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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nAmOI4GFnQ0 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nAmOI4GFnQ0)

I had supremely high hopes for the Sunshine Tomorrow boxset and the stereo mix of Wild Honey that came with it, and this sample.... my god. It goes so beyond my expectations.

It opens up the song in ways I didn't think possible.... it sounds so beautiful and full, and there's now a guitar section I've never heard before??

Simply astounding.

Wow - I'm in the middle of listening over and over. An amazingly great remix. Thanks for posting the link.

Sounds great!

Awesome!

 This should have been a hit single. Mike's vocal is outstanding,  aND this is my favorite vocal period of Brian's as well.

Great to hear!
I feel however this mix is missing a certain "punchiness"...   

You're right that sounds great!

I'm glad! ;D

goshdarn, it's like a completely different song now! If the rest if the album sounds half as good as this does, I don't think I'd be able to contain myself!  ;)

Wow that is fabulous... that WH-era organ sound is in there, never noticed before.

I hope Michael Buble keeps his hands off it though...  :p

Wow! Very close to the original and yet giving a new view on the song. Thanks for sharing the link and to everybody involved for making this new mix!

Wow, folks, what have you been and gone and done? That's fantastic!

Those horns! (Among a whole bunch of other things jumping out at one.)

Thanks for the link, jj. :=)

I've waited 50 years to hear it like this and hot damn, it was well worth it!!   :woot :woot :woot :woot :woot :woot

Oh, wow -- wonderful separation and clarification on the voices!

 :listening

Sweet fancy moses! It's like hearing it for the first time! :o

Urgh... it's already been taken down.

I always felt this would have been a good single!  Can it still be....do they have such things anymore??

Especially in view of the pending probable "hitlessness" of the Friends album!  Heck that far back in the day, could it have even charted R&B??

Wow. I can't believe it's already been taken down. Also interesting is that the label isn't doing ANY promo or press on this pretty amazing release. All that they did was a press release over a month ago. Getting ANY of this material out there would probably be a smart move on their behalf, but this is the Beach Boys organization after all...

I'm almost but not quite glad it was taken down. I want to get the overwhelming pleasure of the entire (except for Mama Says) stereo album on June 30.

Ugh hearing this makes me dream of a remastered Friends.... please lord i NEED IT

It was like I was really hearing it properly for the first time, Fantastic, is all I can say. I'm excited for the album now.

Perfectly said. I am shocked that there is really zero effort at promotion! Brian's solo NPP album had weeks of promotion and publicity. Hell, Rolling Stone usually has a few sneak peak singles exclusively available before each major release...shame that isn't being done this time.

anyone dl this before it got taken down?

Makes no sense that this got taken down. Seriously, WTF?

To be fair, it WAS listed as a private video. Maybe it was accidentally uploaded too early or something? Other than that, it does make absolutely no sense why it'd be taken down.

nm it got axed on soundcloud

100% agree that more promotion would be nice; the "McCartney Archive" model of pushing a song or two to YouTube (and as downloads for purchase) from the collection and maybe even a few tidbits *not* on the set as exclusive downloads on the official website would be cool.

Though, that brings up an interesting question in that the band doesn't really seem to have a full-active, BRI-toned official website. The "official" site at "thebeachboys.com" seems to be a promo fluff website that mixes press releases for Capitol product with random bits about Mike's touring band. Brian's tour dates aren't listed, and they should be right alongside Mike's. It's basically reads more like an official site for Mike's touring band along with some promo for Capitol product, and an occasional story about Brian. And of course, after all these years "beachboys.com" still leads to that fan website.

That all being said, this new set is streeting in 8 days, so we'll hear it all soon enough.

I do hope that *if* Capitol/UMe isn't putting even the minimal level of promotional push into this set, it might motivate BRI to start opening up their archives and releasing the stuff themselves online, and/or shopping the stuff to another label.

Was it an upload related to the record company or a leak?

Did anybody make a copy?

It was posted by the official Beach Boys YT channel. I suspect they accidentally posted it earlier than they wanted to. These kinds of early streaming releases are often tied to articles on the web “premiering” the songs. Maybe we’ll get it back soon. If not, it’s really not too long before we have everything on CD anyways.

