The Smiley Smile Message Board

Good Vibrations took 7/8 months to record. In the middle of those exhaustive months, Brian Wilson once considered to give Good Vibrations away to an R&B group....

Let's imagine that this happened...

Brian instead focuses on completing SMiLE throughout those several months, and releases an album in the fall of 1966/winter of 1967, as planned.

What would have happened? Would The Beach Boys be hailed as spokespeople of the 1960s? Would they just fall into further obscurity after the commericial performance of Pet Sounds?

Anyone?

I've pontificated on this from time to time and, more often than not, I surmise that the effect Smile would have on the record buying public, similarly to Pet Sounds, would have been minimal and it's counterpart, Sgt. Pepper's, would have most likely overshadowed it even if released afterward. However, it would have been seen by fellow musicians and the like as groundbreaking and as revolutionary as Pet Sounds. The fact of the matter is The Beach Boys had an image that couldn't easily be shaken and The Beatles, though almost always a step behind them, were "more popular than Jesus." Though, I'm a natural-born pessimist, I could be wrong. Good Vibrations was a big success so Smile could have been too. 1967 saw psychedelic music push to the mainstream and the average "square" was turning "hip" to new ideas.

It seems like Good Vibrations was a huge part of the promotional campaign for Smile.  I genuinely believe that if Smile was released it would have been huge, but I think that is dependent on Capitol's promotion campaign.  If Good Vibrations hadn't come out then Capitol wouldn't have a hit single to assure them that Smile is commercially viable, so it probably would have gone the way of Pet Sounds and remain virtually unpromoted by Capitol.  So basically Good Vibrations was key to Smile's potential success.

What if aliens came down from the sky in 1960 and abducted Brian Wilson, so The Beach Boys never even existed. How would the world be different?

What if... people stopped typing it as SMiLE ?

Why, then we'd have world peace. Mayeb even candy bars too !

There is no SMiLE without GV's pioneering of the modular recording technique.

Oh Wouldn't It Be Nice..... lol  :lol

SMiLE.  There ya go Andrew. ;)  I'm not big on "what ifs".  What was though?

Sadly it didn't happen and Good Vibrations was absolutely and entirely the best way possible to set THAT table.  But... ... ...  No.

Its not being released spelled the difference between history recognizing the Beach Boys as one of the the top 3 or 4 bands from the 60s/70s [and therefore potentially for an even longer time-frame] in terms of quality, content and influence to ever record a song and of being recognized however they're seen now.  Pet Sounds sets them up for some high class recognition.  Good Vibrations framed that picture...loads of OTHER recordings...at least til 1972[ish] provided further proof.  It's just that due to the lack of there being a Smile [sorry Andrew...SMiLE] circa i966/67...the group fell off the radar and the public  kind of forgot about them....thus missing out on some real MAGIC

How are the Beach Boys perceived NOW?  Not including US?  ['cause we're not the average music fan and our's is not the average perception]  Go see the Mike Love version perform.  They do it well.  And THAT is the Beach Boys.  Brian does it all ever so differently.  The crowd size?  Somewhere around the same numbers on average, per show, would be my guess.  It's just that Mike and Bruce et all do it about 3 times more often.  And that doesn't include the times when Brian comes off the road.

If SMiLE ;) had been released...Good Vibrations would have been one of the first singles.  Oh...and THIS board [and all Beach Boys related sites like it] would be about 10 times busier.

A SHaME really. :hat

 :rock    :bow

Ya know, I digress, if Smile had been released and they had attended Monterey Pop, as they had intended, (they helped conceive it for GOD'z sake) and they performed material from Smile (I'm thinking Heroes & Villains, Cabin Essence, Do You Like Worms?, Mrs. O'Leary's Cow, Water, Surf's Up). Hell, maybe Van Dyke and Mike Love kiss and made up, Van joined them on stage for a chorale of prayer, then perhaps they would have been revered, perhaps crucified, as the forerunners of psychedelia in 1967. Perhaps The Mamas & The Papas, Jefferson Airplane, and Grateful Dead could have been outshone.

If Smile had been released, I suspect this board would be a quiet thing. The legend and puzzle of the unreleased album was what fuelled the board and it's predecessors. If smILe had come out on schedule there'd be no mystery, no debate.

And we're assuming that it would have been a hit and a critical success, but it might have gone almost exactly the same way as SmileySmile… it had the same singles to drive it; shared half the songs (albeit different versions, granted, though even a few here prefer Smiley Chimes).

Smile would have been further fromPet Sounds than Pet Sounds was from Summer Days or Party! And it could have lost them even more fans.

I realize you're being in part humorous here, but the main conceptual drivers of the concert were John Phillips and Lou Adler, weren't they? My understanding is that Brian, like McCartney and Jagger, et al, fulfilled a kind of 'ambassadorial' function, symbolic representatives of different elements of the transatlantic pop mix.

And the groups to 'outshine' were hardly established pop acts like the Mamas & the Papas, Jefferson Airplane and Grateful Dead (or, for that matter, The Byrds or Simon and Garfunkel) - they were rock newcomers like Janis and Jimi, and 'outsider' pros like Otis Redding and Ravi Shankar, getting their first major exposure in front of the predominantly white and middle class 'pop' scene. Even with a string section performing 'Fire', and the booming choral vocals of 'Cabin Essence', I suspect - sadly - the Beach Boys would have had a hard time pulling focus from Jimi immolating his guitar at the conclusion of 'Wild Thing'.

EDIT: I'm probably taking your post way too earnestly, yonderhillside. If so, sorry.

Maybe - in either Rusten/Stebbins or Badman (which I don't have at my disposal right now) there are indicators from Brian that Smile required another year of work.  Time is of the essence in this business.  You needed to be on the charts either coming or going every few months.    

And GV was a monster radio hit, but still I have found no 1966-7 performance, contemporaneous to the release to indicate there was a  bona fide  organized and thorough promotional campaign, complete with GV  appearances on every US (My TV antenna did not reach overseas.) major television network.  

And, I do not (and will not, now) equate that to setting a GV track to whatever film footage with firehouse or other scenes was available.  I mean that the band would perform GV and probably another song, be seated, talk to the host, discuss Brian's technique, and done either the "live" or taped-in-advance performance.  A lot of the late shows were live, after the 11 p.m. news as is the model now, five decades post.  

But, I don't think the industry was ready for Smile without significant marketable radio singles and promotional coordination.  The trend as was sort of set with The Beatles was to release singles between LP's and these singles would not be part of an LP.  One that comes to mind is The Little Girl I Once Knew, which probably should have been on SDSN.  The whole LP thing ended up going on the then-newer fm dial.  AM had too much stuff to market, too much weather, too much news to read in between.      

Smile needed, according to Brian, another year to complete.  He didn't have it.   ;)

(Don't mean to have all that italicized - the functions won't seem to do what I want them to do. Sorry for that.)

Filldeplage - there's a debate at the moment in New Zealand, where I live, about our statistics for child poverty. Most findings put it, shockingly, at about 30% or higher. One right-wing politician has made the clearly fallacious argument that, compared to Bangladesh, kiwi kids aren't in any kind of poverty. An equal argument could be made that, compared to folks in Hollywood, our upper-middle-class are themselves impoverished.

