Beach Boys - OPO/POO/whatever

but i'd still go for "Heroes and Villains"

makes me cry

I'd go for this version as well - it's available now at the end of the combined Smiley Smile/Wild Honey cd. I presume it's the same version you mean.

Also, Mike Love? C'mon! He's indefensible!!! That guy needs a goddamn Mouth Diaper for all the shit that spews out of it.

The soundtrack to "Cocktail" would've been a much more adventurous thing indeed.

I think this was next up after 'Smile' if Mike Love hadn't scuppered the idea. Bastard.

Surfin' Safari
Surfin' USA
Little Deuce Coupe
Surfer Girl
Catch a Wave
In My Room
Be True to Your School
Fun, Fun, Fun
Don't Worry Baby
I Get Around
Help Me Rhonda
California Girls
Wouldn't It Be Nice
You Still Believe in Me
That's Not Me
Don't Talk (Put Your Head on My Shoulder)
I'm Waiting for the Day
Let's Go Away for Awhile
Sloop John B.
God Only Knows
I Know There's an Answer
Here Today
I Just Wasn't Made for These Times
Pet Sounds
Caroline, No
Good Vibrations
Darlin'
Cool Water
Trader

(80:05, chronological. contains the entirety of Pet Sounds as well as most hits. Had to cut "Matchpoint of Our Love"!)

Not nearly as painful as seeing footage an early 80s Beach Boys show where Dennis Wilson hobbled out in inexplicable tears and struggled his way through "You are so beautiful" while his arms were stretched out at odd angles twitching.

"Until I Die" is a close second, though.

"feel flows" for what i like most

(if POO meant "Piss On One")

Jesus, January must've been one angry month for me.

in 1968, if you had a tape deck in the car, it was almost certainly an eight-track deck, which means you didn't have a rewind button. which meant those poor stoner beach boys fans would have to just play the tape through and wait for the song to come around again. which probably means nobody ever found his house.

Anyway, I want to say Surf's Up as it's one of the best songs ever written.

the song doesn't tell you where to start from though...

The result is that both versions suggest more than they deliver. Love it.

Geir OTM. I don't actively hate Mike Love's singing voice - in fact, there are rare examples where it's quite pristene and beautiful like on "Meant For You", but yeah as long as it's not his full composition. (and i'm not including the bogus legal wranglings of his getting his name in the writing credits and royalties of many otherwise non-Love songs in the recent years)

I do actively hate him personally though. Yeah yeah, I never met the guy, but in this one instance, I think I'm justified in this opinion just based on what I heard, which is a lot. (the story about Love calling Sean O' Hagan an "English faggot" is hilarious if not slightly sad)

I think Mike Love's about as big a dick as they come, but my understanding is that he legitimately co-wrote the lyrics to those songs, and Murray fucked him out of the credits.

Anyway, still waiting for the ultimate songwriting partnership - I mean, bring those two rivals from the 60s, Wilson and McCartney, together to write a couple of songs together and record them as duets. I am pretty sure the results may be interesting (McCartney has generally had a creative boost from having good songwriting partners - not only John Lennon, but his writing together with Elvis Costello resulted in his best stuff for years too)

Hope the Pepto's tasty.

That makes sense, and begrumblingly, I guess he deserves the credits. But I mean, what kind of things have Love contributed to Beach Boys songs in comparison to Wilson that warrents his name being one half of the credit listings anyway? "Hey, Brian, what if I throw in a "doobie doo waaaaaah" in the bridge?"

Of course, the melody is the only thing of value nevertheless. Whether Mike Love wrote a stupid lyric about surfing and cars and girls on the beach or Brian Wilson wrote a sad lyric about being unlucky in love, none of them were quite essensial anyway.

