The Smiley Smile Message Board

The discussion in the "formula" thread got me thinking about this.  We know Capitol refused to sell Beatles records initially.  I don't really know why that was.  I've read that it was because British groups hadn't been successful in the past, but I don't know if I buy that.  Maybe someone who's more knowledgeable can fill me in on what I might be missing.  Then when they did start releasing the albums, they weren't issued as intended in the UK.  The Beach Boys were just about as popular as the Beatles at this point.  Soon after, Pet Sounds was released and of course Good Vibrations.  We have those polls that showed the Boys were the most popular group in the world.  Smile was just around the corner and even bigger things were expected.  Smile was shelved and things quickly went downhill.  Then there was the odd release of Then I Kissed Her in the UK before Heroes and Villains was released.  Basically, I'm saying that EMI tried to keep the Beach Boys from becoming more popular than the Beatles, possibly in retaliation to what Capitol did with the Beatles.     

I know there were other factors at play, but I don't really see this discussed that much.  There's probably a big flaw in my argument that I'm missing, so feel free to poke big holes in it.  :P

UK lps typically had 14 cuts, as opposed to the US's 12. Also, UK lps didn't include a bands singles, and UK bands also released EPs in addition to lps and singles. All of which meant that the top UK groups like the Beatles and the Stones generated enough material so that record companies could issue 3 US lps to the UK's 2.

In 1963, British bands were considered to be strictly minor-league by US labels. And it's a myth that the Beach Boys ever rivaled the popularity of the Beatles anywhere in the world, notwithstanding that silly UK music magazine poll.

Not true. In Sacramento the Beach Boys were tops over everybody! 
Just ask Fred Vail

If releasing "Then I Kissed Her" as a single in the UK was an attempt to sabotage the Beach Boys (which it wasn't) then it backfired as not only was it a hit but the Boys continued to have great UK success for the rest of the decade.

And I think you've been taken in by Beach Boys spin if you thin there are polls proving they were the most popular band in the world. There was one poll in one UK music mag that unfortunately Mike Love heard about and hasn't stopped bragging about since.

EMI released "TIKH" when it did for one reason, and one reason only - to keep the product stream flowing. In the UK at that precise juncture in 1967, they could have released "Surfin'", and probably have scored a Top 10 hit.

Yeah - if they wanted to "bury" The Beach Boys, or at least keep them on the second rung (below The Beatles), they likely wouldn't have released anything at all!

... and deservedly so.

Maybe not "bury" them, but to "send a message." Without Brian authorship, they met the "minimum" releasing an untimely BB single, but sending the distribution stream for authorship royalties to others.

How much on the UK radar was the story of Carl's arrest for the conscientious objector status? Did they want to play that up or down?  They knew in Ireland that Carl wasn't at the first Dublin show, and got there to join them onstage for the second one, on 5/2/67. (Eric Anniversario setlists.)

They did TIKH in a show in Dublin, 5/2/67 the week after Carl's arrest and release.  TIKH was on SDSN, but released in the UK ( if I'm reading Bellagio correctly) at the same time as Pet Sounds.  Singles usually "precede" and album or are released close in time to it.  This TIKH was one full year after the album was released in the UK.  

It looks as though there were five LP's released in the UK in 1966.

February - Party (which had Mountain of Love) - US - November, 1965

April - Today - (US March, 1965)

June - Pet Sounds - (May, 1966) - also May, 1966 in the U.S.

June - SDSN - (US - July, 1965)

November - Best of Vol. 1.  - (July, 1966)

It's important to also make some distinctions between EMI and Capitol, as i outlined in the other thread relating it to The Beatles and how the products they had for the UK being of their own wishes were not lining up with Capitol in the US who were doing what they basically pleased with the material in order to fit their methods of releasing singles and albums for the US market. EMI and Capitol were in the same structure, but often not in the same universe as far as targeting their own markets, especially the US versus UK and Europe. Capitol had or seemed to have a definite vision and plan for releasing in the US, which they knew, and EMI's offshoots in Europe were doing the same thing. It's relatively easy to put it into perspective by comparing the Beatles UK releases as they were handled by their home company EMI/Parlophone in Europe versus Capitol in the US, and how EMI handled Beach Boys product at the same time coming from their home company Capitol in the US.

