OK this has been bugging me lately - Mike made a big mistake on the chorus lyrics to Good Vibrations.  "I'm pickin' up good vibrations, she's giving me THE excitations!"  First line has 8 syllables, the second nine, and the "THE" sticks out like a sore thumb.  It doesn't even make sense - what's wrong with she's giving me excitations?  What are "THE" excitations?  So on probably the biggest song in their career, Mike blew the lyrics.  No wonder Brian wanted Van Dyke to do them after he'd promised them to Mike.

So we have the following

Yes, in early 1995, Billboard ran story a 3-CD set called "The Smile Era" (2 discs of Smile material and 1 disc of Good Vibrations sessions).  Leaf, Linett and some Capitol staff were quoted.

See Billboard, Feb. 4, 1995, p. 10
https://books.google.com/books?id=sAsEAAAAMBAJ&lpg=PA10&dq=beach%20boys%20%22Smile%20era%22%20Billboard&pg=PA10#v=onepage&q=beach%20boys%20%22Smile%20era%22%20Billboard&f=false

p. 127
https://books.google.com/books?id=sAsEAAAAMBAJ&lpg=PA127&dq=beach%20boys%20%22Smile%20era%22%20Billboard&pg=PA127#v=onepage&q=beach%20boys%20%22Smile%20era%22%20Billboard&f=false

So we have the following announced and unfulfilled dates for a Smile release:

Jan 1967
May 1967
Jan 1973
late 1988
August 1995

If it wasn't for BWPS we would never have gotten the Smile Sessions box!

I hear, "Lonely in the night, I feel".

Listen to this cover....which is damn good.

https://youtu.be/1TMOwMtdgF8

Nice cover but they got the lyrics wrong - it's "My love is burning brightly Like the moon and stars shine nightly" not "my moon and stars shine nightly."  Nevertheless very enjoyable.

Brian in his solo career has gone back to a “Pet Sounds” production style multiple times, evident in What I Really Want for Christmas on.  Bass harmonicas, horns and strings, percussion all reminiscent of Pet Sounds.  I think he went back to that well because he no longer had new ideas for a new “sound” and he knew his band was expert at recreating his original PS production style. 

Elton met Brian in 1970, I believe. There’s a rather famous story about it.

Elton confirms first meeting him in 1970.

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/postrock/2007/12/when_elton_met_brian.html

Thanks for that link, I had no idea that Elton had a hand in ensuring that Brian would be honored at the Kennedy Center Honors like he was. I’ve watched a number of clips of other entertainers I like getting the Kennedy Center award, such as Bruce Springsteen, Robert DeNiro, Led Zeppelin, Paul McCartney, Carol King and Sean Connery. But only one of them moved me emotionally, to tears actually, and that was when Brian Wilson was honored. Thanks, Elton.

There are some problems with Eltons recollections of meeting Brian in 1970.  First, he says there was a sand pit inside the house.  The sandbox was long gone by 1970.  And he says the house was purple - hadn’t he been forced to repaint it in 1968? 

I just ordered it and it said 20 copies left.

I'll never need to listen to Smile again, now that I have this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S6aFEU-43a8

VDP was in no way responsible for Brian’s mental state

The failure of Smile was both due to Brian’s mental state and a cause of Brian’s mental state.  The Smile project was inextricably tied up with Van Dyke, their collaboration, their friendship, and clashes of personality.

Best for Brian in a personal sense - Andy Paley.  Andy really understood Brian and how his musical mind worked and was able to turn on Brian’s creativity and inspire him, besides being a good friend to him during the Landy dark days.  The music they produced was not on a par with Brian’s best, but that had to do with the Landy situation and then Brian’s mental state.

In terms of quality and quantity Mike Love would be the best lyrical collaborator, if we look only at quality Tony Asher.  Van Dyke and Brian did some brilliant work but in retrospect I don’t think the collaboration was good for Brian - the clashes in personality and the fallout from it all derailed Brian with long lasting consequences.

While it may have inspired Van to incorporate Americana themes into Smile, especially the plight of the native Indians, I don't see any direct parallels between the poem and any of the lyrics Van wrote except in the most vague general sense.

It'll be interesting to read Brian's new liner notes. I remember when "That lucky old sun" came out, I played both albums (TLOS and OCA, since both albums feature Brian and Van Dyke but in different roles) to compare the approaches of each songwriter's vision of California. Van Dyke's classy and elegant way and Brian's pop-y rock and roll version. Beautiful stuff, each completely different yet similar in Brian's vocal arrangements. Speaking of vocal arrangements, I seem to remember that AGD said, Brian did all the arrangements while Brian once mentioned he just did what Van Dyke told him to do. IIRC there is no credit in the booklet for the vocal arrangements. That's why I'm interested in hearing Van Dyke's and Brian's new statements about the album. As mentioned before, imo OCA features some of Brian's best and most soulful vocals in later years.

You know I never thought about it until now (a “duh” moment) that Lucky Old Sun was Brian’s take on Orange Crate Art.  Makes me wonder if a composite album of the best tracks on each could make a coherent album that would be more of a collaboration than OCA was.  Maybe Brian realized he missed an opportunity with OCA by limiting his role to vocals and made up for it with Lucky Old Sun.

1. Cabinessence
2. Cool Cool Water
3. Caroline No
4. Surf's Up (but Wouldn't It Be Nice to Live Again would have been better)
5. Still I Dream of It (Adult Child)
6. And Your Dream Comes True
7. Funky Pretty
8. Whistle In
9. Don't Back Down
10. Mama Says
11. Transcendental Meditation

Other closing songs don't really stand out in any way for me as closers.

