The Smiley Smile Message Board

back in 2002, when brian and band played their first of many glorious concerts at royal festival hall, "'til i die" was one of the first songs played. since then i have seen brian and band 24 times, 25 with c50, but no more live performances of "'til i die", one of THE masterpieces in the catalog. i am just wondering if it has been too difficult for brian to play it, given the loss of his two brothers.

They played it a few times on the Brian Wilson/Jeff Beck tour.

thanks, good to know. i realize it wasn't a hit and therefore might get lost in the set list shuffle, but i think i read somewhere that he found that song difficult to do live. still, i've seen him sing forever, and lay down burden, which he dedicated to carl.

Really? That's cool!

Mike & Bruce also played it in 2004 I believe

The Brian Wilson band played it 7/18/2000 (a good day! ) in Boston - found it on lastfm setlists.

Pet Sounds Tour. 

And I've heard Brian do it live several times.  The last fm seems a pretty good source, even if they "lift" setlists from other boards and "edit them" and then claim it as their "original" submission. 

Some of us were born "at night" but not "last night!"  ;)

Pretty sure Mike/Bruce were also playing it briefly around that time as well.

Here is the premier of Til I Die from last year's tour:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BN4QFDKgraU

This a good place for song played stats.

http://www.setlist.fm/stats/songs/the-beach-boys-3d6c17b.html?song='Til+I+Die

Beautiful! Thank you!

I was at that show.. goosebumps indeed.

I thought the sound was off when I was there, but now I notice Brian just forgot to sing the first verse. I wish it was played at the 50th shows as first time played. It's special when a reformed band breaks out a never played before gem.

see: Led Zeppeling "For Your Life" 02 Arena

Yes, it's one of my favorite things about any concert when a deep cut is played live for the first time like that.  Good mention of For Your Life. 

I saw David Byrne and St. Vincent last summer and they were playing mostly the same setlist for the entire show but for the show I went to, Byrne introduced a song they had never played live before.  We were all expecting just another cut from their collaborative album but they went into "Wild Wild Life" and the room went crazy.  In an homage to a scene in the film True Stories in which the song was featured, different members of the band rotated to sing a line of the song and they all just looked like they were having a blast.  Certainly not an obscure song, in fact one of the biggest hits Talking Heads had but Byrne had never played it live ever and on a tour where only three Talking Heads songs had been played, nobody was expecting it.  It was an awesome moment, probably one of my favorite concert experiences ever.

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I saw David Byrne and St. Vincent last summer and they were playing mostly the same setlist for the entire show but for the show I went to, Byrne introduced a song they had never played live before.  We were all expecting just another cut from their collaborative album but they went into "Wild Wild Life" and the room went crazy.  In an homage to a scene in the film True Stories in which the song was featured, different members of the band rotated to sing a line of the song and they all just looked like they were having a blast.  Certainly not an obscure song, in fact one of the biggest hits Talking Heads had but Byrne had never played it live ever and on a tour where only three Talking Heads songs had been played, nobody was expecting it.  It was an awesome moment, probably one of my favorite concert experiences ever.
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seriously, that would've been amazing to see. as a huge Talking Heads fan that would be just awesome. they had stopped touring before True Lies, right?

Did GoogaMooga just say that he saw the C50 tour 25 times?!? Wow.  :o

I really hope Brian adds this to his regular setlist - if all goes well I'll be seeing him on his next tour...and since this is my favorite song, I sure would like to hear it in concert :angel:

It's a brilliant song but I imagine it might not feel too comfortable singing it when you're over 70.

Anyway, judging from the footage at least Alan's really into it.

Seems these days Al does everything he can to be a good performer...bless him for it, cause his voice has really held up well.

Interestingly (to me anyway, probably not much anyone else), we've had very few chances to see Al on stage singing this song (and a few others). The touring BB's never did while he was in the band. Brian had in the setlist when Al wasn't with him. Mike's band has done the song on occasion in more recent years, obviously without Al. Al hasn't put the song into any of his own setlists as far as I know. It wasn't done during C50. So the only time he has sang the song on stage has been the hand full of times he's performed it with Brian.

That's why I really hoped they would work "Surf's Up" into the C50 setlist (with Scott Totten singing, or Brian, or whoever), even to just hear Al sing his bit at the end. I did get to see Al with Brian's band backing Jeff Beck up on the song last year. That was a nice one.

I loved the Smile tour, but I always felt a tinge of disappointment when they started the Smile part of the show with about 10 seconds of Stephen Desper's re-edit of 'Til I Die, and then didn't go further with that song.

As far as I know, that was just a way to get all the singers in the right key to start "Our Prayer." I don't think it was meant to be "'Til I Die."

I doubt that made it any less tantalizing  8)