Best Summation of SMILE.

[brianc]

To me, "Smile" took things outside of Brian's writing being more incidental, and into real reflective territory. Maybe that was largely the influence of Van Dyke, but it makes it stand out all the more.

As far as "Smile" being compared to "Rhapsody in Blue" only by Beach Boys fans... I don't know. Classical fans have not looked into the merits of rock that often anyway. That said, Philip Glass has gone on record praising "Pet Sounds" as a unique piece of music, influencing and transcending its genre. Also, no one disputes that "Sgt. Pepper" will likely be in the league of "Rhapsody in Blue" a hundred years from now. And I think "Smile" is better that "Pepper."

[Dancing Bear]

As far as "Smile" being compared to "Rhapsody in Blue" only by Beach Boys fans... I don't know. Classical fans have not looked into the merits of rock that often anyway.

Let's be fair, pop music fans don't often go beyond the "that Bach dude is cool" level either.

Also, no one disputes that "Sgt. Pepper" will likely be in the league of "Rhapsody in Blue" a hundred years from now.

Yeah, the Time-Life History of Music. Don't forget to include "Never Mind the Bullocks" and "What's Going On" in the basket. But I suspect that when someone compares Smile to RiB, it's a uncompromising way to imply that Smile is above "pop music". But I've been wrong before.

[Bill Tobelman]

Not so with SMiLE which was meant to showcase Brian Wilson's new LSD inspired spiritual music (key word being "spiritual").

All due respect, Bill... you've zero'd in on that notion as being the underlying motivation of Brian Wilson. But the lyrics of Van Dyke Parks point to something that is uniquely American, and that will continue to be one of Smile's great attributes.

What people do not see is that Van Dyke Parks' lyrics ARE part of Brian's spiritual SMiLE plan.

If you read Brian's interpretive explanation of VDP's "Surf's Up" lyrics (in Jules Siegel's article) you'll find that the explanation ends with enlightenment, God, and a children's song, the song of the universe. Sound's like "Surf's Up" has something to do with some spiritual matters.

"Vegetables" was written because Brian wanted people to get into such things because they are "an important ingrediant in spiritual enlightenment." Sounds like a spiritual goal here. And what's so American about "Vegetables" or "Wind Chimes" (which VDP has also taken some writing credit for)

Brian had his "fire" and "fighting" LSD trip (#2 in his bio) which figures to be influential as an inspiration for SMiLE via the "bio" as well as Brian's comments to journalist Tom Nolan in which Brian noted what's behind his new spiritual music direction.

So in "H & V" we get the fighting bit (Brian even wanted to record a live barroom fight) as well as some laughter (which Brian felt could prompt a spiritual experience---see Vosse in the SMiLE DVD) as well as some fire ("fanned the flame of the dance") as well as some very spiritual "death and rebirth" (as in ego-death and being spiritually reborn...as a 'child') which comes through in VDP's lyrics "the rain of bullets that...brought her down...but she's still dancing."

Also Brian's #2 LSD trip happened in 1965 (see bio) and he had the ego death thing happen. So VDP's line about "at 3 score and 5 I'm very much alive" one can see how this applies to Brian, 1965, his spiritual LSD trip, as well as his "ego-death" but not actual physical death.

All of this stuff is spiritual in Brian's eyes. It's brought forward by Van Dyke Parks' lyrics, and it's misunderstood by the public because it's intentionally presented as a mystery/riddle.

[brianc]

Let's be fair, pop music fans don't often go beyond the "that Bach dude is cool" level either.

No doubt. But there are always exceptions to every rule.

Yeah, the Time-Life History of Music. Don't forget to include "Never Mind the Bullocks" and "What's Going On" in the basket. But I suspect that when someone compares Smile to RiB, it's a uncompromising way to imply that Smile is above "pop music". But I've been wrong before.

I think you are right... that's exactly what they are trying to say, and I think "they" are correct. It's one of those rare examples that DOES transcend the genre. Sort of like Myazaki with anime or Neil Gaiman with comic books.

