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Post by Kapitan on Oct 5, 2019 18:36:41 GMT
I've had not only mixed feelings about this album, but inconsistent feelings about it.
It's the first Beach Boys-related album I got when it was more or less new. I didn't get it immediately, but I did get it in 1998, so within the first six months of its release. Wilson had toured Minneapolis and had a very positive review, and roughly simultaneously I saw I think the A&E doc that used a clip of the Bernstein / Surf's Up performance--my first exposure to Smile! I had Pet Sounds at the time, but that was it, and I was treating it like a unique event, the single example of Wilson's genius poking through the banality and mediocrity of the Beach Boys. That's how I thought about them before!
Once I'd heard about Smile and heard that bit of "Surf's Up," I came to immediately appreciate him much more. I bought this newish album and hoped it would show a somewhat newly freed and healthy (or so I thought of him) Wilson finally unleashing his oddball brilliance.
Instead, I heard an adult contemporary piece of pop. I tried--really, really hard--to find hints of the avante garde because I thought that's where Wilson's brilliance lay. So I'd grab on to lyrics like "I miss the way that I used to call the shots around here" and imagine I'd found the genius breaking free, or maybe the first part of "Happy Days" and think it was some new oddity (not knowing it was almost 30 years old...).
But even as I hoped I liked it, forced myself to like it, I openly mocked the production. To some extent, I still do. The nylon stringed guitars, the noodling, the overall sheen: it's just not for me.
Increasingly, though, I really appreciate the songs. I like the ones most people like, including "Your Imagination," "She Says That She Needs Me," "South American," and "Lay Down Burden," but I also really, REALLY like the pop fare of "Dream Angel" and "Where Has Love Been?" I wish the Beach Boys remakes weren't there, but honestly I wasn't familiar with the originals when I first heard this album anyway (much less the recycled components of things like "SSTSNM" and "Happy Days").
It's a good album. The production still strikes me as dated, as it did even when it was a new album. But Brian is singing really well throughout, doing justice to this solid batch of songs. Sure, I'd have loved to hear his then-current band redo the whole thing circa 2004-08, but this album is much better than I gave it credit for at times along the way. If imperfections disqualified albums from our libraries, they'd be small, small libraries after all.
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Post by kds on Oct 6, 2019 1:08:34 GMT
Yeah, the production is embarrassing (the backing track on Your Imagination sounds like a generic Xmas album they'd sell at KMart for $3), but its a mostly enjoyable album.
Firstly, Brian's vocals are much better than the albums he sang on three years prior. Plus, the material is strong enough to overcome the production, especially South American which makes me long for more Brian / Buffett collaborations.
Even the 110% completely unnecessary BB remakes (seriously, who keeps convincing Brian, Al, and Mike to do this?) don't mar a solid listen.
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Post by lonelysummer on Oct 8, 2019 5:10:02 GMT
I loved it when it came out; my feelings for it have lessened since, but it's still one of Brian's better solo albums. I like all the songs pretty well except for Sunshine (not a fan of the dozens of white boy reggae tunes I've heard through the years) - at least until it gets to the part "baby, don't be afraid to call", I love that part. The weirdness of Happy Days feels out of place on this album. I do like the remakes but they would have fit in better on IJWMFTT. My initial favorite was Where Has Love Been? Very tender, loving song that didn't seem to get any notice. Lay Down Burden will probably be the one I always go back to now. Really touching tribute to Carl.
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Post by Kapitan on Oct 10, 2019 13:48:57 GMT
My initial favorite was Where Has Love Been? Very tender, loving song that didn't seem to get any notice. Yes! I don't think I've ever seen anyone call that out as a favorite, but I agree with you entirely. It's not an all-time classic, by any means, but I think it's a lovely little song. In fact, it is just now occurring to me how perfect a fit it would have been in the 2004 Smile shows' acoustic mini-sets. I can hear it, an acoustic guitar, maybe a xylophone or something small, a tambourine, and those voices...
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Post by B.E. on Nov 9, 2022 1:49:07 GMT
Intriguing...
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Post by Kapitan on Jan 31, 2024 15:47:41 GMT
The Pitchfork obituary of Melinda Wilson linked to this 1998 interview/story done by the New York Times in connection with Imagination. It's pretty interesting reading in some ways: the writer calls Imagination "the latest and best of these albums," with the rest of "these albums" apparently being his 1988 S/T debut, IJWMFTT, The Wilsons, and Orange Crate Art; Brian's next album is, of course, to be a rock and roll album; Brian saying he didn't think he'd perform live with the Beach Boys again, though he may consider recording with them if he and Mike could get along; and a few comments from Paul Mertens, who first played with Brian on Imagination. www.nytimes.com/1998/06/21/arts/pop-jazz-brian-wilson-is-back-that-is-he-s-back-again.html
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Post by lonelysummer on Feb 4, 2024 20:30:14 GMT
It puzzles me that people always expected Brian to come up with something WEIRD. Especially in 1998. He's happily married, has a young family. The music on Imagination is peaceful, pretty, happy. The only time it ventures into "weird" is Happy Days. Why would he want to go down that road in 1998? To get the "weird" Brian back, you would have to put him in a situation like he was in circa 1976/77.
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