The point is: these kind of comparisons - indeed, all comparisons - are inherently relative by nature. It has been demonstrated on this thread that Capitol provided considerable press and promotional support to both 'Pet Sounds' and 'Smile'. I totally understand your position that what they did wasn't enough - and indeed, by issuing certain singles and a 'Best Of' - they undercut the effectiveness of those efforts they did undertake.

But: GV was a #1 hit. Capitol issued full-page ads; commissioned multi-page articles in their in-house mag; made standees for record stores; and produced a promotional tape (admittedly for in-house purposes) which culminated in a plug for the album based around that recent #1 single. All in the face of a band/record that consistently missed its projected release dates (despite significant production of LP and 45 covers); the cost of which was much higher than the then-average in production/studio time, despite the last record not resulting in the expected financial income; which failed - for almost a year - to produce the speedy, all-important follow-up single that was expected of all major 60's pop groups - a fact you recognize in your post above; which was fighting them legally over royalties and a projected subsidiary label; and - eventually - released an album that used almost nothing from the studio time the label had paid for.

The last one of these points I realize falls outside the purview of the argument you're making, but does again, serve to make the point that all these things are relative.

EDIT: Brian did indeed say he 'needed another year' to complete SMiLE. But in the pop context in which he was working, almost two full years between albums was unheard of. The Beatles, to provide the closest possible analogue, were issuing at least two LPs worth of new material a year from 1964-1966 . I'm definitely not arguing that Capitol were as supportive as they might have been, but I don't think it's fair to suggest - especially in light of the extensive Anderle/Vosse interviews (the former of whom was actually charged with setting up Brother Records) that a lack of promotional support from the record company was any kind of critical factor in the collapse of the album. In fact, it could be argued they did the best they could to promote a basically non-existent product.

You are correct about everything being relative.  When I wore another hat (politics) there would be a full candidate promo, if you will "package," including car bumper stickers, meet-and-greets press releases, position papers, speeches, radio ads, TV appearances, that were hosted by groups doing election debates, yada yada, etc.  You can have a "fully-prepared promotional file" and the devil is in the details - the actual "execution" - and any DJ (we have an esteemed one) worth his or her salt would listen and play GV while they still had the "nod" from the executives who ran the radio franchises.  

There is still for me a huge disconnect as to the resources advanced consistent with their "emerging musically sophisticated scope," in that time window.  I will go out on a limb and suggest that Brian's performance on Bernstein, was as close as there was to a live performance up to the live GV in 1968.  

There may be a file at Capitol where they attempt to defend whatever they say they used. But the reality is that there was no live performance of GV that I can find or can remember from that era.  I am very open to seeing anything appropriate such as a personal appearance and performance on say, Johnny Carson, who had an 11 p.m. slot or anyone comparable.  Even if they taped a live concert with GV to promote or WH.  Radio was it.    

And you are correct about the faction-based positions on poverty or any political spin.  I get that and constantly filter it to see if it is left or right or in the middle.

The most accurate accounts come from The Beach Boys themselves, commenting on what happened on the  UK - 1967 tour, the record company had another agenda to advance, selling records in the older BB catalog. And just because some author or historian comes up with a file from an ad campaign, doesn't mean they did the job, placing the ads, showing actual documentary evidence of live and taped TV spots,  which actually took place.  

It may run contrary to whatever people have found to "source" from files.  They may have prepared a package but it was not a full on in-your-face one.  They didn't create Brother Records for nothing.  Just sayin' and JMHO.    ;)

Sorry, FdP, I continued to edit that post while you were writing yours.  That's why the quote doesn't quite match up with the post above it. I appreciate your reply.

The general discussion of politics - and specific consideration of TV spots you concentrate on - aside, I would love to read your thoughts on any of the actual points I raised above.

EDIT:
I am sorry, but I don't get what you mean by the "the  UK - 1967 tour". (I may well be being extremely dense here.) Do you mean the UK tour of '66, while the tracking sessions for 'SMiLE' were moving along, and Brian in all recorded utterances was deeply positive about what was being produced? Or the '67 tour(s), after the functional collapse of the Smile album, when the band were trying to pick up the pieces? I'm not trying to be aggressive here, but a bit of context would be useful.  :)

Haha a little bit, but that's okay. But yeah, actually, I always took their part in Monterey at face value and never looked too far into it. I suppose that would make more sense them being ambassadors of sorts. As I was always somewhat surprised they would have been ones to partially conceive the idea anyway. And I didn't bother to mention Jimi, Janis, or The Who, because, at that festival especially, they couldn't have been outshone.

THB  - I don't think you are dense - there is so much to absorb and process.  It is the '67 tour, after Brian appeared on Inside Pop, right after Carl's arrest.  Smiley did not even come out until September of 1967.  So we know Brian is working on something spectacular with Surf's Up.  It is on national TV. That is real promo.  

But Bernstein isn't a Dick Clark, featuring teen music-of-the-day, or Ed Sullivan or Johnny Carson who did variety shows for both adult and teens - more family entertainment for Ed Sullivan, Carson is on at 11:30  p.m., after the late news.

Bernstein is a serious classical artist.  The show serves to translate what is "rock music" to adults who are scared to death of it.  Bernstein had a Sunday Young People's Concert series that was mostly classical music and he served as the conductor trying to get kids interested in classical music.  Bernstein is drawing the analogy as between classical roots and rock music, tying the generations together for the adults (maybe some of the kids who have not looked at rock music, quite in that way.)  

And, I don't have Badman and the Rusten/Stebbins books handy, which have interspersed with the concert stuff, what is going on exactly at those moments with the concerts, touring and sessions. When you follow the timeline, month-by-month, it is really helpful.  Moi - a major geek.   :lol  I have some references to it around #42 in the other "contentious" thread.

The Paris Gaumont interview from 1970 is invaluable for the band insight going back a few years.  In French, subtitled.  On Youtube.   ;)

Mike Love would have to choose a different name for his autobiography.


Anyways, there's a great article that answers a similar question: What if Pet Sounds had never been released? I think some of you would enjoy reading it.

https://arkhonia.wordpress.com/2012/11/06/smile-my-first-25-years-what-if-pet-sounds-wasnt-released-in-1966/

Thanks for this, FdP - it's becoming clear to me I really need to invest in Badman and Rusten/Stebbins!

The single hit #1 and stayed there in multiple American regions and markets for close to a full month. In Europe too.

Just how bad or how lacking was the promotion to have a single sitting at #1 for more than a week, in the case of GV spending multiple weeks as the top single in various markets?

If the single stiffed, we'd have something to criticize. #1 for more than a week - Then, as now, quite a major feat for any record or musician.

Whatever was done or wasn't done, someone did a corking good job promoting it to that level of success.

GF - that was all radio.   There was no GV performed until well over a year later in 1968.   So, no Darlin' or Wild Honey on film. (that I can find)

They did I can Hear music - http://youtu.be/vzCy0VKMhUs     (20/20)

Do It Again - http://youtu.be/eLFAYaae0


They did Never Learn not to love (1968) with Dennis on lead, Carl on Drums. - Mike Douglas show.

http://youtu.be/810v2bVX8j4

They did a real bona fide promo for Breakaway and Celebrate the News on Mike Douglas with Carl on drums and Dennis on lead on July 8, 1969 - with the LP of 20/20 in hand.  Mike Douglas.

