted for Love You and it looks like I tied it up