Pet Sounds and POB Appreciation Thread

[retrokid67]

What are your favorite moments off of each of these albums?  Which album speaks to you guys the most?

[pixletwin]

Pet Sounds: The Quando sere/Aint found the right thing/People I know don't wanna be.... part is my favorite moment.

POB: Farewell My Friend. The whole song. It's difficult to write about the important things in life without being preachy or pretentious. Farewell My Friends is warm, thoughtful, and sentimental without being sappy.

Which one "speaks" to me the most depends upon my mood. Lately POB has been a go-to album for me.

[bluesno1fann]

Have to agree with Pixletwin on that it depends on the mood.

The thing is both albums are absolute masterpieces - in different ways. Pet Sounds is a more beautiful album, and is easily more complicated musically. But POB is stronger emotionally, it's more powerful, Dennis opening himself up.

To the question as to which album is better, I simply can't decide. And any other level-headed poster should agree.

As to my favourite songs off each album:

Pet Sounds: Don't Talk, God Only Knows, Caroline No
POB: River Song, Friday Night, Thoughts Of You

[Moon Dawg]

  POB was an album of choice for my girlfriend and me circa 1999- 2000 - a vinyl promo copy I bought used in 1985. After we parted ways in 2002 I had no way to play the record as I had no turntable. Maybe 2003 I managed to acquire an "unauthorized version" CD. This was a dark period for me. I'll never forget the cathartic tears that streamed down as the opening chords of "River Song" played. It hurt, but it was beautiful. RIP Dennis Wilson.

[Sheriff John Stone]

Favorite part of Pacific Ocean Blue: There are a few lines in "Time" where Dennis sings "I'm the kind of guy who loves to mess around, know a lot of women, but they don't fill my heart with love, completely free...oooh I love you, I really do..." It might be the most honest moment in any Dennis song, maybe any Beach Boys' song.

Favorite part of Pet Sounds: It might be the opening of "You Still Believe In Me" or maybe the entire song. When I first heard that song, it was one of those "we're not in Kansas anymore, Toto" moments. It was the beginning of something very different but I didn't know what at the time. This was no ordinary (or older style) Beach Boys' album.

I'm not copping out on your question, but they each touch me in different ways. Pacific Ocean Blue is almost entirely about love, or the loss of it. It touches my heart like no other album. It is raw emotion.

Brian has said many times that Pet Sounds "has a lot of love in it" and it does, no doubt about it. But, to me, it is a more spiritual album. Yes, it touches my heart, but in a different way than Pacific Ocean Blue. Pet Sounds also reaches my mind and my emotions, in a more cerebral way, if that makes any sense. Pet Sounds is almost a religious experience!

[CenturyDeprived]

Favorite part of Pacific Ocean Blue: There are a few lines in "Time" where Dennis sings "I'm the kind of guy who loves to mess around, know a lot of women, but they don't fill my heart with love, completely free...oooh I love you, I really do..." It might be the most honest moment in any Dennis song, maybe any Beach Boys' song.

+1.

[Magic Transistor Radio]

Pet Sounds: the bridge of Here Today, the whole of That's Not Me and Caroline, No

POB: River Song and Thoughts of You

Pacific Ocean Blue is by far more powerful emotionally to me.

[Jon Stebbins]

Ironic that the Beach Boys are considered such a "fun" and "sunny" band...and these two records have some of the most brutally and beautifully painful moments in recorded music history. To me Don't Talk (Put Your Head On My Shoulder) penetrates so deeply towards an initially hopeful, but ultimately hopeless place, where both the artist and listener know that any love this real, this deep, results in a raw and vulnerable reality that is bittersweet at best, and devastating at worst. I love it, it moves me, i know where Brian was when he created it...I've been there...I'm sure many of you have too. POB has that moment in Thoughts Of You...where... the sea air, is flowing through my room again, like the thoughts of you, fill my heart with joy again...I'm sorry...i miss you. ...The sweet, familiar sea air is fleeting, it comes and it goes, like the joyous moments of love, that fade, falter and turn to longing and regret...I'm sorry, i miss you, I f***ed up, It's damaged and gone. Brutal. Honest. Brilliant. We as fans are lucky the Wilsons are so tapped in to a spiritually honest realm. They are a pure conduit that gives us all a place to reflect, and to feel. Thanks Brian, Thanks Dennis.

[Micha]

Pet Sounds: The outro to GOK is so beautiful it sometimes hurts listening to it.

My favorite parts are that one, the bridge of Here Today, and the part of IJWMFTT between the first chorus and the second verse, with the woodblocks.

POB: I'd have to listen to it again first to see if I have a favorite moment there.

[JK]

"I'm Waiting For The Day" on PS, particularly the sections with the descending bass line-----wonderfully joyous stuff.
And the closing section of "Time" on POB----in a field of one (like Dennis, I suppose)...  

Which of the two albums? Sorry, permanently out on that one...

