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Post by Kapitan on Aug 17, 2020 12:10:08 GMT
This week's album up for discussion and rating is Brian Wilson's solo album Imagination. Released on Giant Records on June 16, 1998, Imagination reached #88 during its 2-week stay on the US charts and peaked at #30 in the UK.
Joe Thomas collaborated as songwriter and producer. He had worked with the Beach Boys on Stars & Stripes and later worked with them again on That's Why God Made the Radio and with Wilson again on No Pier Pressure.
The album also featured contributions by future Brian Wilson band members Scott Bennett (guitar, electric guitar), Bob Lizik (bass), Paul Mertens (clarinet, fiddle, percussion, flute, and saxophone), and Todd Sucherman (drums), as well as a few celebrity guests such as Christopher Cross, Timothy B. Schmidt, Bruce Johnston, and Jimmy Buffett.
Rate, and discuss below.
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Post by kds on Aug 17, 2020 12:23:25 GMT
I have to say that super ultra glossy production aside, I find Imagination to be one of the most consistently good Brian Wilson albums. The "title" track, Lay Down Burden, and Sunshine are very good songs. South American is one of my favorite BW songs (thanks for the assist Mr. Buffett).
I really think of this album as kickstarting Brian's solo career proper. BW88 was a bit of a false start since he was still a member of The Beach Boys at the time (albeit somewhat on and off). Then, he sang on a VDP album, and a self covers soundtrack. So, Imagination started a fairly prolific period for Brian.
Say what you will about him as a producer, but Joe Thomas has been successful at getting some very good material out of Brian later in his career.
Now, it seems like we can't discuss any later era BB release without bringing up self covers, and there are two here - Keep an Eye on Summer and Let Him Run Wild. Completely unnecessary.
I almost gave this album an eight, but I'm settling on a seven.
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Post by Kapitan on Aug 17, 2020 12:49:38 GMT
Imagination—the first Brian Wilson solo album and one of the first Beach Boys albums I ever heard or owned—is one I’ve gone back and forth on to some degree. But in the end, I think it’s a pretty good album.
My two biggest complaints all along were the Thomas production influence and the relative lack of Wilson’s genius on display. As my knowledge grew, I also was unhappy with all the recycling: two full-on Beach Boys remakes, two reworking of unreleased Beach Boys songs.
But as the years go by, without the complaints dissolving at all, I enjoy it more for what it is: a reasonably strong set of enjoyable soft rock songs.
I still don’t like Thomas’s production style or taste. The nylon-string guitars, the keyboard sound choices, etc., annoy me. But as others have noted, he always seems to get Wilson to sing pretty well, and nowhere is this more obvious than here (possibly because he was also a much younger man than on the 2012 or 2015 efforts).
I’m still disappointed at the lack of genius on display … but is that even fair? Most musicians—even most professional musicians—have zero genius. None. Wilson has written, performed, and produced enough stellar material to make some of us (meaning me) occasionally take it for granted and assume it will be on everything he does. That’s unrealistic. Those expectations are too high.
If there isn’t genius on display here, there is Wilsonian talent. “Your Imagination” and “Lay Down Burden” are wonderful. “She Says That She Needs Me” is very good. “Where Has Love Been” has really nice vocal parts. “Dream Angel” is surprisingly cool considering it’s almost a power pop tune outside of his wheelhouse. “South American” has its charms.
The remakes, I’ve long-since learned, are just par for the course. Wilson revisits his material. Whether it’s releasing multiple versions of the same songs (Be True to Your School, Help Me Rhonda, the duo on this album) or simply keeping old unreleased material around to be used or reworked later, probably every Beach Boys album since the mid-60s includes some aspect of these phenomena.
Really, remove the noodling, be it nylon string guitar, electric guitar, or keyboards, and this album is approaching Wilson’s best solo work of all (which would also make it approach the best Beach Boys-related work in 40 years). And maybe I’m mellowing as I age, growing into that adult contemporary market Joe Thomas inhabits, but even as it is, I like it quite a bit.
8.
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Post by Kapitan on Aug 17, 2020 12:55:00 GMT
I should add, "Cry" is probably the most affected by the awful production, from the guitar licks to the embarrassingly bad keyboard "piano" tinkles throughout, to the atmospherics. I would love for this to have been redone at some point by his band in a better arrangement. Even his falsetto parts, which are nice parts, just aren't sung well. There is a good song hiding in there.
"Lay Down Burden" suffers as well.
I guess Thomas has a thing for mucking up ballads.
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Post by kds on Aug 17, 2020 12:57:32 GMT
To be fair about the "lack of genius" on display, I really think by this point in time, the "genius" had left the building.
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Post by Kapitan on Aug 17, 2020 12:59:47 GMT
To be fair about the "lack of genius" on display, I really think by this point in time, the "genius" had left the building. For sure. My only real point in raising it was my own unrealistic expectations at the time. In 98-99, I was only just discovering Wilson was a genius in the first place. And so for me it all felt contemporaneous in a way, and I thought it ought to be there for me to "discover." (As if nobody had noticed before me, in the late 90s...)
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Post by Kapitan on Aug 17, 2020 13:12:19 GMT
I should add, "Cry" is probably the most affected by the awful production, from the guitar licks to the embarrassingly bad keyboard "piano" tinkles throughout, to the atmospherics. I would love for this to have been redone at some point by his band in a better arrangement. Even his falsetto parts, which are nice parts, just aren't sung well. There is a good song hiding in there.
"Lay Down Burden" suffers as well.
I guess Thomas has a thing for mucking up ballads.
