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Author Topic: Would Terry Melcher still be working with the band?  (Read 3243 times)
CenturyDeprived
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« on: October 30, 2016, 09:34:12 AM »

If he had not passed away in such an untimely manner, would Terry Melcher still be producing material for the band, or collaborating with them in some capacity? I wonder if there would have been a Bruce & Terry reunion, with Don't Run Away being  performed at an M&B show?  (Speaking of which, did Terry ever perform on stage with the band during his lifetime?)

I wonder if the mega failure of SIP was really the nail in the coffin for his continued work with the band. Despite the fact that most of that album is lame (especially the production), I kinda dig Terry's production style with the band on Somewhere Near Japan (with some Byrds-esque touches), and other late '80s BB tunes. Even Kokomo's production isn't too bad for the era, IMO.

What does everyone think? I wonder how TWGMTR would have sounded with Terry instead of Joe. Would Terry have gone Autotune happy too?
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rn57
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« Reply #1 on: October 30, 2016, 10:18:26 AM »

Hard to say what Terry might be doing in 2016 were he still here - except that he could still have been working with his mother's foundation for animals in some way. That took up a lot of his time from the 1980s until his final illness.

The fact is, after his Equinox label closed up in '76 or so, he did very little outside of working with the BBs that was music-related, so it's not easy to picture him, say, working with bands or singers emerging from social media or such.

That said, it would have been interesting had he been involved with TWGMTR....
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« Reply #2 on: October 30, 2016, 10:19:14 AM »

I think Melcher was way past his sell-by date artistically by the time he worked with the band. Definitely think he would have been auto-tune happy; heck, his production already sounded thin and plastick-y by that point anyway.
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« Reply #3 on: October 30, 2016, 11:04:21 AM »

They tried to duplicate the success of Kokomo by giving the band that "new sound" which worked on Kokomo, only the same market forces mixed with the required dumb luck necessary many times to have a hit record were not there several years later. The sound they tried to use on SIP was not embraced by the public. And I know it's been a controversial statement in the past, but SIP did not have a box office smash of a film with a major star associated with it to drive the songs on SIP. And was there anything on the SIP album as catchy and as radio and MTV friendly as Kokomo? Any out of the box smash hits on SIP that would grab the public's attention?

Melcher was brought in to recapture the lightning in a bottle that drove Kokomo, and he gave them the similar sounds that I guess were asked of him, but the scenario was different and the songs weren't as catchy.
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« Reply #4 on: October 30, 2016, 11:08:04 AM »

They tried to duplicate the success of Kokomo by giving the band that "new sound" which worked on Kokomo, only the same market forces mixed with the required dumb luck necessary many times to have a hit record were not there several years later. The sound they tried to use on SIP was not embraced by the public. And I know it's been a controversial statement in the past, but SIP did not have a box office smash of a film with a major star associated with it to drive the songs on SIP. And was there anything on the SIP album as catchy and as radio and MTV friendly as Kokomo? Any out of the box smash hits on SIP that would grab the public's attention?

Melcher was brought in to recapture the lightning in a bottle that drove Kokomo, and he gave them the similar sounds that I guess were asked of him, but the scenario was different and the songs weren't as catchy.
"Somewhere Near Japan" could've been a great followup single to Kokomo but was stupidly released in a different mix/arrangement as the far superior album version. If it had been released in that forum, it would've done reasonably well, and then SIP's "Strange Things Happen" would've been the perfect lead single for SIP.
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« Reply #5 on: October 30, 2016, 12:17:59 PM »

The local Oldies station played their version of "Under the Boardwalk" yesterday...lol.... I'm surprised they even KNEW about that one...
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« Reply #6 on: October 30, 2016, 02:00:06 PM »

Regardless of its merits or lack thereof, SIP was not gonna sell based upon its distribution alone.  Very minor label.  SIP always gets blamed for bankrupting that label, but it must have been very weak to start with if that happened.  I had never heard of it before and right now, can't remember its name.  Take the weakest stuff off and replace it with three or four more good tunes, and it would at least been serviceable though.  Too many re-makes too.  Entire group, including Brian, were in a bad place back then....
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« Reply #7 on: October 30, 2016, 02:05:51 PM »

Did Melcher work with the band at all after Summer in Paradise?

I think it's easy to blame Melcher for that horrible late '80s-early '90s Beach Boys sound, but I would assume (hope?) that if he had worked with the group subsequently that his tastes may have evolved. After all, he produced some good sounding Byrds records and stuff in the '60s-'70s.