In addition to awesome, crazy chord changes and harmonies, teen bravado, and lots of really weird slang, it has one of my favorite lines ever "None of the guys go steady cause it wouldn't be right/to leave your best girl home on a Saturday Night"

(if not that, then)

'Til I Die

(if not that, then)

I'll Bet He's Nice

Aren't You Glad

Errr... Hate to ruin it for you but it's "And the guys go steady...".

Errr... Hate to ruin it for you but it's "And the guys go steady...".

-- dog latin (doglati...), October 19th, 2005.

Errr... Hate to ruin it for you, but you're wrong. Google it. The song wouldn't make sense the other way. It's called "I Get Around". It also says "And we've never missed yet with the girls we meet."

It's "Hang On To Your Ego" (check your lyrics, dude!), and if I remember right it was because the label thought it was too bitter a song that way.

Yes, but before it was Hang On, it was Let Go (which makes so much sense and would work better as a lyric if they'd kept it).

Also - I don't see how your Get Around lyric would make sense... If it wouldn't be right to leave your best girl home on a Friday night, assuming that your best girl is one you're going steady with, then why wouldn't you be going steady with her?

OK, if you have a steady girlfriend, the responsible thing to do would be to take her out on the weekend, instead of doing what you want to do, which is CRUISING, MAN. Therefore, none of the guys go steady.

Beach Boys lyrics.

My pick: "Here Today." Or "Hushabye."

Oh, what Monkey just said.

14. Hang On To Your Ego
(Brian Wilson, Terry Sachen)
Lead vocal: Brian Wilson.
Recorded Feb. 9, 1966 at Western Recorders, Hollywood, CA.
Mixed from the original four-track master tape by Larry Walsh and Mark Linett at Capitol Records, Hollywood, CA, December 1987.

Hang On To Your Ego was recorded with the working title of Let Go Of Your Ego, but when lyrics were written, the sentiment of the song was turned around.

"The thing about ego," explained Mike Love, "was you take acid and you get rid of your ego."

When a dispute developed within the group over the lyrics, Brian opted to have the chorus rewritten. The reworked version, I Know There's An Answer, was included on the Pet Sounds album.

This version of Ego features only Brian's guide vocal, with no backing vocals.

-- dog latin (doglati...)

Nope.

We always take my car cause it’s never been beat
And we’ve never missed yet with the girls we meet

None of the guys go steady cause it wouldn’t be right
To leave their best girl home now on saturday night

And a special shout-out to Brian (or whose-ever idea it was) for appending the word "Now" to the end of every "Fun Fun Fun" lyric. Genius.

All Summer Long
Cabinessence
Til I Die
All I Wanna Do
Our Prayer
Surf's Up
Warmth of the Sun
Here She Comes
Girl Don't Tell Me

This version of Ego features only Brian's guide vocal, with no backing vocals.

There's a wonderful instrumental version of Let Go/Hang On/I Know where after the refrain "I Know There's An Answer" there are three notes played on some kind of wind of brass instrument that aren't on Pet Sounds. It's repeated again on Brain Wilson's live Pet Sounds album though.

When some loud bragger tries to put me down
and says his school is great, I tell him right away
now what's the matter buddy ain't you heard of my school,
it's number one in the state...

Were they taking the piss?

These were some of the first Beach Boys lyrics I ever really noticed. Quality!

Has everyone heard the "The Warmth of the Sun" comp? The new stereo mix of "Let Him Run Wild" is smokin' aces. I might even pick that song for my answer to this thread. There's also a new mix of "You're So Good to Me" that will melt you.

Oh, the whole thing is just amazing. Best Beach Boys comp ever, no really.

I can't believe I never posted to this thread. anyway, if I have to go to the grave w/only one song, it's "Can't Wait Too Long".

Of course, Dom, the question is which version? GV or SS bonus track?

Me? I'd say the boxed set version...

I have noticed an increasing number of Beach Boys CDs in the discount bins here. At the same time, the recent "Warth Of The Sun" CD contains a lot of previously unreleased stereo versions and mono versions of songs who have previously only been available in the other form (at least on CD).

