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I had a proper listen to it for the first time in ages today and lots of it I really like. Much of it picks up exactly where BW88 left off. It seems to have such a bad rep because of Smart Girls which admittedly is cringeworthy but there is some great stuff on it. Love Ya, Rainbow Eyes and Someone to Love are my favourites. The GIOMH remakes can't hold a candle to the originals. Brian sings really well on much of the material (no shouty, robotic performances here) and I'll take the backing vocal stacks here over the Wondermints/Foskett any day. It seems despite the issues in Brian's life at the time, this seems to be a project he really had interest in. Am I alone in liking the most misunderstood album of Brian's career?

You know, tragically I think your comment about the GIOMH remakes not holding a candle to the originals is true. Says a lot for that album...

As for Sweet Insanity, I think one of the magazine reviewers stated that it, 'sounds like an album made by a man who has just come out of a coma'.

Personally I think the production, vocals and lyrics are horrible (though the vocals and lyrics on GIOMH were no better). Thank You is painful to listen to as it is apparent just how much Brian had been brainwashed.

The cover of Rainbow Eyes on the Caroline Now! album was nice though.

I admit the lyrics to Thank You are creepy when you know the story behind this period in Brian's life but then it seems every solo album has to make a reference to his problems at some point. As for the reviewer's coma comment - Brian sounds totally alive and joyful on these songs.

when i first heard it back in 1990, i agreed with what brian said to people magazine  "here is a guy from the 60's who can still sing his ass off". i have always agreed with brian's statement. i liked it then and still do. so put me in the camp that likes/loves this lp.

I like it for 80%. Some very nice and catcy songs. I didnt like the remakes on GIOMH.

For reference purposes, my impressions come from the Vigotone 112 version of this album, which I bought on silverdisc when it turned up in the bins of a local record store sometime in the 90's.

The production, to my ears, is pretty poor, and it does manage to torpedo some songs that could have been much better overall. Pretty poor is actually kinder than what I would have said.

To me it sounds like the equivalent of putting a 45 year old guy who drives his family around town in a minivan into the driver's seat of a Formula One race car, and turning him loose on a competition track.

It was hard to get past the shock of hearing "Concert Tonight" which was the opener of the Vigotone disc. The harmonies are simply "off" at best. I could not, and still cannot, imagine a musician like Brian Wilson putting something like this as the intro or the convocation to any album project. Therein lies one of the biggest issues I have:

Landy seems to have held onto a fantasy of being a record producer, a hotshot producer at that, and if anything this album shows just how either delusional or misguided that fantasy really was. In comparison to BW88, where at least some outsiders who knew what the heck they were doing were brought into the proceedings, Sweet Insanity seems to have had no "off switch" or a voice to at least veto something in questionable quality or taste, or even add some musical weight to some of the production decisions.

Having said that, I can and do hear some neat purely musical moments in a few songs, specifically in the melodies and chord changes which are clearly coming from Brian. But the production and some rather poor musical decisions after the songwriting itself casts such a dark shadow over the music that it is still difficult for me to listen to or enjoy. And the fact that the album was rejected does not surprise me.

One thing that stands out with Brian's (and the Beach Boys') better releases over the past four decades or so is the way the lack of actively trying to make a song or album "sound like a hit" by using then-current production tricks, sounds, and gimmicks is what actually makes certain songs more memorable and worthy of repeat re-listening. One cannot just put the "Beach Boys sound" or the "Brian Sound" on top of whatever a top 10 hit record sounded like in 1990 and expect it to catch on with listeners. As I said in another thread, that overt chasing of a hit record is what may have crippled several good songs, or made lesser songs even worse, since the late 70's with this band and its members.

If anything, Sweet Insanity might show (or prove beyond doubt?)  that Landy's desire to produce records was as misguided as Brian's attempt to record a rap song.

Unfortunately some genuinely good musical moments, specifically melodies, got stuck in the mud.

I dislike the sound, the singing, the over-instrumentation, the production and most of the songs - but Don't Let Her Know She's an Angel is good - he just needs to record a decent version of it.

