You Are So Beautiful, AGD... To MEEEEEE!

[Jon Stebbins]

I think maybe you are over-reacting. I would never call Preston a scumbag or anything else.

Read up the thread, Jon. You did not call Preston a "scumbag" - bgas did. He called him a "slimy scumbag" in fact and then suggested the usual line of BS echoed around this place that I'm not a real BB fan. Something that would sting if I took it seriously.

Again, I believe that Dennis co-wrote the song if only because it legitimately sounds like a Dennis song. But I do have a problem with the fact that there are two positions to be had here and both sides are saying two different things so it is difficult to say with any degree of certainty who is right and who is wrong and so I don't find the "So you're calling X a liar" that productive, especially since nobody has an objective memory.

Bgas was joking, so I'm glad you didn't take it seriously. The "two sides" from my point of view are many, many, many, many of Dennis' family, friends and associates who recall Dennis telling them his belief that he'd had a part in creating the song, plus one of Dennis' closest friends and family members claiming he actually witnessed the collaboration with his own eyes and ears. The other side is Preston, not saying DW didn't help him write the song, but saying he did not know who Dennis Wilson was.

Regarding certainty, i am certain that Dennis told his inner circle that he'd co-written the song, there are too many of them, and too many that don't communicate with each other, who had the same story in their memory. So it is a certainty that Dennis shared this claim with his loved ones. Not a single one of them said they did not believe Dennis when he told them this. Secondly I believe Billy Hinsche... most of all because he didn't volunteer this story to me, I put it to him as a probable tall tale that Dennis had told Tom Murphy, I treated it as a joke in the midst of an exchange about Dennis' wild and unpredictable nature. Hinsche got very serious in a hurry when i mentioned it. I have it on tape. He was setting me straight. Don't joke about that because its true was his point. He was there. He saw it happen. He knew the year, the place, and the other people in the room, all of whom remember the night, some of whom do not remember the collaboration, but who don't deny it either. But this incident, the night Hinsche refers to with Preston and Dennis at the piano is verified by other witnesses. Hinsche takes it a step further by remembering what was being jammed on by Dennis and Preston, and that a song called YASB came out of it. The time frame checks out perfectly.

If there is evidence that refutes the collaboration (other than Preston saying he did not know who Dennis Wilson was) I have not found it. And now we have Stephen Desper claiming he remembers Dennis working on the song prior to the night of Hinsche's story. It seems that dozens of people would have to be untruthful for this story to not be credible. As for Preston, again dozens of people would have to be untruthful for him to not know who Dennis Wilson was. So maybe it wasn't a lie, maybe it was mental illness, early Alzheimer's, or instinctual protection of a revenue stream. I don't know. But I'm comfortable that all the others are not lying.

[Chocolate Shake Man]

Bgas was joking, so I'm glad you didn't take it seriously.

Erm, no he wasn't. He made his views on Preston clear already in the thread.

The "two sides" from my point of view are many, many, many, many of Dennis' family, friends and associates who recall Dennis telling them his belief that he'd had a part in creating the song, plus one of Dennis' closest friends and family members claiming he actually witnessed the collaboration with his own eyes and ears. The other side is Preston, not saying DW didn't help him write the song, but saying he did not know who Dennis Wilson was.

Regarding certainty, i am certain that Dennis told his inner circle that he'd co-written the song, there are too many of them, and too many that don't communicate with each other, who had the same story in their memory. So it is a certainty that Dennis shared this claim with his loved ones. Not a single one of them said they did not believe Dennis when he told them this. Secondly I believe Billy Hinsche... most of all because he didn't volunteer this story to me, I put it to him as a probable tall tale that Dennis had told Tom Murphy, I treated it as a joke in the midst of an exchange about Dennis' wild and unpredictable nature. Hinsche got very serious in a hurry when i mentioned it. I have it on tape. He was setting me straight. Don't joke about that because its true was his point. He was there. He saw it happen. He knew the year, the place, and the other people in the room, all of whom remember the night, some of whom do not remember the collaboration, but who don't deny it either. But this incident, the night Hinsche refers to with Preston and Dennis at the piano is verified by other witnesses. Hinsche takes it a step further by remembering what was being jammed on by Dennis and Preston, and that a song called YASB came out of it. The time frame checks out perfectly.