I doubt any modern day work with the group would be any worse from a production standpoint than anything Joe Thomas had his hands on (though some Thomas tracks admittedly have a lighter touch than others). After all, Stars and Stripes sounds terrible, though I suppose that it could be considered more "tasteful" (this was also 4 years later, however). Then again, it's hard to think of a worse sound than Summer in Paradise.
« Last Edit: October 30, 2016, 02:56:49 PM by DonnyL » Logged

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« Reply #8 on: October 30, 2016, 03:41:18 PM »

Terry's production cred was solid, Byrds, Raiders, some great mid to late 60's singles were his work. Part of what I think happened was he became more dedicated to working with and for his mom Doris Day, on her TV career, music, and just in general producing and working for her more than in the rock scene. But he definitely had the skills, his resume of rock records in the 60's proves it.

I'll say again, I think Terry delivered exactly what he was hired to do, which was try to capture the fluke of Kokomo again, and it just wasn't in the cards. For one thing, music in 1988/89 was different than the music biz of 1992, let's say. Not just grunge, but a general rejection of a lot of the overly synth'ed up productions and anything that sounded like it came from that style of making records. With rock fans, I'll mention Nevermind but there were more, like Matthew Sweet's "Girlfriend" which was also recorded with an early version of ProTools yet sounded more like "Revolver"...and fans were buying that kind of back to basic sound.

Plus, I have to say this too, the audience for Beach Boys music was starting to become seriously segmented by the time SIP hit the stores. That first Pet Sounds CD release changed the game. It led to a lot of people, in their 20's and especially musicians, getting into what Brian was doing in the 60's with a renewed and different interest. I remember it well, I was one of them too. And then there was the Smile stuff getting more and more underground buzz and cred, and the Beach Boys as of that time were trying to make a whole record that sounded like Kokomo. It just wasn't good timing. The results prove that to some extent. And the GV box set brought it home across the board. The best Mike could do was give away copies of SIP for free on QVC for people buying the box set as a package deal. There was simply no interest or traction.
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« Reply #9 on: October 30, 2016, 08:44:09 PM »

Terry's production cred was solid, Byrds, Raiders, some great mid to late 60's singles were his work. Part of what I think happened was he became more dedicated to working with and for his mom Doris Day, on her TV career, music, and just in general producing and working for her more than in the rock scene. But he definitely had the skills, his resume of rock records in the 60's proves it.

I'll say again, I think Terry delivered exactly what he was hired to do, which was try to capture the fluke of Kokomo again, and it just wasn't in the cards. For one thing, music in 1988/89 was different than the music biz of 1992, let's say. Not just grunge, but a general rejection of a lot of the overly synth'ed up productions and anything that sounded like it came from that style of making records. With rock fans, I'll mention Nevermind but there were more, like Matthew Sweet's "Girlfriend" which was also recorded with an early version of ProTools yet sounded more like "Revolver"...and fans were buying that kind of back to basic sound.

Plus, I have to say this too, the audience for Beach Boys music was starting to become seriously segmented by the time SIP hit the stores. That first Pet Sounds CD release changed the game. It led to a lot of people, in their 20's and especially musicians, getting into what Brian was doing in the 60's with a renewed and different interest. I remember it well, I was one of them too. And then there was the Smile stuff getting more and more underground buzz and cred, and the Beach Boys as of that time were trying to make a whole record that sounded like Kokomo. It just wasn't good timing. The results prove that to some extent. And the GV box set brought it home across the board. The best Mike could do was give away copies of SIP for free on QVC for people buying the box set as a package deal. There was simply no interest or traction.

I find it interesting how the song Somewhere Near Japan has some very Byrds-like  production touches with the guitars. While not a perfect production by any means, I think it shows that he was trying to capture a retro sound with a modern  update, and I kind of dug it.  

It's interesting to think of what went wrong between that song and SIP that followed  to cause things to fall off the rails with the production sound. I guess it was a combination of SIP being rushed to completion, and growing pains of trying to figure out the brand-new way of nonlinear digital editing.  

It strikes me as highly ironic that nonlinear digital editing  is regularly discussed as the thing that Brian apparently would have needed so desperately in order to finish his masterpiece 25 years earlier, but the minute the band had that very technology at its disposal, the result was so poor.

