Counterbalance: The Beach Boys' 'SMiLE'

[Mikie]

Are Klinger and Mendelsohn full of crap or not?  

http://www.popmatters.com/post/183988-counterbalance-the-beach-boys-smile/

[Mike's Beard]

Well they make some good points with the artists they compare Brian to, Brian had moved so far from guitar based rock and roll by that point.

[guitarfool2002]

I was waiting for the obligatory music critic/writer name-check of a modern hip-hop artist to appear, since it so often does in these critic discussions and roundtables. I think I got just over 10 seconds into reading the thing before Kendrick Lamar came up.

No new ground, just some misinformation and a few gaps in the story. Opinions are a dime a dozen. I wish they had debated something more concrete and "discussable" about the project other than guessing whether or not the album would have been a hit had it been released on time. That's too hypothetical for me, there isn't much to go on either way. The one guy argues the point that it wouldn't be a hit without seeming to reference much of the actual music itself beyond the Heroes single.

[John Stivaktas]

Mendelsohn says, "SMiLE isn’t what music needed in 1967". Klinger seems to state that SMiLE would have taken over from Pet Sounds as the "American answer to the recording studio arms race that was happening at the time. It might have taken a while, but it would have happened." I think I concur more with Klinger on his opinions. SMiLE, like Pet Sounds is timeless music, a real statement, as was Wilson and Parks' original intention.

[guitarfool2002]

Great catch on the "isn't what music needed in 1967" line...I'd object loudly and profanely if anyone tried to use that line about any album or song or artist relative to 1967 or any other year for that matter. That's just the kind of thing which torpedoes what could be a good dialogue and sinks it into uninformed gems like that one being thrown out in the same columns where he somehow praises Kendrick Lamar for no reason whatsoever relative to the topic being discussed.

[Kurosawa]

Great catch on the "isn't what music needed in 1967" line...I'd object loudly and profanely if anyone tried to use that line about any album or song or artist relative to 1967 or any other year for that matter. That's just the kind of thing which torpedoes what could be a good dialogue and sinks it into uninformed gems like that one being thrown out in the same columns where he somehow praises Kendrick Lamar for no reason whatsoever relative to the topic being discussed.

Mentioning that guy is just some pathetic attempt to sound hip by mentioning a hip hop guy.

[guitarfool2002]

Great catch on the "isn't what music needed in 1967" line...I'd object loudly and profanely if anyone tried to use that line about any album or song or artist relative to 1967 or any other year for that matter. That's just the kind of thing which torpedoes what could be a good dialogue and sinks it into uninformed gems like that one being thrown out in the same columns where he somehow praises Kendrick Lamar for no reason whatsoever relative to the topic being discussed.

Mentioning that guy is just some pathetic attempt to sound hip by mentioning a hip hop guy.

Absolutely! The sad thing is that I've heard and read this same kind of thing with certain critics and music commentators for years, even some who I usually enjoy listening to and reading will lapse into that kind of name-checking schtick, or whatever we want to call it.

Bottom line, the only reason it seems to be in this discussion between these two is to show that 1. They listen to Kendrick Lamar and 2. They're cool enough to heap tons of praise on Kendrick Lamar. So what, right? Nothing to do with the topic at hand.

[Menace Wilson]

The "broadway" comment seems pretty clueless, though I enjoyed the Fitzcarraldo reference.

[Bicyclerider]

They talk about the BWPS sequence and suite arrangement being what would have been released in 67 which of course we know would not have been - although to be fair since no one can say exactly what Smile 66-67 would have been, perhaps talking about how the BWPS arrangement would have been received was all they could discuss.  If the 12 track had come out in April it may not have initially been successful but in the wake of Pepper it would have risen in critical and popular opinion.

[SenorPotatoHead]

There's absolutely no way of definitively saying how anything would have performed chart wise had it been released at some point in the past.   People use Pet Sounds relative disappointing sales to illustrate how Smile would have done, but Pet Sounds didn't actually do as badly as some would have it, and it was a total left turn from what the band had been doing previously, with little (or none) pre-readying of the public's perceptions.   By the time Smile would have been released the public already had GV to whet their appetites for "something different" and there was some media focus on the fact that the group was doing "something different".    Then there's the UK and Europe - where I firmly believe  the album would have been rapturously received.  In the USA?  Perhaps not as big as overseas, but still cannot see it, at the time, as being an out and out "dud".   That's my conjecture though, which is as correct (ie, not at all correct, because there's no way to know) as any other.  
As a side note:  I love the Beatles too, but I am so tired of hearing about "Pepper" - it was a fun, amazing achievement in recording at the time, but for crying out loud - it was a completely different animal to Smile, and in fact (or rather IMO) not even close to being the best album released that year of my birth (1967).  It had the biggest impact, at the time, of any other album, but that's because it was the Beatles and because nearly everyone feel over themselves to praise it.   I'm not saying it didn't and doesn't deserve its praise - just that it was a tad overblown.  

[edit]:  I will amend this by acknowledging that A Day In The Life is one of the all time greatest things ever committed to vinyl.   It's the one track that truly justifies Pepper.