If there is evidence that refutes the collaboration (other than Preston saying he did not know who Dennis Wilson was) I have not found it. And now we have Stephen Desper claiming he remembers Dennis working on the song prior to the night of Hinsche's story. It seems that dozens of people would have to be untruthful for this story to not be credible. As for Preston, again dozens of people would have to be untruthful for him to not know who Dennis Wilson was. So maybe it wasn't a lie, maybe it was mental illness, early Alzheimer's, or instinctual protection of a revenue stream. I don't know. But I'm comfortable that all the others are not lying.

Again, I reiterate that I have always agreed with the position that Dennis co-wrote the song, though for the record I don't find the fact that "friends say that Dennis told them he wrote the song" to be particularly compelling evidence in it's favour. If anything, relying on that as evidence only serves to harm that position, to be honest.

My issue was your response, "So your calling Billy Hinsche a liar." I just don't think it's a particularly productive response, given the kind of evidence that exists. Really, we don't have lots and lots of people who are providing evidence on Dennis's side. Hell, I could tell all my friends that I co-wrote the song and they could say after my death that I told them personally on countless occasions that I had a hand in the song. Wouldn't mean much. So ultimately it's Billy Preston's word against three people Dennis, Billy, and Stephen. And in that scenario it would indeed be possible for Preston to be right and Dennis, Billy, and Stephen to be wrong even though there's more people. Again, I don't think they are, but it's not out of the realm of possibilities.

I'm reminded of a real life story I experienced. It was in grade school when a discussion race came up in class. One boy put up his hand and explained to the class that everybody is born white and some become different colours/races as they grow up. The teacher explained that this was not true. The boy responded, "Are you calling my Dad a liar?" Funny, of course. But also interesting. Because of course the Dad probably isn't a liar, just misinformed. The world is a complicated place - people can't be reduced to liars and truth-tellers. People can be misinformed, have bad memories, be conditioned by other information they hear, etc. So I guess my point is that just because someone might be questioning Billy Hinsche's version of events does not follow that they are accusing him of being a liar. That's just unsophisticated thinking.

But then again, pointing that out makes me not a Beach Boys fan.

[tpesky]

Not that it hasn't been said but at least one of Dennis's bandmates ( Al) also said that Dennis told him he wrote that song and he definitely believed it. I'm not sure if any of the others ever commented.

[shelter]

Did anyone ever ask Bruce Fisher (the other co-writer of the song) about this?

[Sheriff John Stone]

I'm sorry but I never read Billy Hinsche's account of what he saw. What exactly did Billy Hinsche say about what he saw, specifically about what Dennis contributed? The intro, the melody, the lyrics, what?

[Mikie]

Did anyone ever ask Bruce Fisher (the other co-writer of the song) about this?

Yeah, that's the guy.  He lives in L.A. No mention of "You Are So Beautiful" here, but:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Fisher

Notice here it doesn't give Fisher credit; just Preston and Dennis. Ha Ha!  Jon, did you write that up? 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/You_Are_So_Beautiful

[Jim V.]

Hey Jon, isn't it incredibly possible that Billy Hinsche saw Denny and Billy Preston working on the song? And then after Dennis told him "hey, we wrote this song!" while not knowing the Billy Preston may have basically had it written beforehand without Dennis or Billy's knowledge? I think its very possible that could happen. And that would not mean that Hinsche was a liar, but just possibly not in possession of the true facts of the situation.

And the way you told Wirestone that he was calling Hinsche a liar was kinda weak.

And again...to Sweetdudejim...Dennis NEVER asked for credit, never sought it, never went on record to the press etc... he just told his close friends and family that he felt the song was partially his creation, and Billy Hinsche remembers why, because he was there when Preston and Dennis were working on the song.

