The Smiley Smile Message Board

http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/gossip/confidential/brian-wilson-isn-seclusion-article-1.3468296 (http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/gossip/confidential/brian-wilson-isn-seclusion-article-1.3468296)

Beach Boys' Brian Wilson is planning a new album that will be a mix of old and new.

NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Monday, September 4, 2017, 7:00 PM

Brian Wilson is wrapping up his “Pet Sounds” tour in Atlantic City this month — but he isn’t disappearing into seclusion when it’s over.

Once the tour concludes at the Golden Nugget Casino on Sept. 30 — 51 years after the classic Beach Boys album came out — he’s heading back into the recording studio to mix old and new.

“Our plan is to write a rock and roll album, so if it’s going to be covers, we’re going to be doing Chuck Berry stuff and some of Phil Spector’s stuff — and some original stuff,” Wilson told the Daily News.

Music fans who go to see Wilson’s 12-piece band re-create “Pet Sounds” at the Golden Nugget should also be familiar with the Beatles’ “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” album, which came out months later and has been compared to it a million times in the half-century since. The two albums will always be linked historically. But Wilson says they’re very different masterpieces.

 “ ‘Pet Sounds’ is more an emotional experience and ‘Sgt. Pepper’s’ is more uplifting,” he says. Amazingly, Wilson, 75, says he doesn’t know how the Beatles felt about comparisons between the two.

“We have never discussed, comparing the two, but we’ve talked,” he said.

When asked if he’d like to have that talk with Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr, the two remaining Beatles, he laughed.

“Nah,” Wilson said.

 One song he likes to discuss is the Beach Boys classic “California Girls,” which he calls the best song he’s written. And he loved the way David Lee Roth covered it in 1988.

“It blew me away!” he said. “I loved (the lyric) ‘I dig girls’ — the way he did it,” he added.

Wilson founded the Beach Boys in 1961, but hasn’t kept up with the group that has only longtime members Mike Love and Bruce Johnston on its roster.

“I haven’t seen their concerts, but I’m sure they’re good,” he said.

My comments: It's hilarious to me to see the following links appear within this piece. "John Stamos splits his pants on stage with the Beach Boys" and "Beach Boys can't decide if they'll perform at Trump inauguration".

Any questions? It has to be obvious by now...

And it cracks me up to see this kind of headline for the article because anyone with half a brain has not been going around social media, fan boards, etc saying Brian is too old or frail to tour, he's not happy doing what he's doing, it's time to throw in the towel and retire, he should consider working with Mike and Bruce in some capacity, he's being controlled and forced to play shows, etc. The talk of Brian retiring and going into seclusion is as dumb as those people who have been saying it's time for him to hang up the spikes for well over a decade.

It's hilarious.

Go Brian! Can't wait to see what happens with this album.

Although I understand Brian's love of the Spector sound, I do wonder if there is anything to gain by remaking some of his songs. It's like artists remaking 'God Only Knows' to me. Why bother trying to improve on perfection?

Would Spector be entitled to some form of payment with these remakes? That is another can of worms.

What I'd most love to hear is Brian is going into seclusion to plan his new album.

Since when does a musician covering a song have to be an improvement versus an interpretation or just someone wanting to record a song which they love? If you hold all artists to that standard you're putting on Brian regarding him potentially recording Spector's music, you've retroactively erased the careers of Elvis, Frank Sinatra, Tony Bennett, etc whose entire careers were comprised of interpreting other artist's work since they did not write original material. And there would be no Hendrix version of "All Along The Watchtower" or Jeff Buckley doing "Hallelujah" because in some circles the definitive perfection versions were recorded by the songwriters Dylan and Cohen...so why bother trying to improve on Dylan or Cohen?

Maybe it's the Spector connection itself that is bothering Funky Pretty. Personally I've been pleased tgat Brian's references to Spector have been on the increase recently. Rightly or wrongly I would imagine he's been keeping his thoughts to himself since Spectors fall. Brian just hasn't been Brian without that Phil love thing.

I would love to know what Brian's thoughts are regarding Spector's imprisonment.

