The Beach Boys - The Smile Sessions

  On 11/8/2011 at 9:48 AM, kokeboka said:

I've been very fond of a great smile sessions bootleg called Purple Chick (supposedly a reconstruction made by the session engineers themselves) - can someone who's heard the bootleg provide a comparison to this?

I did already. As mentioned, the bootlegers got it close but not quite right. But this has been ripe for the picking since 2004, because the Brian Wilson version released then is considered to be the actual finished album. The Beach Boys sessions were never actually finished; Brian never actually made up his mind. Back in 67 he submitted a tracklist to Capitol that cointained all the songs that he knew he would include but in no specific order, stating that they should see the finished tape box for the proper running order. The finished version is the 04 version, which is what Brian sat down, rethought and assembled with a mind to make it "final". This version is simply the best Beach Boys sessions cut into place to emulate the running order of that Brian Wilson solo album.

So all the bootlegers needed to do was grab all the Beach Boys sessions they could and rearrange them into the 04 order and it would be the "finished" Smile album. I think one bootleger gave it a shot but the problem was that all those sessions leaked in drastically different quality. A lot of people assembling their own versions of Smile used the released versions from later albums like Surf's Up, Friends etc so not only recordings with more overdubs from after the Smile era but also finished, properly mixed and mastered material...... All of which then had to go next to awful cassette dubbed pieces of stolen archival material that varied in quality from bad to worse.

So this new album is a revelation in a sense because it's the first time we get to hear The Beach Boys singing this album in such incredible quality from start to finish. It's glorious. The production and arrangement is very Brian so some people who don't get into the overly quirky style he has (harmonica and marching-band drums and flutes to tin whistles and strings, really odd and really flavoursome combinations throughout) won't get into it any more than Pet Sounds but this is undoubtedly the creative peak of WIlson's career. The ingenuity of the vocal harmonies alone is breathtaking. Even just as one song alone, 'Our Prayer' is fucking mindblowing. And the overture of 'Cabinessence'!!

And then there's 'Wonderful', which can comfortably sit alongside things like 'God Only Knows' and 'Don't Worry Baby' as a short, sweet, touching song that somehow balances a truly genuine-sounding innocence with utterly brilliant harmonic development and impeccable vocals. Mind you, all this is said from the viewpoint of someone who listens to quite a lot of Beach Boys, not just psychedelic era, so I am biased. But if you are in any way a Beach Boys fan, I daresay this Smile disk is fucking killer, even if you just grab the standard edition. But I'm personally really looking forward to digging through the sessions and comparing it to the hours of recordings I already have. I wonder if they've kept the charming Heros and Villains tracking session where Mike Love deadpans "someone bring me a dildo" and Carl replies "someone bring Mike a bag of money"... He sure has changed his tune since realizing the rest of the world disagrees with him and thinks Pet Sounds is the best Beach Boys album by a long shot. I guess he's smart enough to realize how much money there is to be made if he plays along and promotes Smile as if he thought it was genius all along.

Anyway. Much of muchness what that fucktard thinks, his vocals are great but this is Brian's trip. It's a shame you guys didn't get into his solo version (Admittedly it was better live than on record, but I still think it's a very well made version and not trying to be anything other than authentic) but I would imagine you'll love this.

  On 11/8/2011 at 2:17 PM, Greg Reason said:

I did already. As mentioned, the bootlegers got it close but not quite right. But this has been ripe for the picking since 2004, because the Brian Wilson version released then is considered to be the actual finished album. The Beach Boys sessions were never actually finished; Brian never actually made up his mind. Back in 67 he submitted a tracklist to Capitol that cointained all the songs that he knew he would include but in no specific order, stating that they should see the finished tape box for the proper running order. The finished version is the 04 version, which is what Brian sat down, rethought and assembled with a mind to make it "final". This version is simply the best Beach Boys sessions cut into place to emulate the running order of that Brian Wilson solo album.

