The Smiley Smile Message Board

Watch, enjoy, analyze.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B001BN732I/002-9225065-8452048?pf_rd_p=424837701&pf_rd_s=center-3&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_i=5174&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_r=1SHCC0R54D16WBQVQFKH

Pretty good... but Brian's either post-dubbed or lip-synching.

Or it's a combination of different shots / vocal takes -- the method used on the BWPS DVD.

Edit:

See my follow-up post below.

I think this is most likely, as I heard they ran thru the entire album at least 5 times for the cameras...

The cymbals in many parts of the video are either out-of-sync with the audio, or he hits them and there is no audio. The vocals are slightly out-of-sync at the start of the bridge. The vibraphone doesn't always match up either.

I didn't have a chance to actually listen until now. I would be very surprised if the audio is actually a live performance. Brian sounds double-tracked at points. I suspect this is the album track, with the live performance synced up.

Guys, its a music video...

Surfer girl...marilyn or melinda? you decide!

Neither - in '61 it was Judy Bowlles.  ;D

News from the bloo -- apparently the DVD on the CD/DVD combo is less than a half-hour long. So no complete live performance -- and from the looks of this video, possibly no live performance at all.

Well, that's a shitload of f***.  I'll pass on the combo then.

Amazon lists the DVD at 26 minutes.

Here's what Amazon says is on the DVD:

1. Chapter 1: Morning Beat - Making Of The Album 
2. Chapter 1: Our Prayer - Making Of The Album 
3. Chapter 1: That Lucky Old Sun - Making Of The Album 
4. Chapter 1: California Role - Making Of The Album 
5. Chapter 1: Midnight's Another Day - Making Of The Album 
6. Chapter 1: Southern California - Making Of The Album 
7. Chapter 1: Surfin' - Making Of The Album 
8. Chapter 1: Oxygen To The Brain - Making Of The Album 
9. Chapter 1: Mexican Girl - Making Of The Album 
10. Chapter 1: Can't Wait Too Long - Making Of The Album 
11. Chapter 1: Going Home - Making Of The Album 
12. Chapter 1: Live Let Live - Making Of The Album 
13. Chapter 1: Going Home - Making Of The Album 
14. Chapter 2: Good Kind Of Love - Live Performance From Capitol Studio A 
15. Chapter 2: Forever My Surfer Girl - Live Performance From Capitol Studio A

To decipher the strange "Chapter" headings, it looks like we get behind the scenes footage of Brian and company recording specific songs for the album (although I have no idea why "Our Prayer" and "Surfin'" are included - they must do run-throughs of those on a lark), plus two live performances: "Good Kind of Love" and "Forever My Surfer Girl".

With all the multiple takes going on, it might be more accurate to call the performances "in-studio videos".

OK, riddle me this - Brian has been performing live and solo since spring 1999 on a regular basis... and we're still waiting for a full concert DVD. I think this tells you as much about the nous of his management as does the fact that every one of his solo albums has been on a different label.

This is the one thing that bugs me to no end.  As great as the SMiLE DVD is, I would have loved to see a full concert.  The 2004 unplugged sets were phenomenal.  Shame that no official recording of those is available.

Yo, BriMel, are you listening?  Please release a full concert DVD from the upcoming TLOS tour   

I have been bickering about this for a while.

Brian's albums have not all been on different labels.

BW 88 (Reprise)
OCA (Warner Bros.)
Imagination (Giant)
Live at the Roxy DVD-A (Rhino)
GIOMH (Rhino)
Smile (Nonesuch)

were all released by Warner Bros. records companies. The label on the CD doesn't mean too much -- it's all under the same corporate umbrella.

IJWMFTT was on MCA because Don Was had a deal there.
What I Really Want for Christmas was on Arista (a Sony company)

Technically true, but it does matter. Ask Warner about Wilco and Yankee Hotel Foxtrot...

Luther: Touche. But when you look at something like GIOMH and see it released on Rhino -- that's because Brian and his people made a two-record deal with Warner's (Smile being the other one, and which came out on Nonesuch). So the contract was with one company, but the albums were split between labels. It's just not true to imply that because they're on two labels that he signed with one, then was dropped, then signed with the other -- which is what a statement like Andrew's can imply.