I probably listen to Sweet Insanity (the second version) more than I do to any of Brian's other solo albums.  Though I really don't like "Thank You," which, in addition to being dull, takes potshots at Carl and Audree Wilson, and "Smart Girls" only works as a joke, it sounds like Brian committed more to this album vocally and musically than to any of his subsequent solo albums.  "Someone to Love," "Water Builds Up," "Don't Let Her Know She's an Angel" and "Love Ya" are all terrific songs.  I didn't hear Sweet Insanity until after Getting In Over My Head, and as a result, was extremely surprised that there could possibly be a version of "Make A Wish" that I would like, but the Sweet Insanity version is so deliriously giddy that I find I have to either surrender myself entirely or retreat from it entirely (I go with the former option, incidentally).  The other songs "Hotter," "The Spirit of Rock and Roll," and "Rainbow Eyes" are also quite strong, and "I Do" isn't bad at all.  The great film critic Andrew Sarris once described a scene from John Stahl's The Immortal Sergeant as "the cinema of audacity to the point of madness," but added that it was "always preferable to the relative sanity of discretion."  That pretty much describes the way that I feel about Sweet Insanity, especially in relation to Brian's other solo albums.

I love Brian on the second version of Someone to Love

I like "Thank You", that's about it though. Catchy melody and the lyrics are actually far better than most of the ones on that album.

Sometimes I'll be doing something and have the urge to sing "crazy beatings from my father ahhhhoooooooooo".

While I prefer the redone backing tracks on GIOMH, Brian's vocals are all stronger on the SWEET INSANITY versions of those songs. The original "Make A Wish" is quite a bit better and "Someone To Love" is a great song that deserves a spot on any upcoming Brian Wilson album/compilation. "Thank You" is pretty wretched, but "Smart Girls" has always struck me as just a fun goof in the manner of "I'm Bugged At My Ol' Man". However, I find the material on the first version of the album to be quite weak.

When I saw this topic I started listening to Thank You and just when I read your post and "crazy beatings from my father ahhhhoooooooooo" Brian sang that very line! Talk about perfect timing! :)

I've always liked it. Back in the days of my early BBs fandom it was one of the first BW solo pieces I heard and I immediately fell in love with its delicious weirdness.

I like Spirit of Rock and Roll, Thank You, and Don't Let Her Know She's An Angel.  Do You Have Any Regrets, Make a Wish, and Fairy Tale aren't bad either (though the re-recordings of the latter two are so much better).  All of the other songs are pretty bad in my opinion.  I agree that Smart Girls is worth listening to because of how ridiculous it is but when you consider how it was meant to be a legit rap song, it's kind of sad and either way it should never have been recorded.  The production overall is terrible and some of the lyrics are too awkward for my liking.  But, it's a lot better than some of the latter day Beach Boys albums.  I wouldn't say I like it necessarily but I think with some tweaking, less control from Gene Landy, and the right producer like Andy Paley, it wouldn't have been nearly as berated as it is.

Well...I think "Love Ya" is pretty awesome. A great up-tempo Brian tune. Kinda reminds me of Love You in a way. I also like "Water Builds Up" better than "Let's Go To Heaven In My Car", but honestly I think the verse is better than the chorus on both songs. "Don't Let Her Know She's An Angel" is good at certain times for me. I like the piano demo the best though. I'm pretty sure I don't care for the GIOMH version. I know it never hit me back when I had that album. Maybe I should try that version and the Sweet Insanity version again. "The Spirit Of Rock & Roll" pretty good too I guess, in a really cheesy way. The version with Bob Dylan is just cool because its Brian Wilson and Bob Dylan together, but beyond that it's pretty shitty. I guess I like the Songs From Here & There the best, but even that version isn't exactly amazing.

All the rest of the album is garbage to me though.

haven't really listened to it, but I really dig Smart Girls. Such an interesting track.

Now that is a good song. luHv everything about it. A tweak here and there and you might have a hit. 8)

I do, I do...- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i_GCh5pk-f0 

yep, I really do - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ndMltIVTJc

Wow, that's quite a good cover.  Did Darian cover any of the other Sweet Insanity songs?

Not that I know of - but a Pet Sounds-y version of I Wanna Pick You Up graces the flipside.

I can't get through the day without hearing Smart Girls.

