Only one of those interests me, but just goes to show, Beach Boys fans are not limited to fun, sunny pop music.

Mike may not have a GREAT voice, but he knows how to get the most of out of it. Carl was blessed with a beautiful set of pipes, but he also knew how to use them. The two are not synonymous (i.e, any number of present day singers blessed with pipes of gold that think they have to oversing everything).

You reminded me of when David Leaf came down to my office after a meeting with Don Zimmermann, then president of Capitol Records. He showed me a cassette of unreleased Beach Boys songs that he had given to him to evaluate for possible release. Next to We're Together Again, Don wrote, "This is not a song."

 
[/quote]  I'd like to know Bob Zimmerman's opinion of "We're Together Again'.

A friend gave me a cassette years ago of Wilson/Paley sessions, and there are two versions of Everything I Need on there. One has Brian and Wendy, the other has Brian, Wendy, and Carnie. Does anyone hear have the background on these sessions? I know there's some talk about it on the Brian Wilson as auteur thread, but I wanted to address this subject specifically. There's also a piano instrumental I don't recognize, and a version of Your Imagination with someone singing wordless vocals on the verses. I have no idea who that voice is, maybe Joe Thomas?

Elvis liked to spend money - on himself, his family and friends, even total strangers. This caused conflict with his father, who remembered when they were poor, and believed in setting some income aside. Elvis, of course, remembered being poor, and that's why he gave so much of what he earned away. He believed his wealth was a gift to share with others.

My copy of the first album has the single version and not the original album version.

Okay,  I didn't know they replaced it on later issues. My copy has the original version, plus the lyrics insert.

I'd read a book on Carl or Al.  I think a Carl bio is long overdue. And as far as I know, Bruce has never hit his wife, either.

I can understand Brian wanting to kick back after this tour, but is there anything to indicate that Al and David won't stick around?  Long as they all seem to be getting along, we could still have a proper touring Beach Boys with four originals...

Has David ever said why he didn't stick around after the UK tour a few years back, or indeed after his first post-Al stint?

Cheers,
Jon Blum

I'd be really surprised if Brian continued to tour with the group. But Mike would be a fool not to keep Al and David along for the ride. It gives much more legitimacy to his touring Beach Boys to have some actual Beach Boys onstage besides Bruce and himself.

Honestly I think Paul has only made three to five good albums since John passed away but in the seventies he still tried to make music with a degree of quality and ingewnuity.  I would be a bigger Lennon fan, as I love the best of his stuff 1961 forward, but Yoko ruins it for me many times.

Okay, how about those other two, Harrison and Starr(key)?

I like Ringo's "Y Not", some separate tracks, e.g. Stardust, Let The Rest of The World Go By, Sunshine Life For Me, Goodnight Vienna, Back of Boogaloo and few others. As for George, I prefer his not-so-famous albums (Somewhere in England, Gone Troppo, Extra Texture), although there are some my faves in ATMP & CN f.ex. Art of Dying,  Fish on the Sand, Run of the Mill, My Sweet Lord, When We Was Fab, Someplace Else, Ballad of Sir Frankie Crisp, What is Life. For some strange reason, it turned out that the most playable George's songs are Not Guilty and Bangladesh.  

Have you heard the original Somewhere in England? Some really great tracks got dumped - Sat Singing, Tears of the World, Flying Hour. I think Gone Troppo is a wonderful little gem of an album, nice melodies, George sounds happy....not commercial, but happy. Extra Texture is more of a dark feeling album, but nicely crafted.

Yeah I have the LP boot with the original cover. Flying Hour in particular was a huge loss to the finished LP.

Agreed. I don't have many boots, but the day I saw that one in a shop, I had to buy it.

I can't believe nobody has mentioned The Beach Boys. Although, their career has gone up and down so many times. But in this fairly "hardcore" fans opinion, 15 Big Ones was a mistake that they never really recovered from(until now?).

Well, this is the 'general music discussion" area, we've talked plenty about the BB's fall from greatness after Holland in the Smiley Smile section. Still some occasional moments of brilliance, but overall, quite a drop from the glory years of 1962-1966, and the artistic but uncommercial works of 1967-1973.

Do you mean the version from the first album? Is the first album out of print?  I thought Wounded Bird had reissued all the albums recently. The single version, recorded after the second album, is the one on all the best of's.

Barry became sort of the hearthrob of the group, but I always liked Robin's voice the best. Some of the earliest record buys I ever had were Bee Gees 45's from the local Giant T store. Someone mentioned the Four Tops...now there's another group who's music is ingrained in me forever. Really sad we are losing so many of the greats of the 60's and 70's. Fortunately, I did get to see the Tops in the 90's when all 4 were still alive. Never had that chance with the Brothers Gibb.

Honestly I think Paul has only made three to five good albums since John passed away but in the seventies he still tried to make music with a degree of quality and ingewnuity.  I would be a bigger Lennon fan, as I love the best of his stuff 1961 forward, but Yoko ruins it for me many times.

Okay, how about those other two, Harrison and Starr(key)?

I like Ringo's "Y Not", some separate tracks, e.g. Stardust, Let The Rest of The World Go By, Sunshine Life For Me, Goodnight Vienna, Back of Boogaloo and few others. As for George, I prefer his not-so-famous albums (Somewhere in England, Gone Troppo, Extra Texture), although there are some my faves in ATMP & CN f.ex. Art of Dying,  Fish on the Sand, Run of the Mill, My Sweet Lord, When We Was Fab, Someplace Else, Ballad of Sir Frankie Crisp, What is Life. For some strange reason, it turned out that the most playable George's songs are Not Guilty and Bangladesh.  