Enjoy.  

http://youtu.be/sobVMqnEIOI

Hope it copies.  - so up to that point, they got  20/20 on national US TV - real promotion.  

And Brian and Mike Douglas from 1976.

http://youtu.be/2gQD2g6F7y8

Hope they all copy.  ;)

Note the white jacket on Brian.   :lol

In 1966-'67, were nationally televised TV appearances by bands typically arranged by the record companies, by the band's management, or a combination of both?

GV went to #1 regardless if there was or wasn't a live TV performance of the song. So did any number of hit singles that reached #1 from that era. This notion of music videos being pioneered by someone...they were around since the 1930's. Ricky Nelson's videos on Ozzie and Harriet did as much for promoting records through a TV show as anything, when Ozzie started featuring clips of Ricky and James Burton miming to a record at the end of those episodes, the records started selling if there was a single available for it and the kids watching Ricky, James Burton, and Joe Osborn lip-synch to it on the show wanted to buy it. Bingo - There was something there.

In the mid-60's, The Beatles began filming clips of themselves miming to their latest single specifically to send to the US so Ed Sullivan, Hollywood Palace, and other shows could air it and they wouldn't need to fly to the US to perform it for broadcast. Very soon after the first clips, which were basic miming clips, they began getting more artistic with the film. Hence, Paperback Writer and Rain were as much short films and imagery as they were of the band standing there pretending to play the song. By the time Strawberry Fields and Penny Lane came around, any notion of showing the band pretending to actually perform the song were ditched in favor of making a film with some artistic and visual draw. Depending on the outlet, in the UK the musicians' union had a ban on "miming" which meant there had to be a specific quota of "live" performance on clips shown on TV. It varied, but it explains why some performances are a live vocal mic set to the prerecorded band track.

Brian did the same thing with the GV promo film in the fall of 1966, it was a short film full of imagery and vignettes rather than a stand-up shot of the band miming to the backing track - In fact there are no instruments shown in the promo at all - and it went to #1. There was a shift in direction across the board, not specifically thanks to the Beatles (or the Monkees for that matter who had premiered in September 1966 and had music videos in every episode), but just part of the changing direction of how songs were promoted using film and video.

All of the GV films that were made and shown in the UK and US in Fall 1966 were in line with all of that. As music became a studio creation not specifically geared to be reproduced live, so did music film and video become something beyond showing the band pretending to perform the song. Some songs couldn't be performed unless they rigged up a tape machine like the Hollies would do to play "Carrie Ann" live with the steel drum break.

The fact that GV not only hit #1 but stayed there for multiple weeks and stayed top 10 for well over a month showed that promotions which were done worked beyond what most artists would have expected. Numerous weeks at #1 for a single? Quite a feat.

This notion that the lack of a TV appearance where the band is shown performing GV or any single "live" showed a lack of promotion doesn't make sense considering the success of the single.

And as I mentioned in the other thread, GV actually did premiere on TV. Here is the clipping from Billboard magazine that described it, dated early December 1966:

(http://i115.photobucket.com/albums/n295/guitarfool2002/khjgvtv_zpso6md5ec9.jpg)

That was the appearance where Michael Vosse and Brian went to KHJ studios to be interviewed and watch as the kids danced to the new single being premiered. It made Billboard magazine as news because records were not premiered on TV...but GV was.

GF - those are West Coast articles.  That does not equate to a systematic national promotion.  No way. 

Ed Sullivan or Bob Hope/Jack Benny for California Girls or Andy Williams for Help Me Rhonda, or any one of the other "go to" national network TV outlets that was a "required" element of a national model of promotion for any important single that would be contemporaneous to tour and ticket promotion all of which was going on. 

The national network TV galvanizes ticket sales when the band sits down with the host (not done on Ed Sullivan) and does the "tour talk" and holds up the LP as on Mike Douglas.  It all reinforces the learning curve among all those other bands to keep the standing out, head and shoulders above the others.

Footage set to the single track does not equate to a stand-up performance and interview on a national TV network and may have made the incremental difference between Good Vibrations  being #1 and falling behind Winchester Cathedral for record of the year in 1966 as it did. 

There were already missed TV appearance opportunities with WIBN/GOK.  There was a void in 1966-1967 for  national TV, which is indefensible in my book. 

Brian's appearance on Inside Pop is "it" as far as I can discern for the US.  Their managers needed to maintain a full TV appearance-promotional package alongside touring during that very critical time to keep the "buzz" going.   Just sayin'.   ;)

 

 

Winchester Cathedral - the song beat Good Vibrations in 1966 for #1.

http://youtu.be/-xPFVFm8NpA

Seriously.

Maybe they did.

Not sure but my impression is that band appearances were typically arranged by band management. It was certainly so in the case of the Beatles. It's a good question.

Ultimately the decision on which acts would appear on these shows came down to the talent bookers from those shows. For all of the lobbying by agents and managers to get their acts on a TV show, if the people booking those shows didn't want the band on, or couldn't fit them into the schedule, that band wouldn't be on the show. In some cases - thinking Neil Young not wanting to play Johnny Carson with the Springfield - the band sdaid no even though the show wanted them booked.

In the case of the Beatles, Sullivan actively pursued them after seeing the hype around British "Beatlemania". Ed himself wanted the Beatles on his "really big shew". He ended up negotiating with Brian Epstein, who offered Sullivan the exclusive on the band's appearances, that stretched into 3 appearances with more possibly to be negotiated (and they were). But in a shrewd way, Epstein also managed to hustle Sullivan who normally didn't allow himself to be hustled.

Epstein offered the multi-appearance exclusive with a condition: Sullivan would also book his other Merseybeat act Gerry And The Pacemakers for an exclusive appearance too. It actually ended up working out well for both sides, Sullivan got the exclusive Beatles run and Gerry ended up with a huge hit that was featured on Sullivan, Ferry Across The Mersey out of it.

But the point is and was, if the show didn't want a group on the air, or simply couldn't schedule when that group was available,  the group didn't get booked. The ultimate call was with the people booking and scheduling the show no matter how much hustling and pressure the managers applied.

Brian traveled to NYC to meet with the Sullivan people some time in 1966 to discuss booking the group for an appearance. This was revealed in a letter from that era. The fact they didn't appear until 1968 might explain, and in '68 they also did their current single Do It Again as the featured song, then GV.

Bringing it back to this, Billboard was *the* music business trade paper of note just as Variety was the trade paper of note for the film and TV industry. It was a national publication, not just West Coast. And KHJ at that time was the trend-setter as far as formatting, programming, and sequencing because they took the LA pop radio scene by storm and destroyed their competition. It got to a point where KHJ airchecks were being taken by program directors across the country to their own stations to copy the format and methods that made them such a success, down to the way DJ's like Don Steele delivered their presentations and talk-ups. If KHJ did something, first the other Drake-Chenault stations copied it, then the industry took notice and tried to do what KHJ was doing.