I love it. It's like Love You 2. It's quirky, honest, and really catchy. I've always thought of SI as the "rock and roll album" he's been talking about making for years.
It's an uptempo and fun record and more importantly, his vocals are fantastic and he sounds happy and more excited than ever.

I wonder which cocktail of drugs Landy had pumped into him to cause that.  ;)

I think it's an album let down by ham-handed mixing and engineering. I suspect Brian actually arranged most of it -- it sounds a lot like some of his later gussied-up demos. The problems come how the instruments and vocals blend, and the fact that no one was willing to say "no" to clearly, blatantly bad ideas.

Most of the remade tracks on GIOMH are superior. The vocals on SI are nearly always better.

It's pretty cool that Bob Dylan shows up on a song.  Other than that, the production on this album is wretched.  It makes it hard to listen to any of it.  There are some decent songs on there but there is a good reason this album never got an official release...

Two of the other Traveling Wilburys (Petty, Lynne) are allegedly on the record as well although nobody that I'm aware of has ever been able to confirm exactly where.  I believe "Weird Al" is on the album as well but I might be misremembering. 

Weird Al is on the track that was remade as The Waltz on GIOMH. Also Mr Burns seems to be on the end of Smart Girls!?!? Can you imagine his reaction?
"Smithers, what am I doing on a crappy Beached Boy song?"

I remember liking it when Bill Holdship slipped me a copy of it way back then.  I always thought "Smart Girls" was a hoot, though I like the disco HCTN as well (and I"ll defend the latter a lot harder than the former).  But for me, "Don't Let Her Know She's An Angel," was awesome, "Do You Have Any Regrets" was quite clever and left frield, and "Water Builds Up" was pretty much the perfect pop song in a Disney kind of way.  I always liked "Spirit of Rock 'n' Roll" though I never liked it as much as the first time I heard it on the Hawaii '86 special.

It's kinda downhill from there, though.  I loathed "Brian" and "Rainbow Eyes" put me to sleep.  The rest was kinda meh.  "Country Feeling" classic throwaway Brian -- but not in a very engaging way.

But yeah, I liked it OK.  I always thought the album as whole got a bit of a bum rap, though it probably was richly deserved from a Landy karma perspective.  I haven't listened to it since then though.

The Paley sessions, now...that really made my ears perk up.  Bits and pieces of them were leaking out by around 1994, I remember.  Too bad about the lead vocals.

Dont think so, its a nice item to have if you like your vinyl - http://www.ebay.com/itm/DARIAN-SAHANAJA-Do-You-Have-Any-Regrets-45-PS-BEACH-BOYS-Heart-Zombies-RARE-/400463290884?pt=Music_on_Vinyl&hash=item5d3d78e204

I remember ordering the millennium edition Sweet Insanity in San Francisco from a shop in Castro round 2003. Shop guy was trying to explain to me that it was not very good but I wanted it bad...$30 I think...and I loved it...but not as much as the Paley and Adult Child ones I got off them in the following months

I enjoy the songs and the album has grown on me in a big way. It's not genius, but eventually you end up digging it. Voice big turn off, though.

I have something called the "millennium edition". Haven't played it in awhile, but I recall liking the tunes. It's overproduced, of course, and some of the lyrics are embarrassing, but Brian sounds healthy and comes up with some strong melodies.

This is largely how I feel about Sweet Insanity.  Good times.  Fun, bright, silly, comfortable.  I really knew nothing about the "details of the situation" (i.e.; Landy, etc) and still don't really.  I just know what I hear.  And I thought it sounded good -- yes goofy -- but really good.  Like it was the next logical step (i.e.; improvement in some ways) following his debut:  "Brian Willson (88)."  That's what I heard.

Maybe I'm thinking of the Paley Sessions?  I'm confused.  I've got to find these... I'm not sure where they are!!  HELP!!!  Dammit... why can't these be officially released!!!!  Seriously!  Adult Child, too!  C'mon!!

Count me as one who likes the kooky fringes of Brian Wilson.  Love You, Adult Child.  That's me.  To me, it's a "guarantee on a box" that I'm getting something that no record executive has "approved" for me.  I like the work of an artist at their most uninhibited -- ie. least -- commercial.  I don't care if Landy's working the dials... what a crazy scene!  A reclusive genius, whipped into shape - having dropped a 100 pounds, with a sweat-band on his head doing Jazzercise in the studio with Bob Saget (??what??) while his "doctor" works the faders... bopping along, dropping alka seltzer (i.e. medication) in Brian's water.

