The Smiley Smile Message Board

1. I Wonder if the re-recording of "She Believes In Love Again (from BB 1985) was the only Johnston track considered for TWGMTR?

2. Why in the first place re-record it?
(Does Bruce think that the song deserves a second chance?) 

3. No other unreleased Johnston-songs in the vaults?

Source:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/She_Believes_in_Love_Again

Wikipedia's not the best source. To prove that it was actually me that added the part about the re-recording to the article based on an interview that was posted on this forum - a quick search should bring it up. Btw this is the second or third time this has happened in the past week :lol

I'm also curious as to why that was his contribution and I'm also curious to hear it.

maybe he added a rap or techno beat to it with alot of autotune for the dance clubs... ;D :lol

Nah, he said this version was a "stripped down" version.

so he recorded it while naked??? :o

The Dance club version:  She believes in Pipelines again!? :afro
In fact I heard a short sample of the new stripped version in a radio interview a few weeks ago. But I can't remember which station...

1. Probably, or he (Bruce) would've blurted it out in some interview.

2. Maybe the issue of Carl's vocal and Levine's production comes into play.

3. The best question.... Bruce has always referred to himself as a songwriter first. I assume, as a songwriter with the resources to record demos at any time, he would have several songs in the can. And, keep in mind he has been writing songs for 50 years! I really thought he would have one ace in his hand and it would've been played on this album.

I kind of get the feeling that Brian was as Mike puts it, the "Stalin of the Studio" and they were afraid to push too much for anything to be included (Sans Al, who got the cold shoulder).  So maybe there wasn't enough time or enough of a good aura for Bruce to pull out something from the cobwebs. 

Although, you'd have to imagine if Bruce had anything good up his sleeve, he would have pitched it to Mike by now. 

Yeah, I guess Bruce will always be "the new guy". However, other than Mike, Bruce has served more years as an active Beach Boy than any of 'em.

What ever happened to "Going Private"?
I think there must be a bunch of unreleased gems from those sessions.
I found this interview from 1990:

http://troun.tripod.com/bruce.html

Actually, there were only two Going Private tracks recorded - Let's Visit Heaven Tonight and If There Were Time. The former is typical half-disco that Bruce loved during that period, and the latter is the typical Bruce ballad. Neither are bad...they're just THERE.

I'm gonna wage a guess and say that yes, "She Believes in Love Again" was the only thing Bruce offered up at the sessions. I wonder if Brian produced it? That might be interesting. I don't know why he chose to re-do this one, but I'm guessing he really just thought it was "too '80s" but still thought it was a good song, so he decided to re-record it.


I think it's safe to say that Bruce has pretty much been skating by just doing the live shows since he rejoined The Beach Boys. Yes, he's done a few things here and there with other people, and contributed a few songs to the band ("She Believes in Love Again", "Happy Endings", "Slow Summer Dancing", etc.), but overall he does seem to really have a contented feeling regarding his work. I think he's happier watching Faux News and counting his capitol gains then being creative.

But regardless, he DOES have a few songs that he possibly could have used, that haven't been released as Bruce Johnston or Beach Boys songs. From 1978, he had "If There Were Time" and "Heaven Tonight", which I'm pretty sure were both done by Captain and Tennille. More recently, he had "The Way I Dreamed It" and "My Heart" on Doris Day's new album. Keep in mind, these are recordings from the 1980s, I'm pretty sure. But in the Bruce scheme of things, these are "new". Probably the newest tunes he's written, besides maybe "Slow Summer Dancin'". Maybe he's done stuff since then, but how are any of us to know. I don't find Bruce to be particularly likeable or anything, but I would be interested to hear more of his stuff, and I wish he would do another solo album or at the least contribute a song to the next Beach Boys album.


