Unpopular Beach Boys opinions

[phirnis]

I think BW 88 is a better album than Love You. There. I said it.

Love You has some amazing songs, but even the best of them are brought down to some extent by the insane arrangements Brian went for. Imagine Love You with the production value from "Had To Phone Ya" and many of the other 15BO tracks. Would be a more appropriate follow-up to Holland and a far better seller than what it turned out to be.

Like many of Brian's most interesting arrangements they're eccentric, unusual, maybe even experimental... but insane? I don't get it.

[RangeRoverA1]

<<Like many of Brian's most interesting arrangements they're eccentric, unusual, maybe even experimental... but insane? I don't get it.>>

Check above what it says. See now? Un-po-pu-lar opinions. And that was Cabinessenceking's.

[RangeRoverA1]

"Crocodile Rock" is very good cover. I think everybody - Al, Mike, Carl, Adrian - sounds great.

"Carry me home" is mighty boring.

I regret listening to "Do you have any regrets". Darian's cover is just as bad.

"Wendy" live at BBC is my favorite "Wendy".

[jiggy22]

"We Gotta Groove" is one of my favorite Beach Boys songs of the '70s. Even in it's incomplete form!

[Jay]

I'd rather listen to MIU than some of the pre Pet Sounds era stuff.

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

Omg me too. I like the singles but some of the earlier stuff doesn't hit the mark for me.

Here's mine...I prefer Brian's voice in the late 60's and up to 1974 to anything before.

[Robbie Mac]

Lyrics aside, Sweet Insanity is actually not that bad.

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

Lyrics aside, Sweet Insanity is actually not that bad.

For the most part,  I agree with you, especially vocally.

[Robbie Mac]

Lyrics aside, Sweet Insanity is actually not that bad.

For the most part,  I agree with you, especially vocally.

Yeah, Brian was singing very well here. 

Side story: I was looking for a vocal coaching DVD and found either in the library or Netflix a vocal lessons by this guy that looked kind of familiar to me. I saw the credits on the back and his mini-bio said he was a vocal coach for Brian. Then I remembered where I saw him. He was one of the guys interviewed by A CURRENT AFFAIR when they were covering the conservatorship.

[barto]

Summer's Gone is a better song in every aspect than Caroline, No.

[Lonely Summer]

"Crocodile Rock" is very good cover. I think everybody - Al, Mike, Carl, Adrian - sounds great.

"Carry me home" is mighty boring.

I regret listening to "Do you have any regrets". Darian's cover is just as bad.

"Wendy" live at BBC is my favorite "Wendy".

I like BB's Crocodile Rock better than the original, where it sounds like Elton is saying "Cry Rockin" on the chorus. Al actually gets the full world in!
"Do You Have Any Regrets" is one of my favorite SI tracks.

[KDS]

I like the studio work Joe Thomas worked on. 

I'd rather listen to Imagination or No Pier Pressure over BW88 or OCA, or even BWPS. 

I'd also prefer TWGMTR over any post Holland Beach Boys album. 

[petsoundsnola]

Other than the title track and 'Til I Die, I don't get all of the praise heaped upon the Surf's Up album.

[HeyJude]

Summer's Gone is a better song in every aspect than Caroline, No.

I always figured not liking "Summer's Gone", or at least not loving it, was an unpopular opinion in and of itself.

I was kind of disappointed by it. It kind of meanders and doesn't move to its chord changes quickly enough. I've always felt it was the weakest song in the ending "suite" of songs. Not horrible. Good group vocals, poignant sound effects at the end. But as a composition, it's kind of bland musically.

[KDS]

Summer's Gone is a better song in every aspect than Caroline, No.

I always figured not liking "Summer's Gone", or at least not loving it, was an unpopular opinion in and of itself.

I was kind of disappointed by it. It kind of meanders and doesn't move to its chord changes quickly enough. I've always felt it was the weakest song in the ending "suite" of songs. Not horrible. Good group vocals, poignant sound effects at the end. But as a composition, it's kind of bland musically.

HJ,

I'd agree that Summer's Gone is the weakest of the suite.  I really like Summer's Gone, but it's almost anti climatic after From There to Back Again and Pacific Coast Highway.  I even rank Strange World over Summer's Gone. 

[KDS]

Here's an unpopular one.   I was listening to some 80s era BB the other day.

Keep in mind this is only one person's opinion..........

Getcha Back, Kokomo, and Still Cruisin (the song) are better than anything that appears on Love You. 

[HeyJude]

I'd say "Getcha Back" and "Kokomo" and "Still Cruisin" are some of the weakest "new" songs on their respective albums.