Sock it to me!!

Anyway... SI has a great vibe.  I love the sunny, optimistic (dreadfully poppy) sound of early 90s.  Happy times.  Goofy, DJ Jazzy Jeff times.

(http://valdefierro.com/prince33.jpg)
The way we were...  :'(

Bean Bag- Which band from the 1990s do you think will go through the "endless summer syndrome"?

Well, I must confess, I don't really know too much about early 90s pop music, other than the general aesthetic.  So, I assume you're wondering who will be subject to doing the endless nostalgia tours, a la Endless Summer?  Good question.  Who do you think?  Is there anybody who was "that good" to even warrant the job?  Boyz 2 Men?  Backstreet Boys?

New Kids on the Block, Backstreet Boys and Boyz 2 Men are doing nostalgia tours right now.

In the U.K. 1990s nostalgia is now in full swing too.

What? You mean its not the 90's anymore? Boy that was some strong sh*t I took.......

I hate everything about this album. Even without the truly horrible backstory the vocals were whiney, the lyrics terrible, no melodies stuck in my head, and you can't even call those synth cuts music. Brian Wilson 88 is better in so many ways. The songs weren't improved as songs, and I may be crazy, but I like the GIOMH versions better because they sound less processed musically. Maybe the original Make A Wish is cooler, but neither recording comes near Brian at his best.

Other than two thirds of the 88 LP I can't listen to much of Brian's work during the second Landy period. It's again not just how horrible Brian was being treated, I think it's simply that Landy and his team made awful music and Brian's voice is at its worst. Except for his upbeat manner at the 1983 shows, and his work with outside producers in 1988, 1983-91 is a bit of a wash for Brian.  

Sweet Insanity is the music of the Pied Piper.

I hear it on my magic transistor.

 :brian

If I had approached this cd as the followup to BW88 without any prior knowledge of how it was recorded, who was involved, etc, I would've been disappointed. There isn't any track as beautiful as Melt Away or There's So Many, nothing as catchy or memorable as Let it Shine or Meet Me in My Dreams Tonight, nothing as creative as Rio Grande. I read all kinds of reviews of these tracks before  I found a cd of them, so I was prepared for it to be either a travesty, or a masterpiece. It's neither.

I can imagine the Sire execs who heard the SI tapes thought it was "gentlemen, we've been screwed" Part II. Especially after spending a lot of money on the Brian Wilson self-titled album which wound up with the shipments they sent out of that LP wind up returned and as 99 cent cut-outs later on (I remember seeing a lot of BW cutout LPs, CD's, and cassettes in record stores as late as the mid-'90s). And that album got good reviews. I can just imagine what reviewers would have said about SI. Nope, not a fan of it myself.

SI is some of my favorite stuff to listen to.

I gotta admit, Smart Girls is so horridly cringeworthy it's brilliant. Poor Brian...

Someone To Love is a dope jam.

Dumb question:  Why do they "cut out" CDs/LPs in the bargain bins? 

I was laughing my azz off when I first heard it!!!

You know, bad 80s rap (or early 90s rap) is what it is.  It's retro...  Plus even a lot of the "good rap" from that era was cringeworthy and lame.

People who actually think "Smart Girls" is either good rap or a good song generally really worry me...

And no, Bean Bag, a lot of good hip-hop in the '80s/'90s wasn't lame or cringe-worthy assuming you actually like hip-hop?

Right on!

I love the title:  Sweet Insanity. :brow 

So it's, Sweet?   :quote  And... you're insane?   :quote 

Wait... is this really happening?

I think you're taking this all too seriously.   :lol  It's "ironic."  So bad it's good.  Ironic.  I'm not going to argue the merits of "Smart Girls."

Yes, a lot of rap music from the 80s and early 90s (mostly 80s) was bad.  It too, is so bad it's good in a retro kind of way.

