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I've noticed a few interesting posts regarding bleed-through melodies, new clues in session studio chatter etc.

Bicyclerider commented that during the H&V Prelude to Fade sessions he mentions that there will be lyrics for that piece of music [disc 2, track  19 right at the beginning].

Yorkic made the very interesting point that during the DYLW part 1 sessions BW can be heard singing what sounds like the "once upon the sandwich isles" lyrics, but with a different melody (and he sings it right after talking to VDP) [Disc 3, track 1 around 3:15].

talahrama made the comment that you can hear the bleed through of a melody on Love to Say Da Da [Disc 4, track 11] at around 1:37.

And of course the big clue we already knew about during the Our Prayer sessions--Brian saying "this is a little  intro to the album" [disc 2, track 1 right at the beginning]. I have noticed before that BW talks about Old Master Painter having lyrics (you can here it on the box set on disc 3, track 6 at about 2:04). As a smile archaeologist these things thrill me to no end.

So, I'm wondering if anyone else find anything else like this on the new box set (or on boots they've heard in the past)?

The melody BW sings on the DYLW part 1 session is real interesting because it is different than the melody used in BWPS. Was this what the real Worms verse melody sounded like? It's fun to think about.

Yeah, all this stuff is really interesting, the DYLW bit blew me away. I didn't notice a couple you mentioned, I'll have to look them up.

As far as The Old Master Painter goes, remember that it's an old standard, so it's had lyrics for a while...Sinatra covered it. In the session where Brian quotes the lyrics, he may have just been giving the musicians a point of reference for the melody.

He also sang a bit of OMP during a "Pet Sounds" session too.

As for DYLW the fact that the Sandwich isles lyrics are sung to a different melody makes sense as I've never been able personally to make the "West Indies" lyrics fit the backing track.  Maybe if they were sung to a different melody they would fit as well? 

I swear to God I hear Brian singing a melody on part of "Holidays" before the finished take is done when the other guys are going over it. It took me ages to figure it out, but it almost sounds like part of the "Wind Chimes" melody to my ears. Interesting considering the songs are already linked through the ending becoming the tag of the Smiley Smile "Wind Chimes".

For what it's worth, the meldoy Brian sings to "Once upon the sandwich isles" is repeated in the strings during a few tracks later. I may be wrong. lol

I'm really thinking it was the original vocal melody. Shame he doesn't finish the last half of it :( it'd have been nice if this was around before BWPS as to jog his memory.

I think it sounds like the melody of "Our Sweet Love". "Pretty things like incense and flowers". When this is revealed as truth, please remember who said it first.

Also sounds like "A tear rolls off my cheek". But yerp, that's also the "Pretty things like incense and flowers" melody, too. Probably more so than "Wind Chimes", as it's missing the little ascending bit at the end, but it's not exactly the same as "Our Sweet Love" either.

Short example: http://www.fileden.com/files/2007/2/20/800088//holidaysvocaldemonstration.mp3 (http://www.fileden.com/files/2007/2/20/800088//holidaysvocaldemonstration.mp3)

I was thinking of making this thread,
During All Day, Brian says that during the pauses there was supposed to be talking. I wonder.
He also puts child in Cool Cool Water. I used to wonder if it was just an outtake during the dada sessions, but Brian clearly wanted it in there.

My first instinct is to discount these vocal improvs as hugely important. The Holidays one, in particular, is so short that it could mean nearly anything. A part, a melody line, just some scatting. Who knows? The BWPS version is satisfying on its own terms.

The Worms one is tantalizing, but it raises so many questions. Why weren't there more lyrics? What would go in the rest of the verse? How does it fit with the monotone melody line that BW remembered in 2003? Given the number of things flying around BW's head at this time, I wouldn't discount that it was part of a call-and-response structure meant for the verse -- like the "look so fine" and "caught my eyes" falsetto bits in "Help Me Rhonda."

But it could just as easily be a joke.

And there is space in the verses to add that falsetto bit as the response to the first line ...

Low, chanting style: "Waving from the ocean liners"

High falsetto response: "Waving from the ocean liners"

Low, chanting style: "The bearded cheering Indians behind us."

High falsetto response: "Indians behind us."

The new part fits perfectly with the guitar riff.

Thanks Fishmonk. I hadn't caught that comment in All Day. For those who want to check it out it happens at around 1:25. The suggestion of talking in the breaks makes me think the tune wasn't linked to a water theme yet, but I guess "talking" could mean just about anything (even those "under the sea" sound effects BW and friends did).

I think  the "Child" in Cool Cool Water Fishmonk is talking about is the breakdown going into the mystery 3rd section of Da Da--am I correct? That one has always been tantalizing for me. I wonder if it has something to do with the idea with the low piano notes near the end of the All Day track on the box set that doesn't sound like the rest of the Da Da/Cool Water idea?

I don't see how the Worms melody in the box can be so easily dismissed by some people as a joke or throwaway when it's so melodic and intricate compared to the drone we hear on BWPS.

That's what I was thinking.  As much as I'd like to believe it was the original main melody, the fact that Brian remembered only the melody we heard on BWPS tells me that it was just a forgotten background part.

I agree. And the interesting thing is he is kind of checking in with VDP who is obviously either out in the studio or in the booth, so he is thinking about the lyrics when he sings that melody. It also sounds like he doesn't quite know the words yet.

I think the fact that we don't have more lyrics -- even though they're apparently complete as is -- suggests that the high part can't be the main melody. It would be used up to quickly.


I wouldn't say that. It's a single, unaccompanied vocal line that duplicates a guitar pattern already in the song. He could have just been singing along to that pattern. And I really think the "drone" is kind of the point for the Worms verses. It's part of what makes the song seem so creepy.

I don't think it's supposed to be creepy, though. The lyrics are about seafaring and westward expansion. It doesn't duplicate the guitar line, either; the notes are different. I just don't think the BWPS Worms melody was up to the standard set by most of the other SMiLE melodies. It serviced the chords, but this new melody rings true to me, the way it dances around the basic chords in a vintage Brian Wilson way. We can agree to disagree, I guess.

So, you think Brian of 2003 just created the melody on the fly?

Given his utter lack of interest in doing that for any other song on the set (every other "new" BWPS melody is based on pre-existing instrumental lines), I find that really hard to imagine.

And maybe the chanting was supposed to be the backing vocal. But why would he remember that and not the high part?

It's just so tantalizing. Like in All Day, at the end, he goes into the booth and says "I just want to come in and tell you guys what I want you to do on the track", tell us Brian, what do you want us to do!?

When did Da Da gain the Child part? It was originally recorded at a Heroes session, but it doesn't have a count on the 12/22 session, was it called Da Da then? Then it became All Day by 1/27, at another Heroes session. At 1:33 there's a new piece of music in there, where Child is on the other versions, sounds sort of GV-ish to me, but I don't see any overt connections to any other tracks. On 5/16, for the fully orchestrated version, Child is in there and the song also gains the Da Da title. And then Child shows up again during the Wild Honey version of Cool Cool Water.
What was going on with this song?

That BWPS melody pretty much mimics the chord structure and existing backing vocs, but I'm not going to second guess Brian at any age. Maybe both versions were in consideration at different points. I do know which one I prefer.

But there is no other version! There are a few second of Brian singing one line of a song. What you mean is you prefer a version that you imagine takes off from where that vocal bit begins. We can't know! (Although perhaps someone will mix us up a version real soon ...)


I've come to think that there are basically four key tracks to Smile. Four tracks that show Brian's entire mental trajectory. And they are all the ones he worked the hardest on.

1.) Good Vibes. He creates the modular approach. But not without tears!

2.) Heroes and Villains. He can't find the hit single inside the sections, but he's determined to try.

3.) Vega-Tables. Maybe another single will do the trick. We see the Smiley Smile aesthetic appear ... very sparse tracks.

4.) Da-Da. With the project in shambles, Brian just starts experimenting with a track that covers both the adult-child themes he'd thought of before and the elemental ones too. It becomes a repository of his hopes and dreams for the project, lasting into the Wild Honey sessions and beyond.

Where? And why would he start singing that melody with words behind it? Doesn't add up. I really believe it's part of the original melody.

I don't get a "creepy" vibe from "Worms", either. Not from the verses at least. I DISAGREE IMO.

Also, as far as new verse melodies on BWPS, there's also "Child Is The Father Of The Man" and possibly "Look", both of which aren't particularly melodic like the vocal on the verses of "Worms" in 04. So that kinda discredits the theory a bit that he never came up with any new melodies for BWPS.