It's the same deal with Elvis Costello and the bizarre recent contracts he's signed in which whatever he records can come out on whatever Universal label is appropriate. Lost Highway, Deutsche Grammophon, etc.

Not quite the same thing, in that Costello's is a long-term plan (admittedly an odd one). Wilson's albums may have all come out on Warners subsidiaries, but they weren't pre-planned that way as part of a long-term package. As you said, there was one such instance of a two-album deal. Not the same. And in between each deal, he's been shopping. It's largely coincidental, I'd guess, that each time he ended up on a Warners sub.

I think the both the audio and video are great.  Really good.  I'm no "Brian can do no wrong" blueboarder, but this bodes very well for the album.  I'm not really interested in the debate on how "live" this is (might be a comp or perhaps just the album version of the song with synched video) and I will leave this to others.  Not many live videos are 100% live and most go through a fair amount of post production anyway. 

But isn't this recording of the song MUCH, MUCH better than the demo?  I sure think so.  I am getting more and more excited about this release.

I agree with some others who have mentioned a bit of disappointment with the album version of MAD versus the demo.  I will reserve final judgement until I get the pristine sounding version in my sweaty palms, but from what I have heard of the album version of MAD I concure that the vocal swell that comes at "makes me feel so alone" doesn't touch the demo.  In the demo version it almost sounds as if the vocals are going to burst through the speakers and very desperate.  Gorgeous moment.  That moment is not nearly as rewarding on the album version.  But that doesn't mean the album version is without it merits.  I love the strings and some of the other touches in the album version quite a bit more than the demo.  At least I already have a high fidelity cd copy of the MAD demo, so all is cool.

This new version of FSBMSG is heads and shoulders better than the demo.  If this is an indicator of quality control, I suspect I will enjoy most of the album versions of the TLOS much better than the demos (and I quite like the demos).  Bring it on!

Is FSBMSG going to be a single?

It's lip-synched... that's the album version that's playing.  So consider it like an MTV video, only without the pretension.

Couldn't care less if it's lip-synched, cut together from 5 live takes or whatever. It sounds great!

And for people who always need something to critisize: The piano falls a little out of rhythm in the intro.

I've lost all objectivity with Brian, that seems to me like just a phenomenal song and it certainly sounds like it has that "Beach Boys" sound to it.  I guess "Lush" would be the best word for it.  It seems like something your casual beach boys fan (read, almost everybody alive) would enjoy nearly as much as the 60's songs. 

This is gonna be a GREAT album, it looks like the finished versions are slightly better than the fantastic demos. 

Good stuff. Foskett does a great Carl impression towards the end. Is that d'Amico on drums? And - I know I haven't been paying attention recently - who's the new bassist?

Taylor still looks hot!  >:D

That's Mr Taylor Mills (aka Todd Sucherman from Styx, and the first BWBand drummer) on drums.  The new bassist is Brett Simons

Todd was apparently back for the TLOS sessions and Capitol shows -- Mikey came on shortly afterward as the touring drummer.

I think MAD was mentioned as the first single, on that radio show....

While there may be some funny business with lip-syncing of what not, it certainly sounds good and is a nice primer for TLOS. And Brian looks happy...

And I quote (not quite verbatim) from the Beach Boys' 1989 syndicated TV show Endless Summer:

No official recording is available, huh?

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4182988

Ah, but Sean that is not the FULL and COMPLETE concert, nor is it a DVD... which is really what I was asking for.  But, strictly speaking, yes I had forgotten about that.

I doubt we'll see a complete concert DVD from Brian, at least without the "complete" concert being put together from multiple performances (the Creators at Carnegie is a complete concert, but from two performances, albeit with the two individuals having different setlists)...they'd want to get as close to a flawless performance as possible, and with Brian and his quirks, that's kind of difficult...not to mention the large number musicians behind, any one of whom can mess up...that's the reason there wasn't a complete London Smile performance on the DVD, IIRC...(in fact, even the "Mrs. O'Leary's Cow" bonus is a composite -- notice how Nick's shirt magically changes!)

omg! who is her??

Carol Mountain. Betcha.

Brian Wilson told a LIE ?

