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Author Topic: Is Sunflower actually overrated? Defend the album.  (Read 14118 times)
scooby1970
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« Reply #100 on: August 29, 2013, 06:37:17 AM »

Sunflower is in no way overrated. It's full of exceptional songs, great signing and melodies that put The Beach Boys back on top of their game. I love the album, always have, and it is indeed up there with Pet Sounds as one of the great albums of all time.

Smiley Mark
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Bean Bag
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« Reply #101 on: August 29, 2013, 08:51:11 AM »

Desper was great at making the harmonies really pop out, but I'll agree that way the vocals are EQ'd makes them sound thinner - precisely because certain frequencies are purposefully repressed. At times, such as on the tag of "This Whole World", I believe it also gave the vocals a slightly mechanical and overly sharp sound. It's a little too artificial.

I remember reading (from the 2000 liners?) that they recorded Sunflower in a natural, real stereo fashion.  Meaning, I assume, something like two mics in an open room, or something, to more simulate a binaural sound-field.

Anyway... I think we need a nice audiophile remastering of Sunflower, to fully appreciate the work/effort made by the engineers.  The 2000 remaster sounds a little congested, and the 2012 remaster just brightened it up with more treble and slightly better/clearer sonics.
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Alan Smith
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« Reply #102 on: August 29, 2013, 11:15:24 PM »

whats the story with cottonfields?...... why did they not include it on the US version..... was it not big in US???....

also, do people think it adds to the album? or detracts?......

I have heard it all my life without, and thinking with it included, sounds like a record company move..... throw in a hit to sell the album....

are there more specifics??

RickB

Top Ten UK hit but bombed in the US.

This is also a guess/speculation, so happy to be corrected - as we know Cottonfields was a Capitol records release in the US, while Sunflower was Reprise/Warners.

However, the UK releases of both were through EMI (licensing the Capitol lable for CF, and licensing Sunflower and releasing on the Stateside label), so the ownership rights may have allowed for the inclusion of the former on the latter.  

Wish they'd used the mono version instead of the fake stereo version tho.

Thanks Alan for that........I didn't even think about the Capitol/Warner-Reprise label thing......

Cheers,

RickB

Rick - I was wadding through an older thread earlier and found a post from Alan Boyd about the Cottonfields inclusion, here's the relevant highlight (a link to the full post is below):

"...COTTON FIELDS was never intended to be included on an album, although EMI - which had distribution rights in Europe for the first two Brother Records albums on their Stateside label - saw fit to add the song to their initial release of SUNFLOWER, and somebody at Stateside took a mono single master, made it duophonic (yecch) and it appeared as the first song on side one of the European Stateside Records SUNFLOWER."

http://smileysmile.net/board/index.php/topic,1203.msg26330.html#msg26330
« Last Edit: August 30, 2013, 12:01:41 AM by Alan Smith » Logged

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SonicVolcano
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« Reply #103 on: August 29, 2013, 11:34:30 PM »

Forever, while a great song obviously, could have been so much better if it was recorded in the same quality as This Whole World, Slip On Through or It's About Time for example. Its production somehow always bugs me.
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Pinder's Gone To Kokomo And Back Again
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« Reply #104 on: August 29, 2013, 11:56:50 PM »

It really seems like The Beach Boys can hardly do a damn thing right by so many of their fans..........
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Amazing Larry
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« Reply #105 on: August 30, 2013, 12:03:13 AM »

Forever, while a great song obviously, could have been so much better if it was recorded in the same quality as This Whole World, Slip On Through or It's About Time for example. Its production somehow always bugs me.
It was one of the first recorded, so it would have been on 8-track, so I'd imagine there were a couple reduction mixes done.
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« Reply #106 on: August 30, 2013, 01:06:55 AM »

It really seems like The Beach Boys can hardly do a damn thing right by so many of their fans..........
No kidding, Sunflower is one of the best albums ever made. I understand debating the later stuff, I understand some songs are better than others or appeal to different tastes. Myself though, I mostly see 1961-73 as a goldmine that keeps giving.
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Disney Boy (1985)
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« Reply #107 on: August 30, 2013, 04:13:03 AM »

It really seems like The Beach Boys can hardly do a damn thing right by so many of their fans..........

