What do you think would have have happened if the Beach Boys finished Smile?

Would have been a darn sight better than the s h itty movie soundtracks he dumped on everyone in the 60s. Man i wasn't even alive then and i'm still mad at him for that. That guy was a total waste of space for years and years plus he ate all the food.

 

If released in late 66 or winter-sprung 77, the psych crowd would have embraced the new hipper BB at Monterey Pop igniting sales.

 

I think this is what was the final nail after Smile never materialized...not playing at Monterey Pop. Although given that Pet Sounds and Smile were essentially Brian solo albums backed by the Wrecking Crew, it's debatable how well it would have all gone down with the Beach Boys trying to pull it all live, especially as Brian wasn't appearing live at this period, was he?

 

Hmmm...You may want to check with the residents of California about the culture thing you spoke of. Think they had something to do with giving the state and the west coast for that matter, the image that still persists today.

 

The Beach Boys were certainly never cultural leaders like The Beatles. All they did was make the finest pop music of the latter half of the 20th century.

Good Vibrations very good, but not great (and quite overrated)?

 

Another factor, often overlooked for the more appealing issues like mental breakdowns and Mike's evilness, is the fact that the Beach Boys and Capitol were embroiled in an adversarial legal relationship that had to have delayed the release of any post-GV material for nine long months, destroying any hipness momentum for the group. During this critical period, the Beach Boys were battling Capitol in a dispute over accounting practices and unpaid royalties. This culminated in the group filing suit in March 1967, seeking termination of its recording contract and payment of $225,000 in unpaid royalties. The parties settled the following July, with Capitol agreeing to release its records on Brother. Only then did the long-promised (get it?) Heroes and Villains see the light of day and, in September, Smiley Smile.

 

Hey man, like I said, just my opinion! I know many people personally who think the Beatles are overrated, too...does that make them right or wrong? I'm a big BB fan, I just don't put them on the same plane as many other bands of their era. That's all.

 

I agree. If they had ditched the striped shirts and sang some Pet Sounds & Smile songs & a few hits with updated vocal arrangements, Monterey could've really changed their audience. Brian did appear with them in Hawaii a few months later, but by then it was too little, too late. ...and they still wore the striped shirts. Just imagine them gathered around Brian at a keyboard onstage at Monterey (with or w/o those damned shirts) singing a beautiful vocal arrangement of "Surf's Up". There were few groups who could compete with the Boys vocally in '67.

 

Yeah, that would've been awesome and probably gone down a storm at Monterey.

 

I agree a great performance of their more challenging material at Monterey would have given them the street cred they needed to go to the next level. But people underestimate the importance of Good Vibrations - it was responsible for the Beach Boys toppling the Beatles for the top spot "vocal group" in the NME yearly poll, a huge achievement. People were anxiously awaiting the Beach Boys next step, and that included the Beatles. The followup took too long and was too underwhelming when it did come out as Smiley Smile. Timing was very off. If they could have followed up with Heroes in February and Smile in March, and then a successful Monterey appearance, who knows what could have happened.

 

But you see, the summer fun involving cars and girls WAS the culture that the Beach Boys were promoting/celebrating. They were the ambassadors for the California lifestyle of the time and introduced it to people all over the world. They weren't the only factor in the development of that culture but they played a big part in it. I'm not sure what you mean by the term 'Cultural leader', but they had a huge influence and I don't think the release of Smile would have changed any of that.

Also, no matter how complex the music is on Pet Sounds and Smile, it's still fundamentally Beach Boys music, at least to my ears. Given the climate of experimentation in all things at the time, I think fans would have been receptive of Smile if it had been released as originally planned.

I also wildly speculate that if Brian had been able to finish Smile, he might not have been so crazed in the 70's. To have a vision that specific and vivid and not be able to fully realize it and see it fall apart in the face of grim 'bag of money and a vibrator' reality would have been hard for anyone to take, let alone someone who was already pretty vulnerable.

 

I firmly believe it would have been quite successful commercially at first, shooting up the charts for a short run then making a rather rapid descent as the old audience scratched its collective head. Still, I think a Heroes and Villains Parts 1 +2 single, followed up by Vega-Tables/Wind Chimes would have both made the top 40.

Artistically, it would have allowed them to cast off the striped-shirt square image, especially if supported by a good performance at Monterey. Critically, it would have taken a promient place as a seminal psychedelic document along side Sgt. Pepper, Mr. Fantasy, 5D, etc. We'd be hearing Surf's Up on classic rock radio today. Brian would have still inevitably broken down at some point down the road, however.

