The Smiley Smile Message Board

Don't get me wrong I like seeing him in the recording studio but it seems that they want to JUST film him in the recording studio for his music videos, they did that with this new song as well as "TWGMTR" video. I would like to see more videos (of course) but not JUST him in the recording studio... it would be nice to see a "darker" video akin to Johnny Cash's video "Hurt", that video blew a lot of people away, and now that Brian has a song called the "last song", I think that a darker video makes sense. Here's an idea I want to throw out there as a possible idea for a video for "last song". How about this: basically Brian is walking along the beach contemplating about his life and we see his various facial expressions some happy some sad, he sits down and looks out into the ocean and takes in it's beauty looking at the sunset breathing in, still contemplating. using various footage of him throughout his life (with the robe and beard, the early years etc) fading in and out as if he's thinking about it, including footage of Dennis and Carl and his dad, real brief but intense footage then the song ends as the sun sets with Brian walking towards the ocean slowly. he doesn't actually go into the water because the video ends just before he makes it there, so that the viewer can use his own imagination as to where he goes and what he does after that point.. the whole idea isn't that he Drowns or something stupid like that but that he goes into the ocean just as the sun goes down as symbolism for the end of the "Beach boys"..at least with Brian... film it in black and white and make it as intense as possible and it will reach a lot of people the way that JC "Hurt" did.. it will win awards and all that other cool stuff...but it has to be done right and intense..

there should also be two cops who force Brian to go surfing.  :police:

The music video age has sorta died, no? Some bands still make 'music videos' but I don't think it's a priority like it was during 1982-1989.

They do! Lazy filmlook filter alone won't cut it. Can't we get an appropriately elegant video for "The Last Song" - hell, I'll do it. Someone buy some 16mm or Super-8.

They need good coverage of the tour, raw and without studio vocal tracks edited in.

They should've done that already with Summer's Gone, but for some crazy reason didn't.

well I was kind of thinking of a darker version of that skit. but without the cops...lol..

Crazy reason = Oppositon from the group.

Well, there's still that video to "On the Island" to come... hopefully they'll have the sense to get something on youtube for "Saturday Night" as well.

A good video can still be important, but for different reasons - it's all about YouTube and social media shares now.

The video is nice to see as is...but only for FANS.  For the public in general it's WTF is THIS?  Who are these old farts?  Someone said videos aren't as important anymore.  They're not.  MTV doesn't use 'em anywhere near the way they used to.  Much Music in Canada?  Same.  Sports shows don't use 'em for filler to the same degree.  They had their day.  They're OLD.  Finished.  Now?  Video needs to be informative...or slides. 

Now if radio ever figures out that TV isn't playing videos [or the music made specifically for TV videos anymore]...then radio MIGHT go back 25 years and START to play music made for RADIO...ie:  ears...instead of music made for TV...ie:  eyes.

In the meantime...Old guys aren't gonna sell kids music.  Only the MUSIC can do that.

I don't want to sound grumpy or anything, because I'm not in the slightest. But, simply put, the BB's have never come across as not awkward on film/video outside of concert videos (and even then, sometimes!).

Brian's "camera smile" that he does on for TV/film has always struck me as bizarre and awkward. He's just not the personality type that translates well on film, at least in any format along the lines of a "music video."

Get Brian playing a piano, or in some cases comfortable in an interview (e.g. something like the IJWMFTT documentary), and he comes across okay.

But anything that is "staged" (whether staged miming or actual acting) usually is awkward and awful. Sometimes awful to the point of being awesomely hilarious (e.g. Brian singing "Night Time" on Dick Clark's show).

Exactly! Fans make videos now, not Steven Speilberg. Youtube is the new MTV.

Like said, it's all about youtube and social media. If you want a hit song, you got to have a video, even though MTV isn't the same anymore. People don't share songs if they don't have cool videos. If people don't share them, they don't get views. If they don't get views, less and less people buy the songs. Simple as that.

So what you're saying is that NONE of those songs on you toob...the ones with just slides and stuff get shared?  That a good song doesn't get shared?  Just good videos?  Well then screw youtoob.  I've been wasting my time there watching ALL of the wrong stuff.

Well at least there's no need for sound or speakers then.

I think we can easily split the baby on this one:

First off videos are just as important today as they were in the eighties and part of me can't believe I'm making that statement but after thinking about it logically, I've come to realize that it's true.  You Tube is the new MTV and is one of the mediums that most young people today use to share information with one another.  Therefore if you are a modern artist hoping to sell an album, you need a music video on YouTube just as back in the eighties you needed to be on MTV.  The YouTube video serves much the same purpose as the the old MTV video did back in the eighties.  It serves as a taster where fans can hear a record for free and if they like what they hear (or see) can go and purchase the single (or nowadays mp3).  It's still as much of a vital part of the process as it ever was for the modern artist.  That being said, MTV gave up the ghost long ago on the viability of television being a legitimate avenue to promote music videos because more young people today are plugged into their devices than they are watching a standard television channel.  Modern artists in turn realized that YouTube is the new MTV and if you want eyes to reach you product, you put it where your audience can access it digitally. 

