Brian's Book Discussion Thread.

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

Thanks for that.

Reading I Am Brian Wilson is like having a conversation with Brian Wilson.

In fact, it's more like having a conversation with Brian Wilson than having an actual conversation with him.

That is a GREAT opening statement.

[MyDrKnowsItKeepsMeCalm]

A good review to check out:

http://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/music/brian-wilsons-new-memoir-delves-inside-the-mind-of-the-oft-tortured-genius-8734560

Excellent!

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

Bumping this

[rn57]

Any news yet about Brian's signing at Book Soup in LA? I gotta figure it was quite the contrast to Mike's DC signing that I described in the thread for his book. "Remember Brian will only be signing his book, no memorabilia." By contrast it looked like Mike was up for signing just about anything. I should've brought a couple CDs for him to put the old John Hancock on.

[NOLA BB Fan]

There's a nice photo on his FB page of Brian and daughter Daria at the signing.

[Matt H]

Does anyone know if it hit the NYT Best Seller list like Mike's did?

[Matt Bielewicz]

...I'll address Speeches/Goin Bald in a bit.

Say, guitarfool, I was looking forward to coming back to this point, and keep looking back in every couple of days to see if you're 'there'.

Is it 'in a bit' yet? 

No worries if not - I haven't had a chance to come back to leetwall97 yet, either... busy busy and all that...

Will be interested to see what you have to say, though...

[southbay]

 

There's a nice photo on his FB page of Brian and daughter Daria at the signing.

yes, I was there last night.  Big crowd, so they really hurried us through like cattle.  They were true to their word--books only.  But, and stop the presses here--I got one question in and it is now absolutely confirmed.  "Sensitive Music For Sensitive People" will in fact feature..."Proud Mary". 

[RangeRoverA1]

There's a nice photo on his FB page of Brian and daughter Daria at the signing.

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

There's a nice photo on his FB page of Brian and daughter Daria at the signing.

yes, I was there last night.  Big crowd, so they really hurried us through like cattle.  They were true to their word--books only.  But, and stop the presses here--I got one question in and it is now absolutely confirmed.  "Sensitive Music For Sensitive People" will in fact feature..."Proud Mary". 

Awesome! !!!

[pixletwin]

Got my copy yesterday and darn it if I didn't make it all the way to page 184 by 12:30 am. I had a hard time  putting it down. It sure does pull a sharp contrast in tone with Mike's book (which I liked as well).

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

Yeah I finished it in two days and ended up re-reading it.


Very addicitive.

[JimC1702]

I've slowed down because I only have a few pages left and don't want it to end.  Love the book.  Brian has a fantastic sense of humor. 

[Scaroline No]

I've slowed down because I only have a few pages left and don't want it to end.  Love the book.  Brian has a fantastic sense of humor. 

It was the same for me. I read the bulk of it in two days but then left the last chapter for a third day because it felt like he and I were hanging out, and I didn't want him to go home!

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

I've slowed down because I only have a few pages left and don't want it to end.  Love the book.  Brian has a fantastic sense of humor. 

It was the same for me. I read the bulk of it in two days but then left the last chapter for a third day because it felt like he and I were hanging out, and I didn't want him to go home!

That was a great analogy...that's how it felt to me. Kinda like sitting on the porch chilling and shooting the breeze with Uncle Brian.

[Ian]

I like it a lot too. It's clear that greenman really got Brian and therefore where Brian ends and greenman begins remains subtle as it should be in a celebrity autobiography. That's why Brian's first book was such a disappointment. They made no effort to really disguise the fact that Landry was doing most of the talking. Whereas this book sounds like the Brian we know having an intimate chat with us. I like the fact that it jumps around a lot because I tend to imagine that that is what Brian would be like to talk to

[Custom Machine]

Brian states that David Anderle was involved in setting up Brother Records with Warner/Reprise in 1970 - is that correct?  I thought his involvement was limited to the 67 Brother deal with Capital that was relatively short-lived.

I was also surprised to read that. My assumption is that Brian's co-author/researcher Ben Greenman got his time periods confused and mistakenly wrote that Anderle was responsible for setting up Brother Records for Warner/Reprise in 1970.

[guitarfool2002]

Spin Magazine review gets it:

http://www.spin.com/featured/brian-wilsons-memoir-brings-a-boomer-icon-down-to-earth/

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

That was a great review.

[You Kane, You Commanded, You Conquered]

That was a great review.

Indeed.

[guitarfool2002]

...I'll address Speeches/Goin Bald in a bit.

Say, guitarfool, I was looking forward to coming back to this point, and keep looking back in every couple of days to see if you're 'there'.

Is it 'in a bit' yet?  

No worries if not - I haven't had a chance to come back to leetwall97 yet, either... busy busy and all that...

Will be interested to see what you have to say, though...