Does this mean, as is usually the case when an act's back catalogue is being dumped on discount, the re-releases with one CD each for each album in stereo and mono alike, as announced almost 10 years ago, are finally being made ready for release? Anyone has more info on this?

'can't wait too long'

One of the all time great cast-off tracks. I'm kind of glad they never finished it.

Feel Flows

Has everyone heard the "The Warmth of the Sun" comp? The new stereo mix of "Let Him Run Wild" is smokin' aces. I might even pick that song for my answer to this thread. There's also a new mix of "You're So Good to Me" that will melt you.

― kenan, Friday, June 8, 2007 2:34 AM (1 year ago) Bookmark

This album is my employee of the month for November 2008

Let Him Run Wild is in my top 5. Possibly 3.

At a push... 'Til I Die or Surf's Up.

And it's maybe not their very greatest song, but Let The Wind Blow absolutely slays me, particularly when Brian's vocal rises up and then fades away, trailed by some subtle backing vocals at the end of the "Don't let her out of my life" section. I think it was written after he and Marylin had had a fight - or is that just an invention of that cheesy TV movie? Whatever the truth, it's a beautiful and heartfelt song.

agreed

Don't Worry Baby (Mono)

thank god we have the mono mix

That would be my pick too. Second maybe "Good Vibrations" or "God Only Knows," but "Don't Worry Baby" has always been the one I played the most. When Carl Wilson died, I remember Dick Biondi on oldies radio that late Sunday morning breaking the news (or at least repeating it - I didn't know yet) with that song.

Strange choice, it's not like there aren't a score of great Beach Boys songs with Carl singing lead!

...including "Good Vibrations" and "God Only Knows", hardly deep cuts. It's like if McCartney died and you played "I Am the Walrus" to announce it.

He was the Walrus though.

Not the same, but when Lennon was dying or at least receiving a last ditch attempt to save him in the ER, "All My Loving" was the music being piped into the room by sheer coincidence. As terrible and sad as the moment may have been, it seems like a fitting song. (Lennon said that was the McCartney song he had wished he had written.)

What makes "Don't Worry Baby" for me is the harmonies that bathe you. That's one of the sad elements of Dennis and Carl dying, the idea that an essential part of the whole was gone. Reminds me of my favorite writing on the Beach Boys: "...the Beach Boys were not fakes. Empty, tired, desperate, stupid, and even insane as they were through the next decades, singly or as a group, for a time they nevertheless performed life as some people actually lived it. The Beach Boys celebrated California hedonism, looked for its limits, and found them. Their pleasures, as opposed to those offered by such latter-day inheritors as the Eagles, always radiated affection - perhaps because those pleasures were rooted in friendship, or its memory, or its fantasy."

^to save anyone the search I just performed, that’s Greil Marcus in Mystery Train

'A Day in the Life of a Tree' - I don't know anything else like it.

It's amazing they got someone from outside the band to sing that song. I'm sure any of them could have bosses it, but they thought his voice sounded oaky and they chose him to do it, and it's one of their most emotional songs

He sounds more like a tree than any of the Boys could manage

For a long time I thought it was depressed/drugged/pyjama Brian who was singing it ! Always loved that song.

Yeah it's the oddest thing that, for a band where literally everyone was a capable vocalist, they got their manager to sing it.

But yeah obviously it works.

Manager Jack Rieley was also a regular lyricist for the BB's at the time. Here's more info on his involvement, from Rieley himself (http://smileysmile.net/board/index.php/topic,9651.0.html)

Brian Wilson and I had been talking a lot about the sorry state of the planet back then. He was filled with questions and we went on for hours about it. Forests were dying, the air had turned brown, the earth's future was beginning to appear hazardous to health. When Brian first played the chords and sang the tentative melody for me, he asked what the song should be about and I suggested a single tree as metaphor for the earth; that single tree as metaphor for more than
ecology. I fell in love with the chords at once and loved the swelling tension of that droned bass line; the song seemed to lend itself to the lyrical concept. He went nuts for the lyrics when I showed them to him. Loved 'em, memorized the first verse and was singing around the house. Carl and I were positive that Brian had to sing A Day In The Life Of A Tree.

