The Smiley Smile Message Board

This is something I've always been curious about.  Despite their similar recording circumstances...I've always heard a marked difference in songs produced by Phil Spector and Brian Wilson...two producers who are seemingling forever linked.  They were both working at the same time...in the same studios...with the same musicians...but (and you'll have to forgive my only passing knowledge of the recording process) Spector's songs sound so dense...almost to the point where they become a bit murky.  The definition between sounds becomes lost.  With Brian, it seems like he had a better understanding of how to use a lot of sounds...but to also allow enough "space" in-between to give the music a larger sound.  Wilson's songs leap out of the speakers...and Spector's sound tinny and a bit weak in comparison...almost like they belong to another generation.  This is meant to take nothing away from the songs Spector produced...because he produced some incredible songs...but I don't think he had the natural talent that Brian had.  Imagine what Wilson could have done with "Be My Baby"...oh wait...we do know and it's called "Don't Worry Baby".  Or compare Spector's "Then He Kissed Me" with Brian's "Then She Kissed Me".  I may be biased but I think Brian's version blows Spector's version out of the water.  There are obviously all just opinions...but I'd be curious to know what some of your more knowledgable guys think.  Am I full of it or not?

Agreed on all the sides, specifically with Brian being the better than Phil. And believe me it's not only your opinion.

We're on a Beach Boys board, so of course there's going to be a skew towards Brian. Although Brian admired Phil, and did try to emulate him I guess, I think his productions turned out wildly different and umcomparable. Spector had that dense sound you mentioned, I don't really get that in most of Brian's records. Don't Worry Baby doesn't have the wall of sound - Be My Baby certainly does. I don't think there is Spector's trademark sound anywhere on Pet Sounds - that's Brian's sound. The closest the Beach Boys came to copping Spector's ideas was probably San Miguel - and Brian wasn't even heavily involved there!

Their cover of "Why Do Fools Fall In Love" comes pretty close to the Spector sound.

I agree. Brian's productions sound better not only musically, but also on a technical level. The sound is clearer and more balanced. And yes, IMO even punchier. Spector's productions are so full blast all the time that it kinda loses meaning. Kinda like writing all caps all the time.

Then again, I know Brian's music from the latest remasters and Phil's from the old Back to Mono box, so Phil might have disadvantage because of that.

Spector had a lot of really good songs to work with, but I think he's a very overrated producer. The music that Brian Wilson, George Martin and the Motown people were producing around the same time sounds so much better.

Brian and Phil are both incredible, in different ways. I'll take both, choosing between them is silly.

Fooled by the castanets. There is no aural similarity between SM and Spector's recordings.  Dennis was likely talking about a party town for Americans in Mexico (SM de Allende), whereas  Phil, I think, purveyed an El Barrio, East Harlem vibe.

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I agree.  I guess I'm just curious about the difference in overal sound considering the similar creative circumstances: same time period...studios...musicians.  Brian obviously learned a lot from watching Spector work...and I think he took what he learned and applied his own "style" to it.  To me, again, it all comes down to space.  Brian allows enough space between sounds while I think sometimes Spector simply tried to cram too much into too small of a space.  That said...Spector's classic productions are incredible...and I think I may go listen to them right now!

My two favorite Spector stories: Spector hanging up on his west coast promo man, some dude named Sonny Bono, when Bono had the nerve to tell him that it was time to change the sound.  Thus, ended Bono's employ with his hero...but he'd obviously use what he learned to carve out his own spot in history.  The song, by the way, was "Walking In the Rain" which is a great song and production...but which was considered behind the times, I guess, and Bono had no luck gettting it played.  The other great story, of course, is Spector booting Brian from a session (for his reworked version of "Don't Hurt My Little Sister, I believe) because he thought Brian's piano skills were subpar (though I'd think that Spector probably had other motives for keeping Brian in his place).