I don't see where Carl's draft status had much if any effect in the UK market in Spring 67. In the US it was more of a blurb in the fan magazines and more of an issue within the band and close interests since they didn't know where Carl would end up if he wouldn't have been able to stay with the group. I think it my have been a footnote if that in terms of 1967 that got more attention later as the histories of the group started to be written. It didn't seem to be that much on the radar.

GF - I don't know if you were following this, at this time, but it was carried in the news and on TV.  There was newspaper coverage and national TV covered it as well.  Actors, actresses, (Jane Fonda) etc. became involved in the anti war effort. They became newsmakers. Not just in Teen Set.

And under "Blog and News" a legal website called "reasonable doubt" an article - "January 3, 1967, Beach Boy Carl Wilson Becomes a Draft Dodger - Today in Crime History..." With over 12,000 hits. Carl got his notice in 1966 and was supposed to have reported on January 3, 1967.

And the defense lawyer used a theory of The Selective Service system being illegal. The appeal of the case is searchable under 436 F.2d 972.  (This was the Ninth circuit)

And I don't know the nuances as between EMI and Capitol.  But any dummy can look at a 1967 single coming out two years after a U.S. release, but not just any unremarkable work but Pet Sounds, and say, "What is wrong with this picture?"

Band members are apparently not in agreement and are on record opposing this.  I never heard any echoes of this type of discontent until this point. 

Prior to 1966, the story of The Beach Boys in the UK charts was pretty dismal. Seven albums released of which one charted, peaking at #17 in mid 1965... four EPs, two charting in 1964 at #11 & #19... and eleven singles, of which six charted, all outside the Top 20 except one at #7. Party ! and that bloody song changed all that, both charting at #3 in March 1966, after which John P. Smith just couldn't get enough of them: between February 19th 1966 and February 8th 1968 there wasn't a week without at least two Beach Boys releases in the album and/or singles chart (never mind the EP chart where they were pretty much ever present until it was discontinued 12/23/67.)

I'm talking specifically about Carl Wilson's draft issues and not the issues of the draft overall as your post seems to be focused on. In 1967, news of Carl Wilson declaring CO status was not a major story, and word of it seemed to exist mostly in the fan press and gossip columns in music publications. In the UK I don't think it was more than a blip on the screen if that relative to when it actually was happening in '67. I believe it did get reported what the outcome and settlement was through the courts, but even that was not much of a story as it was a wire-service blurb. What you said about seeing it mentioned in one of the "Today In History" type of reports backs up what I suggested originally, that it became more of a known event years after the fact than it had been when it was actually playing out in the courts.

I'll also go back to the single release issue and ask again what I did in the other discussion: If it were that big of a deal, why did the group at that time acting as Brother Records issue a single with "Devoted To You" as the flip side of a Brian And Mike release (the second Brother single to come out), when that had been culled from an album over two years old and a cover song to boot? If they had a new album to promote, why not grab a track from Smiley Smile to put on the B side? If it did sell, at least the band themselves would have gotten paid for it rather than paying Boudleaux Bryant to release his song. If it were such an issue in the UK, the band themselves decided to do the same thing in Sept 1967 when they actually had a new album to promote and sell.

Ya, the favorite song!   ;)

Honestly, I haven't followed the pattern of US v. UK releases until seeing quotes starting in 1967 and up to at least 1970.  The imaging and inconsistent stories and band protesting the release of TIKH, suggest that something outside of their control was going on.

Five albums released in the UK in 1966 does seem like a lot.  Andrew - Were any U.S. TV shows such the variety shows being broadcast in the UK at the time, such as Ed Sullivan or American Bandstand?  

The kids would have known there were new BB songs and may have asked why those records weren't available to them. (As we asked "Where was Surf's Up?" for some years after the Inside Pop program of Leonard Bernstein aired.) Airing in 1967.

'Cuz it was just Mike and Brian like the A side?

The label for DTY also just said Brian Wilson and Mike Love I believe.