Too long for me  :lol

The best recording of Aren't You Glad is the live version on the Beach Boys Live In London record, the song has so much more life on that recording than the studio version.

Al's vocal on the live version is amazing

PM a link? :D

Wow. They really just chucked away any chance of getting people aware and excited for this release, didn't they? Unless they decide to reupload at a later time before release (then why did they even upload it in the first place?), they will have continued their long streak of "blowing it".

The odd thing about this video's history is that it was put up on youtube around 1 a.m. EST a couple days ago as a public video, I found it in my subscription box and posted the link here soon after. When I went to listen to it again the next morning, it had turned unlisted so you needed a link to see it. Then before the day was done, it was gone permanently.

Who knows what kind of behind the scenes stuff went on here, because the powers that be squashed a nice little opportunity for themselves. Every single comment on youtube was positive, with many of them as glowing and joyous as they were here. It was so great to see some of the widespread excitement for this, I just hope it doesn't go away before June 30.

A bit of an overreaction, if you ask me. I'm sure it was posted accidentally. They likely published or listed it earlier than they had planned. I guarantee that video and others reappear in good time, likely on the promotional schedule they had previously planned.

Here's an article on the new Aren't You Glad mix on NPR, but of course, the link and video doesn't work. GREAT JOB.

http://www.npr.org/2017/06/23/533847251/songs-we-love-the-beach-boys-arent-you-glad-gets-a-crystalline-new-stereo-mix

Update: it's up, and WOW it's friggin' incredible.

It’s working on NPR now. All is right with the world.

Thank you!

Yay! Finally got to hear this... so crisp and bright... and those horns! Amazing.

Mike, Mike, Mike... why didn't/don't you sing more vocals like that? This was a really cool voice of Mike's that he almost never used again. You might hear a tiny bit of this type of phrasing on the bridge of Oh Darlin', but other than that, I can't recall another song in the ENTIRE catalog where he sounds like this.

Not whiny, not overly trying to sound young or cocky... just nice, simple, and sweet. A killer vocal.

I wonder if Brian coached Mike to sing like this as part of an overall plan to make all the band members sound drastically different (and less like what the public expected the BBs' voices to sound like) on this one particular record. After all, Carl sounds near unrecognizable (in a way unique to this album) IMO on some of his leads on the WH album.

It seems like this LP was a very deliberate attempt to sound NOT like "The Beach Boys", and I can't help but think that Mike succeeded with flying colors.

For the longest time, before I studied the credits and did online research on who sang what... I used to think the lead vocal on this song was Bruce.

I think his lead on 'Meant For You' is fairly remeniscent of this. In fact, I thought it was Brian singing that lead for a time.

I love Mike's lead on MFY, totally. But I think that's a very different sounding voice too. Different from his "usual" voice in a very different way than this song, IMO. I think it's a true bummer that Mike didn't sing more like AYG and MFY throughout the catalog, and instead kept on trying to mimic his 1963 voice for decades.

He had a great range that really worked with many styles. I think he has tried to vary his voice even up to recently (Pisces Brothers is a good example of this), but I think him being guided by nostalgia and less by a genuine artistic muse has kept that variation mostly tucked away.

Finally hearing this mix and man that sounds damn good. The mud is completely gone and you can hear gems, once hidden, now clearly out in the open. Cannot wait to hear this album in full!

Edit: thank you so much RONDEMON for posting that link!

(https://preview.ibb.co/eyYQ05/IMG_3345.jpg) (https://ibb.co/iDBCf5)

All good points. Add Cool Head, Warm Heart to the list of solid vocals that show his non-nasal side.

But Aren't You Glad... this one's just particularly special.

"Aren't you glad" is back online, this time on NPR:

Songs We Love: The Beach Boys, 'Aren't You Glad'

http://www.npr.org/2017/06/23/533847251/songs-we-love-the-beach-boys-arent-you-glad-gets-a-crystalline-new-stereo-mix


EDIT:

I didn't see that it was already posted by RONDEMON. Sorry!

Sehr gut. Danke mein Herr! Now I can start obsessing about it again. ;D

Wow, this sounds great! Love how they kept it dry like the original. Can't wait to hear the whole album.

