While Al can surely be indecisive and finicky, and slow to finish stuff, and while I'm sure that was the initial deal behind "Waves of Love", I don't think that's what's driving the 500 versions of the song at this point.

I think we can firmly call this milking the same thing over and over (no "Jenny Clover" pun intended) to generate "content" at this point. Remember, he has also (I'm not kidding) discussed doing a "Jenny Clover 2.0" mix as well.

I don't know why Al has an aversion to working on *something* else, *anything* else. I promise you, he *does* have other tracks in his vaults (to say nothing of BRI vaults) that nobody has heard that he could work on.

It's just a drag that Al has an amazing studio at his disposal, but doesn't seem to take much advantage of it. It would seem the desire is there to put out new content, maybe Al just hasn't found a creative spark to get him to hole up in his studio and write/record a bunch of new material to be released. Maybe that'll change.

Even though we all already knew this, it sounds like there is plenty of jaw-dropping material for the *next* set after "Feel Flows", and beyond.

I think it's difficult, especially for non-hardcore fans, to truly understand the depth of the BB archives. I honestly can't think of another case, in popular recorded music, or even in other fields like film, of *this much* A-quality material over the span of *years and decades* being left collecting dust in vaults *for decades*. It's so crazy, I can't even think of something that comes close.

!!!!

wow.

It almost seems like Al absorbed some of the indecisiveness that Brian notoriously (to his own detriment) had regarding finalizing the song Heroes & Villains from 55 years ago, and it is manifesting all these decades later.

I know deciding on final mixes can be hard, but this is a bit ridiculous! (All due respect to Al).

Maybe Al feels a need to make things as good as he can possibly make them, with a mind towards perfectionism, perhaps to compete or at least have material be in what he views as even remotely in the same league as the high standards set by the Wilson brothers. Being in a band with arguably the biggest musical genius of the 20th century might have affected Al and created a compulsion to get things as right as he can.

That's the only real explanation I can see for this. And maybe also because it's one of Carl's last vocals, Al may feel like it's an extra precious thing to get right. Unless he thinks he's finally gonna have a radio hit once version 12 comes out? 

It's not all that unusual for musicians to make a great many mixes before deciding on one, but it's another thing entirely to keep releasing version after version after version (even if it seems at least 2 versions were released or leaked inadvertently).

This is like Al's version of Brian's Shortenin' Bread tick.

I finally got around to watching this film tonight. Truly fascinating and well made. Very much a missing link to many questions about the Manson/BBs story. Highly recommended.

And this is all not to say that there wasn't or shouldn't have been room for Brian to do solo albums. The Beach Boys were clearly not interested in churning out albums regularly after 1980. Brian certainly had an excess of songs by the end of the 80s that never would have fit on BB albums, assuming other members also contributed songs.

However, the band, up to a point anyway, was clearly willing through the end of the 80s to take any Brian they could get, and to work within conditions (e.g. LANDY) that they didn't like for many reasons. Carl specifically singled out disliking Landy's lyrics for "In My Car" ("I'm master of my fate, when I accelerate"), yet even in that case, they (or, at least Carl and Al) sang on "In My Car" and agreed to put it on a BB album. And they managed to get Brian on several other songs from the period, including "Make It Big" and "Island Girl", as well as work at that time circa 1989 on "Don't Fight the Sea."

I can only imagine the hostility and resentment that Carl would've had against Landy, but objectively speaking those lyrics aren't so out of left field and are certainly not worse than anything Mike would have written for the Beach Boys.

I know the lyrics aren't the greatest, but I freakin' love the "Spirit of Rock and Roll"....   I can't listen to that one without hours later still be singing to myself, "The spirit, the spirit, the spirit of rock and roll"

Interesting how "Black Widow" was rewritten as "Let's Do It Again."   I forgot, was Black Widow itself recycled from something else?

Nothing from Brian's own career. It's got a very strange, unique riff in the verses that he hadn't used before and hasn't used since

This song has some of my favorite melodies from Brian's entire solo career. Very strange indeed, some ascending vocal melodies that almost didn't quite seem to make sense yet they sound killer, and a very unique BW type of way.