So was "Then I Kissed Her" the Beach Boys on that record, what's the big deal then?

The Carl Wilson Draft Dodger was on national TV. It was in the newspapers.  IIRC, the reviews of the April, 1967 concerts referenced the arrest and release.

The release of Brian-Mike was unusual. And Devoted to You from Party was 2 on side B.  But that was released close in time to Smiley, by a couple of weeks.  It was not connected to Smile.  That, I don't find unusual.  Devoted to you was covered by James Taylor/ Carly Simon, and was old Everly Brothers.

The single release is the UK issue. Not the States.  This TIKH was off the track and off the wall for that matter, for 1967.
And the BB's seemed very upset by it.  

But over here, no one knew who was in the band, much less one of them was appealing against being drafted.

I don't understand how it ties into anything beyond EMI in Europe needing a single, taking Then I Kissed Her to use as a stop-gap where nothing else was set for release but demand was high, and taking that release all the way into the top 5. It's a blip on the screen, it didn't harm the band's sales strengths in the UK at that time and fans continued to buy what they put out in relatively good numbers in the UK for the next few years. In terms of the US, it meant nothing since Capitol never pressed it for release in the US, it was a non-issue. I don't know how this relates to a larger picture scenario any more than Gettin Hungry taking a 2+ year old cover song as the flip side credited to two individual band members seemed to concern the band as a whole who by then was calling the shots on what Brother would be releasing.

OK - the issue is their discontent with the untimely release and the ages old imaging promotion. 

A "surprise" stop gap. I could get that as reasonable if the band, themselves, considered it reasonable.  And they didn't.

But the Beach Boys were not making or planning releases for the UK at this specific time. Their plans were to get Brother up and running which happened that summer of '67 and get the freedom they wanted to work on outside music and do their own projects as well. I still don't see where the major implications are or were with EMI putting out a single in Spring '67 that went top-5 anyway. It didn't harm the band's commercial viability much if at all, and it came and went as soon as the next single(s) came out and sold in the UK.

GF - if you see the Gaumont Palace interview on YouTube, you'll see the band complaining in 1970 that the record company, and they don't mention EMI, but Capitol, refusing to market them, their work, and their public image, appropriately.  And I agree 100% - with them.

1970 was a different set of circumstances. The band's separation from Capitol was nowhere near on friendly terms, in fact there was a lot of spite and what some might call sabotage directed at the band after they cut ties with each other and the band shopped for a new label which they found at Warner/Reprise eventually.

Capitol at some point during this actually deleted all of the band's previous releases from its catalog. Which meant they basically cut off the band's ability to make any money from albums made prior to 1969, and fans couldn't go into the shops and buy the majority of the band's music for a period of time. You couldn't buy Pet Sounds after a certain point in the shops, etc. That was a corporate spite move, and if the band in 1970 was sounding bitter about labels and the like, I could see why especially as their own relationships with Capitol soured to the depths which it did. That was more relative to current events I'd say than it was to a one-off single released by EMI in 1967.

GF - I'm not sure if EMI is sort of a corporate alter ego of Capitol, analogous to EMI/ Parlophone (for the Beatles) but "someone at the top" appears to have set the wheels in motion, for whatever reason to cause the discontent of several band members in 1967,  and they could maybe see the "writing on the wall."  They had been complaining for four years. 

For very young guys they had a lot on their plates.

Was this to me? I don't think I follow if so.

Hardly, at least at the time under discussion. In 1955, EMI acquired 96% of Capitol stock thus in 1967, they owned Capitol. In 2012, Capitol was sold to Universal Music Group.

In practice, EMI was a completely separate autonomous company from Capitol.  Capitol had no more control over what singles EMI put out than EMI/Parlophone had over what Beatles singles Capitol (or Vee Jay, for that matter) put out.  Any complaints the Boys made to Capitol wouldn't have meant a damn thing to EMI.

Regards,
Jon Blum

Thank you both for that (Andrew, too.) Just pulled out SDSN (180 gram vinyl reissue) that my youngest son bought his mama! The way the logo is displayed as "two halves of a whole" does lead the consumer to think it is a joint effort.