50 Big Ones - How was the track line-up chosen?

[Eric Aniversario]

I know that it's loosely based on the tour setlist, but some inclusions/exclusions seem a little quirky to me...I know that we could each come up with our own ideal version of "50 Big Ones" to sell to the public, and come up with 100s of variations.  But some songs seem unfairly left off and some that are included seem like odd choices. 

Examples:

Left off:

Be True To Your School - A top 5 hit, and it's also mentioned in the liner notes...was it dropped last minute in favor of something else?
Then I Kissed Her - A big hit abroad, and one that elicits cheers in the first few notes in nearly all the live settings I've heard it in.
Disney Girls - Bruce's one big contribution doesn't make the cut?
Come Go With Me - A top 20 hit...it seems that Al was only allotted a certain number of leads on this compilation?
409 - A very well-known car song

Included:

All Summer Long - Never released as a single, featured prominently in some movies, but not a lot of casual fan recognition
The Little Girl I Once Knew
Friends - A great song from my favorite album - but doesn't fit into this comp very well

[gfac22]

That's a good question, I'd be interested in finding out the answer as well.  I wondered if the band compiled the tracks like they supposedly did with The Warmth Of the Sun, or if this was more or less a record company thing.  I can't imagine Mike allowing the omission of Be True To Your School. 

[Phoenix]

Nevermind.  Thought it said 15 not 50.

As you were.

[GoofyJeff]

The RAH setlist (with TSS "Surf's Up" inserted after H&V and minor shuffling of other songs for better flow) is my go-to iPod playlist.    As much as I enjoy 50 Big Ones, some of the order is a bit jarring.

[The Shift]

Isn't BTTYS a bonus track on the Japanese edition?

[Andrew G. Doe]

I've pondered the omission of "Be True..." on the 2CD version, and this is the only logical explanation I can come up with.

They forgot to include it.  Someone f***ed up.

[Alan Smith]

Isn't BTTYS a bonus track on the Japanese edition?

Yeah, 45 version

[Jukka]

I've pondered the omission of "Be True..." on the 2CD version, and this is the only logical explanation I can come up with.

They forgot to include it.  Someone f***ed up.

I agree. It's just one of those songs that you have to include on every respectful Beach Boys compilation, and the fook up is the only logical explanation. Even if they decided to skip some hits to make room for deeper cuts, I don't think BTTYS would be the first or second to be axed. But hey, with so many hits to choose from, it's no wonder something is forgotten.

[Disney Boy (1985)]

Quite a pleasing fook up though, as it's certainly one of their weaker early hits.

[Please delete my account]

"Friends" would be there to represent "Friends", now recognised as one of their best albums but sadly devoid of any other well-known songs.

[William Bowe]

Personally, I'm happy to credit the inclusion of the three songs listed at the expense of the five excluded songs listed to good taste on the part of the compiler. Those of us too young to have experienced the era directly can appreciate the surf and car oeuvre as expressing the spirit of its time, but there are few of us who don't draw the line at BTTYS.

[Please delete my account]

Personally, I'm happy to credit the inclusion of the three songs listed at the expense of the five excluded songs listed to good taste on the part of the compiler. Those of us too young to have experienced the era directly can appreciate the surf and car oeuvre as expressing the spirit of its time, but there are few of us who don't draw the line at BTTYS.

I adore Be True... but then I'm of a generation and nation that finds the lyrics so way out (I don't think I've ever met a schoolkid who spoke highly of his or her school) that they're completely hilarious. I realise now that it's a terrible sin to like anything ironically, but I'm afraid in this case it's so deeply rooted in me I can never learn not to love it.

As for "Come Go With Me", I must say I've never heard it on the radio or on any compilation. Not being much of a post-Love You listener, I didn't even recognise it when it got played on the tour.

[William Bowe]

Or if I might put it differently - it seems to me that the common thread behind the decisions queried by Eric is concern for contemporary sensibilities. Few of the sentiments captured in the BBs' early work could be expressed unironically today, but BTTYS is more naivete than I and a lot of others can stomach. As an old doo-wop song, Come Go With Me might be heard as pre-historical if the foundation of your musical tastes is the 60s rather than the 50s. You might say something similar of a girl group song like Then I Kissed Her. Sure the original was contemporaneous with early BBs, but to many it might not seem that way - Phil Spector's work never had the mass popular revival that the Beach Boys enjoyed in the 1970s, which is the time their music was directly experienced by a huge part of their mass audience. Disney Girls, in common with almost everything else by Bruce, has dated badly - the line of 1970s MOR it represents is culturally extinct today.

On the other side of the coin, All Summer Long perfectly exemplifies everything that makes the BBs durably significant, and it's simply too good to exclude. TLGIOK gets props today which weren't due to it at the time because we can now see it as a signpost to Pet Sounds. And as well as being a lovely song, Friends expresses Beatles-ish 1960s sentiments that would generally be seen as having aged well.

As for 409, there are better car songs than that one, and unfortunately you have to cut somewhere.