Once upon a time, in my Hollywood days, I went to a garage sale. A young lady, who had been Phil's seceretary was selling some music items among other things. One of the things I bought was a cover proof of the UK Greatest Hits, the one with the bald guy and the ice cream cone. Phil had made some comments and notations on it. The one that stood out was, the comment with the line and arrow that lead from the margin to the ice cream cone that said, "What is this sh*t?"
She said she worked for him for a few years on the first floor of his house; she never acutally saw him. She told me that one day she came to the house early and Phil was behind the fridge door looking for something to drink or eat. Mr. Spector started screaming, "get out, get out.!" She gave him enought time to get back upstairs and started her work day.

My favorite Spector story is getting introduced to him by Nancy Sinatra at the Whisky. Seemed like a great guy to me! Who knew how his story was going to end up? What a shame.

Then there is the tale of Spector pulling a gun on the Ramones...a story that been both confirmed and denied.  Some real similarities with Wilson...both very gifted...yet both lost the plot at one point.  Maybe for Spector it was "River Deep, Mountain High" as it was with "Smile" for Brian.  I'm glad that Brian got it back.

I would say the primary production difference between Spector and Brian is how they expected the records to make their impact. Spector was obsessively focused on AM radio. So his basic idea was to have something that was so stunning coming out of a little transistor radio or a jukebox or a car radio that kids would just run out and buy the record. And selling the record was the be-all and end-all. He doesn't seem to have thought it mattered if the record was being played on a portable right out of Woolworth's or an expensive hi-fi.

(Though it should be remembered that once he started working with the ex-Beatles he was well aware of the requirements of FM and your state of the art hippie stereo system, and fine tuned the productions accordingly.)

By contrast, at least by Today, Brian seems have made it a point to make recordings that were effective on radio, or jukeboxes, or on your parents' stereo if they were out to dinner or the movies and you had access to it. Even when he was pursuing something as close to the Wall of Sound as TLGIOK he kept it in mind.

I agree re Spector's productions sounding murky. His production on Be My Baby (which is a terrfic song!) has always bugged me, in particular when the chorus kicks in for the third time after the instrumental break - the way the drums aren't there and then they rather clumsily kick in after the Ronettes are already singing, it takes all the oomph out of the song, it slows it right down. Brian's production on Don't Worry Baby is vastly superior.

you guys are confusing production with arranging. Brian did both, but Spector only produced. the songs were arranged by others, mainly Jack Nitzsche.

Good point!

Also a good point about Spector producing for AM radio. 

When Spector was on...he was on...even with the murky sound.  You can obviously tell that Brian picked up a lot from hanging around and watching Spector at work...because while we're discussing the differences...there are similarities, as well. 

In regards to "Be My Baby"...it's such a classic that it's hard to find fault in it...but after just listening to it I hear what you're talking about!

I like what Terry Melcher said about how Spector's songs sounded "angry",and I have to agree,they sound angry and loud while Brian sounded prettier and softer..

Hah!  I was thinking the same this morning!  Spector's songs DO soung angry!  Sadly, we all know how Phil ended up.  "He hit me...and it felt like a kiss..."

Basing this off Back To Mono is a mistake - the new Spector remasters sound bloody incredible.

I think Spector was a better producer for what he did - I'd be hard pushed to note a 'weak' production of his, rather than shitty song selection or something. I utterly adore the power he got out of the studio, and Brian never quite got to 'River Deep, Mountain High', which sounds like a jet taking off. But Brian is a far better and more varied musician and arranger than Spector.

To whit, a handy comparison of production technique. This is Don't Hurt My Little Sister, as produced by Phil.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jo_S8XNtCZY

I'll have to check them out!

Now that we are at it, has anyone thought how the golden era BB songs would have sounded if they were produced by Spector? In some cases the results would have been glorious (imagine: third attempt at Help me, Rhonda, produced by Spector. It would have been killer), but in most instances it wouldn't have worked. Individual voices and harmony intricacies would have gotten lost in the wall of sound.

