The Smiley Smile Message Board

What's the consensus?  Where does it reside in your playlists?  Do you skip it?  Do you think of it as one long song or do you see it as separate tracks?  Is it part of Holland or do you think of it as it's own thing?  Do you prefer it or "Fairy Tale Music", between the two versions?  Has anyone here ever tried to rework either version into a shorter, more traditional type song?

It always seems like it's own thing to me and sticks out worse than a sore thumb when played alongside the rest of the Holland (and Holland era) tracks.  I've been approaching it from every possible angle lately but it just doesn't seem to fit.  Is it because it's too much like Love You (of which I stand on the detractors' side).  To those who like Love You do you also like MVAF?  To those that don't, do you dislike this as well? 

I searched the board but while the song has come up from time to time, there doesn't seem to have been any in depth discussion about it.  When you think about it, Brian's biggest contribution to Holland (as it stands) was "Sail On, Sailor" and "Funky Pretty" but we all know the former of those two was an 11th hour bid to try and find a commercial single for the album.  As originally planned, Brian (eventually) schleped his way to the other side of the planet, intending to make MVAF the centerpiece of the band's new album.

What do YOU think of the piece and where do you weigh in with the other questions I posed?

I think it's great. The storytelling itself is a bit amateurish but that's not a major problem. The synth stuff is just amazing and to me the whole thing is a bit like the missing link between Smile and Love You. Mt Vernon saved the Holland album (which I think is wonderful from beginning to end, mind you) from being too conventional overall. It's good to know Brian hadn't lost his knack for experimentation by this point.

I love it. I think it might be one of Brian's last true glimpses of being in total control creativity wise.

To me, it's pure genius - enough to make it the storyline in a (completed) movie a while back! ("Dumb Angel Fairy Tale")

Haven't heard it.

This will take up 12 minutes of your time. :=)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xmqtvzUpxkg

I, for one, love Love You, and love Mount Vernon & Fairway. Those two have a lot in common, instrumentally and stylistically. Brian said in a few interviews that he really liked Switched-On Bach, and I think it shows in both.

Personally, I'm not a fan, and I'm glad it was included as an EP separate from Holland, as I think Holland is a great album without it. 

I've listened to the piece several times, but its just not my cup of tea. 

That's interesting, because I respectfully have a different opinion.

I'm STILL not sure WHY they issued it on a separate record complete with picture sleeve. I think it could've fit on Side B of the album with some re-sequencing. I WISH it would've been included on Side B of the album. Back in the day of vinyl, it was a pain in the neck to have to take the album off the turntable, put it back in the jacket, and then take out the small record and cue that up - two more times. It ruined the flow, the listening experience. Because, as you can hear on the CD, "Mount Vernon And Fairway" fits perfectly after "Funky Pretty".

There's some incredible moments on Love You, but for me, "Mount Vernon And Fairway" is one of the last examples of the Brian Wilson "how did he write something like that?" moments.

How about a version without the narration? I must admit to preferring it. Just the magical music...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MJ0hrRM4B4Q

Well, i could do without the narration/link etc.... However the frustration of the tracks being so short really does my head in, some of them are quite superb and are (in my opinion) up there with some of the best work they have done.

I'm assuming your joking, as your avatar is indeed the cover art for Mount Vernon and Fairway.

I'd heard the narration free version on the GV box.  I do like that version a little bit better.  

I know many on here will disagree, but I'm really not a fan of Brian's mid 70s period.  Funky Pretty is my least favorite song on Holland.  I don't like the Mt. Vernon piece.  And, I don't much care for the Love You record.  

This is my just opinion, but for me, Brian was at his best in the 1960s and early 1970s.  There were good songs here and there after that.  

But, to each their own.  

That being said, I've really enjoyed Brian's output since 2008 (TLOS, TWGMTR, NPP).  

Love it. For me it was the last time we heard Brian as a true musical genius. I do struggle to imagine just where it would have fit on the actual Holland record though. Also, after having heard the narration for the billionth time I do tend to just play the Fairy Tale Music version from the '93 Box instead.

I appreciated it more after hearing Lazy Lizzie.

Umm... hate to tell you this but Jack had to improvise the last 90 seconds of the narration because, according to him, Brian didn't finish it, and Carl helped out significantly with the songs and production. Check out the credits.

I think he was having banter, lol!