Actually I'm pretty sure there was nothing recording for Goin' Private. He was supposed to do that stuff in the early '90s. He talked about all that recording gear, but I'm pretty sure he remarked on The Beach Boys Britain board that he never actually did much of anything. And I'm pretty sure "Let's Visit Heaven Tonight" and "If There Were Time" were late '70s things.

"Hey Bruce, have you written any new songs in the past 20 years or so that we could use for the new album?"
"No, not really. But I do have this really mediocre song that we already released on an album once, maybe we can just do that one again?"
"Uh, yeah, good idea Bruce. We'll think about it."

Bruce said on the BBB board about ten years ago that he'd put together a CD of demos (and I got the impression that they were of new songs), but didn't want to do anything commercial with them, and that he was considering sending a few copies out to people who could then copy them for others and so on. Nothing ever came of it, but it suggests that he's still writing (or was then) but just not that interested in doing much with the songs.

http://www.apopdiary.com/?p=55

listen at 13:17

Muchas gracia

Yes, there it is! Thank you very much! :) I'm impressed.

Ok... but it sounds pretty similar to the original version (which I do not have any problem with in the first place.)
One of the top 5 best tracks on BB 85. Strong vocals from both Carl & Bruce
I wonder if there is a lack of confidence in his own songwriting now a days?
There must be better choices than to re-record a track from 85?!

In case you HAVE to re-record;
Why not "Don't Run Away (a Bruce & Terry track from 1964-65)"?  ;)
I Love that song.

I gotta admit I kinda like his more gritty "Bryan Adams" approach more on "She Believes in Love Again" better than his newer cleaner approach. But whatever. Bryan Adams sucks by the way.

But yeah, I won't lose any sleep if this version of this song never comes out. It was perfect for an iTunes bonus track, but alas, they didn't do that. However, if this gets on either the hits album or the box set I'm kinda not gonna be that happy because I'm sure there is better material out there than this.

The interview seems to be a few years old. Is this really the recording that he was considering for the Beach Boys' new album ?

Oh crap. You're right. That is interesting.

The interview's from 2009, so it's newer than a bunch of the tracks on the final album!  Probably it would have gotten the "Daybreak" treatment with extra overdubs.  But I suspect it would already have been built around the Carl part by that point, much like "Don't Fight The Sea"...

Cheers,
Jon Blum

I wonder who sings Carl's part on the new version? Brian? Or would these use the same Carl vocal, or maybe an alternate Carl vocal? Hmm. Maybe somebody "in the know" can tell us.

I thought Bruce said they were using the original Carl vocal, and just stripping down everything surrounding it...

Cheers,
Jon Blum

I think that was the idear behind it. Bruce specifically talked about "stripping it down". Not opposed to some of those songs being given a more organic production job (as long as the originals are preserved), although I can see why it didn't make the new album.

Don't Run Away would have been a far better song to get the full Beach Boys treatment. It wouldn't have topped the 1966 version perhaps, but it's one of Bruce's best songs and as Mike helped write the track it would have been a great Bruce moment. SBILA is pathetic next to that. I like it best of anything Bruce ever did.

I'd like to know more about this:

You've already done that once, with the "American Band" video.

I didn't think that was very good at all. I thought the home movies of the band driving though Hawaii were pretty superfluous. There's other stuff we could've used - thirty minutes of the band in Japan in 1966, stuff from "Ready, Steady, Go".




 :o :o

some time a few years ago, Bruce mentioned on the Beach Boys Britain board that he was rerecording She Believes in Love Again with Chris Farmer singing Carl's part. maybe Bruce just likes rerecording this song over and over again.

also, if you write songs it's impossible to go 20 years without writing a song. but that doesn't mean you think it should be given to the Beach Boys. I'm sure Mike, Bruce, Al and David all have tons of songs they play on an acoustic guitar at family parties and stuff, but aren't appropriate for the band / won't sell / et cetera.

This is absolutely one of the finest co-leads done together.  OMG.  Even, if you play the old LP, high on the bass, I find it an absolute "chest clutcher," with the orchestration pouring out of the speakers.  