Also how about all of those guitars on the demo of "sunshine" from 1997? Definitely very unexpected to me.

Yes, what indeed was the purpose of BW's people posting these? Definitely begs the question.

Probably for people to listen to

I'd tend to think this would be done with more fanfare and publicity as part of some sort of overarching project that would be announced, but maybe they are just dropping little goodies for people at random. Time will tell. In any case I am grateful to hear these songs.

WHOAH. This is amazing. I have a deep affection for many of these tunes, incredible to hear them in perfect sound quality after poor quality boots for years.

Yes, what indeed was the purpose of BW's people posting these? Definitely begs the question.

Also these were clearly posted roughly without quality control; at the end of Turning Point, there's 17 seconds of silence with a few random blips of other songs for a split second.

Not that I'm complaining.
I just wonder if these are up as a temp/test thing, listen to them while you can folks.

Really digging the Let's Go to Heaven in My Car demo, especially the cut-from-the-final-version response vocals on the choruses.

Thanks for sharing that, interesting. I wonder if those were actually anywhere near the accurate colors of the clothes they were wearing, or if those colors were just seemingly chosen as a best guess by the colorizer. I'm guessing the colors of the studio were based off of other historical color photos to be accurate.

I always liked this song and thought it easily was one of their best later-period tracks.  For all the flack this album gets (and don't get me wrong, this is not a great album by any stretch) as well as L.A. (Light Album), if you compiled the best songs from both albums you'd have a pretty decent effort.  Something like this:

KTSA
Good Timin'
Some of Your Love
Full Sail
Angel Come Home
Livin' With a Heartache
Sunshine
Lady Lynda
Baby Blue
Goin' On

No "Love surrounds me"? That to me is one of the greatest later tracks the Beach Boys ever did.

Oh right.  I knew I forgot one of them.  You can swap it out with "Sunshine" or "Some of Your Love".  😊

Don't swap out "Sunshine" - that would be a travesty.

"Some Of Your Love" is pretty good, but these days I can't help hearing "Mike Come Back to L.A." and it puts me off that song a little!

Some Of Your Love also sounds like Summer of Love in the choruses; identical vocal melody of the title line.

And almost comically, the songs have nearly phonetically identical titles to boot.

This was a good watch. Very interesting in terms of Manson's relationship with the LA music community.

One thing I'll always find strange is that "Never Learn not to Love" will never have a Manson credit despite everyone knowing it's mainly his song. Guess, that's the deal that was made.

It happened again a few decades later, when fellow horrible person Gene Landy had his credits scrubbed from Brian Wilson songs. As much as Landy was a total creep, it also is a bit weird to wrap my head around the fact that the guy's name has been removed from songs for which he presumably actually wrote some lyrics for. Yet I get why it was done.

So thankful to all for the hard work and I can't wait to get my copies...

But... what a long, strange and ridiculous trip this has been

With this band it could never be anything less

It's August 27th, folks.

Nothing untoward, weird, or sinister -- just a scheduling thing, as is commonplace.
I promise, a ton of cool stuff coming up.

Get pumped.

Glad it's not something untoward, weird or sinister. I hate those things. With Iconic in charge now, surely we've seen the end of that type of crap.

Disappointing though about the sliding date. I'll be okay with it though if it's happened in order to facilitate a concurrent blu-ray audio release, or a live video or something else super-cool like that. If it's just like they don't want this coming out too close to a John Lennon, or George Harrison release or whatever - not happy!

My guess is it's either being moved to accommodate extra vinyl pressings from better than expected pre-sales... or that the powers that be think a late summer release is the best way to get the best of both worlds when it comes to some fans buying a "summer" (late summer, but still a summer month) BBs product, while also having its existence still be in recent memory for other potential purchasers when it comes time for a holiday gift near the end of the year.

It's August 27th, folks.

Nothing untoward, weird, or sinister -- just a scheduling thing, as is commonplace.
I promise, a ton of cool stuff coming up.

Get pumped.

Cool, and if anything, the new date makes it closer to the original Aug 31, 1970 release date of Sunflower. Thanks for the update, Howie.

