Sunny Down Snuff and Stand or Fall recording dates

[Jeff]

A few years ago, some people were speculating that the Sunny Down Snuff section, from about 2:35 of the H&V single was recorded during the Smile time period.  Has there been anything new on this?  Anyone have any opinions?

Same question for the Stand or Fall part.  I've never heard anyone say that this might have been recorded during Smile, but who knows?  Anyone?

[Andrew G. Doe]

I'd be surprised - the ambiance is distinctly post-Smile/home studio.

[warnakey]

From what I've read this was recorded in January of 67.

But again, it very well COULD have been June.

I think that it probably was recorded in June at the home studio though. Like someone else said, it sounds a lot more like the "Church of the american indian" section than the Cantina version.

[Bicyclerider]

According to one source, there was an attempt to record the sunny down snuff section in December 66 but Mike refused to sing it and the idea was dropped - no date for this but vocals were recorded Dec 13 and Dec 22nd, both after the Cabinessence Mike Love/Van dyke Parks showdown over the crow cries lyric.  Dec 22nd is the date for the "Swedish frog" section and Dec 13th may have been for the Barnyard backing vocals.

Presumably later in June Brian was able to get Mike et al to sing the sunny down snuff section after all - did you notice in the Smile documentary how Van Dyke smiles when sunny down snuff is mentioned and says something like "Yeah we were able to get that in there"?

[doinnothin]

What is the source for the December 1966 "Sunny Down Snuff" attempted recording for Heroes & Villains?

[Alan Boyd]

I believe the "Sunny Down Snuff" section from the single version was recorded June 14, 1967 as part of the session known as "Barbershop,"

As for the "Stand or fall" verse in the single version, that's a little harder to pin down.  There's no surviving multitrack with that lead part, which is why that third verse presented some difficulty when it came time to construct a stereo mix of the song.  We have the master 8 track of the first two verses, but a multi of the third verse has never turned up. 

As a matter of fact, after all of the tape archaeology we went through on that project, and careful examination of all the surviving reels and mixdowns, I'm thinking that THIS might be what engineer Jim Lockert was referring to when he described some of what went on during the Smiley era mixdowns.  If any of you recall Byron Preiss' book from wayyy back, there was a lengthy quote from Jim in which he described how Brian would record a lead vocal, mix it down to mono, and then erase the lead vocal and put down another verse and then mix that to mono....

"We had one piece of tape for the verse.  We'd mix it to a 2 track, we'd erase the vocals on the verse, and we'd rerecord the second set of vocals on it. We mixed each piece of this down as we went along"

As it turns out, all of the vocals for all of the other songs on Smiley Smile do exist on the original 8 track reels for each of those songs.  There are no missing vocal parts for any songs on that album - EXCEPT for that third verse section of the single version of "Heroes and Villains."  Might this have been what Jim was recalling? The master 8 track for the verse section of the "Heroes" single is completely filled, with Brian's doubled lead for the first two verses.  Is it possible that Brian and the group first laid down the "la la la" parts and the "Stand or fall" bit, mixed it down, and then wiped the lead tracks so that Brian could overdub the lead for the first two verses? 

I know I might be adding 2+2 and getting 6 here (I hate speculating on these things, to be honest), but based on what we've found on the master tapes, and considering what Jim Lockert described years later, it's a plausible explanation.  Sonically, on the single those verses certainly sound as if they were mixed around the same time.

(It also kinda explains why Brian would have settled for such a clunky edit from the first chorus into the third verse, which crashes hard into and actually clips the first "la la" - there might not have have been any way to go back and fix it or generate another copy of that verse, since that lead vocal may only have existed on the 1/4'' fragment they'd just clipped by the time they got around to assembling the pieces).

[branaa09]

Very cool Alan! I just went back and listened to the Stereo Smiley Smile and heard that part. I had never noticed Brian's Lead not separated on that third verse.  It still sounds amazing in Stereo!

