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Post by jk on Jun 2, 2021 17:42:24 GMT
Boy, am I ever late to this discussion! But hey, as you know I'm still catching up on this forum. No worries, sockit. This is cyberspace, where time stands still. And you got here earlier than I did! As someone who bought it at the time I have one or two things to say about SS, but not right now... Well. I bought Smiley Smile in 1968, true to my tradition in the company of a second LP, the Mothers' Absolutely Free. I knew about SMiLE (or Smile as it was then called), as far as anyone knew anything about it in those days, and so my initial reaction to SS was one of total bemusement. I was expecting something opulent (which is not what SMiLE turned out to be anyway but that's another story) and instead got this threadbare, stripped-back stuff that I just couldn't place. Months later, while trudging uphill through snow to the mouse farm, these strange quirky songs began to make an impression on me. And before I knew it, I was hooked! I still think it's a great album, mindful of the frustration and anguish that gave birth to it. My favourite track? Probably "Wind Chimes", the one I heard first on French radio that totally floored me then and still floors me today:
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Post by Deleted on Jun 3, 2021 1:34:09 GMT
So what would I suggest to replace it? The only thing that seems to be missing is Gettin' Hungry. Yes, I know that one sounds more like a Wild Honey tune. And in all reality it's a so-so tune. The choruses are ok, but the verses are pretty weak. What do you think on GH, Kapitan? Save it for the WH album? Single only (a one-off for "Brian and Mike")? I wish they'd finished "Gettin Hungry." I mean, I know they did finish it ... but I mean take some more time and do a bit more with it. As it is, it sounds like a transition from Smiley Smile to Wild Honey: verses the former, choruses the latter. But I think the verses sound stupid, frankly, and the choruses rudimentary and incomplete, like a demo.
So I'd leave it off SS, and either improve upon it for later inclusion or skip it altogether and let it lie in the vaults, where quite frankly it would be surrounded by plenty of music that was superior to it and yet unreleased for decades.
I couldn't have said it better myself. I mean Gettin' Hungry does not suck....just the execution of it. It does sound like a demo, and they should have run through it at least 70 more times and polished it up some. Sadly someone (Brian?) said "ok guys that's good enough". C'mon man! The Beach Boys are not a "good enough" type band! Are they? Ok, maybe on occasion......
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Post by kds on Jun 3, 2021 12:19:17 GMT
I wish they'd finished "Gettin Hungry." I mean, I know they did finish it ... but I mean take some more time and do a bit more with it. As it is, it sounds like a transition from Smiley Smile to Wild Honey: verses the former, choruses the latter. But I think the verses sound stupid, frankly, and the choruses rudimentary and incomplete, like a demo.
So I'd leave it off SS, and either improve upon it for later inclusion or skip it altogether and let it lie in the vaults, where quite frankly it would be surrounded by plenty of music that was superior to it and yet unreleased for decades.
I couldn't have said it better myself. I mean Gettin' Hungry does not suck....just the execution of it. It does sound like a demo, and they should have run through it at least 70 more times and polished it up some. Sadly someone (Brian?) said "ok guys that's good enough". C'mon man! The Beach Boys are not a "good enough" type band! Are they? Ok, maybe on occasion...... In terms of albums, it feels that way sometimes. This is the band that thought a talk / joke track was such a great idea, they'd put them on three of their albums.
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Post by Kapitan on Jun 7, 2021 16:27:37 GMT
Smiley Smile [Capitol, 1967] In the year of Pepper-mania, the Beach Boys' Smile was expected to gallop out of the west and reclaim the honor of rock for its nation of origin. But Smile didn't materialize until 2004, stitched together from old bits and pieces and revived as repertory by a solo Brian Wilson and his enablers. Instead, Wilson retreated into his lonely room and oversaw this hastily recorded half-measure--"a bunt instead of a grand slam," groused Carl. Towering it's not; some kind of hit it is. Without this product-on-demand, we'd lack such impossible trifles as the wiggy "She's Goin' Bald," the potted "Little Pad," and "Fall Breaks and Back to Winter," a transitional bagatelle featuring squeezebox and imitation woodpecker.
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Post by B.E. on Jun 7, 2021 23:00:50 GMT
But Smile didn't materialize until 2004, stitched together from old bits and pieces and revived as repertory by a solo Brian Wilson and his enablers. Yikes. Enablers? I thought this kind of talk was left to message boards and social media comments. Instead, Wilson retreated into his lonely room and oversaw this hastily recorded half-measure--"a bunt instead of a grand slam," groused Carl. I have to think that Carl would have grown to regret this comment. Honest in the moment, but invoked by nearly every dismissive fan and critic since.
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Post by kds on Jun 8, 2021 15:10:23 GMT
I always thought Carl's comment was a bit off base. As a baseball fan, I think a bunt can be a beautiful thing. I'd equate Smiley Smile to hitting into an inning ending double play with the based loaded and one out.
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Post by Kapitan on Jun 8, 2021 15:18:46 GMT
Baseball certainly isn't my strong suit, but it seems to me bunts are strategic decisions to advance other runners or score, not misfires.
I'd say Smiley Smile might be more like having designed and practiced a Hail Mary from the star QB to the star WR, but then as the clock was winding down, they chose to run an extremely unusual but unsuccessful trick play like lining a backup QB at WR and getting him the ball in an end-around. It wasn't either the traditional play to run out the clock (e.g., RB up the middle, or "the [mid-60s] formula") OR the spectacularly designed play (Smile).
Somehow it was both unusual and experimental AND half-assed AND unsuccessful. Not exactly an ambitious failure, which a person can live with more easily.
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Post by kds on Jun 8, 2021 15:42:49 GMT
Baseball certainly isn't my strong suit, but it seems to me bunts are strategic decisions to advance other runners or score, not misfires.
I'd say Smiley Smile might be more like having designed and practiced a Hail Mary from the star QB to the star WR, but then as the clock was winding down, they chose to run an extremely unusual but unsuccessful trick play like lining a backup QB at WR and getting him the ball in an end-around. It wasn't either the traditional play to run out the clock (e.g., RB up the middle, or "the [mid-60s] formula") OR the spectacularly designed play (Smile).
Somehow it was both unusual and experimental AND half-assed AND unsuccessful. Not exactly an ambitious failure, which a person can live with more easily.
This is true, unless you listen to the modern analytics crowd who don't believe in traditional baseball things like giving up outs. Maybe Carl was an early analytics guy.
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Post by Deleted on Jun 8, 2021 21:35:18 GMT
I always felt Carl was referring to the force, not the strategy of the move. At the time they needed to "knock it outta the park". Instead, they held back and did this little thing resulting in a grounder that got everybody tagged out and the inning was over....
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