I love - LOVE!!!! - pretty much every single album from 1963 - 1979 (with 15 Big Ones and MIU being the only ones I merely quite like). With some Smiley Smiler's I do often find myself thinking, "Are you sure you actually like this band at all...Huh?"
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drbeachboy
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« Reply #108 on: August 30, 2013, 08:06:26 AM »

It really seems like The Beach Boys can hardly do a damn thing right by so many of their fans..........

I love - LOVE!!!! - pretty much every single album from 1963 - 1979 (with 15 Big Ones and MIU being the only ones I merely quite like). With some Smiley Smiler's I do often find myself thinking, "Are you sure you actually like this band at all...Huh?"
I thought this from the first day that I came here.There are quite a few in here that think nothing was great except for Pet Sounds and Smile. You know you're a real fan when you can find redeeming value in SIP. Smiley
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The Brianista Prayer

Oh Brian
Thou Art In Hawthorne,
Harmonied Be Thy name
Your Kingdom Come,
Your Steak Well Done,
On Stage As It Is In Studio,
Give Us This Day, Our Shortenin' Bread
And Forgive Us Our Bootlegs,
As We Also Have Forgiven Our Wife And Managers,
And Lead Us Not Into Kokomo,
But Deliver Us From Mike Love.
Amen.  ---hypehat
Disney Boy (1985)
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« Reply #109 on: August 30, 2013, 08:14:02 AM »

It really seems like The Beach Boys can hardly do a damn thing right by so many of their fans..........

I love - LOVE!!!! - pretty much every single album from 1963 - 1979 (with 15 Big Ones and MIU being the only ones I merely quite like). With some Smiley Smiler's I do often find myself thinking, "Are you sure you actually like this band at all...Huh?"
I thought this from the first day that I came here.There are quite a few in here that think nothing was great except for Pet Sounds and Smile. You know you're a real fan when you can find redeeming value in SIP. Smiley

I absolutely love the title track!! Love it. Great song. I was over the moon to see it's (live) inclusion on MIC.
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Summer_Days
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« Reply #110 on: August 30, 2013, 10:04:55 AM »

It really seems like The Beach Boys can hardly do a damn thing right by so many of their fans..........

I do think 15 Big Ones, M.I.U., Still Cruisin' and SIP are bad albums. I do think BB85 and KTSA are lackluster. Despite that, there are songs on 15BO, M.I.U., KTSA and BB85 that I think are quite good. Not really so with SC and SIP, but hey.

But I love every BBs album from 1962 until 1973, and I of course really think Love You is amazing and LA Light Album is decent and all I've heard from TWGMTR so far is great...I dunno what kind of fan that makes me.
 
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drbeachboy
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« Reply #111 on: August 30, 2013, 10:43:12 AM »

Whether you actually like it makes no difference, but Kokomo is a quality song from SC.
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The Brianista Prayer

Oh Brian
Thou Art In Hawthorne,
Harmonied Be Thy name
Your Kingdom Come,
Your Steak Well Done,
On Stage As It Is In Studio,
Give Us This Day, Our Shortenin' Bread
And Forgive Us Our Bootlegs,
As We Also Have Forgiven Our Wife And Managers,
And Lead Us Not Into Kokomo,
But Deliver Us From Mike Love.
Amen.  ---hypehat
Summer_Days
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« Reply #112 on: August 30, 2013, 11:21:47 AM »

'Kokomo' is the best original song on Still Cruisin', absolutely. And I can think of quite a few other BBs songs that I like less than 'Kokomo'.
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Wouldn't it be nice if we were older, then we wouldn't have to wait so long
And wouldn't it be nice to live together, in the kind of world where we belong?
http://wildsmiley.weebly.com
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