But hang on... this so-called 'new Worms melody' just does NOT rhythmically fit the verse. There aren't enough syllables left in the lyrics to fit the line, or alternatively, there are too many rhythmic spaces in the line for the lyrics to fill.

If you try mapping those syllables to the finished lyrics, you just don't have enough syllables to fill the line:

Brian sings: "Once-UP-on-the-SAND-wich-isles-the-DES-o-da-dee". THAT fits OK. But that means you'd have THIS with the finished lyrics:

"Once-UP-on-the-SAND-wich-isles-the-SO-cial-struc-TURE"

and then you'd have to start the next line with:

"Steamed-UP-on-hawaii..." and then you're out of words, less than halfway through the second line. It just DOES. NOT. WORK.

It works even LESS well with the other lines we know. Mapping what we hear Brian half-sing, half-mumble on to those:

"Wav-ing-FROM-the-OC-ean-liners-BEAD-ed-cheer-ing"

"In-DI-ans-be-HIND-us..." out of words again!

Now, I don't believe Brian sang it as a 'joke', as some people have said - why would you do this, and draw VDP's attention to it like that? that just doesn't make sense, and clearly he was trying to do SOMETHING. So consider what he's trying to do at the point when he sings it. "It's a little bit fast, Jimmy... let's go one... two..." [claps a rhythm and tempo as he says this] "...right, Van?" [still beating time, sings:] "Once-UP-on-the-SAND-wich-isles-the-DES-o-da-dee..." [tails off into mumbling].

He's trying to set the tempo and rhythmic feel of the take. I just think he's more focused on those aspects than on the melody when he sings it. So the melody may well be wrong, or an early try for what he was going to end up with. It sounds to me as though he's read a few of Van Dyke's lines through once, and they haven't stuck in his head yet, but he's trying to sing something approximately right so the musicians know what tempo and rhythmic feel the backing track should have.

I absolutely don't think we can just assume that this is 'the real Worms melody', because it doesn't work with the lyrics we know are finished, nor the rhythm of the track the melody was supposed to go over. Maybe it's a harmony part. Maybe it's a tryout for the melody, and Brian didn't know the lyrics yet. Maybe he just made it up on the spot to set the metre and tempo for the session players, and garnished it with a fragment of the new VDP lyrics he read that afternoon for the first time before the session. But it definitely doesn't work as a melody for the main part of the verse, with the lyrics we know.

Unless I have my understanding of the metre horribly tangled - and if so, show me! I'd love to be proved wrong, here, so please, edit me up some audio that shows how it could have gone. Or post a sound file somewhere of you singing it the way you think it could work. Because I just CAN'T hear it.

MattB

Will have to listen to all 5 discs to locate these parts again but 3 things I noticed (or can remember this time in the morning!) are..

1, Briain saying "Do you like worms?" during a session, although I don't think it was during a worms session - Maybe the first time this song title is mentioned.

2, During the Bag of Tricks session, Dennis? mentions a Police Officer and that you could play a tune on a Police Siren - then someone (Carl, Al or Bruce maybe) mentions that you can play a tune on a Touch-Tone phone! Didn't even know they existed back then?!? Maybe could have been used with the Reconected telephone direct dialing line from Cabin..

3, One of the guys mentions a sound effect they are attempting sounds like someone crunching Vegetables, again not at a Vegetables session, maybe Brian got the idea from here?

Sorry I can't be more specific with track numbers! I was listening on headphones at work.

The issue there is that Brian trails off and we don't have the complete melody.

Here is a link from someone at the SH board. Try listening to this:

Link edited by moderator

Matt's right, I made that point in the other thread. That example is really, if it's anything, and not just Brian goofing off, a counterpoint. The BWPS really works for the 'steamroller' effect of the track anyway.

For those with the Pet Sounds boxset, start listening at the 1:30 mark of the 'Caroline, No' tracking session. Brian sings almost that exact same melody as this 'Do You Like Worms' bit - while showing the tempo of the track to the session musicians.

This melody riff could be the actual melody for DYLW, or it could just be a melody Brian sang when the mood suited him.

Well, at the very least, I feel like we have a cool alternative melody for Worms. We've got old Brian singing the BWPS melody, and 1966 Brian just singing this one, so why not enjoy both?

He also sings the melody of Caroline No to the tempo at another point. The difference from that noodling vocal you cite is that the DYLW count in is an intricate melody that fits the chords exactly. You know what? We're all going to believe whatever we want to believe, so I'll let it go.

.......but not the lyrics  ;D

Frankly, the melody is more important to me than the lyrics. Besides, have any of us ever actually seen the original lyric sheets for Worms? Maybe there was more to it at one point.

Except that we do have the complete melody. It's in the violins a few tracks later playing pizzicato.

Do you have the exact track/timing for this?

I have to say that fits the backing vocals perfectly. I haven't got the box yet, and that's the first time I heard this new vocal. This feel really right to me.

Just listen to the way the new melody harmonises with the high voice on the BV's.  From a musicians perspective this  works really well.

I always thought those backgrounds were a bit on the simple side until I heard this new melody on top. The magic of Brian Wilson strikes again. Simplicity hiding complexity.

I think he means False Barnyard..... There's no pizzicato violins on Worms, right?!

I've been away from the board for a few hours and I see someone posted something by way of proof towards the 'this is the original Worms melody' argument, but the link is gone. Can someone kindly Point Me to a place where I might hear this?

Thanks. And while I'm 'here'... just because the melody Brian sings there in the Worms session is 'more complex' than the one we know from BWPS isn't, to my mind, any kind of argument that strengthens the case for it being 'the real Worms melody'. It just means that the melody he sang during a Worms session, possibly solely to demonstrate tempo and rhythm, is twistier and more complex than the one we ended up with on the BWPS verse. Which doesn't tell me anything at all, but as ever, YMMV...

Meanwhile, I need to give that Holidays session a closer listen. I didn't hear ANYTHING by way of missing melodies on that sucker when I breezed through it the other day...!

MattB

This made me think, did Brian/Darian have this recording when they were working on BWPS? Would have made a huge difference, I love that melody

I don't see how that should annoy you.

I see it as an answer vocal line, too, BTW.

An answer vocal line to what? The melody that was written nearly 40 years later?

It has generally been supposed that the BWPS melody line was vintage. It was reported, IIRC, that Brian began to sing it almost immediately to the Worms track.

I have never seen speculation that the Roll Plymouth Rock melody came from 2003 until this very thread.


We have no idea if they did or not. Brian may well have rejected it, as he rejected He Gives Speeches and Darian's attempts to piece together The Elements.

It wouldn't be the first time there were two melodies for a BB song.

The "new" melody fits the track better and is more fully realised.

And there is also the possibility that Brian remembered it wrong.

As far as I'm concerned, the boxset melody is now the definitive melody, for me anyway.

It is pure SMiLE

Well, I think that this box set certainly casts serious doubts on that supposition. And now there is certainly evidence that there was a melody that existed in 1966 different from the one heard in 2004, and there is absolutely no evidence that the 2003 melody existed anytime before Brian sang it. Let's be fair here, he almost immediately sang "Barnyard Billy loves his chickens" too.

I love BWPS, but there is a desperate desire to believe that a lot of the stuff Brian came up with for it was vintage. Using the Fire Breaks vocals in Fire, vintage. Just putting a string section on Surf's Up section 2, vintage. You even hear people breaking the ruels of rational logic by asking questions as unfounded as, "Well, how do you know he wouldn't have done it like that?" As soon as someone asks a question like that, you know that he or she is not prepared to engage rationally.

BUT.

THE.

LYRICS.

DO.

NOT.

FIT!!!

Yes, you can make the line Brian sings at the session fit over the part 1 verse section, absolutely. It goes well rhythmically, too. I see over at Hoffman, someone called 'The Zodiac' has now edited it in exactly the way I tried to write it out above, to *make* it fit (his link is at: http://www.stevehoffman.tv/forums/showpost.php?p=7104312&postcount=817 Is that guy over here too? Paging the Zodiac...!) There are also various other attempts to make it fit linked in that thread, none of which work as well, in my opinion.