[Andrew G. Doe]

The criteria are really very simple - Top 40 singles (in the main) with a light frosting of other charting tracks, classics and 'new' songs. Thus


Disc 1
1. California Girls - top 40
2. Do It Again - top 40
3. Surfin' Safari - top 40
4. Catch a Wave - classic
5. Little Honda - charting single
6. Surfin' U.S.A. - top 40
7. Surfer Girl  - top 40
8. Don't Worry Baby - top 40
9. Little Deuce Coupe - top 40
10. Shut Down - top 40
11. I Get Around - top 40
12. The Warmth of the Sun - classic
13. Please Let Me Wonder - charting single
14. Wendy - charting single
15. Getcha Back - top 40
16. The Little Girl I Once Knew - top 40
17. When I Grow Up (To Be a Man) - top 40
18. It's OK - top 40
19. Dance, Dance, Dance - top 40
20. Do You Wanna Dance - top 40
21. Rock And Roll Music - top 40
22. Barbara Ann - top 40
23. All Summer Long - classic
24. Help Me, Rhonda - top 40
25. Fun, Fun, Fun - top 40

Disc Two
1. Kokomo - top 40
2. You’re So Good To Me - deep cut
3. Wild Honey - top 40
4. Darlin' - top 40
5. In My Room - top 40
6. All This Is That - DEEP cut !
7. This Whole World - DEEP cut !
8. Add Some Music To Your Day - charting single
9. Cotton Fields - classic
10. I Just Wasn’t Made For These Times - deep cut
11. Sail on, Sailor - charting single
12. Surf's Up - classic/deep cut
13. Friends - charting single
14. Heroes and Villains - top 40
15. I Can Hear Music - top 40
16. Good Timin' - top 40
17. California Saga (On My Way to Sunny Californ-I-A) - charting single
18. Isn't It Time (single version) - new song
19. Kiss Me, Baby [The Beach Boys Today!]
20. That's Why God Made The Radio - new song
21. Forever - classic/Dennis vocal
22. God Only Knows - top 40
23. Sloop John B - top 40
24. Wouldn't It Be Nice - top 40
25. Good Vibrations - top 40

[Sheriff John Stone]

"I Just Wasn't Made For These Times"....Love the song, just don't think it belongs on a 50 song comp.

[Jason Penick]

I'm sorry, but there is no good reason why the compilers should have excluded "Breakaway", while "Add Some Music" and especially "All This Is That" made the cut.

[Cabinessenceking]

I'm sorry, but there is no good reason why the compilers should have excluded "Breakaway", while "Add Some Music" and especially "All This Is That" made the cut.

make it different from other comps. Break Away wasnt played on the tour, the ones you mentioned were.

[EgoHanger1966]

SOS didn't have Breakaway either.

[Andrew G. Doe]

Because it wasn't Top 40.

[Freddie French-Pounce]

The criteria are really very simple - Top 40 singles (in the main) with a light frosting of other charting tracks, classics and 'new' songs. Thus

4. Catch a Wave - classic

2. You’re So Good To Me - deep cut

1) I'd hardly call catch a wave a classic
2) You're So Good To Me isn't what i would call deep - it was on the original Best Of in '66 - and that charted forever! (My first BB record )

[Chocolate Shake Man]

1) I'd hardly call catch a wave a classic

I hear it frequently on classic radio.

2) You're So Good To Me isn't what i would call deep - it was on the original Best Of in '66 - and that charted forever! (My first BB record )

Well, it was probably on there because it was the B side of one of the latest huge singles. The album went to #8 and went gold. Little Deuce Coupe went to #4, went platinum, and charted for nearly a year, but I would still suggest that songs like Car Crazy Cutie, Cherry Cherry Coupe, No-Go Showboat, A Young Man is Gone are deep cuts. But I agree that You're So Good is on this because of its association with the original Best Of, despite the fact that it was probably only on there in the first place because of timing and its association with Sloop.

[EgoHanger1966]

Because it wasn't Top 40.

Cabinessenceking since modified his post, but I was reacting to his possible theory that Breakway was nixed off 50 Big Ones to change it from SOS.

[joe_blow]

[/quote]

1) I'd hardly call catch a wave a classic
2) You're So Good To Me isn't what i would call deep - it was on the original Best Of in '66 - and that charted forever! (My first BB record )
[/quote]

Catch A Wave is played at so many arenas around North America and is very well recognized by many.

[HeyJude]

It seems like recent comps (e.g. "The Warmth of the Sun", etc.) have some input from the guys in the band. It seems to me that what happens is they start with the core of obvious songs, and a few things get thrown on simply because particular members thought of it at the particular time they sat down and thought about the tracks; they were just sort of hot on a particular song at a particular moment.

[Eric Aniversario]

It seems like recent comps (e.g. "The Warmth of the Sun", etc.) have some input from the guys in the band. It seems to me that what happens is they start with the core of obvious songs, and a few things get thrown on simply because particular members thought of it at the particular time they sat down and thought about the tracks; they were just sort of hot on a particular song at a particular moment.

That's what I think happened here...I think that BTTYS was originally part of the lineup and was dropped in favor of something else.