If Billboard reported that KHJ had broken a new single on a TV show instead of on their radio station, the industry took notice. This was new stuff at the time it was happening.

What if the TV shows simply did not want to book the Beach Boys in late 1966 to perform or pretend to perform a song on TV? Brian met with Sullivan's people, nothing came of it until 1968.

Bottom line for me is this: How much more should have been expected of a single than to reach number 1, and not only reach number one but to also stay there in various regional markets across the US for multiple weeks? What else could have been done to make any record more successful than hitting number one nationwide on the charts? I'm not understanding what other measure of success we're looking for when a hit record's peak is reaching #1 on the charts.

And whatever promotion was or wasn't done, Good Vibrations reached that peak. So whatever is was worked.

Winchester Cathedral? File that right next to Englebert Humperdinck's "Release Me" which kept the double A-side "Penny Lane / Strawberry Fields Forever" off the #1 spot in 1967. A fluke. I don't see many people in years to come poring over Release Me or Winchester Cathedral or having those songs show up on anyone's "best of" lists. Flukes.

Guitarfool2002,
I'm trying to figure out the business structure:
My reading indicates that a successful band at the time would normally have a general manager, a tour manager, a booking agent, and a pr manager (among others). Some of these roles would be outsourced (to an agency or management firm) rather than taken on as full time band employees. These roles were separate from the label and the band's responsibility (usually the GM took the responsibility on). And this team was responsible for the band's promotional appearances, both live and on TV.
Is that about right?

If so, it seems the label performed its promotional tasks and the gap (if there is one) with live appearances was on the BB team.

As far as I can tell the Beach Boys at that time still had William Morris as their booking agency; do we know who their general manager was, if any, between Murry and Grillo? Was Grillo a gm or just a financial manager? Was Fred Vail still working for them? Who was booking their tour dates?

Everything that I read that mentions the band's management at this time focuses on the Capitol lawsuit, the start-up of Brother, contract negotiations...

Does anyone have any detailed firm information about the business structure at this time?

Regarding the Beatles and Ed Sullivan, Sullivan was prescient, but Epstein was aggressive from the start regarding TV appearances. He rightly perceived that the Beatles' show was as marketable as the Beatles' music and got them on British TV as much as possible.

There was no template, especially at this time. The ultimate decision rested with the show's booking staff if not the host (as in the case with some of Sullivan's bookings). If the show said no, the artist wouldn't be on. I say there was no template because there were also known "blacklists" in the TV business with acts that were not to be booked for various reasons, sometimes out of personal spite or other personal baggage. No manner of hustling and selling could get certain acts booked onto certain shows.

There was also a lot of crossover and handshake deals as far as who actually handled the bookings or how the process was worked out. Early on the Beach Boys had Milton Berle's nephew Marshall (so he could actually call Berle 'Uncle Miltie' and be accurate!) as their agent and rep at William Morris. Whatever and however he got them booked to various shows, tours, and formats might have included any number of other people involved in the process. But again, the actual shows or venues had the last word, as in yes or no.

Consider this: When the Beach Boys made their first appearance on Ed Sullivan, they were surrounded by hot rods and custom cars, quite a cool visual especially for 1964 to have the band playing around those hot cars.

It was Brian Wilson who set that up. He struck up a conversation with one of the cars' builders and owners in New York at a convention,  and asked first about buying the car (I think - will confirm), then about getting the car to use for the appearance. The guy was shocked when Ed Sullivan actually called him at home to set up the Beach Boys appearance, and he and his hot rod buddies got their cars to CBS studios in NYC and got their cars on the Sullivan show with the Beach Boys. So that started with Brian Wilson - not an agent or a booker or anyone else - talking to the owner about using his car. The Sullivan people through CBS paid the owners to use the cars.

So that was the artist taking the lead on the details of the appearance. I think there were ways it worked, but it also varied case-by-case as to who was actually doing what to set up these appearances.

Also, if a show wanted a band or act that was "hot" at the time, they'd actively pursue them...no hustling or selling necessary by the artist or anyone around them.

Cool story that I've never heard about the car thing and thanks for the overall response!

GF - You are giving the fans too much credit.  I was not that sophisticated  as a pre-teen, to be reading Billboard. I might have had a little advantage, in that my evening radio reception was able to pull in WABC and WNEW, so I listened to Cousin Bruce Morrow  from New York City, in addition to the locals.   That was their job to talk about Billboard and tell us what was in the pipeline.  

Looking back beyond WIBN/GOK - I'm not sure that even Barbara Ann, which was about #2,  Sloop was #3 were ever promoted on TV.  We had UHF and VHF lineups and in a way the VHF were like the early underground fm stations and grew in the 60's.  So, even if the BB's did not get on Ed Sullivan, there were certainly other time slots and programs in the "minor leagues" which were emerging as a forum for younger audiences who would have loved to see them on TV.  

There may only have been a few in each region but still had a wealth of opportunity for teen centered TV programming.  There were other games in town besides Ed Sullivan.  They were not losers.  Or some of the lame circus acts on Ed Sullivan. ( I am being extremely kind.)

So, it is not just the expectation of  Good Vibrations doing better than #1 for a month,  but the expectation that the media job was done right.  They were a group of performers with a solid track record.  GV was beaten out by a fluke song.  So I ask myself "what was missing," that might  have pushed them into the #1 top spot for 1966 and look to the missing link.  

And, I think it was the void of TV appearances that might have made the difference.  So, going back to California Girls, which appeared very successful and very funny with Bob Hope and Jack Benny, they had not "messed up" a single TV performance, and should have had the status to be acceptable to many other TV programs for promotion of a single or LP.  When the weekly newspapers with the TV pullout had a program slot with The Beach Boys, it was listed as a "special appearance" or "top pick" of the week.  

But, I am thinking that even if Brian was responsible for that other Ed Sullivan appearance, that was not his job description.  And the job rested with Capitol (the new Brother Records, or a combination of both) with a well oiled PR machine at their disposal.  Even Party pre-dated Brother Records incorporation, so that promo was probably on them.  

Guess, GF I am just  frustrated in thinking that they were the best and the PR accorded to them should have been commensurate with that standard.  I am not disappointed in the band, but those who were charged with their marketing and promotion.     ;)

  

I'm thinking that it wasn't really Capitol's job. It seems to me that the label did not usually manage a band's personal appearances.

Emily - And I am thinking it was "somebody's job." 

There are agents in place who handle that facet, especially in a mega corp such as Capitol.

from Music Biz Academy...

"A record label, PR firm, music manager, music publishing company, entertainment agency, music distribution firm, entertainment lawyer, music magazine and most other entities in the music industry are all part of a "mass media" wheel that generates airplay, publicity, gigs and record (CD) sales.  All this is part of record deal from a record label, or it can be used to get a record deal."

They already had a "record deal."

This void of TV media is inexcusable for over 2 years, when at their creative pinnacle, in my book.  Just sayin'.   ;)   

Yes, because we all know Pet Sounds was an unqualified commercial flop! (I don't know how it got to #10 in Billboard, or how Sloop John B and Wouldn't it Be Nice made the top ten...payola?). I am so sick of reading what a failure PS was in commercial terms. Did it sell as well as it should have? No, if you think it should have sold in Beatle numbers; but the sales of PS were (in Trump's word) HUGE compared to what SS and WH would do.