But - and here's my point - the finished lyrics do NOT fit that melody, as I said above. There is a 66-vintage VDP lyric sheet for this sucker, Frank Holmes had it, and Darian and Brian used it, or a copy of it, to get the lyrics for BWPS, and when they couldn't read Van Dyke's handwriting on the 'Beaded Cheering Indians' line, that was supposedly what caused Brian to ring Van Dyke and get him in on the project in 2003. So this is a lyric sheet with a solid history.

My two cents - this can't be considered definitive. It just can't. It feels to me like loads of people are jumping in just because this 'invalidates' part of BWPS to their way of thinking, which pleases them in some way.

Sigh. Still, if we all had the same reaction, that would be dull, I guess...

MattB

Are you kidding? It doesn't fit! That's part of what has caused so much discussion here. And fully realized? We're talking about one-half of a single line of lyric! It's like saying you know how God Only Knows goes by hearing a hobo sing the words "I may not always love you." It's suggestive, sure, but it sure ain't realized.


Half of one line of a lyric. Is now the definitive verse melody. Really. Really?


Desperate desire? Really? IIRC, I think most people at the time wanted to think that Brian was more engaged in 2003, rather than just remembering stuff from the 60s. That was certainly my hope.


I think rationality is a peculiar word to use when  some folks here are inflating a half-line of lyric sung a capella in a tracking session into some grand imaginary version of DYLW.

Well, the melody kind of trails off a little, so it's hard to really say for sure.


In other words, you're ignoring the part of my post where I say that I love BWPS?

Matt and Wirestone have hit the nail on the head.

Yeah, at the time, certainly so. And I am not making a sweeping statement. But there are quite a few people on this board who have suggested precisely what I said.


No, but if you listen to it, it sounds he's quite confident about that melody, does he not? He's counting out the beat to see how fast he wants it, and he's singing along with it to get that beat right. Seems to be a pretty case closed example.

I think he's confident in giving an example to a musician. I mean, Murry Wilson is pretty confident when he's coaching the boys on "Help Me Rhonda." But I wouldn't want to use his talk back examples to reconstruct the song.

My bickering aside, I would love to hear someone create a grand imaginary version of DYLW incorporating the box set melody in some way. You'd have to recut the vocals, I think, but it could be really cool.

I think the part brian was singing would have been in the final song. It fits the song.

But he's not giving the melody as an example to a musician. The parade drummer doesn't need to hear the melody to know what tempo to play. Brian sings the melody in order to check with himself to make sure the tempo fits the melody - he says, "Right, Van?" checking with the other songwriter, to make sure the tempo is right for the song's melody. Again, I think this is pretty clear but let's suppose what you're saying is correct - why wouldn't he sing the melody of the song, rather than, say, make up one?

Where's the damn Truck Drivin' Man lyrics isolated on the new set(s)?   >:(

Man, that's not a fair thing to say. I love BWPS too, but this melody is so amazing that I just can't believe it's a throwaway. Do you still need a Prior Mandate to hear it?

It is the melody or it isn't the melody. We will probably never know. And thus we shouldn't jump to conclusions about it. It is irrational to claim that it is definitive...but it is also irrational to claim it isn't.

At this point it is nothing more and nothing less than a melody Brian sings before the take.

I think it's obvious that this beautiful melody is part of the original verse melody. It's not complete but it's part of it. "Right, Van?". That's not the kind of melody you just improvise to the session musicians.

For Me Anyway. AN OPINION. Learn to read

And yes it does fit, very well.

Please don't get so angry when someone posts what they explicitly state is an opinion.

That offends me as much as you were offended by supposed homophobia, seriously.

Respect my opinion and don't be so bloody catty when you read something you don't agree with.

It can't be "definitive" if it's half of a line of lyric. Your opinion, however firmly held, cannot change the meaning of words. More broadly applied, this is a serious problem with much of our current culture.


As stated by myself and several others, it does not.


I wasn't angry. I was engaged in vigorous and lively debate. And having a good time, I thought.


I very much doubt that.


I do respect your opinion. That's why I was engaging with it.

The melody as is fits just fine.  If you start right on the downbeat, and sing it just as Brian does, it fits very naturally, until it goes away.  To wit, with my own interpolative blending:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZYu12MpBqdU (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZYu12MpBqdU)

I'm not saying that's how it would have gone, only that it can fit.

Thanks for that Josh, you've proven that the new melody can indeed fit quite nicely over the verse.

Good points being made all around - my first inclination was that this was a backing vocal/response line to the melody we all know from BWPS, but the more I think about it and read people's insights, I'm really beginning to think it was a snippet of the unrecorded lead vocal.  Of all things for Brian to sing to check the tempo, why would he choose anything but the lead?  And moreover, Josh's earlier point about the BWPS melody being pretty bland by '66 standards makes a lot of sense as well.  The fact that he sang it on the spot with Darian doesn't necessarily mean it's vintage.

This is so good.

I do like it. Interesting.

Now I'd like to hear someone do it as call-and-response.

That's might be interesting but a little less meaningful since there is no evidence that the 2004 melody ever existed in 1966.

There is no evidence the 1966 melody ever existed outside of these few seconds at a tracking session.

And for that matter, the fact that aeijtzsche can record a YouTube video of his own interpretation of how the melody could fit is meaningful in only a limited way. It shows how a fit could be accomplished musically. It doesn't mean such a thing was ever written or even attempted in 1966.

i just posted this in another thread then read this one and so fits perfectly in this discussion. my take on the DYLW vocal...

the moment i heard this, i thought, if you follow the timing he sings "once upon the sandwich isles..." you can sing that melody with the rest of the words right through to upon hawaii all in the first line. Drawing out "upon hawaii" and singing it the exact same way they do in BWPS. maybe thats something he remembered in 2004? just start singing the moment the music starts and it works perfectly, isn't rushed and totally in keeping with his descending vocals as per heroes and villains, so it's not even a stretch of an idea that it may have gone like this. of course, who knows?

i think the fact he calls out to van to check and then sings is significant. it's like he's looking for agreement, so strengthens the case to me that he's singing a genuine melody, rather than made up on the spot!?!

In other words, there is evidence that a melody existed in 1966 while there is exactly zero evidence to suggest that the 2004 melody existed then. But I appreciate the rhetorical acrobatics that you're employing to try to overcome this.

I have to side with Matt B and Wirestone on this one. I'm dubious that the little scatty part Brian sings is the main melody to Worms. It sounds a bit half baked to me and slightly improvised even if it does sort of fit. I think a lot of people underestimate the brilliance of that remembered BWPS Worms melody. Just because it's simple doesn't mean it's not vintage and it syncopates perfectly with the backing track in a way that seems very Smile to me.

Of course. And the fact that he's testing the tempo against the melody. I mean, you really have to purposefully bury your head in the sand to think otherwise.

OK, but I think the 2004 BWPS melody to Worms is great. I just don't think it's vintage. I never had any real reason to before and now I definitely don't. So where does that put me?

hahaha... i love it!! this guy is singing it the EXACT SAME WAY I naturally continued the melody myself! can it really be argued that you couldn't fit it when it clearly does...in this form. whether you like it or not is different but the point is...it fits.

if that clip was played back to brian, i wonder what his response would be? i'm sure he'd dismiss it considering past form but imagine if he suddenly went "oh yeah! thats how it goes!" Now that's a question for Mr Linnett surely?

These are rhetorical acrobatics? I think of it as common sense.

There's no evidence that the 2004 melody existed in 1966. Quite so. But there's still -- barring new evidence -- no way to know that the half-line sung in this session every amounted to or meant anything else. Some of us wish it did. Doesn't make it true.

Calling to Van could just as easily have to do with a musical question as a lyrical one -- Parks both played on and led some of the sessions, so Brian clearly had him there for purposes other than lyrical checks.

I'm not being contrary for the sake of it, believe it or not. I just think that BB folk have a tendency to rush way past where actual evidence takes them. Check out threads where people are still asking if "Little Red Book" was a Smile outtake. And people still sometimes unhappy at the lack of 15-minute H&V mixes, even though we've never found a 60s-era one. How about that great Smile track "Here Come De Honey Man"?

The point is, someone has to be cautious about this stuff.