Interesting that Lyle mentions how restless and how it  drove Hal crazy to have to sit there for hours not doing anything while Brian went over the parts with the musicians.  Especially when it seems Brian was closer to Hal than any of the other musicians.

Link not working for me.

What happened to Pleasure Island - I think that was the name of the project Brian was touting at one point as his next album after Lucky Old Sun.

Favorite: Sunflower
Least favorite: Summer in Paradise (I don’t consider Stars and Stripes a Beach Boys album).
Most overrated:  Surfs Up
Underrated: MIU Album

Didn’t Carl do the vocal arrangements on this?

If so, it's surely the only time Carl did this kind of vocal arrangement - his others are more "conventional", if you will, and not really BW-like.

I feel I Can Hear Music, especially the a capella break, was pretty Brian-like. 

Didn’t Carl do the vocal arrangements on this?

Listen to the rhythm guitar chord stabs - they're the same in both songs.  That's what Terry took from Don't Worry Baby.

If I remember correctly Dennis did some solo songs before the Beach Boys show at a few venues.

And there’s a precedent for the Cabinessence lyrical discussion in what happened with Hang Onto Your Ego.  Mike was singing his part and volunteering to sing Al’s part, yet still expressed his displeasure with the lyrics - and Brian changed them.  Similarly after singing the lyrics to Cabinessence Mike at a later vocal session for the song brought up the crow cries lyrics, only this time Brian didn’t give in but instead - in a not atypical passive aggressive move - called in Van to explain the lyrics, putting Van in an impossible spot and pissing him off and leaving the question unsettled.  Not surprising that Brian turned to trying to complete the single H&V and stopped any significant work on the album after this (and the Inside Pop session that “went badly” with vocals for Wonderful, Cabinessence and Surfs Up attempted).

I think Brian mayhave wanted to finish Heroes and release it and if it was a hit use this as validation for the rest of Smile and to forge ahead and complete it regardless of Mike’s or anyone’s misgivings.  Unfortunately things didn’t exactly work out that way.

Really? That's fascinating, I had no idea.

Do you know the source of that info?

Separately, I've always wondered when it became *public* knowledge that Manson had something to do with that song; does anybody know the answer to that question?

But I had no idea that it was a mystery to the band internally, as well.

It wasn't a mystery to Stephen Desper who recorded Manson singing the song, at Dennis's behest.  But I'm not surprised that no one else knew.  I know Dennis was supporting Manson and the Family and after he had them evicted (by moving out of the rented house and stopping payments) he supposedly gave Manson money for the song - but I'm a little surprised Dennis didn't give Manson partial songwriting credit.  It was recorded in 1968 and released 6 months before the murders.

Lazy Lizzie I would imagine could be skipped over (and should be, to tell you the truth), because I think there's very little musically new about that song to have to secure a copyright for. The choruses are literally a copy/paste of the choruses of the already-released "Better Get Back in Bed", while the verses offer just a smidge of a new melody, and not a very good one at that. I would imagine if the copyright question ever comes up for this song, they might just skip it entirely for content reasons.

Due to so much of the song being simply recycled from another song in a significant way, I almost view "Better Get Back in Bed"/"Lazy Lizzie" as a "Land Ahoy"/"Cherry, Cherry Coupe" type of situation, as opposed to "Lazy Lizzie" really being its own independent, proper song. I think "Lazy Lizzie" is perhaps the saddest commentary on Brian's mental/emotional state in the late '70s.

To my ears, he was just creatively and emotionally spent and didn't give two f*cks about songwriting. It sounds like someone told him to write a song, and he churned this out to simply cause the request for a song to be placated. I hear not an ounce of Brian's heart or creativity in this song. If there was a textbook example of a song being written while Brian was not a well man, this would be exhibit A. One of the few Brian songs I can say I'd be fine if it never existed. I'm a big, big fan of Love You, despite its weirdness, as well as of other unreleased odd Brian demos from this time... but this track is a hard pass for me.

I disagree - to my ears, "Lizzie" is an example of '76 Brian doing whatever the heck he wanted to, commercial or not. The fact that it recycles old rhythms or melodies in not unusual for BW, and I actually DO hear lot of his heart and creativity in this one! It's different, it's joyous, and it's playful - creepy lyrics aside.

I'm with you - I love Lazy Lizzie and would love to hear a well-mixed and mastered version of the song.

Didn’t someone official somewhere say this was coming in February?

The White Album (The Beatles) was more popular and more influential than Friends.  While far from the Beatles’ best album, it is the best representation of the four Beatles’ personalities and where they were at musically at the time, warts and all.  There is a greater variety of musical styles and approaches than anything else they had done or would do.  The three principal writers were all extremely prolific at this time and the songs included show them at their best and at times at their worst.  That’s what makes it such a fascinating album, almost a musical diary of their lives - they let it all hang out. 

I prefer Friends musically but the album is extremely short, didn’t chart, and was running completely counter to the musical trends of the time.  It makes it even cooler now, of course, that Brian was making brilliant music that he wanted to make without concern for commerciality or trends, but if I had to choose between the White Album and Friends in a Best of 1968 list, I’d go with the White Album.

Better yet, why not include both?  I’m sure one of the other albums in your list could be dropped to make room for Friends.