[Vega-Table Man]

You're all making me feel a need to sit and give POB a good, focused listen from start to finish. I've had it for years but admittedly have not sat down and given it my full attention, ever. I think I really need to do that.

[rab2591]

It's very much worth the listen. Also, if you haven't yet, watch The Real Beach Boy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ClBfaGPD0mI (with bonus comment from rockno1fan promoting the defunct petition). Made me appreciate POB a bit more. Plus, it's the best Beach Boys related documentary out there.
_______

Favorite moments from POB:

The entirety of River Song, the entirety of Moonshine, Friday Night intro, Thoughts of You lyrics ("the sea air is flowing through my room again, like the thoughts of you, fill my heart with joy again"), the entirety of Farewell My Friend.

Favorite moments from Pet Sounds:

Harmonies in WIBN, I Know There's An Answer chorus, a cappella break in Sloop John B, the entirety of LGAFA, entirety of IJWMFTT. Ya know, the whole album is a favorite moment for me.

I love both, but Pet Sounds definitely speaks to me the most. However, I have a feeling that as I get older I'll relate to POB more and more.

[Andrew G. Doe]

You're all making me feel a need to sit and give POB a good, focused listen from start to finish. I've had it for years but admittedly have not sat down and given it my full attention, ever. I think I really need to do that.

So, uh, exactly why did you buy it ? Missing a coaster ?

[Disney Boy (1985)]

You're all making me feel a need to sit and give POB a good, focused listen from start to finish. I've had it for years but admittedly have not sat down and given it my full attention, ever. I think I really need to do that.

So a near-mythical Beach Boys-related album is re-released after years languishing in obscurity, you go out and buy it, and then you don't really feel much of a desire to actually sit and listen to it...?

That's quite odd, isn't it?

[markcharles75]

Lot of personal responses so I'll go for it also:

Pet Sounds: favorite moments are too many to describe so I'll pick a few. The 1:21 mark of Lets Go Away For Awhile...that "cry" that occurs is just otherwordly. It literally takes me away: I just feel, hope and dream so many things with this song. I dream of peace, a perfect love and a Sunday afternoon drive with a girl who I'll probably never meet. The ending of Caroline No: the outro melody with the trains ending it all. Its my favorite song of all time but I hardly listen to it. From time to time I'll put it on. But its still my favorite piece of music because I'll never ever forget how I felt when I first heard it. Thanks Brian

POB: probably Thoughts Of You. As with Moon Dawg, I too shared this album with a girl I was involved with back circa 2002 and whom I loved. I'll never forget holding her in my arms as we listened to this masterpiece. I am glad I had that experience in life. I cannot even bear to think of it sometimes. Thanks Dennis

[Vega-Table Man]

So, uh, exactly why did you buy it ? Missing a coaster ?

I didn't buy it. Received it as a gift, loaded it into iTunes, enjoyed the occasional track that's come up during iPod shuffling, but just never got around to playing it all the way through as an album.

So a near-mythical Beach Boys-related album is re-released after years languishing in obscurity, you go out and buy it, and then you don't really feel much of a desire to actually sit and listen to it...?

That's quite odd, isn't it?

I suppose it would be, yes.

[SMiLE Brian]

I am in the same boat as vega-table man, never really got all the hoopla over POB. Love You is where it is at for me.

[stack-o-tracks]

Hmmm how to word this.... I think Pet Sounds is the better album, but the music on Pacific Ocean Blue speaks to me more. I jive more with its style, I suppose.

[bluesno1fann]

Hmmm how to word this.... I think Pet Sounds is the better album, but the music on Pacific Ocean Blue speaks to me more. I jive more with its style, I suppose.

I honestly think that neither is better than one another. At the end, it comes down to which album speaks to you more, which is the point of this thread.

[Gabo]

I would never call POB bad, but it's not my style of music.

[alf wiedersehen]

POB certainly isn't bad, but it is nowhere close to being the album that Pet Sounds is.
It just isn't.

[Niko]

The first run of songs of POB is devastating, but it loses steam towards the end.

[SMiLE Brian]

Pet Sounds really moves me on an emotional level like no other piece of music.

[retrokid67]

I think it depends on taste too.  I listen to Pet Sounds when I want to hear beautiful music (favorites being GOK and Wouldn't it be Nice). POB is what I listen to when I want to be moved (and I love the fact that Denny picked sort of random people to play on it and it sounded so good)  and of course the pain in his voice is just... wow

for the people who can't decide between the two, I started the vote count over for you  

[bluesno1fann]

I think it depends on taste too.  I listen to Pet Sounds when I want to hear beautiful music (favorites being GOK and Wouldn't it be Nice). POB is what I listen to when I want to be moved (and I love the fact that Denny picked sort of random people to play on it and it sounded so good)  and of course the pain in his voice is just... wow

for the people who can't decide between the two, I started the vote count over for you  

Agreed. As I've said, Pet Sounds is more beautiful and musically complex. But POB is far more emotional, powerful and sad.

Love both, can't live without either. And to Vega-Table Man and SMiLE Brian, give POB another chance!