Wow! Very interesting, thank you

Get well soon Billy!

 His book What's Exactly the Matter with Me? Memoirs of a Life in Music is a good read.

Not sure if this was posted before, but it's a funny read.
https://40.media.tumblr.com/92589f007104051b8edbe566697d1303/tumblr_ns20qse72z1trpswuo2_1280.jpg

 

This one paragraph rings true..

"In his just-released autobiography, Love sets out to settle more than a few scores. Perhaps it’s a hazard of the genre, but the entire effort is more than a little self-serving. Love is alternately defensive, angry, self-pitying and proud. It’s dizzying just trying to keep his grudges straight."

http://www.seattletimes.com/entertainment/books/good-vibrations-beach-boy-mike-love-unloads-in-a-contentious-memoir/

I was amazed at the number of pictures of ADG on his facebook page, I would guess he's a big mirror collector

Well Motts gone I think KDS is filling up the slack!

I don't post often but I have to say it's going to be nice not dealing with Mottism anymore!

Sheriff, I think it's time you turned in your badge.

   Well...at the very least he needs to wipe the drool off of it.  These 'guys' who ignorantly label Melinda as the new Landy are such dinks.  There's an old saying.  It goes "Behind every successful man stands a great woman."  THAT'S what's happened here.  And it has for a long, LONG time.  Look at the strides.  Look at the successes.

Look to make sure there's water in the pool before you dive.  Ray and Deb aren't lying.  The insiders aren't guessing.  They KNOW.  Obviously Sheriff and Lonely know s.f.a.

Thanks, Lee, for taking care of this latest absurd comment by this consistently anti-Brian, anti-Melinda, humorless poster.  It's become a complete bore, I must say.

What she just said

"My life has been written about over and over again, and that’s mostly okay with me. Other people can talk about my life. Sometimes they’ll get it right and sometimes they’ll get it wrong. For me, when I think back across my own life, there are so many things that are painful. Sometimes I don’t like discussing them. Sometimes I don’t even like remembering them. But as I get older, the shape of that pain has changed. Sometimes memories come back to me when I least expect them. Maybe that’s the only way it works when you’ve lived the life I’ve lived: starting a band with my brothers that was managed by my father, watching my father become difficult and then impossible, watching myself become difficult and then impossible, watching women I loved come and go, watching children come into the world, watching my brothers get older, watching them pass out of the world. Some of those things shaped me. Others scarred me. Sometimes it was hard to tell the difference. When I watched my father fly into a rage and take swings at me and my brothers, was that shaping or scarring? When we watched him grow frustrated with his day job and take solace in music, was that shaping or scarring? Those are all memories but I can’t get to them all at once. I’ve had a whole lifetime to take them in. Now I have a whole book to put them out there."

I wonder who wrote that ^ for Brian? I hope somebody tells him...

Once a Troll always a Troll...

 Schaeffer Stadium, Foxboro MA...August 73

The greatest thing about this thread is that AGD once again proved that he is the Cliff Claven of the board...constantly prattling on with inaccurate info.

Sarasota, Florida

WBZ AM Boston had some great Jocks in the mid to late 60's..Bruce"Juicey" Bradley, Dick Summers. Jefferson Kay, Dave Maynard..

Saw them in 73 at Foxboro Stadium in Massachusetts. Loggins and Messina and Linda Rondstant were also on the bill..They played their early hits only at the end of the show.

http://blog.chron.com/rantandrave/2013/10/brian-wilson-jeff-beck-breathe-new-life-into-classics/

Yes, I think that is the picture sleeve as I remember it, but I'm pretty sure it came with the Brother label. Of course, I could be mistaken all round, with my memory confusing the GH single with the HV single as well as images of sleeve and label seen elsewhere. As a working public historian I would have to rely upon more substantial evidence than that provided by memory alone.

Also, while I'm here, I'd like to point out that back in the day we, meaning the typical teen record buyer, had little or no pre-release info. These records, singles and LPs, just appeared in the wracks each week. We might hear them on the radio or see the group performing a promo on a TV show but I don't recall ever being aware of any discussion in the press prior to that, at least not until Rolling Stone began to publish.

So when Smiley Smile appeared it was not like we were wondering what had happened to Smile. No, we were wondering what had happened to the glories of Today and Summer Days. We simply weren't prepared for this change in aesthetic direction. Pet Sounds had been, how shall I say, difficult, but having grown up in a rather sophisticated musical environment I was accustomed to listening repeatedly to a work, discovering it as it revealed itself. Smiley Smile came across as not only weird, but as incoherent and, basically, incomprehensible. What the heck were half these songs even about?

Judging from the solo version of Surf's up produced during the Wild Honey sessions, one has to wonder how much additional effort would have been needed to flesh out the track listing and sequencing to produce a coherent and comprehensible artistic statement, no matter how off-beat. This was, after all the height of the Sixties and we were no strangers to the off-beat. They're Coming to Take Me Away Ha Ha anyone? In 4 minutes a perfectly satisfying, minimalist version of Surf's Up might have been recorded, and another 4 minutes could have produced a similar version of Good Vibrations. Hadn't the water chant been worked on during the Smile session? (correct me on that point please) And was not the instrumental skeleton of Cabinessence already in the can?