Sorry to be a grammar Nazi, but I think you mean 'UGE.

So, you're saying that in 1966-'67 the record companies did not typically arrange television appearances for bands, and that such appearances were usually pitched to the TV shows by the band's management team or booking agents?  Were the Beach Boys management team and booking agents affiliated with Capitol Records at that time? 

::)

I'd like to know who, with all of your posts seeming to relate to each other, you are trying to discredit and what your motives are, other than pushing what I see as a Mike Love influenced agenda. You didn't respond to my last post about it and I would like to know. Thx

Woodstock - Here is the short answer.  I don't like the accusatory and hostile tone.  Nor, do I like being assigned a faction position. I work hard to keep an open mind, and expect the same courtesy. I see any and every version of any BB/BW related band.  That supports being open-minded.  
 
As to Jules' article, I likely had read what he wrote when it was published.  And, I found his characterization of Carole Kaye (whom Brian appears to have worked very well with, performing on a great deal of his work) enormously disrespectful, sexist  and unacceptable.  

So, I guess I have a problem with gender bias, and disparaging treatment of women musicians, particularly since Carole appears to have been the only woman working in this capacity at that time.  I hate to think that young women (any students for that matter) have been subjected to reading his article in a textbook on Rock and Roll History, as is evidenced on his wiki page within the context of BB/BW music.  Young women need good women role models in every business, never mind the music business where it must have been an extremely high bar for her employment.  

It suggests that the subject matter is erroneous, and her work as an extraordinary electric bass player, has earned better note, than this disparaging characterization.  The fact that Jules was with this entourage for between 2 and 9 months (according to varying accounts) and doesn't know her role in the group, or attribute it properly, suggests sloppiness, to me.    

Jules' work should be held up to scrutiny, as others' work has been scrutinized over time.  Jules objectified her.  And I have a problem with that. More-so, because it has landed in textbooks.   It is really very simple.  ;)

I'm curious if those who participated in this thread would comment on how this interview adds to this discussion:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jDKaPv-vq58&app=desktop

In this interview which takes place just as Pet Sounds is being released, Mike says at around 7:07 that "we don't get jazzed too much on TV. In the first place, I don't think TV does us justice and vice versa. And so we'd just rather do personal appearance and...records and personal appearances. We'll do TV once in a while, you know. But we aren't worried about it."

Given Mike's statements here, could one not conclude that the decision not to be doing performances on TV around this time was a personal decision made by the band who seemed to think that those kinds of appearances were not that helpful? I'm curious what those who directed their critique towards those in marketing and PR would say about Mike's comments here.

CSM - Thanks SO much for that! I loved it! That mention of the great Arnie (Woo-Woo) Ginsburg -- one of my favorite DJ's alongside Cousin Bruce Morrow!

At any rate, I was listening to the "conditions" that the TV people seemed to want, not so much that they didn't want them on TV - "lip synching!" (Milly Vanilly?)

Not so much, that they did not want to appear.  They seemed to want live vocals included.

Question is whether the record company or the PR people were advancing their interests by not making TV part of the overall promotional package, alongside their "teeny bopper" magazines...

I'm not sure I agree with that reading. After Mike says what I quote him as saying above, the DJ says that lip synching can be a problem and Mike responds by saying, that, yes, "that's another thing." So, yes, they didn't like lip synching and would rather play live but this seems to be just part of the reason why they didn't like doing TV.

Milli Vanilli didn't just lip-synch. They lip-synched to vocals they never even sang!


It's hard to say but either way in May 1966, The Beach Boys weren't too interested in making TV appearances as part of the marketing campaign.

If I had to guess, it sounds like it is more complicated than that.  Maybe it was "diplomatically evasive" because TV promotion was a place where the PR people/record company had not done their jobs, and may have led, only a few months later to the BRI incorporation.    ;)

Hmm...
Sounds a bit like speculation, which I know you don't really encourage, FdP.

Emily - absolutely not.  I am looking at events or (lack of events) - such as no TV appearances contemporaneous to releases of LP's.  And, the fact that these young 20-somethings pulling away from arguably the biggest record company in the States. 
 

Wait, are you saying this: "If I had to guess, it sounds like it is more complicated than that.  Maybe it was 'diplomatically evasive' because TV promotion was a place where the PR people/record company had not done their jobs, and may have led, only a few months later to the BRI incorporation, " which starts with "If I had to guess, it sounds like..." then goes on to "Maybe... and may have..." is not speculation?

Emily - that is just argumentative, word-parsing.  I am looking at a "pattern of non-events, "such as no TV, which one would reasonably expect to occur in the record industry, with the #1 US band releasing new albums.     

And, I do think it was "diplomatically evasive" because there was stuff going on behind-the-scenes that he may not have wanted to discuss and was nobody's business.   

It does not take parsing to see that that is a speculative statement.

Emily - reasonable minds can differ.  I am connecting the (action/inaction) dots to see this pattern of non-feasance to see the reasons that the Boys broke from Capitol and over-reliance on unreliable historic sources such as teeny bopper magazines. 

There are many.   

Reasonable minds can differ on some things.

Emily - we may disagree without being disagreeable about everything.   :lol

That is for sure.

I realize that Emily has already worked through a lot of this, but I just want to be clear. You have stressed the importance of primary sources, which you define as being The Beach Boys. And I may be wrong in this assumption, but I feel like this means that when it comes to say a (in this case hypothetical) contradictory statement between, say, David Anderle and Al Jardine, you would take the word of Jardine given that Jardine is a primary source. And yet here you are dismissing the possibility that The Beach Boys themselves were opposed to doing appearances on TV, something Mike Love directly stated, because you believe he is possibly being "evasive." Now, to me, this seems a little bit like having it both ways. That being said, do you have any evidence that can prove that Mike was being evasive in order to not deal with an issue of the marketing team's failure to promote the band? Or is this simply what Emily calls speculation or, to borrow a term that you have used to dismiss the Siegel article, conjecture?

CSM - primary sources are what I look to first.  (like the Constitution or principals)  Al Jardine is talking about their work process. 

Mike's statement was sort of non-committal. And this is just a semantic considering that they were forming BRI soon (July of 1966, IIRC) after. 

Mike was smart to say nothing at that time.  "Anything you say, can and will be held against you."   

The evidence is the lack of evidence of TV appearances.  For example, in some instances, when you go to prove to an employer that you have "no criminal record," it is the "absence of entries in the log," that proves that you have "no record."

The "absence" of a fact can be used to "prove another fact."   Would it be reasonable to turn down a national TV appearance to perform when they had a new LP? Would they have?  Likely not.  Were most recording artists featured on TV when they released new stuff?  You betcha. The Beach Boys were "conspicuous by their absence."

Siegel trashed Carole Kaye.  Didn't know her role after being embedded for months?  Is that a primary source?  Not for me; it is not. 