[Micha]

Mr. Boyd, is there a physical splice on the mono master for the single?

[Alan Boyd]

Mr. Boyd, is there a physical splice on the mono master for the single?

Yes indeed.  Several.

In fact, the original master tape of the Smiley Smile LP contains so many splices (as well as a couple of song tags without fades), that a subsequent copy had to be made which was then used as the "master" for that album.  The original album, pseudo stereo masters, and master safety copies were all generated from that copy of the actual first generation tape.

[Mujan, 8@$+@Rc| of a Blue Wizard]

According to one source, there was an attempt to record the sunny down snuff section in December 66 but Mike refused to sing it and the idea was dropped - no date for this but vocals were recorded Dec 13 and Dec 22nd, both after the Cabinessence Mike Love/Van dyke Parks showdown over the crow cries lyric.  Dec 22nd is the date for the "Swedish frog" section and Dec 13th may have been for the Barnyard backing vocals.

Presumably later in June Brian was able to get Mike et al to sing the sunny down snuff section after all - did you notice in the Smile documentary how Van Dyke smiles when sunny down snuff is mentioned and says something like "Yeah we were able to get that in there"?

Any chance you remember the source?? This is pretty significant stuff, Mike refusing to sing vocals. Again, not trying to paint him as solely responsible, but the big retcon Ive noticed centers on the fact that he only "questioned" the CE lyrics and then sang them anyway as if he never fought with Brian or VDP at all, contrasting with the primary sources. If true, this puts a big dent in that theory and reasserts that his antagonism, while not the deciding factor, definitely played a significant part in the collapse.

[Shane]

Alan, thanks for posting... it's fascinating to hear info from the "inside".  It's safe to say the recording of Smiley Smile was unorthodox, to say the least...

[Mujan, 8@$+@Rc| of a Blue Wizard]

Alan, thanks for posting... it's fascinating to hear info from the "inside".  It's safe to say the recording of Smiley Smile was unorthodox, to say the least...

In many ways, that was the intention

[Micha]

Mr. Boyd, is there a physical splice on the mono master for the single?

Yes indeed.  Several.

In fact, the original master tape of the Smiley Smile LP contains so many splices (as well as a couple of song tags without fades), that a subsequent copy had to be made which was then used as the "master" for that album.  The original album, pseudo stereo masters, and master safety copies were all generated from that copy of the actual first generation tape.

Due to a lack of education in recording technology history, I wonder why they made physical splices at all. In the pre-digital age I used to make edits using the pause button of the cassette player. Instead of copying the spliced tape, why didn't they edit the parts together using two tape machines? I would imagine that being easier than glueing tape on which you can't see where specific parts start or end. What is the explanation?

[hideyotsuburaya]

'in those olden days' physical tape splices were professional SOP, all recording studio engineers were well practiced in the art of making a deft tape splice on the standard splicing block hardware.  one might speculate it came as a natural outgrowth of acetate-based tape (pre-mylar) which occasionally broke anyway (accidentally without intent ) and the necessitated repair job to keep takes from being lost or compromised.  in the manual splicing procedure sometimes an additional tool played an assistive role--a liquid suspension aerosol sprayed on the tape such as one then marketed under the trade name 'Magna-See" (I believe that was 3M's product, but there were others as it was a simple formula).  It evaporated quickly and harmed nothing (except for a little clean-up perhaps) but for several seconds time it allowed a visual appearance of the recorded tape wave-forms on the tracks.  So the engineer could visually see where the best exact spot to cut the tape might be.  The professional machines were not built with a 'pause' control button like consumer got accustomed to and made their edits with (I suppose there might be pro models that did have one but they're in the minority and definitely not utilized for such purposes)

[Micha]

Thanks!

[Shane]

Also, keep in mind that you lose one generation of sound quality by making your edits between two machines.  Just cut and reaffix the tape yourself, and you're still working with the original tape.