I didn't know that I ever said anything about Dennis asking for credit. Cuz...I didn't.

[joe_blow]

I would imagine there are many songs that have similar stories with their creations. Would it be hard to believe many jams at parties happening where one person or another joined someoneone at a piano and added bits and pieces that went uncredited?

If, for example one day Micky Dolenz says that he was at a party at such and such a place and added the idea for a song that Brian Wilson eventually wrote, I wouldn't necessarily doubt him.

[Sheriff John Stone]

I would imagine there are many songs that have similar stories with their creations. Would it be hard to believe many jams at parties were happening where one person or another joined someone at a piano and added bits and pieces that went uncredited

....so I said to Paul, "Hey, why don't you add "the Ukraine girls really knock me out...", like a California Girls kind of thing..."

[Sheriff John Stone]

double post

[KittyKat]

Billy was a good friend of George Harrison. After seeing what George went through for the lawsuit for "My Sweet Lord" with the authors of "He's So Fine," do you think Billy wanted to make any type of legal action possible by acknowledging Dennis's contributions (whatever they were, after three pages of this I"m still not sure)?  It's not just giving Dennis royalty money. It's giving Dennis royalty money after the fact, because that involves lawyers, which I'm sure Billy could not afford, not could Dennis, really.  The legal fees would eat up much of the money made from the song.

The time for Dennis to claim his credit was when the song was written, which was before it was even sold to Joe C0cker and before it became a hit song. So, wasn't it Dennis's personal responsibility to ask for a portion of the song rights and royalties? It's not entirely Billy's fault for that. Maybe Dennis owed Billy some kind of favor and passed on asking for a songwriting credit. Given the sometimes-sleazy lifestyles involving both men, who were both into drugs big time, who knows, maybe it was a barter exchange or blackmail or something that caused Dennis to not ask for the songwriting credit. In any case, I understand why Billy might want to pull a Sgt. Schulz ("I know nothing! I see nothing!") to avoid a legal settlement with Dennis or his family over the song royalties.

[Jon Stebbins]

Again, I reiterate that I have always agreed with the position that Dennis co-wrote the song, though for the record I don't find the fact that "friends say that Dennis told them he wrote the song" to be particularly compelling evidence in it's favour. If anything, relying on that as evidence only serves to harm that position, to be honest.

I see. So if I'd been told the YASB story by Hinsche while writing a bio on Dennis, and then I'd subsequently mentioned it to 8 or 10 of the other Dennis associates and family members I interviewed afterwards, and all of them said "no, Dennis never mentioned anything about it to me"...that would make the story more believable to you?

[Jon Stebbins]

Hey Jon, isn't it incredibly possible that Billy Hinsche saw Denny and Billy Preston working on the song? And then after Dennis told him "hey, we wrote this song!" while not knowing the Billy Preston may have basically had it written beforehand without Dennis or Billy's knowledge? I think its very possible that could happen. And that would not mean that Hinsche was a liar, but just possibly not in possession of the true facts of the situation.

And the way you told Wirestone that he was calling Hinsche a liar was kinda weak.

And again...to Sweetdudejim...Dennis NEVER asked for credit, never sought it, never went on record to the press etc... he just told his close friends and family that he felt the song was partially his creation, and Billy Hinsche remembers why, because he was there when Preston and Dennis were working on the song.

I didn't know that I ever said anything about Dennis asking for credit. Cuz...I didn't.

Again, Hinsche was clear, he is credible, he says he witnessed the song being created....anything is possible, but i believe him. The fact that so many of DW's friends, family, and associates recall and believed Dennis' assertion that he had a hand in the song's creation obviously strengthens that position.

You posted something about a collaboration not necessarily being worthy of a credit, I assumed for this to have any relevance you were thinking Dennis might have wanted a credit.

[Jim V.]

Hey Jon, isn't it incredibly possible that Billy Hinsche saw Denny and Billy Preston working on the song? And then after Dennis told him "hey, we wrote this song!" while not knowing the Billy Preston may have basically had it written beforehand without Dennis or Billy's knowledge? I think its very possible that could happen. And that would not mean that Hinsche was a liar, but just possibly not in possession of the true facts of the situation.