Well, that's another rhetorical trick, but moving on:


But, of course, neither me nor anyone here is suggesting that Brian is calling on Van to check about the lyrics. To be honest, I've stated this very clearly as have others in this thread, so I can only conclude that you're just making up our position in order to discredit it. The fact is Brian indeed WAS calling to Van with a musical question. I think part of the problem is that you don't quite know what's going on here in this recording. Brian is instructing Jim Gordon on how  fast to keep the tempo. He demonstrates it, says, "Right, Van?" (because he and Van wrote the song together) and then sings the melody in question to make sure it's the right tempo. Now of course it doesn't take a genius to know that if he was indeed trying to make sure the that the tempo was right by singing a melody over it that it would be the actual melody, not a made up one, since a made up one wouldn't tell you anything at all about whether the speed was right or not. He says "Right, Van?" since Van wrote the song with him, and therefore also knows the melody (more so than any other musician in the room) and therefore would be a crucial voice for Brian in terms of knowing how fast or slow the song should go. Now if this isn't common sense, I really don't know what is.


Well, how about this, then? Why don't you try and find one single thread where I am asking a question like that, and then you can come back here and make such a retort. Until then, I'm not interested in having my stance on this devalued because of what other people say.

You're quite right about what seems to be going on with Brian and Van Dyke here. I was wrong to suggest that you -- or others -- thought otherwise.

Excellent, thanks!  I'm with those who think he was singing the melody, and this seems a very logical way the line ended.  I've always thought the BWPS melody was fine, but this one is more inventive.

I don't understand how it "doesn't fit". We know there are unused verse lyrics, there may have been more, there may have been words added or omitted to make it fit the melody. We don't have the complete melody. I've still yet to find the complete melody as people are claiming, it's similar in rhythm to the "My Only Sunshine" part if that's what's being referred to, but the melodies are different. Even if they were the same, how many melodies occur twice on two different Smile tracks? Many.

I don't see the evidence in it being counterpoint, and I certainly don't see it as being evidence of something he pulled out of his ass then and there. He sings the melody while going into the verse. I've never heard Brian sing a counterpoint melody or a backing vocal during a tracking session.

Using the BWPS melody as evidence, something that was on a version of the record created 38 years after it was initially started, doesn't make a strong case.


What? You're trying way too hard, at this point. Not trying to be mean when I say that, but there are how many other Smile things that only exist once? Gonna discredit those things, too?

I don't know, I don't think that works/sounds very good - the way the lines cut doesn't sound natural at all. I know that apparently puts my head in the sand, so I'll give you a muffled thank you for trying.  ;D

And of course, what some people are saying here is that it WOULDN'T blend with the 2003 melody, so you can't please everybody, I suppose. But that's a sincere post.

It's six words and a couple of mumbled syllables. It lasts approximately four seconds.

I'm just unable to translate that into definitive proof of anything. Sorry.

It's not the amount of words or syllables but rather the conditions under which they are sung where it becomes overwhelmingly convincing that this was the melody for the song.

Of course, nothing in this entire thread can be definitive. Definitive is having the finished vocal sung by a beach boy on TSS disc 1. My point would be that there is signifcant thought process to speculate that this could have well been the melody....and speculate i must emphasise. This vocal snippet has me more excited about a "new" what may have been than anything i've heard in years!

Which is why the lyrics for Help Me Rhonda are, as cited in the session for that tune:

"Help Me Rhonda, do ba beep ba dah doo beep bah."

I find nothing to disagree with here at all. Quite so.

(I would have accepted a demo as "definitive" proof, too.)

But did Murry Wilson have anything to do with writing the song? Was he actually an authority in the studio that night? You and I both know the answer to that question, which is why you know that you are being nothing short of intellectually dishonest by bringing this up (twice now, I was being kind and ignored it the first time) in order to pretend its a legitimate analogy to what we're talking about. I can assume that you are actually unwilling to behave respectably here so I'm happy to carry on the conversation with someone who is. Otherwise, I'm done with you in this thread.

chance would be a fine thing...

It's not at all intellectually dishonest to point out that just because something is said or sung at a session doesn't mean that the final tune includes those words or that exact melody. How about how "In My Childhood" became a different song for Pet Sounds? Or how Mike Love created a new set of lyrics for Good Vibrations, and the entire song changed substantially from the original sessions? This was a fluid time for BW.

Further grasping at straws. Murry had nothing to do with writing that song. He didn't co-write the song with Brian and then say, "Right Brian?" to Brian to confirm the validity of it as Brian has done to Van Dyke Parks here.

Again, not trying to be mean, but these are some extremely poor examples, d00d.

As for your last post - again, what does this have to do with anything? So now you're saying it is a valid melody intended for the song but was later replaced?

I'm saying -- as I have said consistently the entire thread -- that we have no way of knowing.

My personal opinion is that it sounds like an on-the-spot riff or improv. But I have not said that I know that as fact. Those who believe it is something more have argued that their opinion in the matter is factual.

I simply don't agree.

(I also regret causing anyone to overheat. I find the topic fascinating, love the snippet, love the song -- old and new -- and enjoy debating this things. And I do think there's a chance this is the vintage melody. I don't agree that it is without question, but I will agree there is a chance.)

I think Wirestone is merely stating that we shouldn't jump to conclusions on this issue. One of the initial posts had the opinion that this was the 'definitve' melody - which is pure BS. We have no idea if this was the intended melody. Sure, there's a great chance this was the melody, but to call it 'definitve' is irrational.

We can only speculate - because until 2004, there was never a definitve recording of lead vocals on this track.

Apart from that example, though, I'm not sure anyone else is really jumping to conclusions. I've suggested that the evidence is fairly overwhelming and I stand by that. Nevertheless, if someone has a problem with someone else's statement then it should be taken up with the person who made that statement not other people. Remember that even the person who used the term "definitive" qualified it by saying "for me, anyway." Even when Wirestone was reminded of that crucial caveat, he chose to ignore it in order to make some irrelevant comments about what's wrong with our culture. So there's a lot of smoke being blown here, as far as I'm concerned.

Was Brian in the habit of not singing/demoing the proper melody?

From earlier in the thread:

That sounds nothing like this melody.

I think Rab was referring to the "doodle-doot all the way like that / we'll get a record oodle ooh" line that starts at 1:33. It sounds just a bit like what Brian is singing as he forgets the words to Worms.

But this is an example that can cuts both ways -- Brian clearly sings the correct melody to Caroline, No a few seconds earlier. But then he sing-talks a string of rhythmic nonsense. So he did just sing random melody lines at sessions -- but here it follows a clear, accurate line from the song.

I don't have the box yet, so when he sings the lyrics he is singing the melody; when he sings gibberish it is to a gibberish melody?

He sings the first five words while banging out a beat, then a few syllables of babble: "Once upon the (starts to slur) Sandwish Isle de dee doo doo doo doo." It all seems of a piece, but he definitely is trailing off at the end, so it's hard to tell.

Cam, he starts out singing lyrics with this new melody, but the lyrics peter out and he goes into a scat at the end of the phrase.  He gets through "a once upon the sandwich isles..." and then gets unintelligible, but the musical phrase is continued to the point in my youtube video (http://youtu.be/ZYu12MpBqdU (http://youtu.be/ZYu12MpBqdU)) where I sing the "ture" syllable of "structure" or so, when I do that line.

And would ya get the box, would ya?

Anyone hear a bit of this in "Tones"?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QH2-TGUlwu4 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QH2-TGUlwu4)

That just blew my mind :lol

Cam, you're thanked in the book for the sessions box yet you still don't have it?! ;D

This also seems to make sense, with the sessions listing four parts. The way aeijtzsche does it, all the lyrics are used up in a single verse. BWPS has Verse-chorus-verse-chorus, but it looks like that might not have been the case.

Here's how the melody played out in my head when I first heard it...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2RpdU8Bep28
 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2RpdU8Bep28)
Like Josh, this isn't meant to say that's how it would've went, it's just to show there are plenty of ways the melody could've gone that would've worked over the music.

Imagine going through life being called "Van". Thank God he wasn't fat. I would've killed myself long ago.

YES!!!!!!!!!!!!! Everybody watch this!!!

Now again I wonder how you get the "West Indies" lyrics to fit.  Was that not supposed to be the second verse?

Sandwich Isles was the second verse. First was "Waving from the ocean liners beaded cheering indians behind theeeeem..." which also fits.

East or West Indies may have fit somewhere else, or maybe not. Either way you slice it, this melody kicks ass.

*cough*

Very nice.

Holidays = Worms 1.0.

Suggested for a while, 'cos of the crossover choruses in BWPS, and I'm sure I could be hearing things, but on this link to the Holidays rehearsals -

Sounds to me like Brian is singing "Waving Indians behind us".

EDIT: Correct link - http://www.fileden.com/files/2007/2/20/800088//holidaysvocaldemonstration.mp3

Praise? Condemnation? Whatever it may be, you heard it here first.