BTW - was the general consensus that it's Carl singing lead in the chorus?

Seems pretty clear now that it's Brian, just slowed down!

Is that confirmed? I always thought it was Carl until the brief falsetto bit made me wonder.

It's an excellent remix and Mike's vocal is outstanding.  Hit me right away.

For those wishing for a punchier sound - that's a function of it being a midrange-centered recording.  You put more treble on there and it's just not going to be the WILD HONEY sound.  It's a midrangey record, and that's where the instruments have the most natural sound in this mix.  They've done an incredible job getting the elements in good separation and clarity without screwing too much with the vibe.

I mentioned in another post that Mike's voice on Wild Honey is perhaps the least R&B flavored as he's sung on any album. Which is ironic because Mike was known as the more heavy R&B vocal guy in the band. On WH, it's Carl mostly, followed by Brian, who are doing the more expected R&B "belting" in their vocals. Mike went for a more intimate and softer baritone style, and I think Mike sounded terrific on a cut like AYG. It's some of his best vocals, on one of my favorite tracks in the band's catalog. I think what they also nailed was that contrast between Mike and Brian, that fastball of having two lead voices on a track with different ranges. It's the fastball used devastatingly on "Kiss Me Baby", "When I Grow Up", etc. There is a special quality to having that sound on a record.

Listen for the falsetto voice doubling the horn phrase after the chorus. That got buried in the original track. But it's a killer part, a small touch but a killer touch. That's Brian doing what he would do later on Do It Again, matching the "Underwater" melody hook in falsetto. And of course the Baldwin hitting those low growl notes in the intro, it was there but hardly noticeable on the mono mix. It jumps out of this one.

An all time classic BB track, a personal favorite. Great to see it released this way.

wow just wow this sounds amazing, I'm pumped I can hardly wait til next friday!!!

Well, despite my above post, couldn't help myself and listened to the reposted video. It's wonderful!

The response vocal in the chorus is a bit too quiet in my opinion, but otherwise it sounds great. Can't wait to hear the rest of the album.

It sounds wonderful.

Although Mark could've used a few more limiters to match the Sgt Pepper's remix. 8)
 

I'm hearing:

"Today could be a lot of fun ..." - Mike

"I got a heart ..." - Brian

"Aren't you glad now darlin ..." - Carl

"Tell me, tell me you know what I mean ..." - Al and/or Brian

I always thought the "Tell me you know what I mean" sounded like Dennis.

Always thought it was Carl there, but I'm leaning towards it being Brian slowed down after hearing it in this quality.

Check it out:

https://soundcloud.com/smilead/arent-you-glad-brian-chorus

I think it is Carl because of that very last "ah oh", it sounds too wavey (can't describe it in any other way) in timbre compared to Brian's at that range.  Break Away's demo has Brian at that similar range in the chorus and he just sounds different to me... 

Sometimes you can pick out Carl because he had trouble pronouncing hard R's so it would sound like Aren't You Glad now Dahlin.  That is usually my give away but it's so hard to tell there.

Wtf how did you do this and can you promise you will do this to more tracks when they're released?

Man I miss those days when your Smile tracks were the talk of the board. Glad to see there's now more material for you to tinker with!

I think this might be closer to the original speed if your theory is correct: https://soundcloud.com/smileyhoneyfriends-1/arent-you-glad-chorus

Nailed it buddy!

Is this 1 semitone up?

I went back and forth between 1 & 2. For some reason 1 still sounded a little slow to me, but I think you hit it on the head!!


Hey man, how are ya? Man, I miss those days too! Can you believe that was 5+ years ago? Great times. Let's see if there's anything interesting to do with the new set!

It's exactly 7% faster, so a bit more than one semitone?  The human voice has a certain characteristic when the speed is changed, and I think that's the closest I can get it to Brian's natural timbre.

I do think it's most likely Brian and not Carl.  It seems like they were actively experimenting with speeding up or slowing down vocals around this time.

The tell me tell me sounds like Brian to me

Hearing it might be Dennis definitely caused my ears to further prick up at that section. Regardless of whether or not it is him, I'm more aware/appreciative of the texture of the vocal at that point ;D (I think it being Dennis is a possibility)

Good reminder of how this could have sounded like an overcompressed mush

Weird ... that actually sounds like Al to me! But I think my vote still goes to Carl. Really interesting vocals on this record.

