The Smiley Smile Message Board

I love this! But is Brian's the only voice I hear or is Al on it too?

Love it too!

I think I here Al's voice as well! Even just doubled over Brian's voice. Amazing how much Al can sound like Brian. I could barely tell them apart on I Know There's an Answer and Be Here in the Morning.

Another one in the "love it" category. Wouldn't it be cool if Brian performed it in his December shows?

Further proof that Brian still "had it" at that point. Much better than anything on M.I.U. except for My Diane.

Wasn't that recorded in 1974? One of the last ones before Brian's voice went South? It's on the Beach Boys Ultimate Christmas album and fits right in. Sure glad they formally released it after all those years.

Holiday greetings to you, Smilin' Ed!  :)

1977. Recorded after the change

The vocal itself was recorded in '77 I'm pretty sure, but I do recall that the backing track is actually from '75 or so, and not originally intended as a seasonal number.

I love it too!

Love it. I'd be sad if anyone didn't. Did Brian record this for a specific album or was it just an idea to jot down?

To you too, Mikie!

Thought the music was written in 74 and the lyrics came later. Pretty sure the track was from 77 because a student at MIU played the fluglehorn on it - or maybe that was just added then.

Vocals were done in 77 and don't sound that different from Brian's voice on other MIU tracks.  His voice was about as good as it would ever get post 1973.

Yep, I agree this is a really nice one.

Will definitely dig it out again in December.

I beat you to it, and dug it out earlier this week. For the record, it appears the whole track was recorded at MIU, as it's on the list of songs recorded with the core BBs band on Nov. 15 (along with two other outtakes - "Our Team" and "How's About A Little Bit"), with the horns added on Nov. 21 and Nov. 22.

Hmm. So you're saying that it wasn't originally tracked in '75 like the liner notes said? Interesting.

When were the lyrics written? I thought they were done especially for the (non) album

Well, I know the tracking to Winter Symphony was done in 1974 or '75. I thought the vocal was done too, but maybe I was thinking of Child Of Winter. I thought his vocal sounded a little clearer. Better pull out the disc for next month's playdom....

C-man would know, and it appears that's not true.

Good of you for giving him props, though. Well-deserved.