Brian Wilson's SMiLE vs Beach Boys' 2011 SMiLE

It does hold a certain charm, just due to the fact that it was actually Brian doing the SMiLE songs! I saw him on that tour, in Ann Arbor, and I teared up for a moment during "Surf's Up". It was just unreal.

 

That must have been amazing, I have the Beautiful Dreamer DVD that has the first show and you can almost feel the energy coming out of the TV, would be fantastic in person.

 

Brian's vocals for the first section are not synced well on The SMiLE Sessions, which is a shame, because everything else about that mix is excellent and definitive.

 

I don't listen to BWPS too much anymore, but I do enjoy listening to the RFH shows from the beginning of Smile Tour. Very dynamic and energenic.Those live performances were terrific.

 

Exactly. The fact that, in the seventies, they first tried to match up the demo with the backing track before deciding to have Carl record a new lead vocal makes it an authentic 'artistic decision' as well.

Years before the box I made a sync myself, which sounded pretty good I think, and Purple Chick did an almost perfect one. But...we didn't have the vocals -only- and were stuck with the demo-piano. That missing piano on the TSS-sync makes all the difference, if only the sync was on point.

Related question: did -anyone- come along a mix with extracted vocal from the box (by some audio wizard), perfectly synced with the backing track? I'm thinking (syncing) about various fan mixes/compilations. I'll have a search myself.

 

Having had a little search, there wasn't a mix using only the vocal from the demo. However, the classic anne wallace mix did come close: the demo piano by Brian seems to be way down in the mix. Any ideas how she managed to achieve such a thing? Is there a multitrack (5.1?) available somewheren? Also, a seamless transition to the Carl vocal and 'by-gone, by-gones'.

 

I did one about fifteen years ago. You need to break up every single vocal phrase and align them so that the underlying piano hits match up with the piano hits of the backing track. I might have time stretched one or two of the vocal pieces as well. Invariably, a perfect a sync is probably not possible because of natural tempo changes of the two sources. You also have to put it lower in the mix so the two pianos blend well, otherwise it will be jarring when the piano on the vocal track comes and goes...

I created it with a very old DAW called SAW+. Here it is. Boy that was along time ago.

 

1966 analysis of 'Heroes and Villains', and related sections:

This is a gathering of relatively period-piece information regarding Heroes and Villains in 1966, especially November of 1966.

I was reading Jules Siegel's recollections about the contents of an acetate-disc that Brian Wilson had played to some guests at a house-party in either late-October(?) 1966 (unlikely because of the content on the disc), or early-November(?) 1966; published in the famous article: Goodbye Surfing, Hello God (1967).
The order of the recorded-sections on the acetate-disc went as follows:

Roll Plymouth Rock - Do You Like Worms
Bicycle Rider - Do You Like Worms
Over, and Over, The Crow Cries... - Cabin Essence
Who Ran The Iron Horse? - Cabin Essence
Out in the Barnyard - Heroes and Villains
Bicycle Rider - Do You Like Worms

What is interesting about this order is how Wilson combines sections belonging to Cabin Essence and Do You Like Worms and intertwines two seemingly different pieces; affirming Michael Vosse's implication that Bicycle Rider and Who Ran The Iron Horse were one song, and that Home on The Range was simply belonging to Cabin Essence. What is also peculiar is that the Barnyard-section from Heroes and Villains, recorded November 1966, precedes Bicycle Rider. In the Durrie Parks acetate-collection; Disc One has an order which the verse of Heroes and Villains follows Who Ran The Iron Horse and is then followed by Barnyard. Also, knowing the order in which Wilson had performed sections for Heroes and Villains in November 4th, 1966, for Humble Harv for KHJ radio, Wilson starts with the verse to Heroes and Villains, then a flutter-horn riff into I'm In Great Shape, and then says: "We're still working... anyway, here's another section now" and then plays Barnyard, which means there was another section, or sections, that were meant to go before Barnyard.

 

This kind of stuff is why I was always so fascinated by SMiLE; it was like there were all of these clues laying around, and no one could figure out the puzzle. I always thought that really, all of the answers to all of our questions are in LLVS. They aren't directly answered, but they're answered in all of the little articles and stories throughout the book. For example, everyone wants to attribute the cancellation of the album to something along the lines of the other Boys didn't like it, or Brian's drug use. The biggest reason, I think, is a tiny article (don't have the book right with me) in which Brian says 'I've lost my talent. I'm working harder and harder and getting less satisfaction than ever before'. In those 2 sentences, he's pretty much told us everything you need to know about why he stopped working on the album. The book is full of little things like that. It's still fascinating to me!

 

In turn then, we have to ask why did he suddenly feel that way, when it is clear that the music he was producing at that moment was amongst the best of his career?