The part under discussion has to be Carl. Haha I wonder if we could use speed variations to make each Wilson sound like another Wilson with other songs?  :lol

My vote goes for Carl too. But it is amazing how much Brian, Carl, Al, and sometimes even Mike sound like each other on WH, which is part of the charm of the album for me.

I'm surprised not too many hear it! I'd bet money that it's BW. Stuck out to me like a sore thumb first time I listened to the remix.

Food for thought (and though it doesn't prove anything): if it's Carl singing the chorus, why didn't he reprise it in live performances?

Same reason both Carl and Dennis sang "Help Me, Rhonda" :)

... but seriously, the vocals on this album are so unusual compared to other BB records. "How She Boogalooed It" could be any of them, for example!

I always assumed that in the live arrangement Carl sang Brian's studio part and Al sang Carl's studio part.

I don't believe I've logged onto this message board in literally over ten years...

and I've come all the way back so I could find this thread and ask if anyone else is bothered that the piano in this stereo mix doesn't fade for the last measure of the intro like it does in the mono mix.

I'll post again in 2028. Be good, everyone; glad you're all well.

Please, come back whenever the urge to post arises!  It is definitely jarring that the instruments in the stereo intro don't fade out, leaving the horn and the organ to finish it off.  I liked how the horn carried on by itself, it was a good mixing choice.

You are absolutely right. Better with the fade.

As a response to the few minor criticisms voiced above...

Surely the immense labour of love that is Sunshine Tomorrow is first and foremost intended to open up the mono Wild Honey, to make audible what isn't audible (or is less audible) in the original. (Just like the later stereo versions of Pet Sounds.) Which is the main reason I'm buying it----along with the fantastic sound quality, if "AYG" is anything to go by. 

That said, the original mono versions of both WH and PS will always be definitive in my book. These stereo mixes give a fascinating wide-screen view of their constituent parts but they can never replace the originals. Or am I stating the obvious?

I agree absolutely, and you're right that we still have the mono whatever happens, so it sort of doesn't matter... but at the same time, it bugs me slightly that there are tiny differences like this between the mono and stereo mixes. I mean, if you're GOING for a different sounding mix in 2017, it doesn't matter, but according to Howie Edelson, they were trying for something that was as close as possible to the mono mix (like Giles Martin and the 2017 Sgt. Pepper mix, right?)

That mixing touch in the original mono, of dropping out most of the instruments just before the verse kicks in, leaving just the horn, bass drum and the organ playing, is a great flourish that leads beautifully into the verse. If the alleged aim was to reproduce the mono mix as closely as possible, why doesn't the stereo mix do that too?

It's a nice touch created by Brian (I would guess) solely at the mixing stage. Clearly, the intro wasn't recorded like that on the tape; as we can hear on the stereo mix, the guitar actually kept playing... but at the mono mixdown, it was dropped out for four beats to lead into the verse with more of a dynamic contrast. It's an example of arrangement — or REarrangement — at the mixing stage, which is commonplace today... but Brian was really leading the pack with this sort of stuff in the mid-to-late 60s. Wind Chimes on Smiley Smile is another great example, as is the SMiLE version of Vega-Tables. Probably the best-known example is the 'accapella section' in Sloop John B. The backing track instruments actually continued playing through that part on the original tape, and the Boys just carried on singing over that section as they did on the rest of the track... but Brian took the mixing decision to highlight just how great their singing was at that time, and on that section, by dropping out the instrumental backing during mixing to create the accapella section. So the mix shapes and becomes part of the arrangement. It was groundbreaking stuff in its day, absolutely part of that whole 'the studio is an instrument' thing that Brian helped to pioneer.

Now, of course, it sounds like I'm nit-picking and whining. I'm not. I will be at the door of my local record store when it opens on Friday to buy this when it comes out (I have to be, because they're only stocking one copy!). I will be buying extra copies for friends. I am FANTASTICALLY grateful that the powers that be are mining the BB catalogue like this and getting a stereo mix of this album out there. It doesn't have to happen, and if no-one was pushing, it wouldn't.

