To be fair, all of The Beatles could be assholes. I admit, they're my favorite band, although I don't put them up on pedestals, which ends up being the problem with most fans. John Lennon once said something like 'You have to be a bastard to make it, and The Beatles were the four biggest bastards on earth'. Which may be a bit extreme, although you get the point. I mean hell, after they broke up, George Harrison got caught in bed with Ringo's wife Maureen-while he was still married to Patti Boyd. So yeah, they all could be dicks.

I've just gotten into Big Star lately, after years of hearing how great they were; I would try a couple of songs here and there, and didn't get it. Then one afternoon, while looking around Netflix, I saw the documentary on them, 'Nothing Can Hurt Me'. I started watching it for the hell of it, and I really got into it. I don't think that Alex did a better song than 'Nightime'!

It is historically incorrect to say that the "SMiLE album (was) cancelled because the other Beach Boys besides Brian didn't like the songs". Go read some quotes from the era, Dennis especially was effusive in his praise for Brian's new Smile recordings, and there is ample evidence that Carl was fully behind the project as well. All of the Beach Boys contributed long hours and hard work to the sessions, and all of them are part of why Smile is great. Smile's demise had little to do with inter-band politics, but instead a combination of negative label energy, budget constraints, creative burnout, and a derailing of something that took on a life and death of it's own.

Wasn't Mike against the smile songs?

I know Dennis said in a press that Smile made "Pet Sounds stink".

No, Mike was not against the Smile songs. He seemed to have some issues with some of Van Dyke's lyrics for being a bit abstract. Although, he still gave those lyrics his all when he sang 'em.

He wanted the band to continue making commercial pop. Of course he was against them. He has said he appreciated "Wonderful" but not all of it was "his cup of tea." I take that as basically all of it. It's up in the air whether Mike was a culprit in the Smile demise. I don't think he was a positive influence on Brian, at the very least.

He sang the songs well because that was his job. Brian was the boss.

Well, if you think he was vocal about not liking SMiLE, then what do you think he thought about Smiley Smile? That album is about 10 times less commercial than SMiLE. Why would he be OK with Smiley?

The Beach Boys IMO are a "meat and potatoes band." The productions, compositions, and performances are perfect but their lyrics lack the creativity of other great 60s artists like The Beatles and VU

And I'm a hungry MoFo.