The narration is too silly for me and Brian sounds too much like Cartman from South Park, but the music is so cool!!!!!
I love the whole "Brian discovers the Mini Moog" narritive and I listen to Fairy Tale Music often. It's up there with Wendy Carlos, T.O.N.T.O., and Mort Garson for me, specifically the Plantasia album that was meant to be played for your plants!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IUVmcKcTZ4A

This is a possibility:

The Beach Boys - Holland

01  Sail On Sailor
02  Steamboat
03  Leaving This Town
04  California Saga: Big Sur
05  California Saga: The Beaks Of Eagles
06  California Saga: California

07  The Trader
08  Only With You
09  Funky Pretty
10  Mount Vernon And Fairway

YEAH BUT NO BUT, i love 'Leaving This Town'

Me too.  Maybe the least Beach Boys sounding song in the entire catalog, but a great track. 

For the Sherriff's updated track list, Leaving This Town got bumped up to the third song on Side 1. 

A flawed work of brilliance. Similar in vein to SMiLE with its music and spoken word humor. I hear it wasn't finished as Brian originally intended, and I do think it shows. The story doesn't really feel complete or particularly compelling. It should have been fleshed out as its own album and Carl was wrong to shut it down and then half-heartedly relent. It's its own thing, definitely.

I don't listen that often but it's interesting when I do. I love the voice, like your dad reading a bedtime story. I just think it needs...idk...more. I love Love You unironically too, btw. Great, unique little album. But MVAF doesn't fit in that collection of songs either. It's its own thing, yet again.

If Brian had the concept, wrote the music, demo'ed the ideas, played the various keyboard parts, wrote the vocal backgrounds, and was pretty much the driving force behind the song, I'm curious what Carl did significantly to the track. He's listed as producer, he and Brian worked on the track, but it was primarily a Brian Wilson creation from the beginning.

As far as Reiley's improv, in a recent discussion there were people here casting doubts on the accuracy of Jack's statements on a number of issues, and could this also be one of them, suggesting Jack had to improvise something because it wasn't finished? Improvising 90 seconds of dialogue on a ten minute track might just indicate Jack improvised at the mic as the track was running out, maybe nothing beyond that. "good night baby, sleep tight baby" was a similar vocal improv that ended up getting a co-writers credit even though the song was pretty much complete before those last 15 seconds or so of the coda.  :)

Yes, it's an island----which is why the original EP solution was a masterstroke. 

I wouldn't say that. More like making the best of an unperferred situation. Ideally, Mt V would have been built upon to be an album in itself I feel. Or the other guys writing sillier songs to compliment it and form a whole album. But Brian was on another wavelength than them, and after his idea gotf shot-down he lost interest (as I understand it). Sure, Carl eventually relented but by then it was too late. So they finished it as best they could anyway and tacked it on as an EP that has nothing to do with the album. I'm not sure how you can call that a masterstroke, as to me that impliesydeliberateness and planning, not happenstance and placating.

That reminds me:  back when Klay posted about finding  the Proposed Brother Reissue Bonus Tracks CDs, one of the tracks was listed as " Fairy Tale/ A Casual Look ( EP Demo versions)";
what do you suppose that is? 

Brian originally planned to have the radio play a Mike sung A Casual Look at some point during the story.

Wow!  Did he fly all the way to Mike's house to tell him?

I think it's outstanding! I had friends over and we listened to it in the dark! Loads of fun! And I agree, it fits with Love You which is Brian continuing where he left off a few years prior with Funky Pretty, Mt Vernon and even Sweet Mountain. :)

Some of the music is well up-there among Brian's best. With his exquisities, as I call them - mini moments of utter genius. The story's an added bonus, enjoyable in its own right.

Now here's a thing - I haven't played the EP for decades, but from distant memory the 93 box stuff and the two-fer CD backing track never seemed exactly the same to my ears. I might have been misrememberating though…

I honestly have no idea what you are talking about here.  ???

*Edit, just got it. Don't read SS before the first coffee of the day folks.

I listen to it in the dark, as instructed.

I'd say most people are in the dark when listening to it.

It's usually the last drink of the day that gets me into trouble round here. ;D

I love the songs, and wonder if there are session tapes where they run longer. It must have felt like SMiLE Part II for the Boys when recording the song snippets; the last time Brian tried recording this way with the band (sans the solo Rio Grande), I'm thinking?