That’s a pretty odd choice to promote the set ... a 15 Big Ones-era live track w the horns, etc? Not ‘69-‘71 era, and not really one of their better live performances or periods for live shows either IMO.

A very odd choice indeed. As a hard-core fan I can certainly appreciate it, but it's just a strange choice on every level, I don't think this choice of a teaser single will get one additional person to purchase the box. I'm not dissing it though, it's a good performance and I've always liked this song, although I'm sure it's not one of the best tracks on the entire box, and perhaps they're just really trying to keep the best stuff under wraps for now.

My guess would be the powers that be were really trying to be diplomatic about giving a spotlight to each of the band members and their own songs. That may well have been some contractual thing. Or maybe it's just some sort of a directive from marketing to showcase each member and this song was chosen because somebody working on this it happens to like it. But my guess is that Al gave it a thumbs up and then he probably still has an affection for his own song.

I love this track, and would go as far to say it is, in my opinion, their best song post-Love You.

The vocal harmonies that kick off the track are brilliant and so BW. We know Brian had been playing around with that snippet since 1964's "All Dressed Up For School",  through "I Just Got My Pay", then in some of the many unreleased versions of "Heroes and Villains". He must have really believed in that snippet, and I don't blame him cause it sounds awesome. I love how it appears in half-time during the "I love you, I miss you, things won't be the same til I kiss you" section. Like Shortnin' Bread, it's one of those BW musical easter eggs that only the die hard fans will know about.

I think the production is cool! It's clean, not overblown, and uses pretty standard rock band instrumentation so hasn't dated badly like other synth-laden tracks from the same era. It has a tasteful arrangement (though admittedly doesn't sound like it was lead by BW - would Bruce have had a hand in it?).

The key change into the sax solo as someone else has pointed out is really quite inspired, musically.

Do people not like it because of the sax solo? Definitely the one element that dates it, but if you try to forget how we now in the 21st century perceive sax solos as cheesy, you can come to accept it... I have.

The chords are great. Love the dramatic, almost spooky sounding minor flat 5 chord on "Why is my love goin' on".

I love how they snuck in the lyric "awaken me beautiful dreamer" - my guess is Brian's input as we know he's a fan of the song it references, "Beautiful Dreamer" and the fact that Beautiful Dreamer Wake spells out his initials.

It's a rare Wilson/Love song from after the 60s that doesn't sound completely half-assed. As a (admittedly amateur) songwriter myself, I can tell that a lot of effort went into this one, from the music to the lyrics to the arrangement to the vocal performance from all members of the group.

It really baffles me that it quite often gets singled out by fans as a song they especially don't like. I don't think those people are wrong, taste is subjective after all, but still, it does baffle me! Maybe it is that sax solo after all...

I completely agree with all of this.

Carl almost sounds like he's channeling Freddie Mercury in parts of this song, it's almost like the second coming of his voice. Carl always had a magnificent voice, but I feel like it wasn't until right around the time of this track's recording where his vocals started *soaring* in an entirely new and more powerfully confident way, probably aided by him getting sober.

As the 1980s wore on, despite the spotty quality of the songwriting the band put out, his vocals just kept getting better and better, and I feel like he was peaking as a vocalist just as their songs started getting very hit and miss. Another example of that might be "happy endings". There's an odd, ironic, very BBs nature to this weird phenomenon of his vocals becoming their absolute best right as the time of their songwriting and production declined. But it's also part of why I can still listen and appreciate some of that spottier material, because his vocals elevate it tremendously.

But to me, this song in particular can probably be called a demarcation line of that new era of Carl's voice being at its most powerful and almost operatic.

Also, I agree that a guitar solo probably would've taken this song to another level and perhaps given the band more credit amongst certain music listeners. The saxophone solo doesn't bother me, but it does make the song fit in more squarely with songs like "come go with me" and the other oldies the band had been doing in the mid to late 1970s. It's much more of a throwback 1950s type of sax solo in context, as opposed to a 1980s type of sax solo.

Sorry to bring up this old thread but I didn't want to start a new one. I just came across a making-of of "Amadeus" and was astonished how much Tom Hulce looks, and even acts like Carl in the 90s:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-92JS2FbiHk

Start at ca. 10:11 mins.