Not the full rundown, but to sum up I think sometimes the Smile speculations need to start or pause even with a deep cleansing breath. If I'm walking down the street with someone, and we spot a coin on the sidewalk, what if the other person says "That coin fell out of an airplane I saw flying overhead 5 minutes ago, the pilot must have tossed it out of the cockpit window." All I know is that a coin is on the sidewalk. Is the speculation in and of itself wrong? I don't know. All I have in front of me is a coin on the sidewalk. It could have been tossed from a car. It could have been dropped by someone walking on the sidewalk. Why did they drop it, do they know they dropped it, etc etc etc.

We know what Speeches was and what She's Goin Bald was. We know how Speeches was tried and put on the backburner on the original Smile sessions. We know "Bald" was the reworking of it that was on Smiley Smile. We also know Brian - as is also the case with 99.9% of all songwriters - would create music from ideas, and sometimes revisit, rework, and reuse them. That's what he did here.

We know courtesy of Stephen Desper just about everything we could want to know about the ELTRO, from the exact technical details to how it was used to how it even came to be hauled into the Smiley sessions in the first place. And we even know thanks to his tip where to listen for the ELTRO machine basically crapping out audibly as its limitations were pushed to the edge of what it could do and how it was being pushed for the effects on "Bald". That's the really, REALLY good stuff that the best engineers like Stephen can shed light on, decades after the fact.

We also know there were multiple songs considered for the Smile project in the early 2000's. Some made the cut, some did not. I could name a few, but I'm guessing that's been knowledge circulating for 13 years or so. This one did not make the cut.

To go so far beyond what is actually known, and spin all kinds of possibilities out of the same logic that said a pilot threw a coin found laying on a random sidewalk to me can be a disservice to the whole deal. A lot of it seems geared toward personal reasons of ways to build another fan (re: fantasy) mix, or just all kinds of ways to take a hammer to that square peg so it fits into a round hole.

If Brian was asked about this particular song, and he started commenting on his memories of it, that's what's in the book. Is or was there more to what he said, perhaps even more to the story? Maybe. But what is there now is not so radically "off" that it sends fanmixers back to the editing software to start hammering that square peg into another place. Nor does it suggest Bald/Speeches was anything more than what it actually is, as shown in 1967, 2004, 2012, and again in 2016. Whatever it *was* or may have been, it wasn't used.

Is it an interesting take on it via the book, how it may have been considered for some kind of live performance within the Smile tour situation? Yes. But it was not used. Brian remembered the ELTRO, and had his memory of the limitations on live performance. Stephen Desper spelled it out in great (and fascinating) detail through his writings, including this board. He is a genius engineer - I would rather focus on what he wrote from the technical and precise detail side, I would rather read Brian's thoughts on the music in terms of '67 and again in the early 2000's context since he actually imagined/created/wrote the music in the first place, rather than using a sentence or two in a book to launch into a whole litany of speculations and even possibilities being stated as "this is how it was" types of statements.

That's just me.  

Seriously though, the real meat and potatoes technical info on the ELTRO itself can be found in Stephen Desper's writings, and I would highly recommend anyone with a technical interest in the recording gear aspects of all this to type "ELTRO" into this board's search function and read pretty much everything you want to know about that piece of gear and how it was used in 1967.

[guitarfool2002]

Spin published a great review, kudos to them. The writer connected with the book, and "got it". The evidence I saw of that which jumped out of the review was in the passages quoted and commented on, I'd have most if not all of those examples on my own list if asked what were some of the parts of the book key to understanding what it was all about.

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

Craig...when you read it for the first time, what part jumped out at you the most?

[guitarfool2002]

Quick aside: The legendary/mysterious ELTRO, photo courtesy the group watermarked on the photo. (The 'GA' logo on the unit's panel stands for Gotham Audio, who sold and distributed the ELTRO in the mid 60's)

[guitarfool2002]

Craig...when you read it for the first time, what part jumped out at you the most?

The book or the Spin review? 

For real though, I'd say it was any number of the vignettes and stories about Brian that no one outside of Brian and those who were there with him have heard. That - or should I say those - are the paints that really go into painting the portrait, all the details and descriptions and memories of things that happened as part of everyday life. It's the dose of pure reality versus mythology, it's the living and breathing daily unfolding of events versus timelines and fact-checking detail that humanizes the whole thing. It's a reality apart from the fanbase and whatever expectations and assumptions have been built up.

Favorite parts like that? Too numerous to name. The Magic Johnson encounter to me was one of the highlights. It was, as told in the book, as simple and as nonchalant as everyday mundane activity for them to happen to be in the same place at the same time, unplanned and totally random, and just say hi to each other. Fans of both would see or be a part of a scene like this and a lot would freak out. These two greats simply did what they did and kept going. Pretty cool. "Hey Magic!"