 

Surfs Up was playing while I was grocery shopping the other day. I kind of looked up and thought "Huh, thats odd but cool"

 

Wouldn't have changed things it never was a good album. Self indulgent ramblings of a madman.

 

^ Glad you could get that off your chest.

I don't think the earth woulda spun off its axis, but anything that unique and original – contradictory opinions notwithstanding – would have gotten a positive reception in the adventurous mid-late-60s. And woulda bought the Boys a little time as other internal problems would develop. As it is, they failed to show up.

In any event, it would have taken a back seat to ANYthing the Beatles would come up with, whether it was Pepper or Happy Moptops. If THEY released Smile, it woulda been no more or less heralded than Pepper. People were in love with the Beatles as personalities. That's showbiz.

Sadly, next to the Beatles, the Beach Boys looked like Dull Boys. It had little to do with their music.

Today, it doesn't matter. I've got a bunch of Smile material and enjoy it. It has a fairly high profile in circles where innovative music is appreciated. The remaining Boys work. All is well.

 

I also happen to think it would have been interesting to see how the Beach Boys' Monterey set would have went down. Was Brian supposed to play with them?
Perhaps it would have been better than the Lei'd In Hawaii stuff, but it probably would have also been similar to those 1966 sets when they were doing "Good Vibrations" alongside those short medleys of the surf/car hits.

 

The thing about Smile is that it was never an endpoint. It was only their next album, which would have been followed by another, then followed by another.

Smile was always going to be a challenge for listeners, and listeners at the time would have inevitably compared it to the other current records. If Smile had been released in December 1966 or January 1967 (in the Post-Revolver pop soundscape of the Mamas and the Papas, Face to Face, Hums of the Lovin' Spoonful, A Quick One, Buffalo Springfield, Between the Buttons, etc) it would have been ahead of the curve, and the Beach Boys would have been recognized for pushing the boundaries.

But if Smile had been released in, say, July 1967 (after Sgt Pepper, Are You Experienced, the Grateful Dead, Surrealistic Pillow, etc) it would have already started to look a little quaint, because other tastemakers were pushing the boundaries in a different direction. Brian was right to be freaked out by the acetate of A Day in the Life. Smile would probably have been seen as a highlight on a continuum that included the Association, the 5th Dimension, the Mamas and the Papas, the Free Design, etc - where psychedelic pop started to diverge back to, dare I say it, easy listening. Brian reliance on outside lyricists and studio musicians would have probably been a liability at some point as the cool kids invested in the 'authenticity' of songer-singwriters.

Hindsight is 20/20, but they really needed to have Smile out before the Monterey Pop Festival. And to perform their new material at the festival. Although they had no way of knowing it, missing Monterey Pop exiled them from the land of the cool for the next 25 years.

But even if they'd released Smile in time for Monterey Pop, there's always the question of what they would have done to follow it up. The clock was ticking on baroque harmony pop.

 

I would also mention that the Smile as envisioned on Brian Wilson Presents Smile and the Smile Sessions almost certainly does not represent the album as it would have been released in 1966 or 1967 - those visions are too long for a single LP.

 

I have a hunch it wouldn't have been greatly different than what actually happened. Maybe one more shot at being "out-there." Afterwards a back-to-basics, then a couple commentaries on the environment, other band members step up as Brian steps back. And finally The Traveling Jukebox. Brian would still decline to tour, and develop a solo act.

 

Had Brian been able to put all the fragments together as well or better than completed tracks like Good Vibrations, Heroes and Villans, etc. it would have been The Beach Boys' crowning achievement to date.

 

Nice post!

If Smile had been a moderate success and they'd followed it with a decent showing at Monterey, things would have been fine. Then following it with Wild Honey and Do It Again would have worked, since they have a back to basics feel and 1968 was the "back to basics" year anyway.

 

Yeah, ironically, Wild Honey was one of their most prescient releases - they were way ahead of everyone else there. If they'd released Smile and Wild Honey in the same year, Wild Honey might have been (eventually) seen as the more forward-looking of the two.

 

At best it would've been like Kiss' "The Elder"......A misguided bomb that would develop a cult following over the years cited by some as being their best album but ignored by fans of the more common direction of the band's music......That little stash that gets taken out of its hiding place after the masses go to bed.

 

As much as i love them....they weren't hip....transition failed where The Beatles succeeded....

 

When SMiLE didn't come out, I was 14 years old.

and 15...
and 16...
and 17...
and 18...

and so on. (Until 2011, at least.)