The Smiley Smile Message Board

What's the big deal? More importantly, if you were to make it mono and replace 'And Then I Kissed Her' with it on SD/SN, would it have the great rep it seems to? Would it dramatically raise the quality of that album? I don't think so.

Nice vocal, though.

I think that's why it got on the radio in 1969.. because it sounded like something that could've been from 1965.

to me, then i kissed her just isn't a revelation...it sounds pretty much like spector's production...but the thing, is i've never heard the original version i can hear music

Neither have I, that I can remember.  And apparently we aren't missing much.  Everyone, including I think Ronnie herself, said the Beach Boys' version of "I Can Hear Music" was superior to the Ronettes'.   It was the Ronettes' last record on Philles, and Phil didn't even produce it.  It only made it to Number 100 on the charts, whereas the Beach Boys version was almost in the Top 20 when the Beach Boys were quite uncool.  Phil's biographer Richard Williams said this in "Out Of His Head":   "Spector was so dispirited (over the failure of his production of Tina Turner doing "River Deep Mounain High") that he gave the group to Jeff Barry, who cut a fine song called 'I Can Hear Music' with them.  It suited Ronnie's voice, but Barry's production was unexceptional.  Three years later the Beach Boys turned it into a classic, thanks to Carl Wilson's inspired production and angelic lead vocal".

Compared to "And Then I Kissed Her", this one is STACKED vocally.  I think the reason it's popular among us Beach Boys fans (including myself) is the wall of Beach Boys vocals that just hit you like a wave right from the start:  "Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh".  VERY positive engergy.  And the chorus is a great hook.  And it's about music!  Kinda.   Singing about music in a very spiritual-sounding way.

Craig

I've heard the Ronettes version, in fact, I heard it before the Beach Boys version.. it's nothing special.

I think it's a great song, especially the production which I'm told Carl did, but in the liner notes for the 2fer, Brian is quoted as saying "We got the guitars to sound just how we wanted on that one".... leading me to believe that Brian had at least a hand in producing it.  Either way, it sounds like a church choir which is why everybody likes it whether they admit it or not.  Plus it just drives the whole song... it's just balls to the wall from the very beginning, it starts, it is what it is, it switches up a bit in the acapella part, and then it's back 100 miles an hour through to the end, tons and tons of beach boys singing all over the place. 

My favorite part is in the acapella bit, somebody (Brian? Carl?) is singing REALLLLY high in the background "Muuuuuuusssiiicc..... MUUUUUSSSIccccc.... MUUU---uuuuuuu-----ssssiiiiicccccc oohhhhhhhhhhhhhhh"

I betcha the high voice is Bruce.  He's said the vocals were done by just him, Carl, Al, and Mike. 
No Brian.  But I've always thought maybe Marilyn's on it.

Craig

Yeah, I do remember reading somewhere that it was the first track that Brian had no input on at all.

Could Brian have helped mix it?  I'm trying to figure out what he's talking about on the 2fer notes.  Of course he could just be making things up, it would not be the first time, right?

I found the notes.  Check this out.

"They say that I have a genius for makin' a complex piece of music seem easy.  I wanted the instrumental track of "I Can Hear Music" to be smooth and subliminal.  I used acoustic guitars.  Carl wailed on the lead.  His voice was gettin' established fast in the group." - Brian Wilson

He seems pretty adamant that he was there producing the track.  Surely he wouldn't just outright make that up out of thin air?

Brian also credits Carl for producing "Add Some Music to Your Day" which all other documentation says is a Brian production.  And he said that they tried to make the Party album into a party, which I don't hear on the outtakes.  I would take Brian Wilson's notes with a grain of salt.

I love ICHM, and one of these days it'll convince the boys to add it to the Truck's repertoire, because it's such a challenge to sing, and so rewarding when it turns out all right!

Brian also mentions "Cotton Fields" in the liner notes for Friends.. they're pretty much worthless fluff.

I love it...very gospel-ish style of singing.

Exactly. For example, in the 20/20 liner notes, he writes: "By this album I rolled around to doin' what I call a rock and roll waltz with Cabin Essnce", and he also implies that he wrote and recorded "Our Prayer" for the 20/20 album.

He didn't say that he wrote "Prayer" for 20/20, he told how he wrote it at the piano, but no mention of this album (or any other). But with "Cabinessence" he really seemed to talk about writing it for 20/20. But I we all know about Brian's memory, don't we?

If anyone wants to hear the Ronettes version for comparison, I've posted it here:

http://www.yousendit.com/transfer.php?action=download&ufid=CDFFBA9507F03D07

It's no longer available on domestic CD compilations.