No no no no no no no no no... that could never happen. After all, he's... Brian Wilson.  ::)

haha. I love Brian and Mike exchanges. They are always hilarious!

Who's to say he wasn't lying in 1989?

Wow!  This is a fabulous recording.  I really like the demo version of this song, but this version is significantly better.  Great blending of BWs vocals with the other band members.  Sure, the singing (or lip-syncing) on the video clip often fails to match the song, but who cares?  For many, many years now, BW's leads have often way too grating to my ear, and I've always wondered why they don't blend the rest of the band more into his vocals.  They've done it big time here, and the result is a much more enjoyable listening experience, in my opinion.  Hope the vocal blends (and probably pitch corrections too) on the rest of the album have been done this well.

Hmmm .... experts say that auditory memory can be fleeting, and it appears they are correct!  Just went back and did a comparison of the demo version and the Amazon venison of Forever My Surfer Girl, and contrary to my comments above, they sounded virtually identical.

Guess I was thrown off by the Amazon visuals of BWs band singing harmonies, causing me to think they were mixed louder and Brian was mixed softer in the Amazon version. 

Still, the great majority of BW's current (by current, I actually mean the past 30 + years!) vocals are mixed too loud and sound too strident to me.   I'd really like to hear more harmonizing along with his leads, including a prominent harmonizing double voice in many cases.   In Forever My Surfer Girl, the fact that BW's voice is so often mixed with the harmonies of his band, as well as the fact that it seems electronically full (from a reverb and eq standpoint) and most likely pitch corrected in places, makes the song very listenable to me.

Also, I'd love to have a single version of Forever My Surfer Girl, with a longer ending added to the song, so that as it fades out it sounds self contained, rather than like it is fading into the Venice Beach Narrative.

Venison? It's very deer to me. ;)

Yes, it took me quite a while to hunt down the Amazon venison.  A friend of mine on dial-up advised me that when he listens he gets Amazon venison jerky.   :)

Is that really the version that's going to be on the CD? Brian's voice is very prominent in this version. No offence, but Brian has a very, very weak "falsetto" as of recent years. I would have thought that the rest of the band would have "blended in" more with Brian. Using this as a "final" version might not be that good of an idea.

I demand more quotation marks.

Jimmy Hester's Idol? I remember you. That porcelin guy, right?

Oh, and this is Jimmy. That was really funny, by the way. :lol

TLOS will soon rule the planet and my "idol" will be forced to
move out of my garage. Might be a good thing, but then who
will I get to mow my yard?

All hail Jimmy Hester's idol!

Come on.  They always mix Brian's voice that way, you expect them to do it different on this c.d. for some reason when they didn't on any of the last 9 albums? 

:lol

I was waiting for someone to comment.


Now I don't feel so bad for not noticing a difference. :lol  I thought something was wrong with me!

I see where you're coming from, Jay, but you should cut Brian a little slack on the falsetto.  He's 66 years old...and given what he's put his voice through, it's a wonder he even has a falsetto at all.  And the few times we've heard him use it recently haven't been too bad ("First Noel", the end of "Surf's Up", harmonies on the demo of "Forever She'll Be My Surfer Girl"). 

I do agree with you though that the band should be a bit more blended with Brian's voice.

Live or studio, that's not Brian - Darian takes the top, Jeff the next step down, Brian the middle.

"....a children's song" as heard on BWPS? That's Brian.

Listening now... and, yes, that's Brian... and at least one other voice, probably Darian.

Go halves ?

Not according to one of the people you mentioned and it wasn't Brian.  :-D

Yeah that's the part I meant...to me it sounded like Jeff doubling him, but either way Brian still hit it (in the studio, at least).

Andrew, I believe, was referring to "Columnated ruins domino" which is, from top to bottom, Darian, Jeff, and Brian.  "A children's song" to my ears sounds like Brian multi-tracked.  Darian flat out said that that particular part was all Brian and (if you can believe Darian) that was the easiest part to get Brian to sing - apparently the rest of the melody proved to be rather problematic for Brian.

If Darian said that, then that's the way it was.  :)

There must be a small range of notes that he can still nail, like that part.... and on Good Vibrations he nails the "it's WEEEIIIRDDDD" part as well.  I'm sure it's probably doubled but it's so strange to see him hit some notes dead on and then others he sounds god awful. 