Carl is magnificent, and with the two voices (Bruce's) and the harmony on the background, that it would be awesome on a newer release.  It could almost be analogyzed to Disney Girls, maybe in the less well-known sense; but, just the dreamy quality and background percussion is amazing.  One might  listen with headphones, for the full effect.  

Magnificent song.  

It seems that there will be another album...

Maybe a remake of Only With You, with Dennis' vocals and the guys blended in,  on harmony as in the tribute...The fans are ready for that, I think, from the response at these magnificent shows. POB version is magnificent as well.    

Ya, it is no reunion.  It is a re-birth!  ;)

They are on a roll!  :)

"Don't Run Away would have been a far better song to get the full Beach Boys treatment."

Absolutely gorgeous song.

Shelter for the win.

 :lol

I guess the deal for the album was from the beginning that it would be a Brian album like the early ones up to Pet Sounds. Mike got his song in there certainly because that was part of his deal with Brian.
If these assumptions are true I wonder how big the chances for Al, David and Bruce actually were to even get a song in there. One of David's songs was begun. We saw a short clip from the "She believes in love again"-sessions. Now, did they do any of Al's material ?

"One of the top 5 best tracks on BB 85. "

Because it's a poor album

Ok, ha ha  :-D "She Believes In Love Again" And BB - 85 = Guilty Pleasures of mine!

But I agree with some other fans; I would prefer a remake of this song:

Don't Run Away:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NtDGXpfIoz8

I wonder how well known this song is among the fans?

Haha fantastic! This here is the truth.

Another good Bruce and Terry song that would work well I think  is "Little Beach Girl"

only youtube version I can find is the Pat Boone version, but it gives you the idea...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_oKr7lPKQ0    :-D

Somewhere stashed away, I actually have this single. Not sure where I got it, but I bought it because of the writing/arranging credits. Pat was such a musical slut.

I don't think anything was set in stone about the song selection. The new Rolling Stone article has at least some insight into this. It describes Al continuing to attempt to present "Waves of Love" to Brian and the group to work on, and Brian continually avoiding it both directly or indirectly. The article seems to read as though the author thinks it's a good song, but for some reason Brian doesn't want anything to do with it. It would have been interesting for them to delve a bit further to find out why. Did Brian just not like it too much? Did Carl's appearance on the recording weird him out? Was he aware it was already on Al's solo album?

The whole reunion power structure is interesting and hasn't been fully explored. This recent article got into it more than anybody has. It kind of strikes me that Al is purposely being a bit passive (both in terms of not pushing his stuff on the album or making the setlist politics more severe) just to make sure the whole thing doesn't devolve into too many disagreements. I mean, in some sense, he should have as much say as Brian and Mike in that they all own the BB name/Brother equally. It seems like Al isn't trying to assert too much power in all of this, and I have a feeling that while he's not literally holding this reunion together, we may owe a big thanks to Al for being passive and letting Brian and Mike and their camps do most of the jockeying.

Impossible.

If this was genuinely considered for the new album, I think it would've made a lovely addition and I can think of four or five BW songs I'd happily replace it with.

I was listening to the original in the car this morning and thinking that it's really a beautiful song. A pretty Bruce ballad would really have given the album a more classic 70s feel I think. Hell, the opener sounds like a Bruce tune - I don't know why people aren't more receptive to his stuff.

Imagine if they could use Carl's gorgeous vocal on the chorus too. That could've been stunning.

Another Bruce Johnston bit: in 1994 he announced that he was going to host his own slow-dancing music radio show. Still waitin'.

Has he got a vagina? i mean jeez, does he write/listen to anything other than slow-love-romantic-cheesy-ballads?

That's funny! Sometimes I wish this board had a facebook 'like' button.
Hey don't be baggin' on Bruce. Did you know he won a grammy? It's true - just ask him!

Interesting he was taking way back about the Doris Day album which just came out last year...