I never would've expected, but yes - I do see it also

Wait until you hear the session excerpt for "Sound Of Free."
I told Boyd -- "This sounds like if Lennon recorded Plastic Ono Band during the RAM sessions."

This thing is packed with, like, a billion little gems.

What a group.

Wow, that is amazing, cannot wait to hear.

In the event that there's a follow up digital release sequel that comes out with some extra content that wasn't able to fit on the CDs, like Sunshine Tomorrow 2, I'm realllly hoping there might be some alternate versions of Celebrate The News, either session excerpts or instrumental version with backing vocals, stuff like that. (Of course I'm chomping at the bit to hear the new mix that is included on the proper set! )

I have a hunch if this physical release set sounds like hotcakes, that we might be lucky and get a sequel set of extra tracks like that. There's certainly a recent case of that happening from only several years back as I mentioned.

That said, I certainly don't want to be a whiner and complain about what we didn't get, I am extraordinarily grateful for what we will get already with this set that's going to come out!

We Didn't Start the Fire by Billy Joel came on the radio recently, and it dawned on me that the song almost feels like a reworking of the "bunch of pop culture/historical references all bundled together in a cheesy song" DNA from LBWL (the song); I wonder if it ever occurred to Mike after hearing We Didn't Start the Fire (which I'm sure he did, it was/is played everywhere) that Billy Joel sort of lifted the idea he did first a decade prior.

I do realize that Mike didn't even write the lyrics to his own song. Nevertheless it seems like he was just attempting to pull the heartstrings of a listener or something, although it was a much more clunky and ineffective manner than the song that Billy Joel had major success with it. Was LBWL the first song by a famous artist to have that type of a theme? Or maybe Mike's song in and of itself was ripping off the idea of other earlier songs?

Of course various songs over the years by famous artists reference pop culture events, but I'm talking about a ridiculous mouthful of pop-culture events just spewing out one after the other in the lyrics, and that being essentially the totality of the song.

Amazing beyond words, thanks to Howie, Mark, Alan, and everyone involved!

Just wondering again how the shows or the setlists will relate to the "Feel Flows" box set enough to brand the tour as such.

My guess (based on how their "Wild Honey" tour looked like):

- Disney Girls (1957) (that's a given)
- 'Til I die (they did play that a couple of times through the years)
- Feel Flows
(- possibly Don't go near the Water)

Let's not forget All I Wanna Do. I'd be highly surprised if Mike didn't play that one, considering he's done it a number of times in recent years, and also it's one of the true feathers in his cap from the FF era.

I just re-listened to this interview again, and it's worth listening to a second or third time. Just really interesting to hear Brian so engaged, talking about a host of things (many very specific to the exact era the interview is from).

Jamake Highwater is quite a good interviewer who Brian seems especially comfortable with. He seems to talk like a regular guy without the polished interviewer style one might expect from someone granted access to interview/record a major rock star, which is a breath of fresh air. (After just reading the Jamake Highwater wikipedia page, it seems there were definitely some unfortunate skeletons in that fellow's closet involving Hightower impersonating his ancestry and pretending to be Native American, but that doesn't detract whatsoever about what a solid interview this was).  One wonders if Highwater had known about the Native American song lyric concepts that Brian and VDP had recently been crafting (and shelving with SMiLE) if he'd have asked a bunch of questions on that topic.

We know the interview was conducted while Carl was driving, but am I right in thinking that this was driving around Los Angeles?

I've never understood this whole phenomenon of pre-ordering. Is there some reason that's better than just trotting down to the record store on release day? Is there some danger all the copies will sell out the first day?

Pre-ordering online is a necessity for most if they want it on release date. There is no record store to trot down to anymore for many if not most folks. They don't exist anymore for many folks, unless they want to drive long distances to the few indies that survive. Big box retailers aren't going to carry most stuff.

What I don't understand is the need to pre-order things *far* in advance. Other than locking in a good price if it goes up initially for pre-orders at a low price, there's no need to pre-order things *months* in advance rather than days or a few weeks.