So, if Smile has ben like a great stained-glass window, the shards of which could not be fitted together, Smiley Smile might have been like a gallery showing of discreet but related canvases that, however odd, made sense. And we, the record buyers, would have bought into that - had only a little additional care and effort been invested in the project and its presentation.

Oh well, let's just fire up another bowl and...wait...what was I sayin...yeah man...far out...

Spot on!!

Are some folks that spoiled with what exists in 2012, or is it just a case of not knowing the history as early as 8-10 years ago because they weren't there?

Some of these statements are totally uncalled for. There is no need to go there with project Smile, which was at a certain time a very helpful and informative educational resource for those interested in learning about Smile, and the history behind it. Remember, there was *next to nothing* "official" to run with before a certain time, in fact with the music there was barely anything above the quality of what had appeared on official releases like the '93 box set. All the other stuff was whatever quality it was traded around, which was usually a few generations of dubs and copies away from the original, which itself was questionable.

Bottom line: Smile as we know it in 2012 would *not* have been possible without those who exchanged and shared the information through things like Project Smile, which some good people spent their time and/or money out of their own pocket in the days of mailing envelopes full of CDR's rather than uploading/downloading to share this music and the saga with anyone interested.

If the quality or the flow of the programming or the out-of-date information isn't compatible with an iPad or whatever other 2012 standard exists, there is no need to try to lessen what was a much-appreciated effort to compile most of what was available (and even then, available meant what a relatively small cult of collectors, fans, and researchers were working with) into one CDR that could be used as a reference. For doing that, it was a success, no matter what the standard of 2012 (instant downloadable gratification and 'lossless quality') would compare it with. A lot of people who were interested in learning more about Smile were able to do that through the original "Project", for that it was valuable.

Sometimes it feels as if the past 10 years or whatever didn't happen...I just hope more context and history is considered before posting criticisms of something as seen in this thread.

Right on!

Brian Wilson Presents Pet Sounds Live today at 4:00  EST on VH1 Classic channel

Tyler has great taste. He is also a huge fan of the Shangri-Las and Yardbirds, and sang backing vocals on the second Left Banke album.

Which begs the question: how come Aerosmith are so awful?

They are only awful to pop pussi.es.
[/quot

Pussi.es eh? Or pussies even. Yeah, well this particular pop kitty loves the Beastie Boys, Nirvana and the Pixies as well as the Beach Boys. Aerosmith do suck though.

Walk This Way..Kitty

The truth lies somewhere between the two extremes being proffered here, and my opinion of him is evolving somewhat. Love's heartfelt comments at the Grammy Museum event were telling, and illuminated the multifaceted nature of his relationship with the group as a whole. He is a ham, which enables him to be comfortable onstage and entertaining, which the audience mostly enjoys, even if many also find his antics smarmy and annoyingly cutesy (the drawn-out opening to Be True to Your School? Insufferable IMO)

 He has also shaped and pushed the band toward his desired, mostly lightweight image relentlessly over the years, away from the progressive direction that the Wilson brothers were fighting for throughout most of the '70s, only reluctantly ceding a degree of hegemony to Brian and Al on the setlist, with these concessions wrested from his iron fist with great effort. He obviously is at least somewhat fond of the deeper cuts, as shown by his reactions to CA Saga's performances and his willing participation in the more serious work during the late '60s- early '70s  (with the exception of most of SMiLE, which he admires but is loathe to give too much credit to because doing so would be admitting both that it was beyond him lyrically and that he made a bad call by playing a significant role in creating a negative environment around the recording of it, two things he is not able to publicly acknowledge), but he is determined to give them as close to an obligatory role in the current tour as he can get away with (witness "It's O.K."s inclusion, a mediocre track at best but fitting his vision of the band's ideal, more commercial image).

There is an element of reactionary revisionism in the relatively recent, almost wholesale embrace of him by many, but some rehabilitation of his image is deserved, reluctant as I am to award it to the main Clean Liver (nothing wrong with that in and of itself, unless it inhibits creativity and progressive songwriting) who, along with Bruce and a now remorseful Al Jardine, steered the band towards becoming a nostalgia act in the mid-to-late '70s and thereafter.

  Wow.."It's O.K." rocks..great fade

Good one from Bob Lefsetz news letter...

Paul McCartney should be quaking in his boots.

This record should be unlistenable, a complete waste of time, Brian hasn't done anything good since 1998's "Imagination". That's the only time he recaptured the original Beach Boys sound, when he worked with Joe Thomas.

He worked with Joe Thomas again.

I had zero hopes for this album. The last two times I ran into Brian Wilson:

1. He hung his head on the table at the BMI dinner, even though he was the one being honored.

2. He wouldn't reveal a single detail about this album, as if he worked for the CIA and would be shot if anything came out.