I've been fixated with the Purple Chick bootleg Smile for ages - I always thought of it as the best 60's record, despite being a bootleg. The fact that it's incomplete just adds a little bit more magic to it... The intricate production on Cabin Essence, Wonderful and Song For Children blows me away every time. It feels like a huge leap from Pet Sounds, which is already a landmark album. If Smile were released when it was originally meant to the way Brian wanted to, it would have changed music forever. We can thank Mike Love for that not happening...

You know I just went back and looked at my copy of the Purple Chick bootleg and the one I have is assembled to match the 2004 Brian Wilson version.

Still worth hanging onto because it's in stereo. Although the new version comes with a handful of stereo mixes, the definitive album is presented in mono only. Mark Linett said Brian preferred mono not because he was deaf in one ear as most people assume but because he wanted to control the listening experience. Still I'm happy having stereo mixes as well; generally there are merits to both mixes, as in the case of The Beatles stuff and Piper at the Gates of Dawn.

And yeah I do love Pet Sounds but this trumps it mightily... It's no longer a collection of (extremely good) songs, it's an elaborate construction of songs, fragments and alleyways that few / no other composers could hope to emulate.

Great post, thanks. I was curious about this and am a total BB noob.

It seems like there are a few editions of this. Which is the one to get? I like to get into things thoroughly, but in this case not insanely.

been listening to some of the outtakes, really interesting.

  On 11/8/2011 at 6:10 PM, Ascdi said:

Great post, thanks. I was curious about this and am a total BB noob.

If you're new to Beach Boys, be sure to listen to Pet Sounds before getting to Smile/Purple Chick/Smiley Smile. There's a big jump in the production, which is interesting to note. I would recommend that you check out the Purple Chick bootleg (which is what a lot of people were listening to before Brian Wilson finished Smile in '04), as well as the 2004 Smile. If you're curious about what they actually released back then instead of Smile, get the Smiley Smile album - I'm not a big fan of this one, there are only a few good songs there, IMO.

Also, I'd say it's worth checking out Wild Honey (the album they did after Smiley Smile). It's very different from Smiley Smile, Smile and Pet Sounds - since there was more Dennis Wilson doing production, it came out with an interesting motown feel to it. Not groundbreaking like Smile or Pet Sounds, but a really good record nevertheless.

I'm a big advocate of The Beach Boys Today; some utterly incredible songwriting on there.

Even if the whole LP consisted of 'She Knows Me Too Well' it'd still be one of their best albums That song is a fucking work of genius. And then there's 'Please Let Me Wonder'... Sheer perfection.

  On 11/8/2011 at 5:09 PM, Greg Reason said:

It's no longer a collection of (extremely good) songs, it's an elaborate construction of songs, fragments and alleyways that few / no other composers could hope to emulate.

this is true. Now i'm not a big follower of the Beach Boys or of Wilson's solo career, but i was pretty blown away on the first listen of the Smile sessions. What really shines on this VS the Brian Wilson version is that it sounds almost like a broadway musical recording in comparison, but more than any existing popular musical it is wholly entertaining as music only. I'm having trouble describing how it makes me feel but sometimes it's like listening to a parallel dimension of all of the production and recording techniques from that era at their upmost full potential on display.

this is cool but its mainly just the same shit that was on all those bootleg versions in a slightly different order as far as i can tell? maybe some different mixes of things too. Pet sounds is still much much better to me but this is pretty great too + should bear in mind it still never got properly finished

I'm really impressed by the generosity of this as a package. Obviously there were huge cash incentives to dumping it all out for consumption, but CD1 (all I've heard so far) is so lovingly done that even the outtakes/odds and ends from tracks 19-28 just enhance the "canon" sequence before it. "Heroes and Villains Sections" is both deconstructed and complete in and of itself. BW could have tacked that on to the end of a release in '67 and A Day in The Life would have seemed like a quaint little folk arrangement in comparison.

Christ, it all sounds so good. While I liked Brian's 2004 smile, this is just plain masterful.

Also, I'm really glad they got him out of that piano.