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Title: Brian Wilson's Smile vs. Beach Boys Smile Sessions (from Consequence of Sound) Post by: Rocky Raccoon on September 27, 2014, 08:40:12 AM http://consequenceofsound.net/2014/09/brian-wilsons-smile-vs-the-beach-boys-the-smile-sessions/
Can't believe it's been ten years already! Title: Re: Brian Wilson's Smile vs. Beach Boys Smile Sessions (from Consequence of Sound) Post by: the captain on September 27, 2014, 08:55:38 AM Hmm.
Fun exercise and obviously something done by someone or other on this board pretty much all the time. The writer makes what I consider fundamental errors, though. He says the song "Surf's Up" appears on BWPS is "in its full [suite] form for the first time." But while there are themes linking assorted parts of Smile's music, we can't say that the BWPS "Surf's Up" suite was originally intended to be presented that way. (I think the lack of any actual plan is as likely as anything else. Or rather, settling on any given plan.) He lets 40 years of legend inform his listening of the original recordings, saying BWPS's "over and over the crow..." lines lack "the anger and befuddlement" in Love's original performance. Pure projection. Finally, the subhead asks which of the two (BWPS or TSS) is "the real deal." The answer, if by "real deal" one means the definitive recording of Smile as originally intended, is obviously neither. There is no such thing and never can be. BWPS can't help but be influenced by the time that passed between the original sessions (at which point there was no final Smile, only components), to say nothing of the fact that it was part re-creation and part creation. And TSS is, as noted before, not a finished product. You can't go back to finish the originals, and you can't assemble something as it would have been assembled when its creators seem not to have had a consistently agreed upon plan for assembly. We're left with two interesting and enjoyable and sometimes brilliant products, neither of which is "the real deal." |