I'm not sure what this point about Jardine means. As I said, the case of Jardine vs. Anderle was purely hypothetical and never happened.


He says, "we don't get jazzed too much on TV. In the first place, I don't think TV does us justice and vice versa. And so we'd just rather do personal appearance and...records and personal appearances." That doesn't sound non-committal to me. He goes on to say that the would go on TV but he obviously makes the case that it's not something the band enjoys doing.


It's not semantic and the formation of BRI has nothing to do with this quote.


What evidence do you have that he was concealing something?    


And I'd respond to that by saying the evidence for that is Mike outright saying that the band doesn't like to TV appearances because they don't do the band justice. What evidence do you have to show that any other party was stopping The Beach Boys from appearing on television or is the only evidence that exists on the matter come from the band themselves?


But in this case, there is no "absence" of evidence -- there is a band member saying outright that the band doesn't like doing TV spots.


What is your evidence for this?


The really higher end tended not to do it. The Beatles virtually stopped doing TV appearances by this time. I don't think you can find a single TV performance by them in 1967, a benchmark year for them.


To be perfectly honest, I don't really understand how you are using the term primary source. I don't particularly think like a journalist where I think this idea of primary is coming from. In the academic world, a secondary source can just as valid/trustworthy/accurate as a primary source, if not more so. So I'm unclear on how you are evoking this terminology. In that case, it's a conversation that's probably best reserved for elsewhere and maybe a journalist could possibly take it up. That being said, when I used it in the post, I was trying to establish the kind of value that primary sources have for you.

CSM - I responded fully.  And, don't go much for the split post. 

I am not thinking like a journalist, now.

Leaving things out is not unreasonable to the prying eyes and ears of the press.  If I were in "stealth mode" with a company to be emerging, I might not comment or have something scripted ready (that is me, looking at what I consider reasonable and not Mike.)   

And, you think the BRI incorporation, on the horizon has no relationship? Especially since a Greatest Hits, Vo.l 1, was coming out in 1966, in July.

The fact that there are no appearances indicate that something is missing to me and find it a problem.  I care what band members have to say and not the opinions of "others" who are not band members.  They are largely irrelevant as far as I am concerned.  Everyone has an opinion, but not everyone is a principal. ;) 

 

Yes, and in this case the only evidence presented for why they didn't do more TV is that a principal said they don't like to.

Which is pretty compelling evidence, I'd say.

Ever consider the possibility that they were not "invited to the party on TV?"

And that could have been a source of rejection or embarrassment among all the band members, including Carl, Dennis, or Al?  

Could they have chosen not to lip-synch?  Why would they do California Girls and Good Vibrations in 1968? Think they didn't want to do GOK or WIBN or Sloop on national TV?  

And even do lesser hits later, such as Cease to Resist on Mike Douglas in later years?  

What is the evidence for this possibility?

CSM - I see you cut off three big 1966 hits from my response.

What is a reasonable explanation for GOK, WIBN and Sloop not to be on US TV?  All Top Ten hits.

The evidence is the absence of TV appearances. They were on for many other hits, constantly. The time break occurs in late 1965 through 1968. Can you explain why these hits were not on TV?

I cut them off because you don't like me splitting up your posts and I was trying to be accommodating. I guess you can't win for trying!

There was a promo video made for Sloop. Did that ever air? What about that other promo vid with the boys in the monster masks? Did that air anywhere on television?

The fact that the Beach Boys weren't on television does not prove that they were not "invited to the party."

The industry practice was a performance and little interview with the bands, not a video. VHF and MTV were not even live for 20 years hence. 

Every band, whether The Turtles, Paul Revere, etc., played their songs to a live screaming audience.  This was absent. They did their other hits such as California Girls on Bob Hope and Jack Benny.  Why not GOK, the second (or top) song on the planet? 

Not every band. As I noted, by that time, The Beatles were not doing those kinds of TV appearances anymore, probably for similar reasons as The Beach Boys.

The reason why I brought up the promo videos is because if they had been shown, it would be difficult to argue that they weren't invited to the party on TV.

The reason why not GOK has been answered. By May of 1966, The Beach Boys had decided they didn't like doing TV appearances anymore. We know this because they said so. Maybe in 1965 they still didn't mind or they did them begrudgingly as a kind of one-off thing, as Mike says that they might continue to do. But ultimately they didn't play the song live because in their words TV didn't do them justice and they'd rather do "records and personal appearances." We have no evidence that suggests any other reason.

The Beatles are irrelevant.  These are The Beach Boys. This is the US. 

If they did lesser songs such as Cease to Resist, later, that argument makes little sense to me. 

It does not explain the near 3 year TV void when they are doing their greatest hits.

Were they blackballed by the music industry for the perception of avant-garde music when the Beatles avant-garde music was highly promoted?

Had they reached their end-point with surf-cars-girls motifs?  Were they expendable at that point? 

They certainly were screwed in the UK for the 1967 TIKH tour.

Who did that?  Apparently the principals were not happy and are on record as such.     

 

The Beatles may well be relevant; the Beatles didn't like doing TV and started sending out promo videos instead. Just after that the Beach Boys who also didn't like doing TV started sending out promo videos. Makes sense and given that the only evidence is that the Beach Boys didn't like doing TV it's really the only supported conclusion available. Thanks for finally providing some evidence so we can stop the conjecture, CSM!

Emily - you grew up with MTV.  I grew up with live TV.  The Beatles were based in the UK.  There is an unaccounted for void on live TV.  I have no idea how the Beatles were promoted in the UK, before cable TV.

And, I don't agree that an opportunity to promote on TV would be passed by, especially if performed (as it should have been) as a live performance and not a lip-sync. How much dollar value is put on a live appearance to promote an upcoming LP? Pet Sounds was under-promoted as far as I am concerned.  

That is inconsistent with the rest of their careers, whether on Johnny Carson, Mike Douglas, Bob Hope, Joan Rivers.  Or Shindig, Where the Action is, or any other teen-based shows like American Bandstand.  The Sunrays were on Where the Action is.  Almost every other band.  Why not them?  ;)

It is perfectly accounted for by a direct quote at the exact time we are discussing by one of the principals that they don't like doing TV!

Here's the promo you were all bothering Capitol for not producing
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-2QM_H3akLk&t=5m55s (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-2QM_H3akLk&t=5m55s)

Emily - it was an off-the-cuff remark that does not support in any way the absence of the band from the TV screens for 3 years and the concurrent incompetence of the management.  Nor it is credible, with the various variety shows that some hosts would not  have jumped at the chance to have The Beach Boys on their shows. No one turned down that TV exposure to support concert ticket sales, as well as LP/single sales. 

Why would they break their backs touring, to stay in the spotlight, and reject TV as a medium for promotion, because "they didn't like it?"

If the issue is still (after all the discussions from previous weeks) centered on the band not appearing on TV, we have a May 1966 primary source of a radio interview where a band member (Mike) answered the question. The band did not want to do TV appearances at that time, and they did not. Mike said they preferred to promote through their live concerts rather than lip-syncing on TV. What we also have are the examples of the band following what the Beatles had also begun doing, by sending short film clips to various TV shows in place of them actually appearing on that show and miming to whatever single was out. Sloop John B had the promo film with Derek Taylor and the swimming pool. Good Vibrations had the firehouse film directed by Brian (which was reported to have been seen on UK TV as well as some who remember it on US TV), and various versions that used live performance clips from England cut to the track (I posted one specific example from Beat Club). Heroes even got a clip that showed surfing footage cut to the song.