What makes it bad is that it was so new that it was often relying on its novelty of being something new rather than pushing the art form to something original or genuine.  A very common occurrence in the performing/entertainment arts when something strikes the public fancy -- placing giant dollar signs in the eyes of executives and half-wits who stick their face in a camera and strike a pose.

But it too can be good in an ironic way.  And yes, I like music... I don't toss out entire genres.

But Smart Girls is one strange fruit.   :3d

Oh, sure, yeah, I thought you were talking about stuff that's now considered classic -- Big Daddy Kane, Eric B. & Rakim, Tribe, etc. -- but was still very popular and mainstream at the time rather than, say, Kriss Kross or whatever other crossover acts A&Rs cooked up.

I don't get into ironic music appreciation, I guess. To me "Smart Girls" is just awful... but funny. BIG BRAINS ARE AWESOME DUUUUDE

I like how Smart Girls alludes to the different BB legacy songs /sounds. The chorus is my least favorite section
but the whole thing is pretty humorous. You have to admit its a unique piece in Brian's reperitore

Compared to Smart Girls, Wipe Out with the Fat Boys is a masterpiece.

The record companies put a notch through the cover or UPC price marker on the cardboard of a vinyl LP or the plastic case of CD's and tapes,  to indicate it's a discounted item that the record store can no longer return to the label, but can try to retail them at a discount. The artist also gets a lower fee for a cut-out rather than a full-priced LP according to Wikipedia, which makes sense.  I read somewhere that Sire shipped out a lot of "Brian Wilson" LP's and put a lot of promotion behind it, but it didn't sell too well, so they wound up with record stores returning the albums. They then tried to get rid of the returns by shipping them to stores as cut-outs and having stores sell them as marked-down records. I'm not sure if stores can get partial refunds on unsold cut-outs, but it would seem fair. I was at a Sam Goody in a mall in the mid-90s that had a lot of BW cut-out for 99 cents.  I already had a copy or I would have bought one.

Ah the cut-out bins.

Target, Kmart -- Peaches and Sound Warehouse.

I wonder how many records I flipped through in those bins.

Surely thousands, maybe tens of thousands.

I miss the cutout bins. Got some good stuff in them.

Man until 1990 or so you could get some great stuff sealed in the cut out bin. Love You was in there even in the late eighties as was the Celebration and Looking Back With Love LP's. You would see the Goin Public LP a lot. I remember I got at Target for 99 cents in 1989. It to this day is the only album I sold because I thought it was terrible. I never have gotten a new one, and for an obsessive vinyl collector like me that says a lot.

Listening to Sweet Insanity for the first time with phones.  :afro

There are a lot of neat cues to other songs scattered all through this album.

Heard a brief sax line from "Tequlia" at the end of one track.

My copy is the Japanese release and the sonic quality is even pretty decent.

You have to let this album grow on you. Yeah its 90's-era over-indulgent production but
check out the melodies. They are really good and Wilson's vocals are strong and confident
if not technically accurate.

You can feel that he really was into this music. Okay. Im done trying to convince ya.

I really do like the melody of Thank You (Brian), I might even be able to tolerate the lyrics if I didn't know who wrote them. I Do (Do You Have Any Regrets) is also a nice tune. I probably don't mind the 80's/90's production as much as most here do, there's some good music hidden under all that gloss.

I get what people are saying positive, it isn't to my taste but I can kind of feel what they are trying to convey. Me? I feel I know too much about that period to see it as anything other than a Landy fraud. I don't like the music in any case, nor the songs or vocals. The pitch he generally used from 1983-91 is just really off to me. 1988 LP again being half an exception, but otherwise he was never this whiney.

I don't know it was like he was being told to dress too young (remember the leather pants), to make his voice sound younger than he was comfortable with, to sing styles he wasn't into. I remember hearing Rainbow Eyes back on the Diane Sawyer interview in 1991. I think then what I thought now. He sounds pitchy, strangely detached, and he didn't have anything musically or lyrically to sink his teeth into. I suppose there are little moments of Brian in the proposed album, but far too few. If he was singing better and the production was better, maybe the base melodies could have made the grade. As far as the feel and sound as it is, to me it's his SIP. Of course he can't be blamed in the same way The Beach Boys could. By 1984 Landy was already in the way musically and personally, by 1990 it was a nightmare.

for some reason I can't hear the song "Hotter" without hearing the word "Harder"...."You're making me harder"..it kind of sounds like he's actually saying that!! :lol

And there is a difference ???

not really, it's just funnier... :lol

If the best tracks from SI and SIP were combined, could it be a half decent album? Sweet Insanity in Paradise?