We recorded the instrumental track in a few days. On the day we were to record the lead vocal, I was with the engineer in the control room (this was in Belair, at the Bellagio house) and Brian was in the studio. He did a few warm-up takes and then, dramatically animated as was in wont, tore the headphones from his ears and exclaimed that he needed me to help him. I went out into the studio and he pleaded that he just wasn't getting the feeling that I intended with the lyric.

"Show me what I'm supposed to do," he insisted, handing me the headphones as he ran to the control booth.

I did about 5 takes of the song, all except for the false-setto bit near the end. Each time I screwed up one part or another, and after each take Brian used the talkback to inform me something like, "I see what you mean. But how about the blah-blah part. Do another take so I'll know just how to do the song." And dumb me: I did another take.

It was after one of those that Brian burst from the control booth to the studio, laughing loudly, a proclamatory laugh. He rushed me like
a bear, raised both arms into the air as would a victorious high school athletics coach and exclaimed that I had just done the final lead vocal!

I protested. It was turning into another BW cop-out, I suspected. But
by then Carl was there too. He said Brian had told him a couple of
days previous that I had to sing Tree. It had all been cooked in
advance.

To my astonishment, the false-setto bit turned out easy. After Van
Dyke's bit, the added voice at the end is Linda Jardine. Reports of Brian crying, with joy or otherwise, upon hearing my vocal are bullshit.

Ahah that’s great thanks !

There’s a bit in the Long Promised Road doc where the journalist Brian is riding around town with informs him that Rieley died. Brian is shocked to hear the news and a few minutes later gets really upset. This era and the work he did with Rieley def. meant something to Brian.

I love how it goes from silly/simple to mesmerising in the last minute, when the falsettos kick in.

There’s a bit in the Long Promised Road doc where the journalist Brian is riding around town with informs him that Rieley died.

Is it more likely that he had forgotten or never been told? Rieley died at least 5 years before that was shot.

Yeah that’s how I read it as well.

'A Day in the Life of a Tree' - I don't know anything else like it.

― Dr Drudge (Bob Six), Friday, September 29, 2023 6:49 PM (three days ago) bookmarkflaglink

Absolute greatest track sequence run they ever did will be the second half of Surf’s Up.

I was thinking this but also that the second side of Sunflower gives it a close run for its money. Both those albums win in terms of sequencing - silly (but not entirely irredeemable) fluff at the beginning, moving to some of the most sincerely outstanding so far of their careers

I never really clicked with “Forever” but the acapella mix on Feel Flows is gorgeous.

I think 'Forever' is one of the better Dennis ballads. A highlight on that album

my thing with Surf's Up is i much prefer different edits and mixes of the last songs, which are obviously the best ones, to the album versions. i'll take the Desper mix of Til i die every time (it's a contender for my OPO), and the bootleg edit of Surf's Up with the extended George Fell into his French Horn intro and with BriWi's lead vox intact. so will invariably reach for other discs when i want to hear those songs.

When i throw on Surf's up LP it's usually because i wanna hear Feel Flows or Long Promised Road (which itself is not quite as good as the live version on Endless Harmony imo but the studio version is great too).

The flow of the sequence works so well that it more than justifies the inclusion of the lesser songs (with the one obvious exception)

It was after one of those that Brian burst from the control booth to the studio, laughing loudly, a proclamatory laugh. He rushed me like
a bear, raised both arms into the air as would a victorious high school athletics coach and exclaimed that I had just done the final lead vocal!

ahahaha didn't van dyke parks do the same thing with brian on "orange crate art"?

RIP Jeff Foskett

https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/jeffrey-foskett-beach-boy-brian-wilson-dead-obituary-1234924498/