And the way you told Wirestone that he was calling Hinsche a liar was kinda weak.

And again...to Sweetdudejim...Dennis NEVER asked for credit, never sought it, never went on record to the press etc... he just told his close friends and family that he felt the song was partially his creation, and Billy Hinsche remembers why, because he was there when Preston and Dennis were working on the song.

I didn't know that I ever said anything about Dennis asking for credit. Cuz...I didn't.

Again, Hinsche was clear, he is credible, he says he witnessed the song being created....anything is possible, but i believe him...and the fact that so many of DW's friends, family associates believed Dennis' assertion also strengthens that position.

You posted something about a collaboration not necessarily being worthy of a credit, I assumed for this to have any relevance you were thinking Dennis might have wanted a credit.

It's definitely a valid point that many of DW's friends say that he helped write it. But lot's of Billy Preston's close friends might say the opposite. So who's right?

I will admit however that this does sound like one of Dennis' sappy love songs, the kind of which I'm not too fond of. I think he was an extraordinary artist, but some of his love songs were so.....how shall I say this.....un-poetic. And "You Are So Beautiful" definitely is pretty straight up, just like a few of Dennis' love songs.

[AndrewHickey]

What I don't get is how this song ever took more than one person to write. It's one verse long, and most of that consists of just the title repeated, and it's not as if there's any sophisticated melodic development or massively complicated chord sequence.

Of course, Ding Dang apparently took two people, but *three* for You Are So Beautiful? (I'm assuming that since he's credited, Bruce Fisher did something too). I'm not saying it didn't happen, I just don't see how.

[Jon Stebbins]

Hey Jon, isn't it incredibly possible that Billy Hinsche saw Denny and Billy Preston working on the song? And then after Dennis told him "hey, we wrote this song!" while not knowing the Billy Preston may have basically had it written beforehand without Dennis or Billy's knowledge? I think its very possible that could happen. And that would not mean that Hinsche was a liar, but just possibly not in possession of the true facts of the situation.

And the way you told Wirestone that he was calling Hinsche a liar was kinda weak.

And again...to Sweetdudejim...Dennis NEVER asked for credit, never sought it, never went on record to the press etc... he just told his close friends and family that he felt the song was partially his creation, and Billy Hinsche remembers why, because he was there when Preston and Dennis were working on the song.

I didn't know that I ever said anything about Dennis asking for credit. Cuz...I didn't.

Again, Hinsche was clear, he is credible, he says he witnessed the song being created....anything is possible, but i believe him...and the fact that so many of DW's friends, family associates believed Dennis' assertion also strengthens that position.

You posted something about a collaboration not necessarily being worthy of a credit, I assumed for this to have any relevance you were thinking Dennis might have wanted a credit.

It's definitely a valid point that many of DW's friends say that he helped write it. But lot's of Billy Preston's close friends might say the opposite. So who's right?

At the time I wrote my book on Dennis this was a completely unknown thing in BB's fan circles etc... No one had ever put forth this possibility. I was told something offhand by Tom Murphy who engineered much of Bambu...nice guy...but I thought he was off base. When i mentioned it in passing to Hinsche he gave me the story, his clear recollection of seeing this collaboration, the time, place and who was there. he told me the song was unfinished when they started playing, and that as the night went on Dennis and Preston had the song completed as we know it. Who did what, I don't know. I do remember thinking, how come Hinsche knows about this and no one else does? I was wrong, a lot of people did, it had just never been printed in the mainstream. And as I started asking others that i interviewed, to my surprise...a long list of people recalled Dennis telling them he'd had a hand in writing the song. They were all willing to go on the record about it. This was a revelation. Dennis not only sang that song, but he, on some level, believed he had helped create it. No Beach Boys fans or Dennis fans knew that, so I reported it. What Preston's friends think was meaningless to that succession of events.