Some scattered thoughts...

Just listened again after a few years. For some reason I remembered it as having better vocals than BW '88, but after re-listening I think I formed that opinion based off the 2 tracks where his vocals actually do sound better than the stuff on '88. And those tracks are...

"Rainbow Eyes"
"Don't Let Her Know She's An Angel"

I can hear now how the rest of the tracks are pretty shouty, and a little cheap sounding on the production / mix side compared to '88.

I have a hard time getting into "Someone To Love", "Water Builds Up" + "Love Ya".

I do really like the full version of "Concert Tonight".

Shame about the lyrics on "Thank You". That's gotta be one of THE very best latter day BW melodies / chord progressions, along with "From There To Back Again" + "What Love Can Do", imo. I was a kid when I first heard it, and didn't really understand what the lyrics meant at the time. David Leaf was bummed out when I told him I liked the song. I only listened to stuff for melodies and chords, and that was the standout track to me. I'd say it's worth listening to just for the "Thank You, Thank You" part. Especially when it modulates. That kills me every time. The alternate mix is better though. A little less processed.

Could you imagine that!

"Thank You" are probably some of Brian's most honest lyrics. Which of those lyrics do you think are a complete lie? You really think it was all Landy's doing that Brian didn't see his family as much?

Part of the lyrics touch on how Landy had brainwashed Brian into thinking that Carl was insanely jealous of him and resented his newfound 'independence', if you don't find that total bullshit then I don't know what to say to you.

Was it brainwashing, or did Brian's own band come to resent him in many ways? What do you think?

why is there that stupid laughter at the beginning of "smart girls"

seriously

did they finish it and landy was like "NEEDS SOME DUMBASS LAUGHTER OVER THE BEGINNING BRYUN" and then someone went "hee hee hee. HEEE HEE HEE HEE HEHEHEHE."

and then this happened: http://www.fileden.com/files/2007/2/20/800088/truck.mp3 (http://www.fileden.com/files/2007/2/20/800088/truck.mp3)

lol. :lol :lol

They may have resented that after spending x ammont of money to treat Brian, he then cut them out of his life.

But was it Brian who wanted the Beach Boys out of his life, or Landy? I think the latter. Of course Brian may have been so brainwashed by that point that he really did think Carl meant to harm him but trying to get Landy out of his life.

To be completely honest, it's hard for me not to like anything beach boys or related.…and sweet insanity is no exception. I loved Don't Let Her Know She's an Angel, Someone to Love, Concert Tonight, Spirit of Rock and Roll, and even a special place for Smart Girls. I can always pick out the best things from each song even if they're a stinker of a song…Smart Girls- I love the chorus, Lets Stick Together-I love Weird Al's accordion and the vocals, and I love the energy put into concert tonight, someone to love, hotter, water builds up, and country feeling (if included).

Er, yes. You really think Brian didn't want to see his own children?

Are there more than one version of Concert Tonight?

What I have lasts about 25-30 secs.

first version of the lp has it in full.....

deleted

Ok thanks!

In order to promote the health and welfare of the members of this board from henceforth I will not post anymore until I have changed my (hideous) avatar. I apologize to anyone who may have suffered migrianes or flashbacks from being exposed to it.

Your avatar must be Melinda's POV when she moves in on Brian for a snog - if they actually still do those sort of things.

And your avators are legends. Filthy, Rich and Catflap was my favourite

Is that you singing?

Well observed likeness between PCH and Baby Blue.

Where is the connection b'ween those two songs and Smart Girls?  You're a wacky fellow RDZ. :pirate

Water Builds Up  rules. It is easily one of my favorite songs by Brian. I can relate in so many ways. The song describes losing your cool but in a funny and creative sorta way...

