Like Landy was to Brian, Murry was first helpful, then detrimental to The Beach Boys.

Why do you think that happened with Landy? Did he see an opportunity for money and jumped on it?

Regarding Landy, he's generally looked upon as somewhat of a controversial figure due to his methods of therapy and the reports back on these methods from his former patients.  You might want to peruse this thread a bit which delves a bit into Landy's treatment of actors Gig Young and Maureen McCormick:

http://smileysmile.net/board/index.php/topic,14006.0.html

Thanks for the link. That was actually a really interesting read.

As I mentioned the other day I think on one level Murry truly loved and cared about his boys. 

But he was never able to conquer his own demons where he could be anything other than marginally helpful or effective presence in their lives.  So the short answer is while he remains an integral part of The Beach Boys' story, whatever contributions he made to their career unfortunately are overshadowed by other less than favorable aspects of his personality.

I can understand what you're saying about him trying to help, like when he sold off Sea of Tunes.

He looked at it like a favor; he was going to put The Beach Boys out of their misery and end it with a pile of money. But, instead, everyone turned on him.

Like Landy was to Brian, Murry was first helpful, then detrimental to The Beach Boys.

Why do you think that happened with Landy? Did he see an opportunity for money and jumped on it?

I am ready to admit that I am nowhere near as knowledgeable as most other people here, and that I've been into this band only a short amount of time (approximately a year,) so I was hoping that someone would know more than I do on this topic.

What I know about Murry stems almost entirely from the stories of his drunken abuse. Oh, and also that he's a genius too.  

When listening to things like the disastrous "Help Me, Rhonda" sessions, it seems that he always has words of advice for the boys, whether they were asking or not.

However, some of his suggestions/observations seem accurate, which leads me to ask...

Was Murry helpful to the band? Or was he more of a detriment?

Am I missing out on anything exceptional or important by sticking solely with The Smile Sessions? I was curious to know if anything great (and not on the box set) is floating around out there...

The Smile 'Unsurpassed Masters' CDs have some great Vegetables stuff not on the box.

Thanks, that's good to know. For some reason I can't explain, I love that song.

Am I missing out on anything exceptional or important by sticking solely with The Smile Sessions? I was curious to know if anything great (and not on the box set) is floating around out there...

Part of the reason Lennon was so down on TM was due to the fact that the Maharishi made a few sexual advances towards a female student, sort of taking advantage of her. Lennon got pretty mad about this, as one should, and wrote a song called "Maharishi" which you now know as "Sexy Sadie." George persuaded him to change the lyrics.

Something that's kind of funny is that the story is said (by John's-then-wive, Cynthia, Paul, and George) to have been made up.