If primary sourcing is not sufficient enough in the form of a band member in May 1966 answering off the cuff why there are no TV appearances, combined with the evidence the band was instead using film as the Beatles had been doing to promote the singles on TV and we have examples, it's hard to imagine what else in terms of "proof" could be produced.

The band didn't want to make standard TV appearances as of May 1966 going into 1967, so they sent films instead, just as the Beatles had been doing since Day Tripper was released. The most basic answer is the band said no to doing TV and that's why there were no appearances.

The decision came from the band according to the May '66 radio interview, they simply said no. If the band said no, that's the last word.

GF - the jury is out.  While it may have been a statement from a principal, it is not a strong one. 

No one seems to get that these videos were not in any kind of promo level circulation.  Having a video is one thing; there was no VH1/MTV as an outlet to promote it.   

This is from 1967 UNICEF in Paris and yet nothing live on TV, from the States.

http://youtu.be/YTpzKDhdjms    --Hope it copies. 

They did live stuff IIRC during the TIKH in the Spring of 1967 in the UK.   

Here are 4 principals in Paris talking about the record company not doing right by them.  1970.

http://youtu.be/uehyh57k2_E

Hope they copy.

One personal appearance on a TV show is equivalent to one airing of the promo video on a TV show in terms of quantity of views. One promo video can be shown on multiple TV shows. So the idea that MTV wasn't around is not at all pertinent to whether a promo video can suffice to replace a personal appearance. That's completely illogical. The Beatles, who undeniably had a much more professional and successful operation than the Beach Boys made this choice. If the Beach Boys prefer live shows (which history has shown is by far their chosen method of getting their music out there, why wouldn't they chose to follow a route that the most successful band in the world had chosen that satisfies their own preferences?
The videos you link to make no reference at all to why they don't do TV.
FdP, in this very thread you dismiss other actual primary sources as not being 'primary' according to your personal definition because they are not the actual Beach Boys. In your arguments earlier in this thread you place statements by a Beach Boy over any other, much stronger evidence. But in this case, you are dismissing the only evidence provided, which is Mike Love, a Beach Boy saying, with other Beach Boys present and not controverting his statement in the least, that they don't like to do TV, combined with a career-long commitment to live concerts.
Your arguments in this thread are entirely inconsistent and exhibit cherry-picking evidence to support pre-conceived notions. It's not credible in the least.

Emily - that is my experience as a fan "at that time."

And if you can tell me the TV spots were those pre-fab (pun intended) videos were aired, it would be helpful.  Ed Sullivan was not showing music videos.

They did not air on prime time TV.  There were only the 3 major US networks and a smaller VHF band emerging which did have other major live bands.

When they came out of their "self-imposed " (which I don't believe) TV exile, they were doing 1966-7 stuff on the major networks, doing GV - 2 years post release.  Makes no credible sense.  

 

That is flat out false.

There is video around of The Beatles themselves recording an introduction specifically for the Ed Sullivan show before the airing of the Paperback Writer/Rain videos.

There is also video of Ed Sullivan on his show introducing the Hello, Goodbye promo film.

He was indeed showing those videos.

Furthermore, there is currently a Youtube video floating around of Dick Clark showing and talking about the Strawberry Fields/Penny Lane promo vids on American Bandstand. This one has had the sound muted for copyright reasons but you get the idea:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ysG6GN9n3nE

So these videos definitely circulated.

Here's a very informative blog post about the Beatles' promo films:
http://wogew.blogspot.com/2015/01/the-beatles-music-videos.html

No one can be expected to have seen every episode of Ed Sullivan or other shows featuring popular music, nor can one be expected to remember all they've seen. This is why research is often more useful than memory.

I would like to see evidence of that.  There is a detailed master list of all Sullivan's shows and live guests on ranker.com.  His last show was June 6, 1971.

For example on June 28, 1964, The Beatles 3rd appearance shows the songs they sang, Twist and Shout, Please, Please me, I Want to Hold your Hand.  Pre-recorded video, inserted into a live show.  It is listed last show # 361.  Not a video.

On show #426, The Beach Boys did (Sept. 27, 1964) the did I Get Around and Wendy.  

http://www.tv.com/shows/the-ed-sullivan-show/june-5-1966-the-beatles-on-tape-richard-pryor-jack-benny-robert-goulet-charlotte-rae-107885/

You can find both examples in The Beatles Anthology series. Disc 5 has The Beatles recorded intro for the Sullivan Show and Disc 6 or 7 has Ed Sullivan outright introducing the Hello Goodbye video in lieu of a Beatles performance.

The Paperback Writer entry on Wikipedia says the following: On the first day they recorded a colour performance at Abbey Road Studios, for The Ed Sullivan Show, which was shown on 5 June

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paperback_Writer

The Hello Goodbye entry on Wikipedia says the following: The Beatles produced three promotional films for the song, one of which was shown on The Ed Sullivan Show in America. ... In the US, the first promo for "Hello, Goodbye" was premiered on The Ed Sullivan Show on 26 November

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hello,_Goodbye

http://youtu.be/rblYSKz_VnL  - Hello Goodbye - performed not a video to a singles or album track.  Hope it copies.

did you read the material posted?

I'm sorry. I'm quite confused. You linked me to the promo film that I have been referring to.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qf5Eclt6_ac
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lICpC2GoHjg
these were both shown on Ed Sullivan
edited: lol - I first posted a parody of Rain!

There is a Paperback Writer video that is a video set to the single.

 http://youtu.be/qf5Eclt6_ac   Hope that copies.

Don't have that Beatles anthology.   ;)

so you agree?

Where are The Beach Boys? In 1965-1968?

The Beatles have the hula girls (BB)  for Hello, Goodbye. That is a (live) taped stand-up performance.

??? So?

Emily - there is a difference between a taped "stand up"segment that is inserted into a show which I gave an example of with the Beatles, above, and one that is pre-fabbed, and set to a video.  Hello Goodbye was such a performance. 

Where is the evidence that the BB's segments ever aired on live, national TV? 

Ed Sullivan treated the Beatles like royalty.  The Beach Boys were on as far as I can tell in 1964 and 1968.  In 1968 they did GV but Do It Again which was timely. 

There is a TV gap that remains of nearly 3 years in the States.   Taped "performance" would have been acceptable.  No Sloop, no WIBN and no GOK.  (Pet Sounds.)

When VH1-MTV started airing of course they aired Sloop on that promo but that was in the 1980's, and not contemporaneous to the release to boost sales and concert tickets.   

Huh?