 

He couldn't see the forest for the trees and he wasn't able to put all of the pieces together anymore. With "Good Vibrations", he had successfully boiled down all of those sessions into a seamless mini-epic, but this exhaustive modular method of working proved to be unwieldy and burdensome for an entire album. He threw everything but the kitchen sink into "Heroes & Villains" but somehow it just didn't cohere in the way that he wanted it to. Maybe it was a little too free ranging and esoteric for its own good. And I wouldn't say that he "suddenly" felt that way--I'm sure that it was a gradual build up to that point. He always had his share of insecurity and self doubt and the mixed reaction that his previous opus, Pet Sounds, received may have given him reason to feel that people might not get Smile. I wish I had the exact quote at my fingertips, but at one point in the late 60s, he said something like, sometimes you make a piece of music that's just for you and maybe it's not meant for the general public. Smile was a personal project for him. He must have known that a song like "Surf's Up" was very special, but maybe he was afraid that it would be misunderstood. The drug problems were taking a toll, making him increasingly erratic and indecisive. Then factor in the burden of expectation on the part of the record label and his bandmates--his whole family and network of associates was depending on him to deliver the goods--and it's not hard to imagine why broke down.

 

Yes, I perceive things the same way, but then he also had the doubters. And I can't help thinking that it tipped the scales.

 

Sure, but in all fairness to the much maligned Mike Love, I can sort of see where he was coming from. He was the one who had to go out and sell that material on the road. Pet Sounds was difficult enough. How were they going to perform stuff like "Cabinessence" on stage back then?

 

I've often wondered if the other guys even got to hear what the finished songs were like; for all we know, they just knew whatever section they were doing vocals on that day. That's why none of them really seemed to know what SMiLE even was. It was a ton of these pieces, and only Brian knew where to put them (at least for awhile); when even he couldn't figure out where they went, that's when the gig was up.

 

25 year old guys singing like angels vs. the humbled voice of a 60 year old man - for this kind of music - the angels win, handily.

 

I have to agree, but what an incredible sight and sound it was to hear Brian and his band play Smile on stage. In hindsight, I wish Brian would have released Smile as a live recording instead of as a studio album. Those shows had so much energy and were a pure joy to listen to.

 

I believe you are misreading Siegel's article.
"He then played for them the collection of black acetate trial records which lay piled on the floor"

"Most were instrumental tracks . . . Brian supplied the vocal"

Then he describes Brian singing vocals to Plymouth Rock, Bicycle Rider, Who Ran the Iron Horse, Barnyard and then Bicyce Rider again.

Then he writes "Like medieval choirboys, the voices of The Beach Boys pealed out in wordless prayer from the last acetate . . ."

To me it's clear that the vocals Brian was singing were not to one single acetate that had those sections in the order Siegel describes, but were vocals to the different acetates he was playing until he went through the collection and came to the last acetate which was Prayer.

 

Ah! I did indeed misread! Well, it's still of note the order Brian had presented these sections to these guests...

 

I do remember that in the article, Siegel talks about how Brian knew what every acetate was just by looking at the grooves in it, as they had no labels. Unless he was just exaggerating a bit.

 

I guess groove-wear would've made it easier for Brian!

 

I did too.

 

I think the original scattered sessions and BWPS should exist in harmony, Listen to them both to get the full Smile experience. BWPS is the only 'official' sequence of Smile from the man himself, but that doesn't mean you shouldnt create your own sequences and mixes, the modular nature of the source material begs for rearranging and tinkering. I think BWPS is done extremely well, as good as it could've been. I still prefer some songs on the original sessions, like 'Barnyard', 'Good Vibrations', and 'Vege-Tables'. But i absolutely love the Look/Song for Children/Child is the father/Surf up sequence. Absolute genius, except one thing...its in the darn middle of the album! Surf's up to me is the ULTIMATE closer to this record, so it's jarring to me to have surfs up end then 'im in great shape' start up. I also don't think 'Great Shape' and 'Barnyard' should be separate tracks, I prefer Brian's original idea of making them both part of 'Heroes and Villains'...but he changed his mind on this, and he rearranged the fragments, and it doesn't ruin the album or anything. I think this sequence is mostly excellent, besides a few of my personal gripes. I mostly listen to the original session tracks, just because thats my personal preference, but I also listen to the BWPS versions. Heck, my version of Worms has the intro lifted from BWPS, and the vocals ontop of the original 66 SMiLE version backing track, because I feel like thats the ultimate version of the song. Not one or the other, listen to them both!

 

Amen to that. In terms of a rousing concert closer, maybe "Good Vibrations" seemed like a better crowd pleaser than the more moody, subtle "Surf's Up", but I can't imagine the studio album ending any other way. I also prefer having "Great Shape" in with "Barnyard" and apparently the compilers of the 2011 set agreed, though in my own custom version, I stick "I Wanna Be Around/Workshop" in between the two. BWPS also excised the "Barnshine" fade with YAMS and that heavenly fade at the end of "Vegetables"--these were the two most surprising omissions, but pretty much everything else was included in one form or another.

 

Except BWPS was NOT sequenced by Brian Wilson, but by Darian Sahanaja. Brian stated that in several interviews while promoting the album. And on top of that, the sequence was based on a live performance, and, in the the end, the studio album sequence was simply recorded, note for note, based on the live performance.

 

I guess compiled by Brian or not, it was a sequence approved by him, and its the only official sequence out there.