[brianc]

And what's so American about "Vegetables" or "Wind Chimes" (which VDP has also taken some writing credit for)

Fair enough, Bill. But how could you gloss over the astute American references in "Heroes & Villains" along the way to your zen-conclusions? Are we supposed to ignore the lyrics in "Do You Like Worms" and "Cabinessence"? Or the campire Americana of "My Only Sunshine"? Or even the notion that VDP himself has put forth that it was directly American -- historical as well as contemporary?

It's great that you are trying to document Brian's LSD trips and his travels to Big Sur and Lake Arrowhead in 1966, but in doing so, you've weaved a tale connecting the music to Brian's real life that is so far removed from hard evidence that at times it directly condradicts what the creators of that music themselves have said.

[Bill Tobelman]

Brian & Van Dyke aren't going to admit to what they were up to!!! That's not what SMiLE was about...you don't present the purposely unexplained mystery (in much the same fashion as the unexplained mystery was personally presented to BW in late 66) and then explain it. Brian didn't explain it to the Beach Boys, Anderle or any of the Vosse posse, or to his wife, or to the press, or in liner notes, or to Todd Gold. That's why nobody can tell you what SMiLE is about. They can't explain it even though they were closest to it (and that's the ultimate point of the original post of this thread).

Glad you mentioned "Cabinessence." Once again we have the "fire" stuff from Brian's #2 trip with the "fire mellow" and "light the camp." But this time instead of the fire engines from #2 trip were get the "Iron Horse" (since we're at Lake Arrowhead were, in the vast past, the train helped build the dam). Maybe the train is as red as a fire engine a la the train Brian & the Beach Boys posed on with BW dressed in psychedelic red (seen on the "Sloop John B" sheet music (I seem to recall).

The "timely hello" line matches the description of his first trip as in his bio. Brian mentions there being something sacred about the "hello" that greets one prior to dropping acid.

So the train in "Cabinessence" is also a metaphor for the fire engines of trip #2. The "who ran the iron?" backing lyric heard on some bootlegs implies "heat" as does "home on the range" as in stove. Actually you can see this in Frank Holmes' depiction for "Cabinessence." There's a big "range" in the picture.

Phillip Lambert, in his book on Bri's music, musically links the "home on the range music" and "Mrs' O'Leary's Cow"(which is yet another fire reference).

So as you can see by this post & my prior one that I'm linking both "Heroes & Villains" and "Cabinessence" as well as "Mrs.O'Leary's Cow" to Brian's second trip. It is, at this point, interesting to note Steven Desper's claim that "'Heroes & Villains' and 'Fire' are mystically related in Brian's mind" (this claim can be found  VIA Priore in the revised LLVS).

Here's another one.....Dennis Wilson was present at the writing of "Surf's Up" (see "bio" and/or talk to Mr. Stebbins about this) and Dennis further inspires the rivalry between the BB camp & the British Invasion. So I think that the epic warlike images in "Surf's Up" have, on some level, something to do with this.

Also Dennis' presence may have inspired the "hand in hand line" as Brian & the BBs join forces, "some drummed along" is a 'drummer' reference, and "to a handsome man & baton" is Dennis (the sex symbol of the group) with his drumstick!!!

"Are you sleeping Brother John?" is the "I'm Only Sleeping" Lennon being asked if he's going to be caught sleeping, as the BBs have a proper answer for this Invasion stuff!!! Also of course "I'm Only Sleeping" is a cool LSD song. Folks typically only tend to pick up on the "Frere Jacques" reference.

[Bill Tobelman]

Forgot to mention that at the end of Brian's trip #2 he somehow manages to get in his car & drive.

This works well disguised as the "truck driving man" in the "vast past" (as Brian went back in time in trip #2), "the last gasp" (as Brian ego-died in trip #2), "catchin' onto the truth" (via LSD),"catch as catch can" (as Brian drove to Marilyn's house & tried to embrace her sister).