Yeah, what's up with that??

Okay, I'm probably going nuts - and making myself hear what I want to -  but having just listened to the Holidays rehearsal through headphones, I now think I'm hearing this:

Waving Indians behind us as we
(incomprehensible) East or (incomprehensible) we

Yep, pretty solid evidence  ::)! And yes, I know "waving indians" isn't right. But, thinking again of Holidays as an early stab at Worms, as has been suggested, and bearing in mind the lyrics recalled by Frank Holmes that don't seem to have made the final cut, doesn't this verse make

Cheering from the ocean liners, beaded
Waving Indians behind us as we
Returned to the East or West Indies we
Always got them confused

Haven't tried this against the Holidays backing yet, mind. But keen to hear what people with keener ears than mine think listening to that rehearsal tape.

But the part he's singing over is the "second chorus", as he states. So if he was singing Worms lyrics, wouldn't it be "rock rock roll..." if anything?

One more observation towards what I hope to be a wildly unpopular theory :) -

Connections (perhaps spurious): Crashing tympani on verse? Check. Vaguely Hawaiian sounding piece towards the end of the song? Check. Slowly winding down piano piece at what seems to be the conclusion of the track, only for a repetitive coda to start up? Check.

Conjecture (utterly spurious): A naval, seafaring feel to the track (borne out in OAH's lyrics) that also fits the original "Ocean liner/steamed upon" words, perhaps even more so than the DYLW music we know. Middle section the original version of "Bicycle Rider"? It's actually easy, and surprisingly satisfying, to fit those lyrics - or "Ribbon of Concrete, see what you've done, done, etc" - over the vibraphone (?) piece in the middle.

Way short of lyrics - based on how many are used on BWPS - but, if you're able to listen with an open mind, try listening to Holidays with this structure in mind:

Bicycle Rider/Verse 1-Roll Plymouth Rock/Bicycle Rider/Verse 2-Roll Plymouth Rock/Music Box fake ending/Wahala-lu-lay (to fade)

No doubt I'll be shouted down - and probably rightly! But an interesting exercise.

Thanks Bubba Ho Tep  - still waiting on box to arrive in NZ, so have only heard that mp3 that was linked to (without the "second chorus" bit), so this might a case of too many ideas, not enough information!

What I might suggest though is that depending on how you look at it, the vibraphone/possible-"Ribbon of Concrete" sections (parts 1 and 3 in my schema below) could be considered verses and the upbeat section a chorus, albeit one with some changing lyrics? Choruses with different words throughout the song weren't all that unusual even in '66, largely thanks to people like Dylan.

Awesome, makes a lot of sense - even reminds me a bit of "Little Pad" the way you sing "Hawaii" at the end.

And finally (I promise this time), the circumstantial evidence:

"That's not 'Worms'" - Al Jardine
Re-emergence of "Rock, rock, roll" in "OAH" in BWPS
(EDIT: originally had the dates wrong) Holidays recorded early September, then goes untouched. Worms tracked mid-October. Were the lyrics Holmes received from the unexpurgated original version? If the "East or West Indies" lyrics and others were at some point removed, this would explain why he recalls them while no other participants do so for Do You Like Worms, and why the song as we now know it doesn't actually seem to support that section melodically
The title: "Holidays"... Worms lyrics fit in with this thematically: "cheering Indians behind us", "returned to East or West Indies", Hawaiian motif.


And now, let the parade-raining commence.

Very interesting. And the melody sounds related to what the plucked strings are playing in the second half of the "rock rock roll" section that comes right after.

Thanks for the support R&R

But "definitive" was the wrong choice of word for me to use.

So I retract it

Preferred, favourite, melody of choice.

Whatever it is, I love it.

Can I weigh in and thank Josh for this again:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZYu12MpBqdU&feature=youtu.be

Totally works for me and it's a much better melody. Somebody should make a cover of DYLW this way. The 'new'-melody as a lead vocal and then when it switches to the BWPS-melody you could make a harmony with 4 voices.

2nd that thanks, and to Bubblegum also for the other video. Listening to it sung like this , and reading some of the arguments for it, I'm slightly more convinced that it could have been be a feasible melody. I still think it would have been less effective than the BWPS one - it's pretty cluttered and awkward -  but it's fascinating to speculate on what might have been.

I'm reluctant to accept that this automatically usurps the BWPS melody for historical accuracy though. From all accounts Brian's recollection of the melody used in 2004 was instantaneous upon hearing the track. Sure, he may have misremembered, but it works perfectly, and the drone of it is very 66. Just imagine Mike Love lazily delivering that BWPS melody ....

I agree with all of that.  I'm not sure that this melody is any indication of what he would have done with the finished vocal, and as it is I prefer what we got in 2004.  I'm quite impressed by what our members here were able to do with it though.

Praise, no diggety. Likewise Bubblegum -- excellent (and not at all unreasonable) leap into the unknown.

Now, Holy Bee -- where's that Holidays demo from? If it's the box set, I'm ready to be embarrassed.

I believe it is indeed. Thanks to runnersdialzero, who posted the link to that mp3 (and presumably put it together too) earlier in the thread. Anyone else hearing what I'm hearing? There's a much more concise summary of my theory over on the "Worms" thread on the Smile Sessions sub-forum.

Yes. It is disc three, track six "My only Sunshine: parts 1 & 2" at the 3:12 mark.

EDIT: Sorry, removing link for sheer awfulness. No offence taken from those who pointed it out! Hope this is okay, mods - no intention to disrupt the flow of the thread.

Curious about how how chronology experts like AGD are piecing this together  now that all is exposed. 

Holy Bee, you are very wrong and should stop. What you just did makes no musical sense.

Dur dur d'être bébé.

After a couple of days of thought -- and  a lot of ranting here -- I've actually nearly reversed my personal opinion.

It seems likely to me -- now -- that the "Worms" session melody is at least the first draft of a verse lyric. And the reason is listening to the PS box edit of the "Caroline, No" sessions. Yes, at 1:33 on the track, Brian sings some gibberish. But before that, he sings the exact melody line of Caroline, No, for much the same reason he's singing DYLW -- to check the tempo as he's instructing the musicians.

Much of my previous argument was based on how little we actually know. I decided I simply couldn't draw conclusions with such sparse information. But the "Caroline" session is not only real information -- it's directly pertinent. And actually hearing this earlier example, where he does almost the same thing -- well, it makes it hard to argue forcefully that the melody means nothing at all.

Now, even though I've changed my personal opinion, I don't necessarily think any differently about the wider issue. Information is still scanty. We can't know for certain what the melody line means, or how it was going to be used. That info seems to be, sadly, missing. But yeah, I have basically changed my mind.

Commence throwing things at me. The bruises will heal my conscience.

No disrespect to the good people here, but to these ears it just sounds like a dude still auditioning ideas in his head.

The incompleteness and off-the-cuff delivery -- which, unlike the "Caroline" stuff, isn't necessarily directed at the musicians -- suggests it's a fragment he was kicking around as one of many possibilities and, like a lot of Smile, figured he would get around to finishing later.

Brian's mind is creative. It is perfectly possible he made ALL of those melody lines up on the spot: Barnyard Billy, the 2003 melody, the melody on the 1966 session. That does not invalidate any of them.

I think there is just no way for us to know. We can only believe. I believe it's an answer line because this melody consumes the lyrics for a complete verse in the time of half a verse. I may use it that way when I make my next fan mix. ;D

There's also the fact that these songs had likely been kicked around in his head for nearly 40 years by the time BWPS was being done. There was probably a better time in his life to grab these post-Smile ideas for said Smile songs out of him, but I'm sure some of them still existed and were remembered for BWPS. Shoot, plenty of people add onto songs they have released, so yeah.

Will do! Apologies to the ears I've offended. Bad afternoon.  :)

EDIT: Further - awful as the mp3 I posted was, and having re-listened to it, it WAS awful, what I didn't expect was all-round support for a terrible idea. I did expect, and maybe I was foolish to do so, some basic civility, even on a message board.

I tried something, it didn't pan out. I put myself in a place for judgment, and I got it, so as I said, no offense taken. On the other hand, I wouldn't accept that kind of aggressive dismissal - and it reads as nasty, no matter how it was intended - from my mates, or someone I met for the first time chatting about the BBs at a bar, so I don't think I have to take it here. You could've said "Nice try, holy bee, but frankly it doesn't work. In fact, it makes the opposite point to the one you intended". Maybe "you are very wrong and should stop" meant the same thing. It reads very differently.