Just listened to the 2.0 version for the first time in a while and had a much better time than I remember having! It's kinda the Adult/Child to BW88's Love You - even more flawed than it's predecessor, but just as enjoyable. Almost unrestrainedly cheesy, but I could care less... Brian sounds like he's having a lot of fun. I agree that it probably gets a bad rep because of that horrid final track, but anyone can swap it for one of the outtakes; get rid of "Hotter" and replace "Smart Girls" with "Being With The One You Love" and "He Couldn't Get His Poor Old Body To Move" and you've got a worthy follow-up to BW88, I think.

I found so much stuff on the dollar wall at Nuggets in Kenmore Square in Boston.  Ah, memories of hours upon hours of browsing.  Pure heaven.

Take away the horrid Thank You Brian which is just plain offensive and Smart Girls which is worse that 10x Summer of Loves and Wipeouts combined and what you are left with is really no better or worse than your typical BW solo album.

"Hotter" is such a kick ass fun 80s song that I can't believe I didn't hear it in the opening credits of How I Got Into College or One Crazy Summer.  It's got all the hallmarks of a perfect 80s teen comedy/sex romp theme song.  And that chorus is KILLER.  I really think it could've been a hit!

Also really love Water Builds Up.  Its the poppiest of pop. 

I think "Thank You" has pretty awesome music/melodies. Admittedly the lyrics are crappy (and unnecessarily defamatory), but I think Brian was making a sincere effort with this one... and I really like it, even if it is a guilty pleasure.

Thank You's lyrics are utterly foul and it's a shame to have to listen to Brian sing them... but dang, those "ahoooos". Which, as someone's pointed out, makes it an uncomfortable track to have the urge to sing, as I'll probably have for the next week or so.  >:(

Yes, the lyrics are horrible, but it does have a nice tune, one that sticks in my head.

In terms of a really solid BW tune with cool + catchy melodies and harmonies, marred by lyrics that on the level of cringeworthy as the track is great, the only other example quite as extreme as "Thank You" which I can think of is "Matchpoint of Our Love".  Of course their subject matter is extremely different, and the suckiness is apples and oranges on both of them.

I can still find it in me to like both songs.

(Compare to something else with cringeworthy lyrics like "Hey Little Tomboy" - IMO a pretty good tune musically, but nothing special).

Someone To Love is is so good, I can feel it in my winky

it's funny because I heard the world premiere of "Smart Girls" on the Dr.Demento show back in the day and didn't think too much about it because it fit that format..

Well, i like "Make A Wish", that's for sure. Oh god----that song.

I'd actually love to hear "Make A Wish" with an arrangement a bit more like "I Just Can't Wait To Be King" off the Disney album...

Cheers,
Jon Blum

Gee, you think so? To me, that's the one song I really can't stand on the album*, and chiefly because of that chorus... "You're making me HOT-ter, you're making me HOT-ter"... It's so mind-numbingly repetitive, and not the good kind of "Ding Dang" repetitive either. I'm sure one day I might wake up singing it and then come around, but for now "Hotter" is a clunker for me.

I hear what you're saying about it being perfect for a teen comedy/ sex romp though. Actually I think "Don't Let Her Know She's an Angel" would have been ideal closing credits music for one of those flicks-- Brian operating in full Diane Warren commercial mode, and yet his tune works brilliantly whereas Diane Warren makes me want to reach for the nearest pistol to shoot at the TV whenever I hear one of her songs come on.

Going through the S.I. songs quickly, I'd say my favorites and the only ones I love unabashedly are "Don't Let Her Know", "Rainbow Eyes" and "Make a Wish". I suffered through enough crappy 1990s production during that decade to where I've become largely immune to it, so it doesn't really affect my enjoyment of these tracks all that much.

"Brian", the song, is probably one of his top post-Beach Boy melodies. It's a damn shame about those lyrics; I guess they are an accurate reflection of where Brian was at the time, but still pretty hard to stomach even today. Yet that melody, wow.

"Water Builds Up" and "Country Feelin'" certainly aren't for the uninitiated, but they appeal to me greatly. I'd take a whole album of Brian singing about things like kitchen emergencies and playing with chickens down on the farm over the forced Buffet-isms of Imagination or the "Mozart of the Modern Era" thing he's been rolling with ever since then. That's largely because I believe that the goofy songs are guileless and seem to reflect the "true" Brian every bit as much as something like "Surf's Up"... I think it's disingenuous if his modern day production team put the kibosh on letting him express this side of his creativity, because it's all part of what makes Brian such a wonderful talent.