[Bean Bag]

When listening to Beethoven's 9th -- do people truly need to know he was deaf at the time?  No.  It doesn't matter.  Great things rise above their circumstances.

As time rolls on, hundreds of years from now, Smile will be discovered and rediscovered by people interested in great music.  They will find it.  If it is truly great music -- it will survive and rise above its time and creation. 

All those circumstances will be inconsequential to its inclusion in the pantheon of great music.  We're not privileged to know what music will survive, but even in Smile's unreleased form...it survived.   

[Bean Bag]

For those who are into meanings of SMiLE era songs, please help me out on this one.

"Well, you're welcome to come"..... Where? Anywhere? How about "You're welcome to come...on the SMiLE trip." Yes? No? Was it just a throwaway B-side?

Yeah this one's an odd one for me too.  It's one of the few Smile bits that actually got released.  To me, it does sound like a tossed-off throwawy.  Was it the "you're welcome" for getting Brian to actually "finish" and release H&V?  Was it even a true "smile song?"

[Dr. Tim]

I'd picked "Rhapsody In Blue" as a comparison point for Smile for two reasons: (1) musically, it blew the roof off in its day and (2) it is a favorite piece of Brian's.  I'm not saying it IS "Rhapsody in Blue" or that Gershwin (or Ellington or Copland) are eclipsed or inferior.  Did Smile blow the roof off in 2004?  Maybe in time it will be seen as such, that is my hypothesis.  Certainly most any major composer or music historian working today (Philip Glass, Steve Reich, John Adams) will tip their hat to it and to Brian's talents for orchestration and counterpoint.

Nice to see everyone finding all that deep "spiritual" stuff in the lyrics too!  All this doesn't make Smile better than everything else, it's just that I think using classical music terminology to describe it is justified here, more so than most "important sixties albums".

P.S.: prior to the 2004 debut, an English chuch choir had adapted "Our Prayer" to be sung to the liturgical invocation "Kyrie Eleison".  So when Brian said he'd write songs people would pray to, turns out he was right, crazy as it (and he) sounded at the time.

You want to use some other cultural icon song as a comparison point?  "Satanic Majesties"? "Mairzy Doats", maybe?  Fine with me.

I did my label-placing on the basis of Smile's 2004 debut as a finished concert work.  The 1966-67 snippets are NOT the finished concert work.  They are a fascinating listen and a must-hear for any student of BW, though.

Prefer using other pop albums (Sgt. Pepper)  or songs (What's Going On, Rocket 88) as high-point cultural references?  Sure, I guess, but I wasn't talking about Smile to the exclusion of such other items.  Not my yob.

Now to muddy things further: no doubt you've heard of bands like the Fab Faux doing note-for-note concert performances of Sgt. Pepper and the White Album?  As if they were already part of the classical music canon, played on "period" instruments?  (In this case, instruments that replicate the sounds of the original recording "period").   And then there's Philip Glass's "Low Symphony" based on the David Bowie/Brian Eno LP.  So what's classical music now?  

[brianc]

Classical music WAS the popular music of its day, and has become the catch-all moniker for orchestral or concierto music. If you are talking about the second half of the 20th Century, in terms of classical, I'd say that avant-garde was the classical of its day, inlcuding minimalism, musique conrete and other sub-genres (the heavy-hitters being John Cage, Lamont Young, Steve Reich, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Terry Riley, et al). After the '60s, I have no idea where classical music has really gone, other than Philip Glass's extremely popular expansion/continuation of minimalism. But that's me not really knowing.

It DOES seem that some artists in the pop/rock idiom have crossed over into that level of appreciation, but maybe that's just me being a rock fan and wishing it so. I don't think so, though. My hunch is that, a hundred years from now, composers like Lennon/McCartney, Brian Wilson, Stephen Sondheim, Ray Davies, Pete Townshend, Bob Dylan and Joni Mitchell will be remembered as pop classicists, capturing a time and place as good as anyone working in any idiom.