I'm 29 and have been online since the late 90's, and this is the first board I've ever tried to contribute to. I love the Beach Boys and I am over the moon about TSS. I like talking and theorizing about it. I don't think or claim to have a great musical sensibility. I don't think I am rude. I don't think I am stupid. But I clearly am too sensitive for what passes as acceptable banter round here, so I think it's only sensible to - to quote Hot Lips in Altman's MASH - "resign my commission".

I don't expect anyone else to be sorry about this. But before someone else who could contribute something to the ongoing conversation - and no doubt more usefully than I did - is driven away, either by thoughtlessness or (less charitably) the freedom to bully that 'net anonymity allows, try to remember - manners cost nothing.

Tygerbug, this isn't directed at you specifically - indeed, I appreciate your very gracious reply to me on the DYLW thread -  but a certain harshness seems to be standard practice on this board. No worries if that's what you guys enjoy, but I'm saddened to say I'm clearly not of the same opinion.

Now, If you'll excuse me, lurking is free and frankly, safer.

P.S. One thing before I go - Good God, this box set is glorious. Enjoy it.

  I apologize for my bluntness, but I felt that it needed to be flatly said that you were wrong here, and had proven the opposite of what you were trying to prove. The two tracks just don't go together, and having proven that, it was clear to me that you should stop with this line of thinking, period.

   It was an idea, you tried it, it didn't work, no harm done.

   I have only recently joined this board and I don't like people being jerks to each other on the internet either. I suppose we all contribute to that every now and then.

Come back Holy Bee.

This board needs the whole spectrum of human behaviour to work correctly.

I've had to be away from this thread for most of the weekend, but I'm quite glad I was while all the tempers flared and dischord was brokered, while points were made in anger and later retracted! I'm hoping things have calmed down enough now to try to summarise where we are with this.

As various attempts to line up the Brian session fragment with the backing track show, it's totally possible to get Brian's mumbled melody over the verse *track* just fine. When done as 'The Zodiac' did it on the Hoffman board (once again, see http://www.stevehoffman.tv/forums/showpost.php?p=7104312&postcount=817 ), it fits the backing track really well, rhythmically and musically. 'The Zodiac' made real in file form what I heard in my head right away when I first heard the 'mumbled melody', and I'm sure that was the experience of many others here too.

However, as the various Youtube performances show, it's much, much harder to get the known *lyrics* to fit that melody - you really have to crowbar the lyric in by futzing with the meter and the delivery. It's always possible to fit almost any lyric into any line by forcing syllables into a meter and ignoring the natural stresses and pronunciation of words, and my feeling is that that's what's needed here to make that lyric fit that melody. Props to the Holy Bee for bravely trying with the Worms lyric over the Holidays backing, but I personally find that delivery majorly unconvincing for exactly that reason - the stresses are all wrong and it sounds forced. Mind you, the Holy Bee's spirit of experimentation and enquiry is exactly the kind of thing we're *all* into doing here, even if I don't personally like the results on this occasion... so I say stick at it, Holy Bee. Your opinion and voice is needed here just as much as anyone else. That doesn't mean someone isn't going to call you a jerk here from time to time - that seems to be, sadly, how the Internet works, and is not how I would ideally like it either, but it's the Internet. It is what it is. Dust yourself down, stand up and keep going, I say.

Josh H's attempt sounds much better IMHO on the "Sandwich Isles/Social Structure" couplet, which just about works ("Once-UP-on-the-SAND-wich-isle thesocialstructuresteamed up-ONNNNN Hawa-IIii") although the 'social structure' part of the line suffers, has to be awfully rushed to make it work, and again the stresses have to fall in an odd sounding way to do it). But the Indians line completely resists such crowbar treatment. As far as I can make out, Josh didn't sing all of the words there to get around that problem (Mr H, please correct me if I'm being unfair here).

You could sing the "Ocean Liners/Beaded Indians" line as Josh sings the 'Sandwich Isle/Social structure' couplet, but this would be the result:

"Wa-VING-from-the-OC-ean line-ersbeadedcheering in-di-AAAAAANS behindus".

That... just does not sound good to my ears. But maybe that's just me.

Putting aside my subjective opinion on the merits and demerits of finding a delivery that makes the known lyrics work with the verse backing, the fact remains that the Brian-sung session melody snippet is incomplete. It can be completed and melded with the 2004 melody to fill the line, as Josh H has demonstrated, but that is instantly heading into the realms of speculative, 'fanmix'-style guesswork about how the line might be completed.

So, to summarise the facts: On the one hand, the 1966 session tapes offer a partial mumbled fragment that doesn't fit the whole verse, nor fit the required lyrics without meter strain. A 'fanmix' is required to complete this melody and make it fit the verse lyric, either by blending it with the 2004 melody, another SMiLE-era melody, or by just making something up.

On the other hand, from the 2004 live performances and the BWPS album, we have a BW-remembered, BW-sung melody that fits the meter, lyrics and track.

What's the difference? Well, one dates from 1966, the other one is of unknown (and possibly *unknowable*) creation date but was not actually heard in public until the 2004 live performances of DYLW.

Heading back into subjective opinion-land for a moment, I have to say that I like the mumbled melody too - it's sort of 'jaunty' and 'nautical' and cool. My heart would like it to be part of DYLW somewhere, but my reasoning brain keeps pointing out that it wasn't and isn't (Brian has had at least three major opportunities over the years to put that melody to the track and has still never used it). Also, the lyrics have to be completely mangled to make it work, and it needs 'fanmixing' to fill the line. Personally, I also quite like Josh's efforts on the 'Sandwich Isles/Social structure' couplet but don't think it works at all on the other one, and I'm already seeing other discussion on-line which describes what Josh created as a 'Frankenmelody'. I guess you really can't please all of the people, all of the time...!

Anyway, for all those reasons, balancing heart and head overall, and reaching a conclusion, I prefer the melody featured on BWPS. But as ever, YMMV...

Somewhere on this board, I'm sure Bill Tobelman is laughing, as I don't think there has ever been a better SMiLE-related illustration of how 'unknowable' a riddle SMiLE can be than this little fragment (correct me if I'm selling his theories short, but I believe Bill has said he believes SMiLE to be an ultimately indecipherable Zen riddle which hints occasionally at its deeper nature without ever giving up any of its secrets). We hear and like this snippet, but it doesn't make sense, doesn't fit with the other known facts about the track content, and we'll probably never know whether it was destined for the album or not or where it was supposed to go if it *was*. That's SMiLE in miniature, right there!

For a better conclusion to these ramblings, I'm going to borrow what Rab 2591 said, as I think he has already said everything that I could ever say or that ever needs to be said on this subject, earlier on in this thread:

"It is the melody or it isn't the melody. We will probably never know. And thus we shouldn't jump to conclusions about it. It is irrational to claim that it is definitive...but it is also irrational to claim it isn't.

At this point it is nothing more and nothing less than a melody Brian sings before the take."

All I can add to that is "Er... What HE said."

MattB

PS One final thought - it IS kind of cool that there is totally *new* SMiLE stuff to discuss in this fashion, ain't it?

PPS Having said that, zoom out from the specifics of this discussion a bit, and what do we have when you boil it down?

Poster A: "This part goes here! I feel strongly that this is how Brian might have done it back then."

Poster B: "No way, that sounds awful. Brian would never have done that in 1966. In 2004, maybe, but not 1966."

Poster A: "He so would too, and here's my downloadable fan mix to prove it. Doesn't that sound great?"

Poster B: "Jeez... that sucks"

Poster C: "It's awesome! That's going in my lineup"

Poster D: "I think this entire discussion sums up the ultimately ineffable nature of SMiLE, actually"

Poster B: "Yeah, maybe - but it still sucks"

In other words: pretty much like any on-line SMiLE discussion I've participated in since Autumn 1995. And I actually mean that in the fondest, nicest possible way, and in full recognition of the fact that at times, I have been Poster A, B, C, D, and pretty much any other letter of the alphabet you care to name...

I'd like to lob this perspective into the mix.

Brian is recording a song he recently wrote in this newly discovered fragment. He's trying to line up the tempo of the backing track, and, with Van sitting (presumably) just behind him in the control room, sings that fragment.

If it weren't the melody he'd written for DYLW, why on earth would he have sung it? There really is no reasonable explanation other than That's How It Goes.