But my point here remains a valid one. The example of this kind of technical approach to arrangement by mixing on the intro of Aren't You Glad is much more subtle, and much less of a big deal than on the accapella section of Sloop John B. But you wouldn't make a stereo mix of Sloop John B and leave the backing playing through the accapella section when it's such a feature of the song in the original mono mix (and indeed, they *didn't* do that for the 1996 stereo mix). So why treat Aren't You Glad differently? Why make a stereo mix where the idea is to mimic the mono as closely as possible... and then not reproduce the mono as closely as possible, deft little flourishes like this and all?

UNLESS, of course... there's a technical reason. And there might be. Could be that the separate tracks available to create that intro when the mono mix was made are no longer available in 2017. That might mean that dropping out the guitar would have also dropped out, say, the horn. And I seem to recall that Aren't You Glad IS one of the tracks for which the original multitrack is no longer around, or at least not accessible...

It could also be that the instruments are still on separate tracks, but that a 'deconstructed' intro like the one created during the mix for the original mono record just doesn't sound so good in stereo. Sometimes when you do that, it sounds OK in mono and you get away with it, but muting the tracks in stereo sounds too obviously like... you muted the tracks to create that intro. You can sometimes hear that you've muted a track more obviously in stereo. So perhaps they changed it for the stereo mix and left everything playing for that reason...?

It's highly plausible that it was done for one of these two reasons. Time will tell. Thanks for a great post!

Weren't there also some minor liberties taken with the stereo mix of In the Back of My Mind?  I seem to recall the song fading out earlier on the original mono version,  compared to a slightly extended fade with some reverb added at the very end on the stereo version. 

I love those little touches that they made to the stereo version of that particular song, but I totally get it that some people are put off by little changes.

Please avoid quoting this post of mine when replying.

I'm very confused as to what the second line means. Might somebody be very obliging and offer me some clarification? I'd Appreciate any fellow member clearing up what the last line of the post means. Thanks :)

I can understand how it can be jarring to not hear certain elements, but to me it's a case of the nature of mixing in the 60's on 4- and 8-track without automation and recall available in the technology of that era, along with the necessity of bouncing tracks and locking in elements of the mix in order to free up additional tracks and space. Not to mention having to do certain things literally "on the fly" during the mixdowns. Mixing was a performance back then, it was done live and apart from making notes on what was done, you couldn't go back later and replicate it exactly. Today it's a simple case of hitting the "save" icon and all the fader moves and whatnot come back instantly.

There are elements of those final mixes from the 60's era (and beyond) that cannot be duplicated or replicated, so kudos to the efforts in trying to create a stereo mix where there was no stereo mix prior, using whatever raw tracks are available on the master reels, and trying to capture the texture and the feel of the original mixes in modern projects and reissues.

Beyond all those limitations, there is a fundamental difference between the textures of a stereo versus a mono mix and a different mindset from the beginning of the process that goes into creating them.

I kind of like the notion of using what is available on the masters versus using digital technology to copy and paste then fly in elements from other sections to create fantasy "original" versions if there are gaps in the master tracks. It's like Lucas using CGI to create visuals that weren't in the original Star Wars decades after the fact. Fortunately that doesn't happen too often in archival reissues with classic albums.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts in your post, Matt. I find most of your points well-expressed and agreeable.


And this seems to be the most "acceptable" reason to me if the change was indeed deliberate.

But if it wasn't intentional, it seems like neglect/an oversight in the remix process. And it seems like the faded out piano in the intro was possible to execute because that piano part *is* correctly muted when the cycle of the song repeats after the chorus/before the second verse on the new mix (well... actually the piano fades back in on the second beat of the first measure of the second verse in the mono mix but it starts on the first beat in the new stereo mix).

I realize I'm one person with their own subjective opinion on the internet and am no authority on the matter. I have the maturity of a ten year old when it comes to dealing with differing music mixing decisions—even when the piano came in on the stereo mix of the Smiley Smiley version of Wonderful irked me lol.

Aren't I glad that these new mixes exist? Yes!

[/pedantry]

I love picking this stuff apart as much as anybody, truly.