[Dancing Bear]

Has Steve Reich ever commented on Brian's work?

[Bean Bag]

Now to muddy things further.... note-for-note concert performances of Sgt. Pepper and the White Album..."Low Symphony" based on the David Bowie/Brian Eno LP.  So what's classical music now? 

By all means, muddy away!  The unique thing about the last hundred years is that we have more than just manuscripts and sheet music.  We have more than the surviving recordings using those period instruments.  We actually have the "piece" -- the performance.  The Monet on the wall.  The recorded work produced by Brian Wilson, Pet Sounds. 

Smile is even further unique in its pop-incarnation because it's the "sgt pepper" that doesn't have its single monumental performance on wax.  It somewhat side-stepped its time already by being a "work" BEFORE it became a "performance."  So...it should make a b-line to the pantheon of great music, by avoiding that "perfect singular state" issue.

Oh, things do happen for a reason.

[brianc]

I love having the '66-67 Smile sessions on LP, having Smiley Smile and having the 2004 album. All are unique. It's amazing how this album has been a part of Brian's life process. Also, all the stuff that ended up on various albums through the years. The music he thought ruined his life ended up being sort of his life-story. The music and lyrics are about a journey, and what a journey that man has been through.

[Aegir]

I listen to pop music from 100 years ago. I just think of it as "pop music from 100 years ago".

[Bean Bag]

I listen to pop music from 100 years ago. I just think of it as "pop music from 100 years ago".

Me too.  And the big pop stars of 100 years ago; Billy Murray, Henry Burr, etc...were freak machines (seriously).  Duplicating a single performance - 100s of times, as you probably know.

It all changed when Louis Armstrong (etc...) created Jazz.  Then it became more about the performance that got waxed.  That's when the performance became a "work" just as valid and important as the composed "work."  And independent of the composition, which often served merely as the launching pad, or canvas, if you will.

Things changed again thanks to guys like Brian who just weren't creating compositions, then performing and taping performances.  They were actively making the finished recording a sonic painting.  The whole being several layers deeper than "pop music of 100 years ago."  So it's not the same thing as that old music at all.

That old stuff has its own unique vintage that can never be duplicated.  Like an old photograph.  But there was rarely anything "artistic" in the recording.  The performance, perhaps...but not the recording.

[lance]

The things we talk about and debate now will be talked about and debated a hundred years hence. There will ALWAYS be this Beach Boys/Beatles comparison. There will ALWAYS be the questions of what SMiLE "could have been" and the debate on whether BWPS is definitive or not. Love You will ALWAYS be controversial and brilliant.

[Bean Bag]

The things we talk about and debate now will be talked about and debated a hundred years hence....

Yes.  It's hard......impossible to know...and fun to imagine... 100years from today exactly how thing will be sorted out.

There will ALWAYS be this Beach Boys/Beatles comparison....questions of what SMiLE "could have been"... and the debate on whether BWPS is definitive or not.

As for what will remain controversial....  170 years ago... slavery was controversial.... so too was abolishing it ....But now, slavery.... easily more controversial. 

so.....those things might get sorted out too.  For now... we have the luxury of scoffing at our ancestor's ignorance....

Love You will ALWAYS be controversial and brilliant.

...so too we have the luxury of choosing which side we'll be on for today's controversy...  a stance few will remember... so enjoy!


 

[Bill Tobelman]

I listen to pop music from the tin pan alley period, especially after having a few. Songs by Gershwin, Porter, Kern, Warren, and Arlen really have the care & attention that the listeners of musical compositions deserve.

Geez guys, my last batch of SMiLE posts prompted no responses. But that isn't going to stop this SMiLER. Only the truth shut me up.

You like to separate yourselves from the CNN crowd only to totally buy the truth as presented by the mass media. What radicals. Okay, back to the follow-up to PET SOUNDS.

If SMiLE was to be just as much a jump above PET SOUNDS as that record was above SUMMER DAYS.......