With the BWPS version, it seems feasible to me that he remembered some backing vocals. SMiLE contains the most complex backing vocals the BBs ever recorded (hell, that 10-part combined chord and countermelody backing for the H&V verse is possibly the greatest backing vocal arrangement BW ever committed to tape) -- and his writing had a tendency to pile things on top of each other.

If you'd never heard the H&V melody, say, but heard that isolated backing vocal track (as on the original single), you'd be blown away, and would have trouble working out where another mleody could have fitted across it. And a glance at the lyric sheet would have got you nowhere. Likewise, if you'd heard one of the three combined countermelodies of the GOK fade, you'd have had trouble imagining either of the other two, and would have thought the job was a good 'un. Similarly, the GV chorus is made of three stacked melodies: Mike's one, following the bass line, the stacked 'good bup bup', and then the stacked high line. Each would be enough on its own if you didn't know the other two existed.

For my money, this was the melody BW wrote for DYLW, and he had stacks of bvs sloshing around with it. I've always thought, for such a supreme melodist as BW, that the BWPS 'melody' for DYLW/RPR is nothing of the sort -- it's practically static; something quite uncharacteristic for BW, especially at this period in his writing, when his melodies were prone to doing extraordinary things -- big reaches (Surf's Up, Cabinessence), difficult and very satisfying leaps (Wonderful), twists and switchbacks (Heroes And Villains, this DYLW melody, Vega-Tables).

I've often wondered whether BW recorded demos. F*** knows how you memorise Surf's Up or Wonderful without committing to either tape or paper. Astonishing writing.

If only, if only...

Nice post Matt

  The 2004 version makes complete sense of the track, to my ears. The very heavy drums require a heavy melody. It all fits together perfectly. Nothing else is going to really fit as well.

   That little snatch of Brian singing sounds like a generic Beach Boy "answering" backing vocal that could have resulted in a jazzy, alternate take on the track, which is something Brian seems to have tried for basically every track on Smile .... Roll With Me Henry, that sort of thing.

The confusion could have been easily avoided if only they hadn't edited out the part of the session tape where Van Dyke says "Brian, I've decided I hate my lyrics and want you to come up with the most convoluted phrasing scheme possible along with a melody that sounds like a castrato yodel so no one will listen to the track more than once."

Which boot is THAT on????














OK, OK, I'm kidding!

;)

MattB

Wow, for a Beach Boys fan to call that melody a castrato yodel is really rich. You all feel free to believe whatever you want. I think it fits the Hawaiian/Polynesian vibe of the verses perfectly. Horses for courses, as they say.

My horse is running on a course that says 'I think the mumbled melody is all shades of Hawaiian cool, too'. It's shaved into the grass of the final straight.

The main problem is that Brian doesn't give us the full melody line. Anything presented beyond those notes he sings on the tape is pure speculation.

Good discussion all.  Holy_Bee, please stick around.  Great posts from Matt and Boiled Egg.

Since nobody seems to have tried it yet, here's (http://www.sendspace.com/file/tdstr6) an attempt at demonstrating the "newly discovered melody as answer/response rather than main vocal line" theory.  Very crude.  Kind of works, but I don't know if it's a much more compelling idea than anything either suggested or presented thus fur.  I think the melody line he sings matches that "second" chord rather than the first, if that makes sense.

You guys have got it all wrong. I am 100% certain that this is how the melody fits into the verse:

http://www.fileden.com/files/2007/2/20/800088//doyoulikewormscorrectvocals.mp3 (http://www.fileden.com/files/2007/2/20/800088//doyoulikewormscorrectvocals.mp3)

HAHAHA Awesome!!!!!!!

Sounds good to me.

You blew it, but it was fun! :-D

Now... THAT really works, in my opinion. And obviously, if the BWPS melody is carrying the lyric, the fact that the 'new' melody (which, of course, is possibly an older one...) can't rhythmically fit in all the words in doesn't actually matter!!

Still speculation, of course, but at least this suggestion WORKS!

MattB

PS And runners... for what you have done, may you be incarcerated in an echo chamber set to infinite regen feedback for the rest of your born days!! (only kidding...)

maybe putting a fork in the DYLW road here, but...

Regarding the disputed melody line...first of all, first thing I thought of was actually one of the WIBN sessions (specifically, when he burps)...sounded very similar to his vocalizing then to kind of set the tempo. Similar pseudo-melody.

I'm wondering, though, how this outtake slipped by Midnight Beat/Sea of Tunes...

Didn't Darian have full access to the Smile tapes in the vault?? Certainly if it was "officially" believed to be THE melody, it would have been properly adapted in BWPS.

And speaking of Darian and his access...didn't he say that the melody for "Song for Children" came from a clarinet line he heard bleed through someone's headphones on the original session tapes??? Whatever happened to that, and how did it elude the box? Can anybody hear it???

Given the space crunch, "Holidays: isolated headphone clarinet bleed" might not have been a top priority for general consumption, despite the historical interest.

And it seems like the DYLW melody-reconstruction process of 2003 might not have gone any further than going by what Brian sang upon being played the track. .  The fact that he did come up with a previously undocumented lead line was probably as far as they felt they needed to go.   Now if they'd made a point of playing him this fragment too, he might have gone "oh yeah!" or he might have just been all like "whatevs, Darian".

I love musing over the idea of hidden intention behind these little fragments.  "Surf's Up 1967" is the same way - "what does this key change mean?!?"

I didn't mean that granular, but...is there any spot in the sessions where if you listen carefully can you actually HEAR the bleed???

Only what had been gone through at the time, in the ongoing process of cataloging and identifying the tapes.

I tried to listen for it during the Look sessions, but I couldn't hear it. Anyone else?

Yeah I was hoping to hear this as well. Has anyone other than Darian confirmed that this exists?

Why are we all so sure that scrap of paper contained the final draft of the lyrics? The music seemed to change daily, why not the lyrics? Listen to some early Pet Sounds drafts. Words were excised/added as the songs progressed.

This isn't great, (so no rude comments please) but off the top of my head, what about.....

Once upon the sandwich isle across the sea
And then the social structure streamed upon Hawaii

No idea about verse one though. If you add anything past ocean liner you lose the second line rhyme.

I'm really happy that this box-set has thrown up more puzzles and questions, rather than being the final word.

Seems that all evidence we actually have shows that lyrics actually didn't change much at all, except "Good Vibrations."

- All Smile versions of "Wonderful" had the same lyrics.
- The "Heroes And Villains" lyrics pretty much stayed the same, except "for" was sung as "as" in the demo.
- "Vegetables" except the "cornucopia" verse was dropped after the demo

Yeah, but this lyric sheet already had a word (at least a word) missing. So this lyric sheet was hardly the ten commandments.

But as less than half the album had completed vocals, that's not saying much.

So to go through your list,

Only one SMiLE version of Wonderful had complete vocals

Heroes still wasn't finished.

And VegaTables, as you rightly point out, had lyrical changes.

So I would say there is no evidence that lyrics didn't change much

IMO

Before we get wobbly about this -- what's chapter and verse on the DYLW lyrics? What do we have, from when?

A lyric sheet in Van Dyke's handwriting, given to Frank Holmes for reference during his illustrations.

Anyone got a copy or a transcript?

I don't think something heard through headphone bleed on a multitrack is able to be mixed into a song without ridiculous amounts of hiss etc. coming into the picture. Like, a legit ridiculous amount, not just "o no wat happen" hiss.

Amazing.

That might be because Dennis says it :)

Yeah, it's Denny talking to Carol and Scott.

Yeah, that's Dennis, I think. But at some spot on the V-T sessions Brian complains about am out of tune piano, and his speech there is slurred like it often is these days...

I don't think it was, because DYLW got scrapped altogether, so there is no "final draft". Even BWPS doesn't use all of those lyrics, leaving out the "Having returned to the East or West indies" bit.

Agreed.

Have you never heard Da Da?

Another mystery solved by the box set:  where the "linett tape" version of cool cool water (on Vigotone) came from - the one with three rounds of "cool, so cool, coolin' me" etc.  When only one round appeared on the GV box set I wondered if Mark had just looped it three times to create a "song" back in 88 - but now we know there were three rounds recorded, with the piano child bridge inbetween the second and the third.  so Mark just chopped out the bridge, and voila - the booted Cool Cool Water that we've come to know and love!

why does everyone forget that the wah wah hoo wah was slowed down?