I'll add "Sunshine" and "Happy Days" to the production disasters. There are better songs in both of those than come through in the end as well. (Though "Sunshine" might be my least favorite song on the album.) They both have been neutered entirely.
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Post by kds on Aug 17, 2020 13:19:19 GMT
To be fair about the "lack of genius" on display, I really think by this point in time, the "genius" had left the building. For sure. My only real point in raising it was my own unrealistic expectations at the time. In 98-99, I was only just discovering Wilson was a genius in the first place. And so for me it all felt contemporaneous in a way, and I thought it ought to be there for me to "discover." (As if nobody had noticed before me, in the late 90s...) Ah, yeah, I can see that more for a new fan.
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Post by Kapitan on Aug 17, 2020 13:25:03 GMT
For sure. My only real point in raising it was my own unrealistic expectations at the time. In 98-99, I was only just discovering Wilson was a genius in the first place. And so for me it all felt contemporaneous in a way, and I thought it ought to be there for me to "discover." (As if nobody had noticed before me, in the late 90s...) Ah, yeah, I can see that more for a new fan. Especially since at that time I was of the conspiratorial Brianista mindset that he was pure avant garde genius, and that the only thing holding him back previously had been Big Bad Mike Love & Co. In other words, I knew just enough to be dangerous (to the truth)!
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Post by kds on Aug 17, 2020 13:27:40 GMT
Ah, yeah, I can see that more for a new fan. Especially since at that time I was of the conspiratorial Brianista mindset that he was pure avant garde genius, and that the only thing holding him back previously had been Big Bad Mike Love & Co. In other words, I knew just enough to be dangerous (to the truth)! Well, at least you grew out of it. Some never do. When I first starting to get really into the band, I think I was leaning Brianista for a little while. But, it didn't last.
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Post by Sheriff John Stone on Aug 17, 2020 13:29:01 GMT
Well, Kapitan wrote most of my review for me. I always liked Imagination, and for many years I considered it Brian's best solo album, only eventually surpassed by No Pier Pressure, and just barely. Imagination is one of the few Beach Boys' albums and solo albums where there are no glaringly weak songs. It's a solid album from beginning to end. The remakes/re-recordings always bothered me, especially because A) It's Brian Wilson the songwriter, and B) it was ten years since his last solo album was recorded. C'mon, they couldn't come up with all new material! And, yes, I think they short-changed with the number of songs, too. A Brian Wilson solo album has to have at least 12 songs, though Imagination did clock in at 39 minutes.
Joe Thomas worked his magic with Brian's voice, and I never had a problem with the production. I actually like it, though I did/do miss some rock & roll. They were trying way too hard to get Brian away from rock & roll and into pop. The songs? The title track is good. "South American" is excellent. "Where Has Love Been" is OK to good. "Cry" is very good. They did a nice job with "She Says That She Needs Me", but some of the magic was lost from the original track. "Let Him Run Wild" doesn't work but "Keep An Eye On Summer" kind of rocks, the only song on the album with an old Beach Boys' feel. I'm glad The Kapitan mentioned "Dream Angel" because I found it to be THE underrated song on the album, and I wonder how it would've done as a single. "Lay Down Burden" is always at or near the top of my favorite/the best BW solo songs. It's easily the highlight of the album for me. Why didn't they release THAT song as a single? Unfortunately, the album ends slightly weak, which is rare because Brian has a penchant for ending albums strong.
The bottom line? Joe Thomas did his job and he did it well. He made Brian sound good again, dare I say normal again. He smoothed out any rough edges that undoubtedly would've been present with Brian on his own. On the other hand, Imagination is probably too much Joe Thomas's album. I always got the feeling that Brian wasn't totally into the project and Joe carried it. The trend started in 1988 and continued with Imagination...a lot of collaboration. Imagination got a lot of attention. There was a DVD, some TV appearances, and Brian performed some of it in concert. I really thought a single would catch on. There were three or four songs on the album with hit single potential. I suppose, in retrospect, Imagination officially launched Brian's solo career, whether he knew it or not...whether he wanted it or not. But, damn, it would've sounded so good as a Beach Boys' follow-up album to Stars & Stripes.
A ranking? Like almost every BB-related album, take off one or two songs ("Let Him Run Wild" for one) and add another song or two and you have a great album. Instead you have a good, borderline very good album. I can't go with an 8; it ain't that good. How about a 7, but that might be stretching it a bit, just a tiny bit.
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Post by Kapitan on Aug 17, 2020 13:43:19 GMT
But, damn, it would've sounded so good as a Beach Boys' follow-up album to Stars & Stripes. But, damn, it would've sounded so good as a Beach Boys' follow-up album to replacement for Stars & Stripes.
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Post by Sheriff John Stone on Aug 17, 2020 14:35:45 GMT
But, damn, it would've sounded so good as a Beach Boys' follow-up album to Stars & Stripes. But, damn, it would've sounded so good as a Beach Boys' follow-up album to replacement for Stars & Stripes. I always had a soft spot for Stars & Stripes. It some ways it was a necessary step, in a similar way that 15 Big Ones was. More on that down the road. 
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Post by kds on Aug 17, 2020 14:47:32 GMT
The one positive thing I'll say about Stars and Stripes is that it brought Joe Thomas into the fold.
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Post by Kapitan on Aug 17, 2020 14:50:38 GMT
The one positive thing I'll say about Stars and Stripes is that it brought Joe Thomas into the fold. Who'd have thought this would be something Beach Boys fans would say. When I think back to peak-Brianista era (say, '04ish), this would have gotten you declared a heretic and stoned outside the city walls!
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