I still have a hunch that under the right circumstances, which only partially arose in glimpses on a few songs, that Terry could have made The BBs sound awesome, even in the digital age.
« Last Edit: October 30, 2016, 08:44:49 PM by CenturyDeprived » Logged
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« Reply #10 on: October 31, 2016, 10:44:21 AM »

Good question. Terry died in 2004, a good dozen years after SIP, so one might think the ship had sailed away like a boat in Lahaina Aloha. Mike speaks highly of Terry as a friend in his book, and Bruce and Terry were best buds to the end, so could they have collaborated further? I for one, have enjoyed most of the Love/Melcher catalogue.

I remember someone, (Bruce perhaps) saying Terry didn't like performing live. Did he ever sit in on any live shows? Is there any unreleased material form the SIP sessions? What about the B&T work that showed up on Dorris' album a few years back, was there additional material that Terry and Bruce worked on from that era?
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« Reply #11 on: October 31, 2016, 11:23:45 AM »

I think Terry Melcher got good vocals out of the band on SIP, and the title track, especially the version with Roger McGuinn makes that CD a keeper. If the two versions of the title track were to surface on another comp, I think I could live without the album. What killed it for me was the brash drum sound, sounded like a drum machine, but IIRC it was live drumming. Oh well...
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« Reply #12 on: October 31, 2016, 12:41:55 PM »

It's sad that the group didn't put together a complete album in 1989 instead of giving us Still Cruisin'. And it's too bad they went back to Capitol, who were just hoping to catch some residual Kokomo sales, instead of a label that really believed in them as a contemporary album. The singles from SC got next to no promotion, I suppose Capitol figured they'd sell themselves. How do you go from #1 all over the world to #99 with an anchor on the Hot 100? Still Cruisin' should have at least dented the bottom of the top 40 (it was top 10 on the AC chart), and Somewhere Near Japan could have easily been another decent sized hit. By the time SIP came out, the wave had passed on that style of music and production.
I'm surprised Terry never went back to work with Mark Lindsay. The 2 had nothing but praise for each other in later years. Lindsay did one cd, Looking For Shelter, that had a very 80's sound to it (recorded in 1989/90, not released until 2004).
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« Reply #13 on: November 04, 2016, 01:08:10 PM »

Gary Usher's take on Terry Melcher in the 1986 timeframe as described in the various iterations of the "Wilson Project/Tapes" books is interesting.

My recollection is that Usher had the impression that Melcher had a fair amount of ambition to be *the* producer for the band in the late 80s, and Usher understood how someone else (Usher) vying for that role would be an awkward situation when they all had to work together a little bit on something like the 25th Anniversary TV special.

In a weird way, I see Melcher, in his iterations working with the BBs, as a bit like Joe Thomas. I don't think either of those guys had a particularly great production "sound" in their respective eras, but both seemed to be attuned to a reasonable degree of catchy melodies and catchy chord changes.

The best thing Melcher ever did for the band were his handful of good *musical* bits (not lyrics so much, which were presumably usually mostly Mike) he brought into tracks like "Lahaina Aloha" and "Strange Things Happen."

His actual production has never impressed me much. His stuff usually sounded pretty thin and kind of tinny, though perhaps a lot of that had to do with the era (1986-1993 or so). "Rock and Roll to the Rescue" is, production wise, kind of embarrassing. "California Dreamin'" is okay, though that was working from a recording made without Melcher in 1982. Melcher's stuff on "Still Cruisin'" is musically usually not bad, but the production again is usually thin and limp. "Somewhere Near Japan" is about as beefy of a production sound as he seemed to ever get.

"Summer in Paradise" I've long said is perhaps the worst *sounding* album the band did in terms of production, mixing, and mastering. It makes the '85 album sound warm and analog in comparison. Not sure how much of SIP's awful tone and sound was due to the drum sequencers, how much was production itself, and how much was the very early use of computer-based digital recording/ProTools.

I would imagine the main reason Melcher didn't work much with any of the band after 1993 or so is that they weren't recording much of anything. The failure of SIP certainly didn't help Melcher's cred either.
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« Reply #14 on: November 05, 2016, 12:58:15 PM »

Gary Usher's take on Terry Melcher in the 1986 timeframe as described in the various iterations of the "Wilson Project/Tapes" books is interesting.

My recollection is that Usher had the impression that Melcher had a fair amount of ambition to be *the* producer for the band in the late 80s, and Usher understood how someone else (Usher) vying for that role would be an awkward situation when they all had to work together a little bit on something like the 25th Anniversary TV special.

In a weird way, I see Melcher, in his iterations working with the BBs, as a bit like Joe Thomas. I don't think either of those guys had a particularly great production "sound" in their respective eras, but both seemed to be attuned to a reasonable degree of catchy melodies and catchy chord changes.