Have you heard the original Somewhere in England? Some really great tracks got dumped - Sat Singing, Tears of the World, Flying Hour. I think Gone Troppo is a wonderful little gem of an album, nice melodies, George sounds happy....not commercial, but happy. Extra Texture is more of a dark feeling album, but nicely crafted.

My band does Make it With You, and I've played a lot of their songs on my own - Too Much Love, Everything I Own, Look What You've Done, the Guitar Man, Diary, Fancy Dancer. Great songwriters, great singers, and they had one of the best all around musicians in the biz, Larry Knechtel, playing keys, bass and guitar.

what about bob dylan after the 60's? lol

Dylan's last 4 albums have been every bit as good as anything he ever did in the 60's.

Nashville Skyline, Desire, Blood on the Tracks, Slow Train Coming, Oh Mercy, Time Out of Mind, Love and Theft (to name a few) all came after the fabled 1966 motorcycle accident. If those were the only albums he'd ever done, it would be one hell of a career.

"Smart Girls" would work well on a remastered SIP someday in the year 2525.

I will buy the vinyl at the same place I got the SMiLE vinyl - Silver Platters in Seattle. That store has my undying loyalty.

Who will be the last Beach Boy standing? Mike? Al? Brian? Brian outlived both of his brothers.....but I would say Al looks and sounds the healthiest. but I wouldn't bet against Mike still touring the BB show into his 90's. "The George Burns of Rock 'n' Roll"...still leering at the young girls from his wheelchair.

I don't know why anyone would expect the BB's to get all artsy on this reunion album. it's a reunion for the $$$, so they're gonna go the road that they expect to pay the biggest - A/C, lots of nostalgia, nothing wierd like SMiLE. Their defense will be "that stuff sells to you guys, the die-hards, but we're trying to bring in the casual fans as well'. One last big payday before Brian and Al retire, and Mike and Bruce return to "their" Beach Boys.

I will defend latter day Kinks to my dying day, but if someone wants to pick apart the solo careers of the Davies brothers, go right ahead. It's mostly been Ray and Dave offering different ways of remaking the old stuff. Storyteller, Kinks Khoral Kollection, See My Friends duets from Ray,  and endless live discs from Dave. It's like they couldn't stand to be together, but being together is what brought out their creativity.

Honestly I think Paul has only made three to five good albums since John passed away but in the seventies he still tried to make music with a degree of quality and ingewnuity.  I would be a bigger Lennon fan, as I love the best of his stuff 1961 forward, but Yoko ruins it for me many times.

I don't know if it's even been that many. I haven't really liked an album of Paul's since the Tug of War/Pipes of Peace era. Enjoyed the Broad Street soundtrack, but that was mostly remakes, hated Press to Play, Flowers in the Dirt was half a good album, Off the Ground had maybe one decent song - Hope of Deliverance. I enjoyed some of Run Devil Run...but after that, I stopped caring. I suspect John would've made some good music in the 80's/90's, but we'll never know. Okay, how about those other two, Harrison and Starr(key)? I find I like George's albums the best of the ex-Beatles, but he never varied his sound much. I have to give credit to Paul, at least in the Wings years, every album had a sound of its own.

From a professional standpoint, just recording the occasional single as the guys did 86-89 was probably kind of nice - not having to work too much, no longer fighting the battle of getting a complete album out, who was gonna write the songs, who was gonna produce it, etc. But as a fan those years were absolutely maddening! Every year I would think "maybe they'll get a new album out", but every year there was an excuse not to do one.

I own seasons 1-3 on DVD. One of the best episodic dramas of all time, in my opinion, and better than the movie.

Yeah, WAAYYY better than the movie! Last time I was aware of it being on tv was circa 1990 on A&E. I'm told it never did well as a syndicated show because Kimble finally got to confront the one armed man in the last episode - people aren't interested anymore once they know how it ends. Not true for me, though, I watch the eps over and over.

I personally don't have a problem with Mike saying Dennis' comment was BS, even though I'm sure Dennis really meant it at the time he said it. I don't think the guys themselves are too worried about these things 45 years later  - it's us, the fans, that are hung up on it. My advice to anyone who still hates Mike is: don't go to the concerts, don't buy the album, you've had many years recently to see Brian or Al on their own without the Lovester. You can sit this one out, I'm sure it won't last long.

Personally, I loved the "stack of Brian's" on BW88, OCA and Imagination. GIOMH was easily the weakest BW solo album to that point in his career. I'd loved absolutely everything up to that point - wasn't bothered by the AC sound of Imagination, it sounded exactly like what I expected from and older Brian. Loved the 88 album when it came out, played it endlessly, seemed like an eternity between that and the two 1995 albums, and I quickly fell in love with both of them, too. When GIOMH came out, I played it several times, but it never "hit" me. Nice, pleasant, but very little 'magic". And then BWPS came out, and everyone forgot about GIOMH. Didn't expect to like the Xmas album, but I did. But I would say the jewel of Brian's solo career is TLOS. If that ends up being his last album of newly written songs, I can be okay with it.