"Love Ya" I can take or leave. I still want to sing "Sweetie" every time it comes on, and the newer lyrics just don't seem to work for me. "Spirit of Rock 'n' Roll", I'd agree with whomever said it was better at the '86 Aloha Beach Boys show, which was basically just Brian miming to a studio recording anyway. I think it's better produced, and I don't know whose idea it was to bring Dylan in to sing his three lines (Landy) but that has to be one of the worst production decisions of all time, and Bob's made some doozies throughout the years.

"Concert Tonight"-- I'm not a big fan of the whole track, but as an intro I kind of like it. Again, very catchy. "Someone to Love" is just more of that comfy early 90s closing credit vibe. Might have worked for Twins, Kindergarten Cop, Throw Mama from the Train, Arachnophobia...

Overall despite its myriad of deficits and setbacks, I'll take Sweet Insanity over just about any other Brian solo album (outside of the similarly bonkers Paley Sessions)-- probably for the same reasons I generally choose to listen to 15 Big Ones or Love You over Holland or Carl and the Passions. It's Brian at his most honest and uninhibited, and despite the circumstances it was recorded under it still manages to exude a sense of well-being and oftentimes pure joy, early nineties production be damned!



* - Except "Smart Girls". But I like to try to trick myself into believing that that track doesn't really exist by leaving it off of the album.

I like that analogy!

I love the album on the whole but could do without Smart Girls and Thank You.

No one's mentioned 'I Do" aka "Do You Have Any Regrets"? That's one of my favorites. You guys make me wanna put that cd on again.

I had a listen to the second version last night.  I quite enjoy it, was weird when I first heard the albm in 1992, and from the first version I like the bass on the verses of Water Builds Up.  Some really great moments, including some of tzhe vocals, and other 'fun' moments.  I was also listening to the hotel room tape from 1990 with Brian, Jeff, Bruce, Stamos and others and Brian sings some original, alternate lyrics to "Brian" and "Someone to Love".  Interesting listen!

yes my sweet insanity CD has gotten a lot of spins in my car of late and i've come to the conclusion THERE'S NOTHING WRONG WITH IT, IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN RELEASED.  darker forces were afoot back then.  bob dylan sounds cartoonish though

I do wonder what the response - critical and otherwise - would have been if SI had been released back in '91. I think my initial reaction would have been disappointment that he didn't create another suite like Rio Grande. I don't think the production would have bothered me back then, though, everything coming out at the time was overproduced, if it wasn't grunge, or roots rock.

I think Sweet Insanity is underrated on the whole, but if its non-release in 1991 meant the non-release of Smart Girls, it was probably well worth it.

I know I read Brian mentioning the song somewhat fondly in an interview years later, but still, I do wonder if there's one unreleased song that slipped out which Brian (perhaps on the advice of others) might wish to put back into the vault, would there be a better candidate than Smart Girls? Maybe Brian (Thank You)? I guess with the Landy promo cassette of the album, Smart Girls could almost be considered "released", but not quite in my book.

Apart from Hotter, I loved every track. It's a stellar album. I was over the moon when I got my factory pressed hard copy and played it every day for a couple of years.

I think Sweet Insanity has a bunch of average to good tracks, but nothing that stands out as classic or essential. Which is probably the problem. There's no "Love & Mercy" here - heck, no "Imagination", I'd say. Where's the single?

There a clutch of great songs on this thing, a lot of horrible lyrics and terrible lyrics. But the worst part is the vocal work. There is something about the way the vocals are mixed, or recorded...when one of those wall o' Brians pop up I feel physically uncomfortable.

This.  Exactly.

My problem with the vocals on Sweet Insanity-- and on OCA and Imagination, for that matter -- is that the Wall of Brians intrudes on the lead vocal lines. There'll be a pause in the lead vocal, and the backgrounds will come in so up front, and so identifiably Brian, that my brain doesn't recognize the background vocals as backgrounds. And then the lead jumps back in and BAM! Too many Brians, too in your face, too monolithic.