Brian Wilson's SMiLE vs Beach Boys' 2011 SMiLE

To question 1, yes
Question 2 - According to a conversation that Brian had with Peter Reum, the 3 movement Smile has been thrown around since the early 80's.
Look and Holidays most likely would not have been included, but who really knows for sure.
I'm In Great Shape was on the hand written list submitted to Capitol as a Smile track. One of the great mysteries of Smile. Barnyard may have been a section of it or a stand alone track, but either way, neither were finished.

 

I honestly don't think anyone including Brian knows what it would have been. I think that was the main problem. I'm glad we finally got what we did, but I don't for one minute believe the 2011 version is what would have come out in 1967.

 

Yeah, the 2004 version, which has become the official blueprint for presenting the music, is really a contemporary attempt to include everything from the bootlegs, with no regard for what the actual LP really could have been like in 1967. There's no internal or external evidence that Smile in 1967 would have been anything else than a regular collection of 12 songs, without that pretentious three-movement nonsense.

 

This shoulda been a poll. Great debate!

I only have BWPS and a few Beach Boys Smile bootleg/recreations. I will have to wait to weigh in definitively, but I will say that I loved BWPS, as well as hearing it performed live. It definitely brought some tears.

 

Not true at all for "Look (Song For Children)", "Child Is Father Of The Man", "I Wanna Be Around" (although that's an old jazz standard) or much of "Love To Say Dada" (Blue Hawaii).

 

A couple things they really messed up on SMiLE 2011 was the pitch mistake on "Cabin Essence" (pitch goes up 1% on Mike Love's favourite lyric) and for "Do You Like Worms (Roll Plymouth Rock)" they should have used part of the "Bridge to Indians" sessions which have a sung chord that was clearly meant to introduce the "Do You Like Worms" section:

 

Yes. I really feel Capitol and Brain Wilson should have made a completely different album for SMiLE, instead of using the BWPS Tracklist. Since the music was completely different, they should have based on a theme of what they (Dyke and Wilson) would have visioned in the 60s.

 

It was strictly a Brian Wilson decision. When asked about it he said that this (the track sequence) is how he wants Smile to be heard. Hey, it is his music, so it his decision how he wants it released, not ours.

 

Yes, I wondered why they didn't fix that, it didn't happen on the original Cabinessence - I fixed it in audacity and burned a new version of the disc - also, it's always peeved me that on H&V, the 'la la las' snatch in too quickly so I fixed that too.

I'd heard snippets and had a rough bootleg or two, but I was in awe of BWPS, when H&V kicks in, that sent a shiver down my spine, only let down was Brian's vocals, but I am grateful we have a complete version, even if it is a revisionist. I do prefer the sound and feel of TSS, but it's a shame that it's incomplete.

 

I don't see BWPS as revisionist, but as complete. Since Smile was never tracked or released, it really cannot be revised. As I mentioned a few times in here, Brian had been toying with a 3 movement Smile since the early 80's, so that is nothing new to Brian. Also, had Brian had the Beach Boys complete the vocals we may not have had to wait 40 years for a release. I hear you though, it was so close to completion that one can only wonder.

 

I only meant revisionist as in, it would never have come out that way in '67 - apparently even jackets were printed back then with a track list although I've never seen it.

I am grateful that we have what we have, considering Brian was once so reluctant to even discuss it, and adamant it was dead and buried, and was never going to see a release.

 

Sorry, but I don't.

 

I remember when Smile Sessions was released hearing people complain that disc 1 used "BWPS" blueprint which it did to a large degree but not EXACTLY and saying the 2011 release was "not the definitive SMiLE" etc etc but now 5 years later pretty much everyone I know who cares about such things do indeed consider the 2011 release pretty much the final say on the album. It's not perfect but it sounds great, the track order is one of the best there is and it is easily available on a major record label. It pretty much IS SMiLE. I like Vigotone, Sea of Tunes, Mok etc but when I think of the real deal I think of the disc put out by Capitol Records five years ago.

 

so many years later now, I still come back to BWPS more than the sixties recordings. I like them both, mind you, and their charms are similar but different. However, BWPS just blows me away and I can't put it down. Plus I like the ending of Surf's Up better on BWPS and that's the deal breaker.

 

I loved BWPS when it came out and still see it as a great triumph but I always go to either Smile Sessions or Sea of Tunes nowadays because the original recordings just have more appeal tome.

 

My heart has room for both of these releases. So does my music room. Everything about this album is pretty much without precedent. So it's alright that it's clouded in mystery/controversy and varied opinions on the definitive version/tracklist.

When I listen to The Smile Sessions I think about Brian as a fiercely driven, fragile, walking too close to the edge individual who was understood by no very few within his organization and ultimately his lack of support ended it. And the music is brilliant because it has the boys voices and the wrecking crew. But at the same time it makes me a little sad to think of what could have been if it had been finished.

When I listen to BWPS I think about Brian as an older man who is ready to face things that he left unfinished in his youth. Kind of like a guy who is trying to resurrect a relationship with a child or maybe make good on a promise to finish something that escaped him earlier in life. Like fulfill a fathers dying wishes or something. But I find the music totally satisfying. The lyrics are fantastic and the band is great. I don't miss or think about the Beach Boys voices at all during the album. Beautiful Dreamer was good for me to watch. Though I know that it's hotly debated round these parts.

With that being said, I love that this music was created and has been released. I wonder if they will release a bigger 50th anniversary set next year? That would be fantastic!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

Though I respect the sequencing that Brian & co. came up with for BWPS--and I can only assume that Brian now views this as the "finished" sequence--disc one from the Smile set is not preferred way to hear this music, so I haven't gone back to it in a long time. I think that it was a bit of a miscalculation to try to shoehorn the old sessions into the new three suite structure, with the crossfades and all the fly-ins (some of which worked, others not so much). I eventually reconstructed my own homebrewed mix, tending to favor stereo versions wherever possible. For me, Smile will always have that open ended, unfinished quality to it--maybe out of necessity over the years, it's become a strange kind of strength of the project.

 

When I saw the BWPS concert, I thought that they had been influenced by the bootleg sequences in putting it all together.

 

The original sessions have "the spook." That's the big difference for me.

 

The Beach Boys version, for me.

 

They had. Darien used the Sea of Tunes Vol 16 SMiLE bootleg as his template. It's amazing how tapes copied/stolen from Linnett brought Vigotone SMiLE about and it influenced Sea of Tunes which in turn influenced BWPS which Linnett then used as HIS template for Disc 1 of SMiLE Sessions. A big circle in which a lot of people contributed.

 

Seemed ironic to me at the time. And I thought Priore's work must have in turn influenced the Vigotone/SOT sets before that. I assumed that BW could not face the jigsaw and that The Wondermints (Darien as you confirm) had been instrumental in putting the sequence together, solving the problem relatively simply, thus enabling BW to engage with the project.

 

Brian Wilson's Smile? How about Darian Sahanaja's Smile? First, Brian Wilson Presents Smile was assembled for a live performance, not a recording. With that being said, there is no way the album could ever be...the finished Smile. And, Darian sequenced it; Brian admitted that several times in interviews. Darian also produced the tracks in the studio. Brian Wilson's main contribution in 2004? Lead vocals. Brian Wilson Performs Karaoke.

 

I prefer the "Child Is The Father Of The Man" on the 2004 Smile because I like the way it's structured, and because it's always been one of my very favorite Smile songs. I just wish we could have that particular version with Beach Boys circa-1967 vocals. But in all other aspects, I prefer the 2011, largely because of the recorded sound and vocals.

 

BW version is too clinical.