I was going to say that I could understand not liking the unique production on "Love You", but the production on that mid-late 80s BB stuff isn't that great. "Summer In Paradise" was worse, but while "Getcha Back" is okay for 1985 (at least the drum samples sounds more like real drums), "Still Cruisin'" sounds really thin, and the vocals are processed too much. Pretty much the same deal on "Kokomo." Terry Melcher's production reign with the band was, especially in retrospect, pretty poor.

The compositions on "Love You", most of them anyway (I could do without "Mona"), are leaps beyond those late 80s tracks. The studio arrangement on some of them kind of sucked the life out of them. Brian's 1976 piano demo tape is revelatory, and prove how amazing compositionally songs like "Let's Put Our Hearts Together", "I'll Bet He's Nice", and so on, are. I probably like those piano demos better than some of the studio versions.

[KDS]

I'd say "Getcha Back" and "Kokomo" and "Still Cruisin" are some of the weakest "new" songs on their respective albums.

I was going to say that I could understand not liking the unique production on "Love You", but the production on that mid-late 80s BB stuff isn't that great. "Summer In Paradise" was worse, but while "Getcha Back" is okay for 1985 (at least the drum samples sounds more like real drums), "Still Cruisin'" sounds really thin, and the vocals are processed too much. Pretty much the same deal on "Kokomo." Terry Melcher's production reign with the band was, especially in retrospect, pretty poor.

The compositions on "Love You", most of them anyway (I could do without "Mona"), are leaps beyond those late 80s tracks. The studio arrangement on some of them kind of sucked the life out of them. Brian's 1976 piano demo tape is revelatory, and prove how amazing compositionally songs like "Let's Put Our Hearts Together", "I'll Bet He's Nice", and so on, are. I probably like those piano demos better than some of the studio versions.

I'm not even going by production so much.  I'm going by material (although Kokomo might be the Beach Boys best produced track of the decade).   

I'm sorry, but I just think Getcha Back, Kokomo, & Still Cruisin are better songs. 

Again, one person's opinion. 

And it's funny, you singled out Mona, as that's actually one of my favorite LY songs.

[barto]

Summer's Gone is a better song in every aspect than Caroline, No.

I always figured not liking "Summer's Gone", or at least not loving it, was an unpopular opinion in and of itself.

I was kind of disappointed by it. It kind of meanders and doesn't move to its chord changes quickly enough. I've always felt it was the weakest song in the ending "suite" of songs. Not horrible. Good group vocals, poignant sound effects at the end. But as a composition, it's kind of bland musically.

HJ,

I'd agree that Summer's Gone is the weakest of the suite.  I really like Summer's Gone, but it's almost anti climatic after From There to Back Again and Pacific Coast Highway.  I even rank Strange World over Summer's Gone. 

Have to disagree. I find the chord progression to be beautiful and haunting, and like his work on pet sounds it is deceptively complex.

From the wind instruments to the gradual build of harmonies this song flows like a living organism behind the simple bass rhythm. I love the emotions and I always choke up when I hear it.

[thorgil]

In any other place, Summer's Gone would sound like the great song it is. Problem is it comes after two monster songs like From There to Back Again and Pacific Coast Highway. It's just not fair!

[KDS]

In any other place, Summer's Gone would sound like the great song it is. Problem is is comes after two monster songs like From There to Back Again and Pacific Coast Highway. It's just not fair!

That's pretty much how I feel about it. 

I do think it's a great song, but just happens to be the weakest of that trio.

[petsoundsnola]

If the order was Summers Gone - From There to Back Again - Pacific Coast Highway, that would make all the difference for me.

It may sound cheesy, but to me, hearing the Boys sing "Goodbye" together in harmony as their last word on their last album would have been a better closer, in my opinion.

[KDS]

If the order was Summers Gone - From There to Back Again - Pacific Coast Highway, that would make all the difference for me.

It may sound cheesy, but to me, hearing the Boys sing "Goodbye" together in harmony as their last word on their last album would have been a better closer, in my opinion.

That would've been pretty cool.  I could see PCH as a better album closer. 

[RangeRoverA1]

I don't like both "Summer's gone" & "Pacific coast highway", couldn't care less if they say "goodbye" & how *it* should've ended the album. "Change sequence & see, you may like the song" - that trick doesn't work with me, either.

"Mona" is throwaway, ditto "Ding Dang". If nobody stopped Brian, they would take up the space of both sides of LY. Not unlike "Shortenin' Bread".

[thorgil]

Pity "they" stopped Brian, then!