Did you ask these guys?

(http://www.billboard.com/files/styles/article_main_image/public/media/mike-love-do-it-again-vid-2017-billboard-1548.jpg)

Thanks Craig, I was eating.

 :lol  ;D

Uncle Jesse sure has a creepy grin in that picture. Like the Uncle that we don't talk about, or even mention by name.  ;D

Well for me, it's the 'Wall of Sound' that makes the Spector songs. Perhaps 75% of the enjoyment is the WoS. Hell, on some of them I would struggle to name the singer.

Brian did ok on the Roxy version of BMB granted, but it has nothing on the original. Perhaps a better tribute would be a few new songs with his own WoS.

Don't fu*k with the formula, and unlike Mike....You can quote me!  ;D

And Sugar Ray has a fanatical Ray Liotta thing going on that is rather unsettling.

What I don't want to hear on the new album: 

By the numbers Brian production (bass harmonica, sleighbells, accordions, Pet Sounds style production) remakes of Spector and Berry songs.  BMB, Lovin Feelin, River Deep, Walkin in the Rain, Da Do Ron Ron versions that will pale in comparison to the originals and add nothing to Brian and Phils musical legacy.

What I would like to hear:

Less well known Spector songs:  Hung on You, Paradise, Is That What I Get for Loving You,  Girls Can Tell, Run Run Run Runaway.  Different arrangements with some quirkiness and more "stripped down" arrangements.  Wild Honey style versions of Spector songs would be interesting.  I'd like to finally get a definitive version of a Brian Proud Mary.

That's the first time I can recall seeing Brian mention the David Lee Roth cover of California Girls. 

I believe he's referenced it several times in the past. Here's one instance from a 2005 interview:

http://nymag.com/nymetro/arts/music/pop/12377/

When you came out of that dark phase in the eighties, what were you listening to?
• David Lee Roth. I thought that his version of “California Girls” was really, really good.

Also, here's a link to a 2002 "Hot Press" interview where he praises it (and the video!):

http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:8Vn5IpR1fx0J:www.hotpress.com/Brian-Wilson/music/interviews/Lets-hear-it-from-the-boy/2613063.html+&cd=10&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us

Cool,

Oddly enough, here in 2017, it's almost like Diamond Dave in the one in seclusion (likely waiting on EVH's next move).

Brian's book, page 89: "It's not often that you get a perfect song, but that was one of them. It was so perfect that when David Lee Roth did it twenty years later - and reached the same spot on the charts, number three - he used Carl to sing backup on it to keep the vibe. I love that version. My favorite part is where he ad-libs 'I dig the girls.' "

I must've forgotten to remember that part of the book.  Being such a VH, I'm surprised that didn't stick out more to me. 

There-in lies the biggest difference between "Cousin Brian" and the Follically Challenged One.

 ???  Class... ... ...Ass ::)

I think Brian affinity for David Lee Roth's recording and performance also speak to something interesting (and I think endearing) about Brian, which is that he likes observing the "front man" deal. He admires guys that do that like Roth.

And.... like Mike Love.

In many interviews over the years, even in the midst of acrimony, he shows admiration and genuine appreciation *as an observer* for Mike's role as a front man. He has described being on stage and enjoying and appreciating Mike's performance on stage.

Just another bummer that this sort of sentiment isn't reciprocated with nearly as much enthusiasm or zeal or with a blind eye to any politics or past problems and acrimony, etc. Brian says "Mike's good at X, Y, Z." *If* Mike compliments Brian, it's often "Brian still has X, Y, and Z talents, BUUUUUTTTT........." and then has to qualify it.

Apparently, Mark McGrath's job these days is to yell "YEAH!" and point to Mike Love while smirking.

 :woot :woot :woot :woot :woot

While I would prefer no covers at all, I would especially appreciate no more Chuck Berry covers or Phil Spector covers.  Bri, your oldies palette does not have to be so limited....