Back up a second, though. Did someone really just dismiss "Cottonfields" as 'fluff'? Wow. I love that song. Brian's production (the album version) at least. It's so understated and cool, so many weird combinations of instruments coming together to sound so folksy and downhome. And the vocals are terrific too....

No, no, no, I said Brian's liner notes were fluff, and that he mentioned Cotton Fields on the Friends liner notes even though it was on 20/20.

It's a great song.

There's a big difference between mistaking which album one of your songs is on, and whether or not you helped to arrange and produce a track!  I for one believe that Brian had at least some input in "ICHM" (as I'm sure Carl also did with "ASMTYD").

Well, at least one BB, either Al or Bruce, has said that Brian did not sing on ICHM.  So his impact would have to be minimal, and Brian received no producer credit.

What studios was it recorded in?  If it were done in NYC, that might help remove the possibility for Brian to have been there.  We know that at least some tracks were done in NYC while on tour in that period.

And the BB version BLOWS the Ronettes out of the water.  I am listening now, and there is no contest.

Point taken on the "asmtyd" credit, but I could understand Brian giving someone else credit for something others might think they had nothing or little to do with (I.E., maybe Carl came up with some ideas so Brian likes to say Carl produced that one)... but claiming you produced a song you had nothing to do with, and writing 3 or 4 lines about how great your production on that song was... surely his memory isn't THAT bad. 

"I Can Hear Music" was recorded at the home studio on 10.01.68, one day prior to "Time to Get Alone", and mixed at Capitol on 11.11.68.

I don't think Al or Bruce's comments about Brian not singing on the track contradict Brian's claim to arranging part of it. 

Depends on whether or not he actually DID write/say those things in the liner notes. Those things were  done during the Landy years. He could've been heavily medicated.

I'll admit it - they got a very nice guitar sound on ICHM too. It still baffles me a bit, though, as to why Kissed Her is not all that well regarded in comparison to it. Perhaps I'm in error linking the two songs, but it's a habit I've gotten into. I guess I have cloth ears, or my pro-Brian tendencies are more pronounced than I think.

Hell, I *love* ATIKH. There. I said it.

I really love "I Can Hear Music", and I think the reason a lot of people do is because it sounds like a Beach Boys original, despite being a cover. Let's face it, it's a song that was made for them to sing!!! "Kissed Her" sounds like a cover. Not that it's a bad thing, but it just doesn't sound like a "natural" BB song to me. Mind you, I heard the Beach Boys' versions of both these songs before I'd ever heard the original versions. Just my two cents. :)

what is * ATIKH."

Al thinks I Know Him.


Just kidding.


It's "And Then I Kissed Her."

I don't think that Brian really wrote those liner notes. More likely ghost-written around some genuine phrases from him.

Thanks for that track, Marie - i have been trying to track it down for comparison purposes and have been unable to find it. 

Yes, i prefer the BBs' version, but they certainly took it from Spector's arrangement...and this isn't bad at all.  It lacks the sparkle of Carl's arrangement, and i'm no fan of the Wall of Mud, but this actually isn't as muddy as much of his work, and it's a fine song...nice!

Thanks!

Spector did not produce the Ronettes' version, but Jeff Barry. It sounds somewhat more pedestrian than a typical Spector production.

LOL!  Maybe that's why it doesn't sound so muddy...

Look, just because I completely misread Aegir's comments on "Cottonfields" doesn't mean I can't pursue a single-minded campaign of hatred and personal destruction against him, does it? Because I was kind of looking forward to it. And I love the smell of a flame war in the morning. It smells like.....a lawsuit.

Um.. hahaha

Guess I should've just played along and pretended that I didn't like the song, then.

I think Bluebirds may not have Brian as well. You notice that Brian can be heard on Al's version of Cottonfields but not his own? Desper told me it was Brian so no it's all Al arguments.

You're saying he told you Brian was involved in the production of the 45 version of "Cotton Fields"?  I thought the story went that Al wasn't happy with Brian's attempt, so he re-cut it himself.

I always thought the second version of that song was Al's definitive Beach Boys moment.

No he had nothing to do with the production. He just overdubbed a vocal part.

I think Al had a few definitive moments, but the Cottonfields 45 is definitely one.  That version is so cool.

As for the 20/20 liner notes, it has always bothered me that Brian took credit for producing and arranging ICHM when all authorities have it as the first big Carl production.  The liner notes were published in 1990, right around the time Brian's autobiography came out with lots of obnoxious statements about the other Beach Boys.  As some have suggested on this thread, a lot of this stuff (liner notes as well as autobio) was probably ghostwritten under the direction of Landy.