Brian Wilson obviously does not fit into this category and probably doesn't need to make music videos to sell his product.  Many of his contemporaries no longer make them because there really is no major outlet for the rock music video anymore because the platform for the demographic they are trying to hit has become extremely marginalized.  The assumption is right or wrong that baby boomers and to some degree Generation Xers are not very computer savvy and therefore do not spend much time on the internet.  Therefore they are less likely to crawl YouTube and look for music by their favorite artists on there.  So there is no reason for vintage acts to really engage YouTube as a legitimate platform to market their music. 

So this all being said it's ridiculous for Brian Wilson to pour boffo dollars into producing top shelf music videos when the payoff just isn't there anymore for artists of his generation.  I understand as fans we might crave something a little more artistically inclined than the "lyric video" or the "studio footage video" but in reality there just isn't a payoff there anymore for Brian Wilson and many of his contemporaries.  

Music. Is all.

Well Brian doesn't have to try to be an actor.  Like in his brief appearance for the BBC video for "God Only Knows", they just had Brian sit at the piano and lip-sync while cool stuff happens around him. http://youtu.be/XqLTe8h0-jo?t=55s

I have to agree and this is all the more disappointing since the Beach Boys have such a rich history of making great music videos.  There was a time period when the group was really at the forefront of raising the bar of the music video as an art form with a string of successes (Getcha Back, Wipeout, Problem Child, Crocodile Rock, Hot Fun in the Summertime...)  

The Carl and the Passions era lineup made a couple of really cool looking though simple pre-MTV videos.

"You Need a Mess of Help to Stand Alone" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-t8xU1_Hqhc
"Don't Go Near the Water" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vRi9S5IX9WA

Any awkwardness is certainly minimized when Brian's appearance is kept to a minimum I suppose. But at the point at which we're calling for some auteur director to do something marvelous and then give Brian a cameo, what's the point?

I'm happy with Capitol or Brian's management putting together stuff to get him on YouTube and gets listens and hits. The lyric videos are ridiculous to me, but if they get people to listen, I'm fine. But the BB's and Brian do not, with some scattered exceptions, gel well with film or video outside of capturing raw documentary/musical stuff like real studio sessions (not staged) or live shows. Dennis was an exception I think, but to the degree he "filmed" well ("Two Lane Blacktop", etc.), it was more an innate, natural thing he had than great acting or "posing."

Interesting but I don't agree...what it seems to capture is a certain unrehearsed candor, and ease, and less staged and false.  It emotes a certain happiness with the work, and those who love their work, always do it at their best.  It brings the fan right into the studio, with Brian giving direction, Al goofing with Brian, and the musicians relaxed...

Those are the best.  Posing for this kind of video just might not work as well.  They are inviting us right into the studio.  I like it.  ;)

I always thought the Love and Mercy clip from 1988 was weird, definitely a missed opportunity for Brian's lead single back then. Ten years later the clips for Your Imagination and Lay Down Burden were quite suited to the songs.

Music videos serve a purpose... first of all, they're pretty much extinct now, but when they were in their hay day , 1982-2002 or so, they had a purpose.

Almost every music video made you either want to be the artist, or be with the artist.  At least the good ones.  When you saw Dire Straits doing "Money For Nothin'" you thought, "Hey!  That's me!  Working in this stupid job and these Rock Stars get money for nothin!".  When you saw Madonna the girls wanted to be as free as her and the guys didn't watch the video.  When you saw Missy Misdemeanor Elliot doing "supa Fly" you wanted to go to a club with her and ride around in her jeep. 

Any music video Brian made that was anything other than him in the studio, would come off as either fake or boring.  Brian spends a lot of time in the studio and does really cool stuff there which is documented in this video, and then the rest of his time he spends with his family.  That's certainly wonderful and beautiful and all is right with the world when that happens, but it would be incredibly boring to someone who's not part of that family.

I guess they could contrive some b.s. love story up and have Brian walking around with some chick on his arm going to a theatre performance or something... or they could have Brian sitting with his wife on the beach drinking margaritas...

Really their only options are to show him in the studio, or show somebody else and not even have Brian in the video.  The beauty of showing him in the studio is you get to see how beautiful Brian is at work, and it leaves your mind open to interpret the song however you want, you can make it about your own life and your own loved ones. 

Just my opinion.

... needs less Brian ... more cheerleaders ...







 >:D

The "Right Time" video I assume this thread is about isn't a music video at all, it's a "lyric video". Which is less of an artistic statement/expression, and more of a "now you can read the lyrics to the song you're currently listening to" type thing in the era of YouTube.



Here in the year 2015, music videos are a dead medium unless you are some sexy broad shakin' your tits/ass. Any cleavage showing Nicky Minaj or Katy Perry video is pretty much guaranteed to get 100 million+ views, regardless of how dire the song is.

It doesn't matter how creative or great a song/video involving some 72 year old man is.... Unless it's got Zooey Deschanel, Kacey Musgraves, and/or Lana Del Rey wearing skimpy outfits and making out with each other, singing about/showing what enormous skanks they are, or some gratuitous twerking, nobody is going to give half a crap.



Sex is what sells now, and Brian Wilson lacks what the general public calls "sex appeal".




Yes, and all of our grandparents are definitely not turning over in their graves at the way this moral-lacking, disease-ridden society has turned out.

I think they should have continued the fan video contest they started with BWPS. Imagine for TLOS!

I don't think Lana, Zooey, or Kacey would pull off the 'skank' thing very well in the first place...