Here are some of my guesses (if it is only covers):

http://smileysmile.net/board/index.php/topic,24502.msg593176/topicseen.html#msg593176

I wonder--if such an album actually ever comes out, which is far from a certainty after 15-20 years of talking about it--whether it ends up "new material, mostly new material," as he said in the pancakesandwhiskey interview, or "it's going to be covers ... and some original stuff," as he said in this interview. I really, really, really hope it would be the former. The occasional cover is fine, but I'd take an album of the likes of "Some Sweet Day," "My Marianne," "How Can We Still Be Dancin," or "Soul Searchin" type and quality material that's new (or at least remakes of unreleased stuff) over half an album (or more) of covers.

I would love it so much if he would re-record It's Not Easy Being Me with his mature voice for this new album, should it happen. Such a great song.

While this won't happen, I would totally behind something like that if he has to do covers. Brian Wilson covering Paradise? Hell yeah.

How about a gender-reversed version of the Shangri-Las' forgottten Jeff Barry-Ellie Greenwich gem "Train From Kansas City?" Lots of room for 60s-style harmonies, and a rocked-up beat.

Call me doubtful, but I will believe a new album when it's officially announced with a label signed. This 'I'm making a R&R album for release early next year!' has tended to be a shut down answer for reporters over the years.

http://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-37550152

I don't get why anyone thinks much one way or the other about Brian R&R album idea. He has indeed been citing it for at least, what, 20 years or so? Maybe it's sometimes a "shut down" answer, while I do think he genuinely likes the idea. But he has seemed to like the idea in the same way that someone will say "Yeah, we should really go visit the Grand Canyon someday, maybe we'll do that later this year." Or, when I say "I think I really need a haircut, I gotta go do that" and then say that about every other day for the next month or two before I actually go do it.

Much like Mike's vaunted solo album, I still think Brian's R&R album could materialize. Perhaps I've always not cared too much about the concept because it has never sounded interesting to me particularly. Brian re-making Little Richard and Chuck Berry numbers doesn't sound interesting, nor does writing new songs in that mode. If the well is running dry on "new" songs (meaning he also doesn't want to tap the dozens and dozens of archival songs he hasn't released), I'd rather seem him do a broader-reaching "covers" album if that's what he's inclined to do. I'd rather hear more "Wanderlust" type covers and less "Tutti Frutti" type covers.

I definitely don't think Brian's voice is really suited for rock and roll these days.  The more mellow material is more in his wheelhouse.   I can't imagine hearing Brian, or even Al, trying to belt out Little Richard or Chuck Berry songs.  Maybe Blonde plays a bigger role. 

I dunno; I think some of those oldies are actually perfectly in Brian's vocal range. And there's something to be said for Brian putting more verve into his vocal performances (especially on stage) when he's into a song. That's the only part of his doing a R&R album that I think sounds promising; When he's *into* something, the results are usually better.

So I totally get it; he'd rather sing a Chuck Berry tune than "Surf's Up" at this stage.

Let us all remember than Brian's idea of a "rock and roll album" is more Jerry Lee Lewis than AC/DC. I think we'd be lucky to get something as rocking as "Desert Drive."

I'd frankly rather hear Brian do an album's worth of "rock oldies" in concert than in the studio, as his rather ornate, sleighbells/bass harmonicas/harps/saxophone/lots-of-reverb sort of arrangement/production style tends to soften the "rock" stuff quite a bit.

My concern is that Brian, at times, struggles with faster vocals.  And I also share your concern about going into the studio and giving the "Pet Sounds" treatment to some early rock and roll numbers. 

Brian if you can read this you need to cover Elvis' song "Beach Boy Blues"  :lol

Ehh I think 15 Big Ones is a guilty pleasure of mine, I enjoy Brian cutting loose and recording barebones covers.  But the Pet Sounds pizazz is concerning. Something to think about, remember the rumors going around, in past interviews he has hinted at the album title: Sensitive Music for Sensitive People, and Pleasure Island: A Rock and Roll Fantasy (I think).  Whether these two projects are one and the same remains to be seen.

Good to be reminded that even in this period of acrimony that Brian still exudes class and sensitivity unlike a certain other personage we're all familiar with ;D