And seeing him live is almost creepy. It's really the Jeffrey Foskett show. Sometimes I think it would be better if Brian didn't even show up.

As for this reunion and tour... If you don't think it's about the money, you've got enough. Brian's played it out live, he can do clubs at best. So, he buried the hatchet with his "brothers" and is on a tour that I refuse to attend, to see Brian catatonic at a keyboard he doesn't even play. As for the Grammy performance...who knew Mike Love couldn't hit the notes either?

But there are elements on "That's Why God Made The Radio" that are so right, so perfect, so melodic, so joyous, they transcend not only Top Forty radio, but everything in the marketplace.

You see Brian still hears the sounds in his head. And with the right interpreter, in this case Joe Thomas, he can lay them down on tape.

Ignore most of the Mike Love stuff, about half the album is disposable. But drill down to certain tracks and you'll become speechless. How did they get such beauty, how did Brian Wilson concoct a timeless sound that would fit perfectly on the Beach Boys' sixties albums yet doesn't seem dated today?

I'd start with "Pacific Coast Highway".

Those multi-voice harmonies, I don't know anybody who can still do this, and make it sound so rich.

And what is that, a french horn?

And then Brian starts to sing... And his imperfect voice finally works, it's found its space. His age and inability to be as sweet as he used to reminds us all that we age, and even though we may be pushing seventy, that doesn't mean we have nothing to say...

"Driving down Pacific Coast..."

Have you ever done this? With the top down and the wind blowing in your hair? You feel like the rest of the world doesn't matter, you feel utterly happy to be alive. Brian captures this, along with the bittersweet feeling that it won't be forever.

Isn't this what music's supposed to do? Touch our hearts and souls, set our minds free, so they can reflect on times gone and yet to come?

No one else could even write these changes, never mind make them work.

And be sure to stay until the 1:20 mark, when the above words are sung... It's like an angel, the voice of God, has come out from the wings to reveal truth. Utterly astounding. "Pacific Coast Highway" may only be 1:47, but that's enough, it's not too short, it's not unfinished, it's just right, you want, you need to hear it again and again and again.

After "Pacific Coast Highway" I'd go to the top of the album, "Think About The Days". The Eagles tried this with their last album, opening up with a rich, quiet a cappella number, but now you know where Henley gets it, Brian Wilson doubles down and trumps the band that owns the biggest selling album of all time. It's like you're lifted from your chair and carried over the landscape, in a bubble, only you and the music, no one else. There are no distractions, you can only observe. The human condition is a lonely one, it's a search for connection. Music, when done right, does this better than any artistic medium, even better than conversation. You feel touched by Wilson's magic wand.

And now we go to the third cut, "Isn't It Time", whose title is so close to the superior "It's About Time" from "Sunflower", and it's not as good as what comes before, but the chorus, harmonies and changes beginning just before forty seconds in...this is the Beach Boys sound, something we've given up on hearing again. But the piece de resistance comes at 1:15, I ask you, who else can concoct such a satisfying vocal blend?

And speaking of vocal blends... When you hear the band sing the chorus of "Beaches In Mind", which starts this song, you'll smile. It's just a snippet of the song, but it's so great it puts a smile on your face and makes the rest of your record collection irrelevant.

And I'll throw in "Strange World", maybe because it mentions the Santa Monica Pier, and unlike too many tracks today, the verse actually has a melody. "Strange World" is one of those strange songs where the elements are better than the whole. There are bite-sized nuggets spread throughout. So many songs today are unfinished. But it's the change at the end of the verse that grabs you. Who else takes such risks? NO ONE!

And then there's the single, "That's Why God Made The Radio". Yes, Brian Wilson wasn't made for these times, who listens to the radio anymore? They're talking on the phone, texting... The sixties are done. Or are they?

I bought every Beach Boys album until "Friends". I kept waiting for them to recapture the magic, but Brian faded away and the albums became uneven. Then there was a resurgence with the aforementioned "Sunflower" and I've never given up hope. Kind of the same way you always believe your best days are in front of you, despite all the evidence to the contrary. You see we run on hope. And music. And somehow, Brian Wilson has regained hope, which has allowed him to bestow such great music upon us once again.

There's no "California Girls", not even a "Help Me Rhonda". But there are so many snippets, little pops and crackles of Brian Wilson genius, that not only are you thrilled, you too have hope, that our best days are ahead of us. Hell, if Brian Wilson can deliver, come back from the dead and show that not only has he not lost it, he's still better than just about everybody else, what can you do?

Skip the live show, ignore the reviews, if you were never a Beach Boys fan, move right along. But if you bought the albums, if you lived for more than the hits, your jaw will drop, you will be absolutely stunned. That sound is still there. Brian is still here.

Spotify link: http://spoti.fi/NFTpDV

He played the wonderful 12 string guitar opening on Sloop John B