I think it's probable that the lack of support and "WTF" type of questioning from some bandmates that he endured over this piece (I recall reading such, correct me if I'm wrong) may be part of why he may have abandoned working on it, thus necessitating Carl to help finish it. While I can understand people feeling the fairy tale idea was odd, that's unfortunate if the reaction to this almost-rejected music piece wound up hurting Brian deeply.

I'm still wondering what significant parts Carl added. Reasons above.

One thing Carl did apparently do is go to Brian with the "compromise" of putting the song on that extra record instead of scuppering it entirely and leaving it off the album, since they didn't want it on the album proper.

Isn't MV&F a track on an album with Funky Pretty? Wasn't MV&F presented as sides 3 and 4 of the Holland album? Doesn't the EP say "Side 3" and "Side 4"?

Are you still here, Cam?  
It's over, go home.

Which part did that answer?

An example of the road not taken. This piece sounds almost like Another Green World-era Brian Eno.

How different would their legacy be if the band reconstituted itself as mid-seventies avant garde art rockers? The potential was there.

Somebody invent a time machine and give Al Jardine a bunch of Can records. That should do it.

Eh. You know, I'm sure we all wanted a more artsy, yet still commercially for the guys in the latter part of the '70s. But really, super artsy late '70s Beach Boys? That gives me thoughts of Yes or Emerson, Lake and Palmer. Stuff like that. Fact is, punk kinda reset the whole deal in the mid '70s. Yet once again The Beach Boys really didn't have anywhere to fit in. They definitely wouldn't fit in with the avant garde. They definitely weren't punk despite a bit of influence on acts like The Ramones (where's kookoo adams when you need him?) and even the more polished new wave type of material of Elvis Costello was pretty far away from them.

I really suppose the only scene and sound The Beach Boys truly coulda maybe fit in was the California soft-rock scene with Fleetwood Mac and those types. A lighter Fleetwood. Mature, a bit nostalgic but not necessarily backwards looking. And basically I think that's kinda what L.A. (Light Album) is and I think it succeeds. And I think if that is what The Beach Boys followed up Holland with things might've been a bit different. But we've been over that many times on this board.

Not Emerson Lake and Palmer, but Bowie's Berlin trilogy. Mount Vernon is not miles away from 'Low'.

Of course this was never a realistic option -- the pressures from the audience, the record company, and his band mates wouldn't have allowed this new direction. But Brian did show an affinity for these experimental synth pieces and song fragments. It would have been interesting to hear how he might have developed this style.

I don't think Brian was capable of making Mount Vernon and Fairway type music by 1977, or he certainly was unwilling to. I agree that if the band had scraped off the cheese they could have made a very credible stab at the mid/late '70s California soft/yacht rock scene.

I like the music. A fairytale is a good idea and a good match for the music but I wish they'd written (or found) a better story.

  The narration and goofy voices got in the way of some very inventive Brian Wilson music. I like the 1993 box edit.

That "amateurish" storytelling is a huge part of its charm for me. If the storytelling was more competant or more conventional, MVAF just wouodn't work. This is a gloriously twisted and f***ed-up take on those kids storybooks that came with  EP records of the story.

And the music is proof that had he had the desire (and the encouragement), Brian may have found a second calling doing film scoring since tge Fairytale Music is essentially a musical score for his story.

+1. For some strange reason, some people tend to underestimate how much some real encouragement might have made a difference.

Firstly, I love the Fairytale - it's basically Brian speaking through his music, saying that - at that point in time - he was having trouble tuning into his muse. But no-one was listening... it's also testament to the clout he still commanded that it was included with the album package in any way whatsoever. Charming, yes. But commercial ?

Carl's contributions: he's co-credited on "I'm The Pied Piper", sang lead on that track, "Better Get Back In Bed" and "Magic Transistor Radio" (w/Brian) and is co-credited as producer with Brian of the whole thing. Not denigrating Brian's majority part in it, but as Carl took over, he wasn't in "total control". I wish he had been.

Jack's story: yup, a lot of folk say he tells a good, if not entirely accurate, story (I'm several of them...) but in this instance he told me the exact same thing twice, separated by an interval of nearly 20 years. Listen to the last 90 seconds: compared with the rest of his (admittedly stilted) narration, it's rushed.