And one more thing, I think Phil could have been an all-around guru like Brian, had he wanted to maybe (well, maybe not quite, but...) After all, he did write The Teddy Bears' To Know Her Is To Love Him. That's not a half bad first song by anyone's standards. I've always wondered why he didn't write more.

I don't think Spector had the arranging skill the Brian has.  He definitely would not have been able to arrange harmonies like Brian.  I'll also go back to the quote from Terry Melcher about Spector's productions being "mean" and I don't think that works with the Beach Boys.

He started out wanting to be a musician...but gave up when he realized he'd never be a world-class guitarist (he took lessons from some famous jazz session guitarist).  He just wanted to work in music and he came to the conclusion that with his attention to detail that production was where it was at.  He did receive writing credits on many of his songs...not sure what he added.  I've always thought that Brian really wanted to be more of a Spector figure...the guy behind the glass creating pocket symphonies for other musicians...not as the leader of a working band like he became.

Someone here, in the thread about what songs you wish the BB had covered, suggested what if The Ronettes, in 1966, had done Pet Sounds in its entirety with Spector producing, and that thought is...too exciting and tantalizing to handle. I can't really get that fantasy out of my mind since having read that a while back. What an amazing parallel universe scenario to dream about. It would be really odd and hard to get used to, sure, but i bet it would be spectacular and highly enjoyable nonetheless. 

I want to re-iterate what was said above, that Spector wasn't an arranger, and the Wall of Sound was in many respects a collaborative creation with Jack Nitzche, who first worked with Spector, to my knowledge, on He's a Rebel, which is, not concidentally, the first Philles record that really nails the wall of sound approach.  Spector was tireless at promoting his own legend, and taking credit away from others - for example, the song Unchained Melody, not originally intended as a single, was arranged by Bill Medley, a fact which Spector has flat out lied about over and over since it became such an enduring production. 

As a song writer, Spector really did contribute to all those songs, often just a bridge, but he was generally in the room as they were being written, and the songwriters he worked with tend to talk about those songs as genuine collaborations.  That said, he was working with some of the best songwriters in LA, and as a solo song-writer, he had a knack for melody but just couldnt get away from those cliches fifties style doo-wop chord progressions.   

Most important, to my mind, is that Phil Spector utterly failed to see that albums were the future of popular music.  In the mid 60s, Phil Spector was leaving song after song of truly spectacular material in the can, while generally refusing to produce whole albums.  The one time that Spector applied himself to a whole album, it was a christmas album - and even so, it became one of the most influential and enduring albums of all time, which is in and of itself enough to show that had he applied himself to creating albums the way Brian did beginning with, arguably, All Summer Long and Today, the results would have been breathtaking. 

Finally, I agree with most of the posters here that Brian was more talented, more original, more musical, and a better producer, not to mention that he also sang and arranged, neither of which Spector did, and he was one of the greatest songwriters of his generation, which Spector most certainly wasn't.  But still, I think Spector's influence is more prevelent, and his shadow greater on popular music.  Before 1962, there was nothing like the Wall of Sound in popular music.  Be My Baby, Christmas (Baby Please Come Home) and the other 1963 Spector hits are musical tour-de-forces which blow everything else on the radio at the time out of the water.  After Spector, and continuing into the present, the bombastic, wall of sound approach is  a huge part of popular music.  It defined the production styles of the 70s and 80s, and continues to profoundly color todays pop music.  They aren't using Spectors technique, but they are wall of sound productions in that the goal is to create intense, many-layered productions that leap off the radio start to finish.  Whether this would have happened without Spector is impossible to know, but the truth is, it happened, and Phil Spector's productions absolutely, in my opinion, revolutionized popular music in a way that Brian simply did not. 

Still.... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uKyIZ6h81CI

Surprised Brian didn't try that one for the Disney album.

Howard Roberts.