[KittyKat]

What I don't get is how this song ever took more than one person to write. It's one verse long, and most of that consists of just the title repeated, and it's not as if there's any sophisticated melodic development or massively complicated chord sequence.

Of course, Ding Dang apparently took two people, but *three* for You Are So Beautiful? (I'm assuming that since he's credited, Bruce Fisher did something too). I'm not saying it didn't happen, I just don't see how.

Another thing to consider is if Dennis had written most of the song himself and handed it off to Billy to finish, would it have ever been recorded by Joe if Billy had not taken possession of it? I would think not. Dennis had no "in" with having his songs covered by other people, while Billy had way more contacts in the music world to get a song recorded by a major recording artist. Perhaps Dennis considered it a gift that the song was passed around by Preston and made it to a major recording artist and became a hit. It was enough for him to know that and Dennis was content merely to sing it at Beach Boys' concerts and to know that he had a hand in it.

[OGoldin]

What I don't get is how this song ever took more than one person to write. It's one verse long, and most of that consists of just the title repeated, and it's not as if there's any sophisticated melodic development or massively complicated chord sequence.

Of course, Ding Dang apparently took two people, but *three* for You Are So Beautiful? (I'm assuming that since he's credited, Bruce Fisher did something too). I'm not saying it didn't happen, I just don't see how.

The chord sequence is not complicated but like many simple melodies it can be harmonized in many different ways.  My guess is that the two of them played around with different harmonizations.

[Mr. Cohen]

Preston: [plays G chord] You so are me beautiful to!
Dennis: No, no! How about, you are so me to beautiful!
Preston: Closer. [plays G chord again]. You are too beautiful so me!
Dennis: Wait, wait, wait. I got it. Watch this. [plays G & C chords]. You are so beautiful, to me!
Preston: Dennis, I'm gonna remember this, but completely forget who you are. That why I can have the songwriting credits. Well, I might have to put my buddy in, too. But certainly not you.
Dennis: Well, it's been an honor [shakes Preston's hand].
[Preston walks away and disappears into the shadows of the party].
Dennis: Hmm... that song ain't gonna be anything. You know, I should call Mike about "10,000 Years Ago".

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

[clack]

I wonder how many other cases in music history have occurred. As a songwriter myself the idea of someone not getting proper due bothers me, but at the end of the day, we know the truth, as it were, and Dennis obviously didn't seem to have an outward issue with not getting credit.

It's very common. John Lennon (uncredited) wrote that great riff for the "George Harrison" composition 'Taxman' (best part of the song). Duane Allman (uncredited) wrote the opening riff for 'Layla'. Matthew Fisher (uncredited -- until a recent court case) wrote that haunting organ melody for 'A Whiter Shade of Pale'. Bill Wyman (uncredited) wrote the riff for 'Jumpin' Jack Flash.' Etc., etc.

[Chocolate Shake Man]

Mal Evans wrote Fixing a Hole.

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

It's very common. John Lennon (uncredited) wrote that great riff for the "George Harrison" composition 'Taxman' (best part of the song). Duane Allman (uncredited) wrote the opening riff for 'Layla'. Matthew Fisher (uncredited -- until a recent court case) wrote that haunting organ melody for 'A Whiter Shade of Pale'. Bill Wyman (uncredited) wrote the riff for 'Jumpin' Jack Flash.' Etc., etc.

I meant the ones we don't know about.

[Mikie]

Mal Evans wrote Fixing a Hole.

Then his cremated ashes were lost in the mail. Now that's sad!

[Awesoman]

I see I'm a little late to respond, but just wanted to reiterate that no one is accusing anyone of lying.  I think the general consensus here is that most of us (including myself) believe Dennis had a hand in writing the song.  However because there is a discrepancy between what Camp Preston and Team Dennis have said over the song (and Wilson's obvious omission in the songwriting credits), it is perfectly ok to ask questions regarding the matter.  Again, just trying to look at this objectively.  Assuming we're all adults here, how about we try not to get overly defensive or take it extremely personal when someone dares not see things your way?