Or rather, a better way to put it is, pre-ordering once it's available to pre-order makes sense. What we don't *need* is for something to be *made available* for pre-orders months and months in advance. In other words, this process is, should be, and will be easy: Whenever it's available for pre-order, have at it and pre-order. I just don't need to do so faster than whenever the label and retailers make it available.

I guess some of it may be that some items (unlike FF, presumably?) are made in limited quantities, and it may just be a generalized overreaction to want to make sure the item they want doesn't sell out in advance. Sometimes it's not an overreaction: while it's not an online pre-order thing, I guess Record Store Day in-store items are like that, where it's imperative to get a copy as quickly as possible, but as far as online ordering goes, I'm sure that there are plenty of super limited edition physical album/box releases by any number of artists (not pertaining to Record Store Day, but actual releases that are sold online) that get snapped up by pre-orders long before the release date, and become unobtanium shortly thereafter, unless people pay jacked up prices.

Again, this is presumably irrelevant to FF, but that mindset may be just burned into people's mindsets as a knee-jerk thing across the board nowadays, since physical releases are becoming less common in general, and often are done in smaller production runs. I guess some people who are huge fans just want to have it ordered as soon as humanly possible, and not have to think/worry about whether or not it'll sell out, be difficult to purchase, etc down the road.

Personally I'm not worried about pre-ordering way in advance, because despite that I'm a BBs superfan and CANNOT WAIT to hear FF, I have no reason to think the box will be difficult to obtain if not pre-ordered well in advance. But I'll definitely pre-order it whenever it goes onsale!

I do wonder how many copies will be manufactured of FF. I would imagine that if demand were to exceed the expected supply, that more copies would be subsequently manufactured to meet demand. If Rolling Stone and all of the old guard magazines/publications go batshit crazy about how awesome FF is, and the promotion is done really well, plus great buzz/word of mouth through fans, I have an optimistic hunch that FF will actually exceed sales expectations, and maybe they'll have to make a 2nd or 3rd pressing.

Was this situation similar back in '96/'97 when the Pet Sounds Sessions was released?

At least in terms of the prolonged waiting process and uncertainty?

I guess the internet and message boards weren't what they are today, but curious how the current FF state with everyone on the edge of their seats waiting for info compares to a quarter century ago.

I'm not sure of the exact timing, but I recall the main thing about the PS box was that it was known about, and the sampler (which I believe included the full stereo remix plus some bonus tracks) all leaked out the full year or so before the set was released. People knew the thing existed and was pulled from release very late in the game, so I think there was a feeling that it was almost certainly going to come out, it was just a question of when.

I think in those earliest days of the internet, there were still a lot of fans that learned about releases by stumbling across them at stores, or reading about them in music magazines.

I remember the "internet" era for the BBs picking up in 1998, with a lot of discussion about what was going on with the touring band (remember that back in 1998 there was no big announcement; people just noticed Al wasn't showing up at gigs anymore), and also a lot discussion about "Endless Harmony Soundtrack" and what might be on it, etc.

Wow, I learn something new every day on this board that I didn't know before. Had no idea the stereo remix had leaked a full year before its official release! That had to have both been awesome as well as anticlimactic for the actual release, all things considered. Yet I'm sure minds were still massively blown by all the other bonus tracks that hadn't leaked.

Seeing as the PSS was "pulled from release very late in the game", were booklets ever printed and discarded that didn't pass Mike's barometer? Or maybe the kibosh was put just before anything hit the printing press? Almost makes it seem like it could've been another situation with the SMiLE LP covers that were junked.

Which spins off another question - I wonder what the furthest (other than SMiLE and PSS) that any release has gotten to coming out by this band, before getting killed and junked. I guess Sweet Insanity is another. Although I'm talking about something where something was printed in anticipation of release, but then changed at the last minute.

Was this situation similar back in '96/'97 when the Pet Sounds Sessions was released?

At least in terms of the prolonged waiting process and uncertainty?

I guess the internet and message boards weren't what they are today, but curious how the current FF state with everyone on the edge of their seats waiting for info compares to a quarter century ago.