PET SOUNDS was lyrically a single melody. It was very direct. The backing tracks had melody placed upon melody placed upon melody. It was multi-layered in its complexity as far as the backing instrumental & vocal parts were concerned.

One way that Brian could trump this musical triumph (PET SOUNDS) was to add a similar depth to his lyrical component. This was the one aspect of his art that could be expanded upon.

"Vegetables" could become "Vega" and "Tables" thus adding layers of meaning to his lyrical voice. Cannabis could be "Cabin Essence." Such an approach lyrically would infuse layers of meaning atop his multi-layered musical backgrounds.

In this way SMiLE would be yet another step forward adding a complexity to the lyrical that was previously applied to the musical.

Plus you have to also add in all of my usual "far-out" theories.

This all adds up to make SMiLE the artistic jump that Brian claimed it was back in the day.

[Bill Tobelman]

If Pet Sounds was about the spirituality Brian felt in his heart, then SMiLE was about the spirituality Brian felt in his mind.

[SG7]

If Pet Sounds was about the spirituality Brian felt in his heart, then SMiLE was about the spirituality Brian felt in his mind.

FANTASTIC statement Bill. I really agree with that!

[Bicyclerider]

That Smile lyrical concerns were more intellectual than the emotional concerns of Pet Sounds is pretty obvious - it's Van Dyke's approach vs. Asher/Wilson's.

While I appreciate Bill's LSD interpretation of Smile, it's way too reductive - everything in it doesn't need to refer to a trip or enlightenment on acid.  Smile is more multi faceted than that.  It is very consciously American in subject matter and in musical reference - which to me does give the piece similarities to Rhapsody in Blue.  But I don't like that ini order to make a pop music piece more "important" critics and boosters like Leaf have to try and compare it to classical music.  Putting Smile up there with the best and most ambition pop music ever created (Sgt Pepper, Forever Changes, Blonde on Blonde, Tommy) is more than adequate praise.

I don't think all of Smile being representative or referential to LSD was Brian or Van Dyke's intention, even though connections can be made and are fascinating to note.  And the elitist notion that LSD enlightenment is the "secret key" to Smile and anyone who doesn't get "the truth" is a CNN person or simpleton is just obnoxious.  Just because you think Smile means one thing, Bill, doesn't mean other interpretations can't be valid.  The idea that Brian and Van Dyke have been keeping the "truth" of Smile secret and hidden smacks of conspiracy theory paranoia - maybe Brian and Van Dyke were kidnapped by aliens and through a "mind meld" they both achieved enlightenment, but they disguised this enlightenment as being "LSD" - I mean this isn't far off from what Bill's proposing.  I just don't think the meanings are that secret - other than the fact that Van Dyke's mind works in what to others may seem obscure ways, but are obvious to him (the bicycle rider motif for example).

[Custom Machine]

For those who are into meanings of SMiLE era songs, please help me out on this one.

"Well, you're welcome to come"..... Where? Anywhere? How about "You're welcome to come...on the SMiLE trip." Yes? No? Was it just a throwaway B-side?

Maybe I'm way off base here, but I always considered it a sexual invitation.

[Cam Mott]

"If Pet Sounds was about the spirituality Brian felt in his heart, then SMiLE was about the spirituality Brian felt in his mind."

I believe you are probably spot on, William my man. I'll bet a donut that's the problem Brian had with it, in the end it didn't have enough "heart" for the ol' b-dubster.

Say hi to Margaret.

[Sheriff John Stone]

For those who are into meanings of SMiLE era songs, please help me out on this one.

"Well, you're welcome to come"..... Where? Anywhere? How about "You're welcome to come...on the SMiLE trip." Yes? No? Was it just a throwaway B-side?

Maybe I'm way off base here, but I always considered it a sexual invitation.

  I've thought about "You're Welcome", oh, about a hundred times in the last twenty years. I've never associated it with that! But, who knows, you may be right. I still think "You're Welcome" is the perfect SMiLE opener.