But we've seen a ton of BB stuff remixed into stereo, and it almost *always* has little anomalies that are different; extra overdubs, missing overdubs, things previously muted that now aren't, and so on. Sometimes it's due to the extant tapes available, and sometimes it's a mixing decision.

I'm not sure how much the WH stereo remix was really done with the vague Sgt.  Pepper/Giles Martin ethos of making the stereo mix "match" the mono mix, but to the degree this is the case, there are limitations to this. First and foremost, saying the stereo mix is faithful to the mono mix is partially a contradiction at its core. It *has* to sound different. With "Pepper", the only way in which I hear the stereo mix remaining faithful to the mono is matching the speed on "She's Leaving Home" and trying to match the phasing/flanging on some of the vocals, and things like that. But the stereo remix is a totally different animal.

I'm probably overly-concerned that BRI or Capitol will see the most nitpicky of nitpicks like these stray piano stabs on "Aren't You Glad" and think the hardcore fans will just never be pleased. But I have that concern nonetheless.

The stereo mix *should* be different, and if a few stray things are missing or there for the first time, I think it's a fun element of hearing the new mix. If you want the original, the mono is always there.

I've criticized plenty of mix-ups in the past (the wrong mixes on the 2000 BW '88 CD for instance), but I'm not going to *assume* the guys mixing WH into stereo just forgot to mute the piano. Enough ears have been on this thing, I would go ahead an lean towards this being a decision. Maybe Brian was in on the stereo remix and made that call. Who knows? It's an alternate way to hear the album, so I don't need it to be as precisely identical to the mono as possible.

Take note of Jim Lockert's comments regarding how both Smiley and WH were mixed, and consider again what kind of technology and limitations they had to work with at this time and how these specific albums were given their final mono mixes in 67. When reduction mixes were done as standard practice in order to free up more tracks for overdubbing and additions, whether in the tracking process or in the mixdown process, anything that was done to the tracks is permanently locked into the overall mix. If there was a certain amount of echo added, if there was a fade, if anything was changed prior to the reduction mix and bounce, it got burned onto the tape and cannot be changed.

Not saying that applies specifically to this intro or mute or anything else specific to this track, but that is one of the most basic factors to consider when you're dealing with 50 year old tapes and mixdowns. It's a huge credit to the work of experts like Mark who do this regularly and do it so well that many if not most of these remix projects are beholden to however things were done 50 years ago, and the luxury we've had for the past 40 years or so of having enough tracks to where bounces and reductions weren't necessary and all tracks had their own individual channels and tracks on the tape to isolate and move around at will did not exist in 1966-67 and before.

I've been listening to this often lately, and I think I'm leaning more toward Brian now. It took a bit of "everything you know is wrong"-style thinking to get into the concept though.

A couple things opened up my mind to this possiblity -

1 - it DOES sound slowed-down, whoever it is.

2 - just listened to the Lei'd in Hawaii "You're So Good to Me", and BW is wailing man. Sounds like a precurser to his '70s lounge style. That is to say, Brian and the group were experimenting with singing styles.

3 - recently discovered the old thread about Dennis' lead vocal being present on "I Just Wasn't Made for These Times" - both the released version, the vocals-only mix, and the alternate version on the Pet Sounds box. MY MIND HAS BEEN OPENED. The Beach Boys will never stop amazing us.

Sunshine Tomorrow is up on Apple Music, (presumably iTunes as well).  Sounds fantastic!

Can’t wait to delve into this tomorrow. But I had to sample a little before I turned in, the final track ‘Surfer Girl’ a cappella is jaw dropping. This set is gonna be great!

Judging by a first listen of the tracking session/backing track for "Aren't You Glad", the backing track was recorded in a higher key/ faster tempo and was slowed down for the vocal overdubs...so maybe that chorus vocal in question was just recorded before they decided to slow it down?  Just a thought.  I'll have to listen to it more in depth once I have my physical copy.

@PS: I think Mr. Wilson is referring to Michael Bublé's habit of giving other people's songs the smooth-as-velvet treatment. It's not to everyone's taste although clearly some people like it (over 55 million albums sold!). Whatever, I wish his son the speediest of recoveries... 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Bublé