The best thing Melcher ever did for the band were his handful of good *musical* bits (not lyrics so much, which were presumably usually mostly Mike) he brought into tracks like "Lahaina Aloha" and "Strange Things Happen."

His actual production has never impressed me much. His stuff usually sounded pretty thin and kind of tinny, though perhaps a lot of that had to do with the era (1986-1993 or so). "Rock and Roll to the Rescue" is, production wise, kind of embarrassing. "California Dreamin'" is okay, though that was working from a recording made without Melcher in 1982. Melcher's stuff on "Still Cruisin'" is musically usually not bad, but the production again is usually thin and limp. "Somewhere Near Japan" is about as beefy of a production sound as he seemed to ever get.

"Summer in Paradise" I've long said is perhaps the worst *sounding* album the band did in terms of production, mixing, and mastering. It makes the '85 album sound warm and analog in comparison. Not sure how much of SIP's awful tone and sound was due to the drum sequencers, how much was production itself, and how much was the very early use of computer-based digital recording/ProTools.

I would imagine the main reason Melcher didn't work much with any of the band after 1993 or so is that they weren't recording much of anything. The failure of SIP certainly didn't help Melcher's cred either.
Melcher, like a lot of producers and artists from the 60's, fell head first into the love of synths and drum machines in the 80's. Mark Lindsay's "Looking For Shelter" sounds nothing like the great records he made with Melcher and the Raiders in the 60's. To my ears, it sounds like The Fixx meets Robert Palmer.
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CenturyDeprived
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« Reply #15 on: November 05, 2016, 01:09:23 PM »

Gary Usher's take on Terry Melcher in the 1986 timeframe as described in the various iterations of the "Wilson Project/Tapes" books is interesting.

My recollection is that Usher had the impression that Melcher had a fair amount of ambition to be *the* producer for the band in the late 80s, and Usher understood how someone else (Usher) vying for that role would be an awkward situation when they all had to work together a little bit on something like the 25th Anniversary TV special.

In a weird way, I see Melcher, in his iterations working with the BBs, as a bit like Joe Thomas. I don't think either of those guys had a particularly great production "sound" in their respective eras, but both seemed to be attuned to a reasonable degree of catchy melodies and catchy chord changes.

The best thing Melcher ever did for the band were his handful of good *musical* bits (not lyrics so much, which were presumably usually mostly Mike) he brought into tracks like "Lahaina Aloha" and "Strange Things Happen."

His actual production has never impressed me much. His stuff usually sounded pretty thin and kind of tinny, though perhaps a lot of that had to do with the era (1986-1993 or so). "Rock and Roll to the Rescue" is, production wise, kind of embarrassing. "California Dreamin'" is okay, though that was working from a recording made without Melcher in 1982. Melcher's stuff on "Still Cruisin'" is musically usually not bad, but the production again is usually thin and limp. "Somewhere Near Japan" is about as beefy of a production sound as he seemed to ever get.

"Summer in Paradise" I've long said is perhaps the worst *sounding* album the band did in terms of production, mixing, and mastering. It makes the '85 album sound warm and analog in comparison. Not sure how much of SIP's awful tone and sound was due to the drum sequencers, how much was production itself, and how much was the very early use of computer-based digital recording/ProTools.

I would imagine the main reason Melcher didn't work much with any of the band after 1993 or so is that they weren't recording much of anything. The failure of SIP certainly didn't help Melcher's cred either.
Melcher, like a lot of producers and artists from the 60's, fell head first into the love of synths and drum machines in the 80's. Mark Lindsay's "Looking For Shelter" sounds nothing like the great records he made with Melcher and the Raiders in the 60's. To my ears, it sounds like The Fixx meets Robert Palmer.

Yet interestingly, Somewhere Near Japan, while still mired in some bad '80s production (and some bits of '80s production that I actually dig) also very much, to my ears, emulates Terry's '60s production touches with The Byrds. The end of the song has a *very* Byrds-esque sound, updated to sound modern. That's where I hear what could've been. That song and perhaps Strange Things Happen. While both exhibit some production stuff I don't like, there's still IMHO plenty to like with *some* of Terry's BB production choices. Even if it's not particularly "BB-sounding".

I honestly often find more to like (despite some bad stuff) among much of Terry's BB production choices compared to Joe Thomas.
« Last Edit: November 05, 2016, 01:10:49 PM by CenturyDeprived » Logged
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