The Smiley Smile Message Board

Currently putting together the 1977 gigs & sessions page (and most interesting it is too), and i need help with Denny's canned solo tour - i recall someone here had a newspaper clipping with an ad for it... also any further info on proposed dates and venues gratefully recieved. I'd ask Jon but he's busy bashing out the liners to the new reissue.  Thanks in advance.

question- was there a planned setlist?

They did rehearse a bunch of material from POB...I don't know if they had actually finalized any repertoire.

Jon says "Baby Blue" was also rehearsed.

One planned date was Nov. 29, 1977 at the Academy of Music, Philadelphia.

Tickets were only $5.50, $6.50 & $7.50 !!!!!!!!!!!!

I wonder if Dennis would have been able to pull it off at that point? 1977 is the first year drink seems to interfere with his on stage performances. Of course the added responsibility could have made him resolve to show up sober. Don't get me wrong I love Dennis and think that if he was determind to be fairly straight the concerts would have been amazing.

It certainly would've been something. Shame we'll never  know...

A member of the band that Dennis assembled for this never-to-be tour told me he feels that while the music was "amazing", Dennis wasn't quite "ready" in his estimation...

I'm hoping those amazing taped rehearsals will find their way onto a Dennis Wilson anthology in the next couple of years.  Which means, we need to convince everyone we know to buy a copy of POB/Bambu when it comes out this June!  The stronger sales are for that, the greater chance of more unreleased Dennis coming our way!

What instruments would Dennis have played on stage?  Piano? Other keyboards?  Drums?  Mike's saxaphone?:lol  All?  None? it would have been pretty interesting in any event to see the supposedly "non-musical" Beach Boy up there leading his own band, playing and singing his own songs.  What a shame.

Since he played piano and drums on stage with the Beach Boys, I assume he'd do the same on a solo tour.

Keyboards, and at times possibly nothing, just singing.

The band he had assembled had keyboards and drummers.  That's not to say he wouldn't step back behind the tubs for a number or two, but I have a feeling Dennis would have left that for his band.

woulda been awesome if he'd play that slowed down jam of San Miguel

I spoke to Bobby Figueroa about this last night and he said that they actually did do a show one night at Pine Knob Music Theatre in Clarkston MI. It was after that performance that night that the people who were going to put on the tour realized Dennis was not ready for this.
He'd be the one to talk to about it however since he was on the sessions and was to be in the touring band.

Hi Joanne,
David Beard and I have done a bit of research on this lately, Dave's done a ton of interviews and really dug on this subject for the new POB release and i think what Bobby might be recalling is the mini-set DW and the sidemen did prior to a couple of BB's shows, Pine Knob and Canada...a few POB songs were attempted with a small band(five or six pieces)...actually between Ricci Martin's set and the BB's set is how Wayne Tweed, and I think Billy remembered it. This actually occurred just prior to the release of POB in August 77...there was little rehearsal...a run through at soundcheck is what we've been told...and yeah it was a train-wreck from all accounts. Hard to believe the tour could have been canceled as a result...because the actual live rehearsals for a DW tour came two months later in late Oct. at Brother, this was with a full band, Carl included, plus a horn section...these rehearsals were taped on Oct. 31 and Nov. 1 '77, they are documented and they sound incredible...Bobby is definitely there. The tour was then canceled in mid-November before the first date was played...which was scheduled for late November. This is all tough to figure out because there was so much happening simultaneously but we're getting closer to nailing it down.

hmm..yeah he said it wasn't a full production and it was after Ricci's set...but he said it didn't go well that night and they knew then that things weren't going down too well. I don't know who all 'they' were since I didn't ask. Truth be told I was surpised anything was done at all during the shows then, it was the first I had even heard of it.

Hi Jon,
Can you describe the rehearsal tapes? What songs did they run through?

What's Wrong, Pacific Ocean Blues, You and I, Time, Friday Night, End of the Show, Baby Blue and Moonshine were the main things that were rehearsed. There aren't many lead vocals, just scattered lines here and there... although Dennis does a fairly nice lead on What's Wrong...On one of the takes Carl sings some lead on Pacific Ocean Blues. I don't know if the full rehearsals were taped or just a sampling...but there are multiple versions of some of the songs...and what I've heard sounded REALLY good. Dennis may not have been ready but the band that was playing his music certainly was.

It's kind of strange, on some of the songs there's clearly Dennis singing, but it's off mic.  I don't know why, if he was just singing scratch takes, they didn't put that on tape.

I think the live versions would have been really neat.  The songs would have felt really different, with the horn section filling in for what were strings or string ensemble ARP on the record.  Definitely would have been a happening band.

At the CNE Grandstand, Toronto, Canada in August 1977, Dennis did two songs with the BB from POB, "What's Wrong" and "Friday Night." How does this come into play?

I'm loving all of this research, btw.

any chance we'll hear these in the future?  ;D

This is exactly in the same time frame as the mini-set mentioned in my post replying to Joanne, so I'd venture this guess...they did the short DW set (3 or 4 songs) between Ricci Martin and the BB's for one show, maybe two, and then after that didn't go well they fused two of the POB songs into the BB's set for one show and then chucked the whole thing because Dennis thought it needed more pieces and rehearsal to actually work. Then POB gets released and does really well both critically and sales wise...so the DW tour plan comes fully into play with the rehearsals at Brother in Oct....that would be my guess.

Maybe he took dubs of the tapes home to practice singing to, that's why he didn't want a full vocal on there.

Jon that sounds right to me.