Where was this said?

they say it everywhere man just listen to it

Doesn't sound slowed down to me, d00d.

I don't remember hearing that, although it sounds similar to this from Sound on Sound's article on BWPS:


Now that would have been something to hear.

I definitely remember reading in several places about the clarinet line. I'm sure the Priore book mentions it, but I thought there was another interview too. Maybe just the Priore book. It certainly sounds vintage and I'd be stunned to discover it was written in 03/04.

Child Is father Of The Man - fascinating to discover from the sessions for version 1 of Child, that the part that I previously thought was a bridge (the quick tempo bit that goes up and down the scale) was initially the verse part. Anyone else surprised by this information?

.

Yeah, I'd read it was a vintage part but not that it had only been heard on a bleed-through. A search found this:

I tend to agree and I haven't even heard it. It may not be obvious how it was to work but my donut is on it is not mistaken nor arbitrary.

I've had a listen to most of these experiments with the "new" Worms melody and it is wierd (unless I've missed one) that nobody has tried placing them over the part that Brian is pacing when he demonstrates the lines. He sings over the decending line (is it played by Lyle Ritz on the string bass? I cannot check at this moment as I'm using my speakers to play a film for my son) at the end of the "Rock, rock, roll, Plymouth Rock roll over" part. Maybe the verse melody in BWPS was a period melody and this snipet was a vocal that repeated (possibly only some of) the lyrics over that descending bass line just before the chorus.

 It starts at the same time as the BWPS melody starts. This is obvious from the demonstration. It's been playing in my head constantly for a week now.

I'm not sure. It depends on how it's been edited I suppose but to me you can take it as him following up the previous take by directing Lyle Ritz (who he mentions specifically in the same bit of dialogue) on how to play the part at the end of the section or you can take it as him guiding the whole band on the speed of the whole section from the beginning. Maybe it's due to me repeatedly listening to the preceding take followed by the dialogue while others have been listening to the dialogue followed by the next take. It'd probably shed more light on it if we could hear the whole unedited session.

The descending bassline is the same rhythm as the vocal line on the final take and serves as a counterpoint to it.  

Nah, you could hear that in the SOT set too. But yes, it's very cool since it doesn't sound like a verse backing track at all. More like an intro. How would you put vocals there?

Didn't realise that session is on sot.

Yeah that was my thought - how would vocals fit? Also makes you wonder if there were ever verse vocals given that the verse clearly changed so dramatically between these two sessions. Maybe all it ever was was a feel that brian intended to put words to but never got round to it.

That would have to be some really complex vocal melody. I think he probably had one, cause I don't think he ever composed the vocals after recording the backing track? I've always had the impression that he sat down at the piano, playing different chords and rhythms ("feels") until he found a nice progression, and then came up with a melody.

Are you saying that you think it starts after the first measure? Boom Boom a Boom Boom - Once upon the sandwich etc

I thought that initially, but most people seem to think it starts right on the first beat. Just wondering.

It's quite likely that the lyrics are gibberish, but the melodyline is valid. As a songwriter, it's no uncommon to come up with the melodyline without lyrics first. So in a tracking session you might sing nonsense lyrics to give the musicians an idea of where you want to go with the song. Most of the time when I record early demos, I sing gibberish lyrics just to have something to fill the melodyline with.

But in this case what Brian is singing were Van Dyke's original lyrics, as given to Frank Holmes in order to create his drawings:

Once upon the Sandwich Isles
The social structure steamed upon Hawaii;
Rock, Rock, Roll, Plymouth Rock Roll Over;
Ribbon of concrete, see what you done done
to the church of the American Indian.

Lee

Ah, did not know that. In that case it is quite obvious that this is indeed the melody line and lyrics he intended for DYLW.

One more clue -- if you'll look at Frank's drawing for "Do You Like Worms" in the SMiLE booklet, you'll see images of slices of bread -- representing the "Sandwich Isles."

Lee

heroes and villains part 2 from disc 2 suure is pretty.  i wonder where that woulda fit

I've always wondered if "Little Bird" was in any way an indication to what a more complete "Child" would sound like, vocally.  I think, at best, any vocal hints of "Child" in "Little Bird" are probably very simplified, not unlike Brian's half-remembered melody lines for BWPS (i.e. the verse to "Worms").  I could see Dennis' lead in "Little Bird" being close to a possible "Child" lead, but I imagine Brian's version would have had much more going on in terms of backing vocals.

Somewhat related, I've always wondered how Carl knew to sing "Cabin Essence."  Brian had nothing to do with assembling it for 20/20, right?  Was Carl meant to sing this in 66?  I feel like Brian's voice would suit it more, but always wondered.

i've got two issues with the DYLW ghost melody being the "real" one.

1) it doesn't fit with the rest of the "feel" of the recorded vocals in the song.  both the "rock rock roll" and "bicycle rider" parts are two-part droning harmonies without much in the way of melodic acrobatics. the BWPS verse melody, while not as interesting and "surfer moon"-ish as this ghost melody, is consistent with the rest of the recorded vocals for the song.
2) if Brian knew that the ghost melody was what he wanted for the verse before even recording the backing track, why didn't he lay down those vocals way back when? the fact that they recorded the "la la la la" background vocals over the verse, AND recorded lyrics over the "rock rock roll" part (which is on the same reel of tape as the rest of the verse), but never recorded the "once upon the sandwich isles" lines, suggests that he hadn't settled on that particular melody yet.

perhaps he first came up with all the melodies (including the "ghost melody"), recorded the track, decided that the ghost melody didn't fit (but the rest did), recorded everything else, then came up with the BWPS melody before having a chance to lay it down. (of course, this doesn't explain why they didn't lay down the "ribbon of concrete" line at the same time as the "bicycle rider" line, but that's a question for another day.)

To me, that is all the more reason to suggest that this melody was the melody - it contrasts and therefore is more in line with the Smile aesthetic. So, for example, the last two sections of Cabin Essence has the repeating line "Who ran the iron horse? Who ran the iron horse?" and "Have you seen the grand coulee working on the rail road?" "Over and over..." but that doesn't suggest that the "Home on the Range section" would have repetition like that.


To use the same example as above, why did he record the backing vocals to Cabin Essence and not the main vocal? If he knew the melody to Surf's Up (which he obviously did), why didn't he lay down those vocals? Why are there only backing vocals on Barnyard when there was a pretty obvious lead. To me, this point really doesn't take into account Brian's recording methods in late 1966.

I addition to the tag, I always felt the verses of "Little Bird" resembled "Surf's Up", more than a little. Listen to the baseline. It's a very similar arrangement.

You're right.  They have a similar steadiness, part of the difference coming from "Surf's Up" having more syllables.  But they're similar, good call.

doesn't it for a millisecond sound like the organ is playing the BWPS in blue hawaii main melody at :33 on love to say dada part 2?  i'm sure i'm just filling in the meldoy, but i found that interesting.

Posted this in the DYLW Thread of Smile Sessions Box forum but figured it warranted posting here too:

That's a cover by Ant Bee from the 80's.

Not the same melody, either.

Holy f***, this version is creepy :O

Wait, teh hell is track 24 on here? Who's singing the Hawaiin chant section?

The conversation with regard to the "new" or "lost" melody for DYLW has been fascinating in the extreme for me. I am a newcomer to BW/BB fanhood, only having come to the music a bit less than 10 years ago. I accidentally found some internet discussion of SMiLE sometime in 2002 while surfing the net.

I have listened to the lost melody from my own Box Set. I have listened to my BWPS at the point where this new/lost melody would be/might be included (on Roll Plymouth Rock).  To my amateur ears, I conclude that the new/lost melody would have fit nicely as a counter-point melody to what's already on Roll Ply. Rock. I don't know if the lyrics could be made to fit the meter completely, but the melody fits.

Also, the upright double bass parts in that passage follow the new/lost melody.

All of this conversation reminds me that a very smart person once said that a work of art is never completed, but, merely abandoned.  SMiLE and BWPS are examples of Psychedelic Rock, and, as such, the artist has carte blanche to add layers of complexity to the music. This work is avant garde by its very nature. 

Another lost melody is the missing overdubs on Friday Night. I forget which track it is on which CD in the box set, but one of the hidden tracks is the workshop sound effects, and if you turn up the volume real loud, you can hear extra overdubs bleeding off from the headphones on the "musicians".

Where appears brian singing holidays (time mark)?

1:22 to about 1:28