The Hello Goodbye video which you linked to was a a promotional video exactly like Paperback Writer and Rain was. They are not giving a live performance whatsoever in Hello Goodbye. It's a music video in which they are pretending to sing live - it's a common sub-genre of the music video. That The Beatles are simply miming to their record was so obvious that the video was in fact banned by the BBC for lip-synching (a recent rule in England that obviously evaporated eventually). It's a promo video plain and simple. It has always been described as such and any attempts to call it something other than that is a simple fabrication.

and, even so, Rain and Paperback Writer which were shown on Ed Sullivan and other TV shows are not "as if" performed. The point being, the Beatles made promo films and sent them to TV shows in lieu of performing. The Beach Boys did the same. Neither wanted to haul themselves to the studio and stand there and lip sync. What's the problem here?

The problem is the void.  There are no Beach Boys appearances; real or imagined during that time. 

The Beatles could do anything the wanted.  The Beach Boys had no such luxury. 

Where are the dates of their appearances?

But just as a point of clarification - a taped segment to be inserted into a show is pre-taped for a particular show to appear as if it were part of the live show. That's not what Hello Goodbye was. For HG there were three promo films shot and then dispersed to various television programs. It was a promo film in every way the same as Paperback Writer, Rain, Day Tripper, We Can Work It Out, Strawberry Fields, Penny Lane.

CSM - you know way more about The Beatles than I. 

However, in 1964, there was a "taped segment on June of 1964 of The Beatles." It was a stand up Twist and Shout, I Wanna hold Your Hand, and Please, Please Me.

This is acceptable as an "live" appearance, even inserted into a regular program.  Even in 1964.   

Yes, which was an altogether different thing from the Hello Goodbye promo video. That taped segment from 1964 was not a promotional video.

Before you began talking erroneously about Hello Goodbye as a "a taped 'stand up' segment that is inserted into a show," I had already linked to the wikipedia page for Hello Goodbye which expressly talked about the making of and airing of Hello Goodbye promo film.

But the difference is that the '64 appearance was filmed in the Ed Sullivan theater particularly for Ed Sullivan's show using Ed Sullivan's crew. Hello Goodbye, as explained in the blog post I linked to (eta: and the Wikipedia link from CSM), was filmed as a general promo film.
FdP, it doesn't matter about the Beatles being special. Lots of bands were doing promo films at the time: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_video#1960.E2.80.931973:_Promotional_clips_and_others

Emily - perhaps I am explaining this poorly.  A TV exposure void amidst new bands in the highly competitive music field was almost catastrophic and at a time, when the most media support for Pet Sounds and Smile (or Smiley) were not starting off at the top of the charts.  Keeping your brand out there was part of the job description.

The minutiae is of no consequence as to Ed Sullivan and how he taped his shows. There were other variety shows such as Andy Williams, or Bob Hope, etc.,  The Beach Boys are conspicuous by their absence for an extended period of time.

That's an altogether different point. We could have a debate over whether it was a good decision not to do TV spots, but the discussion here has been about who made that decision. And the evidence in this case points to The Beach Boys making that decision.

There were some citations above in this thread of their promo videos being aired. I doubt their promos were aired any less than any other bands'. They were on the road - that's what they were doing to keep their brand out there. It's been their preferred method ever since, and seems to be their most successful method. They weren't very successful on TV. They usually come off as a bit dorky and I'm pretty sure I've read that they found some of their TV appearances embarrassing. They didn't have that stage presence that some other artists had. They definitely do their brand better service live.
FdP, you are really speculating and have presented no evidence to support your theory that the label somehow kept them off TV. Believe what you want, but an argument is unconvincing to others without either a clear rationale or evidence, neither of which is present.

Look at the Spring of '66 on the cusp of the new BRI with the release in May of Pet Sounds.  Then the release of Smiley about a year and a half later and into 1967.

It is unfathomable to me that if they were invited or had the media package put together properly, there would have refused TV appearances to promote Pet Sounds.  Would they refuse TV?  I don't think so.  

Even during C50, the TV stand up performances, were integrated into the tour with the release of TWGMTR.  Someone made that happen.  

And, in 1967, with Where the Action is, on wiki, there is an enormously long list of the bands that performed.  I don't think the band thought they were "too good" or "too important" to perform on TV during that time.  

I will add that I agree with you, FdP, on the idea that the Beach Boys suffered from very poor management and messaging at this stage (indeed at most stages). But as CSM said, I just don't think it's clear that the label was responsible.

The term dorky did not exist.  They looked great.  They were successful on TV, and I don't know where you get that information.  When they were making an appearance, the TV guides would list them as a highlight for the day or week.  The don't do that for losers.

Just so I'm clear, then, you are accepting your own conjecture over the historical and factual evidence that exists. Elsewhere you seem to have an issue with conjecture. Why are you in favour of it here, particularly when it contradicts hard evidence?

Didn't that Jack Benny appearance offer that same image of The Beach Boys that they were complaining about in 1970 and maybe stuff like that was precisely why they felt the medium of TV (which was really not in keeping with the new hip trends, certainly not in 1966) did not work for them at the time. Like someone on this thread said, bands like Buffalo Springfield were outright refusing to do shows like Johnny Carson because they felt those kinds of shows were lame.

a quick google indicates first use of the word 'dork' with it's current meaning in the '60s. However, I did not quote anyone using the word contemporarily, so it's not relevant. Obviously you and I differ as to their relative dorkiness but that is, of course, opinion. I certainly never said they were 'losers' and never would.
I will look for the interview, but I remember them saying "uncomfortable" probably, referring to lip syncing on TV and one of them particularly mentioning not knowing what to do with their hands when they weren't miming the instruments indicating that it was awkward, which it was. They also didn't do interviews with anything near the charisma of the Beatles and didn't have that 'je ne sais quoi' of Mick Jagger or the dancing of Tina Turner or James Brown. It's opinion but near fact that they simply don't transmit as 'cool' the way a lot of personalities do. And in a few interviews I've seen them acknowledge that.
But they are known for doing great live shows.

It is not conjecture or speculation.  It is a rhetorical question.  Rhetorical questions are asked to make a point rather than elicit an answer.   

That Jack Benny - Bob Hope with the surfboards was for California Girls.  http://youtu.be/AX1U0wtll10

Listed as November 3 1965 on imdb. 

The point wasn't that it was done '66. It's that it's probably part of why they chose, in '66, to stop doing TV.
And the point made by your rhetorical question, and that you've been making all along, is conjectural. Or maybe not even that, as the evidence available suggests the opposite.

As Emily suggested above, I wasn't referring to your question.

Emily - I do not believe that was a conscious decision.  They were disconnecting from Capitol in the Spring/Summer of 1966 just after Pet Sounds was released.

They are on the record, over and over, by the following Spring, uttering dismay for the way the tours were run and what was being promoted.  Those cites are in Rusten and in Badman.

Had Capitol possessed a crystal ball in 1966, think that they would not have promoted the hell out of Pet Sounds instead of releasing Best of 8 weeks later?



 

The label doesn't run the tour. That's on the band's management.

Emily - Perhaps poorly enumerated.  The TIKH Tour (May - 1967) in Europe was an EMI (Capitol) or whatever the structure was at the time, involved venture, IIRC.   I don't have the books at hand but cited them in an earlier post. Post Pet Sounds, Post GV, they had released Then I Kissed Her (from SDSN from 1965.) That it well documented in Rusten/Stebbins and Badman.