I have always been curios if any unreleased bits intended for Mount Vernon and Fairway exist. Or at least longer versions of the musical portions. In my opinion, "I'm The Pied Piper" is one of the greatest pieces of music ever created. It bugs me to no end that there is only a few seconds of it.  ;D

 :lol

It occurred to me that MV&F must be the closest the LP era ever came to the CD's so-called hidden track. You can always skip the hidden track.

It's not too far from something like The Point by Harry Nilsson.

Thanks for the tip, phirnis. I've got it lined up for a listen later in the week.

The music is wonderful, I especially love the eerie "theme music" and the "dom dom kingdom" chant. 

The story itself is okay, kind of a forgettable children's book, the music and sound effects are what make it work.  Jack Rieley does a good job narrating though.

On the other hand, Brian's Pied Piper monologue might be one of the weirdest and most off-putting things ever put on a Beach Boys record.  I think they should have just cut that out.

Imagine if they changed their name (not to the beach but something else) and did more Denny and out-there Brian material. Perhaps the sales wouldn't have improved (but really, could they have been much worse?) But the band's modern day reputation would probably be way better

That's the whole point of it though. I agree it has flaws and doesn't all gel together as well as it should but that wtf monologue is meant to take you aback and make you laugh

As Beach Boys/BW fans, yeah, we gladly would've welcomed more "out there" Brian Wilson music in place of/included on 15 Big Ones, MIU, KTSA, BB 1985, and on and on. And that's not to say there wasn't some good stuff from Brian during the 1974-1985 period, because there was.

However, if you take a look at what Brian DID release post-Pet Sounds, well, some of it WAS very "out there". Released from Brian included Smiley Smile, "I'd Love Just Once To See You (In The Nude)", "Mama Says", "Diamond Head", "Transcendental Meditation", "Passing By (roller rink music)", "I Went To Sleep (complete with snoring sound effects)", "A Day In The Life Of A Tree", and "Mount Vernon And Fairway". And those were the released songs. Unreleased ones include "Sail Plane Song", "My Solution", and "H.E.L.P. Is On The Way".

Again, we love that stuff. You can assemble an album of those "out there" BW tunes for me anytime. But, two quick points come to mind. First, when you look at those above songs, it's hard to say that Brian Wilson DIDN'T record whatever he wanted to or whatever came to his mind, regardless of the commercial potential, or lack of. And, second, I guess you can say that the average (majority of?) Beach Boys fan didn't buy them, literally, although you have to hold the other band members' songs accountable for that, too.

From the pedia:

The Beatles' track "Her Majesty" off their 1969 album Abbey Road is considered the first hidden track in recording history. The original pressings of Abbey Road did not list "Her Majesty" on the back cover song title listing, nor the record label; subsequent LP pressings and then CD issues were issued revealing the track. However, two years prior, in 1967, on the UK version of the Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band album, there was the "inner groove" that appeared after "A Day in the Life" at the end of side 2. It was an unexpected, untitled, and uncredited Beatles recording - so this might be deemed a precursor to the hidden track. A potential hidden track on yet another Beatles album is on The Beatles (also known popularly as The White Album) 1968 double album. The hidden track is an unlisted, untitled and uncredited outro to "Cry Baby Cry" - more popularly known as "Can You Take Me Back", the primary lyrics of the song.

Thanks, ORR. I keep forgetting wikipedia is my friend. :=)

One could argue that the "Banana & Louie" outro to the Pet Sounds album was a hidden track.

True. I wonder if that's where the Beatles got the idea?

No. "Her Majesty" was intended for the side 2 Long Medley between " Mean Mr. Mustard" and "Polythene Pam".  The band decided not to use it, so it was spiced out with the Beatles telling the engineers to throw it away. If it weren't for an Abbey Road studio rule that said that no tape must be discarded, ABBEY ROAD would not have had a hidden bonus track. The engineer spliced it after the final cut. When McCartney heard the final track lineup (and no one in the band knew what had been done to "Her Majesty"), he loved the randomness of it and insisted that "Her Majesty" close the LP.

Good info!
I was thinking of Pepper's inner groove track . Maybe an anwser back to the "Banana & Louie" outro?
I was thiking of

There's a "hidden track" on an LP that the lads and lasses at Wikipedia seem to have forgotten: The ultra-slow "We Wish You A Merry Christmas" tune at the end of side one of the Stones' Their Satanic Majesties...

It seems to have been called "Cosmic Christmas" on CD reissues (whose idea was that???) but it doesn't get a separate mention on mine.