What I've always found weird is that he could hit that part at the end (doubled or not, it doesn't really matter), but he had to shout his way through the whole "laughs come hard" part.  It would have been difficult to use his falsetto there, but I think he could have done it.  It's a bummer too, because that section has always ruined that version for me...he sings the rest of it really well. 

OT,

But why did they not use Mike Love's lyrics for GV on BWPS!

Did they ever give a reason?

For what its worth.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_Vibrations


According to Brian Wilson, when he re-recorded "Good Vibrations" for his 2004 version of Smile, his wife, Melinda, suggested he use the original lyrics written by Tony Asher. From Mike Love's lyrics, he kept just the opening line, "I, I love the colorful clothes she wears," and the chorus, "I'm pickin' up good vibrations, she's giving me excitations ..."

That M name just keeps popping up doesn't it!

It has been suggested by Peter Reum that Mike's boy-girl lyrics weren't appropriate for the theme of SMiLE.  I have to respectfully disagree with the creative decision to go with the Asher lyrics.  IMHO that was a deliberate "f*** You" to Mike.  Mike's finished lyrics were better than Asher's rough draft lyrics.  The Good Vibrations that we all know and love was a better fit for SMiLE than the 2004 GV. 

The Tony Asher lyrics are boy-girl lyrics, too!

I was always under the impression that Tony wrote that first line "I love the colorful clothes she wears" and Mike wrote the rest on the final version.  If Mike wrote "I love the colorful clothes she wears", what was Tony's first line of his lyrics?

Another thing strange about the mix that I guess is a result of all the scissor work Brian did to the original, is that on some of the 'demo' mixes or whatever, it leaves on that kind of shouted pickup right before the chorus, so the original went

"An I'm Picking UP!!! ...GOOD, GOOD, GOOD, GOOD VIBRATIONS, YEAH!"

So when they remade it into the single version and cut the new chorus in, they took off the "An I'm pickin up!" part... since he doesn't immediately say 'good vibrations' after anymore.

then on Smile 04, Brian does it anyways... so it doesn't make sense anymore.  It goes

"An I'm Picking up!!!!.... I'm pickin' up good vibrations, she's givin me excitations"

Not really important but kind of interesting that on the remake he acts like he's going to do the "GOOD GOOD GOOD GOOD VIBRATIONS!!!" version, but instead sings the famous version leaving the "an i'm pickin' up!" part kind of hanging and an unfinished phrase. 

I don't think there was one. It just starts with "She's already workin' on my brain".

There probably was an opening line penned by Asher, but it's been long forgotten. I got the impression that they took Asher's lyrics from the demo where the first line is missing (the mic wasn't "punched in" in time?) resulting in the inclusion of Mike's opening line as a replacement.

I think part of the motivation to use the Asher lyric was to give the SMiLE version of "Good Vibrations" a different identity than the Beach Boys version. I can see the value in that even though I prefer Mike's lyrics.

I think the reason they included Mike's first line is because that's the only line anyone who isn't a fan knows.

Even before BWPS came out, the mixes I heard always had that first line on there.  That's so strange.  Maybe Asher didn't write a first line, you're right.

Which mixes are you referring to? You mean the concert presentations of BWPS? The early version mix of "Good Vibrations" from '66 featuring Asher's lyrics (first heard on the "Smiley Smile / Wild Honey" twofer) is missing the opening line; Brian's vocal appears to be "punched in" just before the second line begins (the impression I get from it is that Brian was singing an opening line that we don't hear in the mix). My point is that this early mix is the only source of the Asher lyrics, so instead of Brian calling Asher up in 2003 and asking what his opening line was 37 years earlier, they just included Mike's opening line in it's place.

Maybe we should have a contest to see who can come up with most logical opening line to Asher's lyrics! Here's my guess: "I only caught a glimpse of her across the room, but... she's already working on my brain."

How do we know BW didn't ask Asher? They were on good terms in the late 90s, at least. Asher doesn' strike me as the type to keep stuff like that around, either.

Of course you're right. If Asher didn't remember, it might have been nice if he wrote a new opening line that would have fit a little better.