It's About Time: Beach Boys Poll Results

Does "Passing By" count as an instrumental? It doesn't have lyrics, but it certainly has vocals

The sad thing about those early albums is that by combining any two consecutive albums and picking only the best tracks, you could have made one strong artistic statement that holds together as an album. They were trying to release like 3 albums a year which is ridiculous. Yeah you might sell a few more albums at the time, but over time strong albums gain good reputations and sell better, and you could still have had a new album every 9 months.

I dunno, somehow 20/20 flows despite the wildly different sources and styles - Bluebirds is on the other side of the album as Cabinessence, so I don't find it jarring. "Bluebirds" sounds fine after "I Can Hear Music" and feeds into "Be With Me" just fine. OK, having a Manson song feed into "Our Prayer" just ain't right...

I never saw much continuity between Cabinessence (or H&V) and Vegetables either.

I've been here a year or two. Changed the number once or twice. glad to know someone enjoyed my posts. And that I turned someone on to "Girls on the Beach"....

I think I was the only voter for passing by

here's a good live heroes and villains
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sQGzRNYcKuY

"Heroes and Villains" benefits tremendously from its proper context on SMiLE, too.

also otm

haha I'm finding so much good stuff on youtube

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nFeMd3HRtTg

you guys I'm holding the last results hostage until someone helps me figure out the album voting

i always thought the sequencing on Endless Summer was terrible - upbeat song/ballad/upbeat song/ballad etc.

― brownie, Friday, August 19, 2011 9:26 AM (14 minutes ago) Bookmark

Definitely not OTM, dude.

I have always enjoyed Brian Wilson's characterization of the chorus in "Cabinessence" as "the most rockin' waltz ever"

oh yeah love that Same Song clip - the expression on Brian's face is so great

20/20's sound is all over the board - psych symphonies next to country-rock and it just doesn't work.

But is that what bothers you, or is it more just knowing that they were from different times and places and never intended to be presented together? I'm asking because there are plenty of great albums with divergent styles placed next to each other that somehow work. Sometimes that's part of the appeal, the all-over-the-map ethos (White Album anyone?)

That live version! Okay! Yeah. Get that level of energy and momentum into the percussion on record (while still keeping the lushness of the overall thing) and you could have had at least a moderate hit I think. Another thing the big beat does is massage those transitions - the wordless "la la la" parts operate more like a guitar solo does in a traditional rock song that way. It's a great song either way.

Incidentally, not so much on that one, but a lot of the stuff upthread (especially the live "Trader") sounds overwhelmingly like Phish to me. Like, if you had slipped it into the Phish-Widespread-String Cheese-etc. playlist of the dudes down the hall in the dorm from me that I played Tony Hawk with in 2001 I wouldn't have batted an eye.

20/20's sound is all over the board - psych symphonies next to country-rock and it just doesn't work.
But is that what bothers you, or is it more just knowing that they were from different times and places and never intended to be presented together? I'm asking because there are plenty of great albums with divergent styles placed next to each other that somehow work. Sometimes that's part of the appeal, the all-over-the-map ethos (White Album anyone?)

― Lee547 (Lee626), Friday, 19 August 2011 16:47 (42 seconds ago) Bookmark

The former, probably, since I'm a huge White Album fan. But yeah, it's badly sequenced as well.

wait you think the White Album is badly sequenced?!

I was under the impression that quite a few album tracks from Pepper were staples on AM radio

Ok the only thing I could find is a few message boards where people said AM stations played the whole album over and over again. They also said there were singles released from the album, yet the singles they named weren't released until the late 70s.

Sort of think it's impossible to find out radio play statistics for the 60s.

yeah I didn't think there were any singles released from Sgt. Pepper

FTR White Album is not badly sequenced - I meant 20/20

Eventually, the title track was a single in the UK.

Meaning Sgt Pepper..

Ok the only thing I could find is a few message boards where people said AM stations played the whole album over and over again. They also said there were singles released from the album, yet the singles they named weren't released until the late 70s.

Sort of think it's impossible to find out radio play statistics for the 60s.

― Telephoneface (Adam Bruneau), Friday, 19 August 2011 16:53 (5 minutes ago) Bookmark

My Dad taped the whole of the White Album off the radio.

agree about 20/20 being a weird record, tho I guess to me, apart from having some insanely good songs on it, it's notable for being the intro to the Beach Boys mk.70s, with rock production and sort of a first step unto updating the overall sound to match what was popular (continuing w/Sunflower thru, say, Holland)

If it had been released in early '67, maybe Smile would have kicked off AOR instead of Sgt. Pepper. Then again, the Beatles were probably the only band that ever got big enough to (repeatedly) force the market to adapt to their creative whims rather than the other way around. Either way, Smile likely would have been a big if not quite Beatles-sized success if it had followed hot on the heels of the "Good Vibrations" single like Capitol hoped it would.

yeah there's def a big shift in mood between Friends and 20/20. 20/20 felt like a sort of hiatus, whereas previously the Boys had ostensibly been making albums on their own terms, that record felt more like a record company hotchpotch. It's incredible they actually recovered and made two albums as good as Sunflower/Surf's Up after that.

alright I figured out the albums NO THANKS TO ANYONE HERE

I think the Head community would really have embraced Smile, if it was released in any form close to the release we've gotten from Brian Wilson recently.

Maybe 20/20 would have worked if the Beach Boys had dragged out Surf's Up and adapted it with the other Smile leftovers, "Can't Wait Too Long" and something else into a mini-suite on Side 2 (beating the Beatles to the punch in the process). Obviously that wasn't going to happen at the time, but it could work, eh?

"Cabinessence" was the song I used to play as a blindfold test for people in college to help them see that "The Beach Boys" weren't who they thought they were. it worked on about 85-90% of the folks who heard it. But it wasn't on my list for the same reason -- it's more of an album song than a piece unto itself.

Btw, I'm on vacation w my kids the only CD in the car is Pet Sounds. The only song my four year-old wants to hear is "Sloop John B" -- which I've now heard about fifty times bc she loves it and is belting it out in her carseat as we go to and from the beach (with mangled lyrics like "Hoist up the joll-EE!"). For the "lite" song amongst Pet Sounds' teenage angst, it's a surprisingly hard song to tire of. The way Brian and Mike alternate leads is subtly masterful -- and the island fisticuffs and food theft make for a hilarious narrative. Also, it really helps break up the heaviosity of the record. Wishing that I placed this now.

We're running out of songs. I'm having a hard time coming to terms with the fact that Beach Boys Love You has zero representation.

20/20 is a pretty funny name for a record that unfocused.

^^My last post - Remove "Bluebirds Over the Mountain," "The Nearest Faraway Place," and "All I Want to Do" from Side 1 in the process.

We're running out of songs. I'm having a hard time coming to terms with the fact that Beach Boys Love You has zero representation.

xposts to Native - A lot of people slag off Sloop John B, but you're right - Pet Sounds would feel like a real drag without it. Much as I love the second side of Today! it's bloody staid and austere, and that's not what the Beach Boys are about. Also I love the little "ah-yeah-yeah" bits after "I wanna go home".

#8

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2532/3838860134_cf7de611cb.jpg

http://image.kazaa.com/images/56/5099969899256/The_Beach_Boys/California_Girls/The_Beach_Boys-California_Girls_3.jpg

http://blogs.941kqk.com/files/2010/06/BBCaliforniaGirls.jpg

California Girls - Summer Days (And Summer Nights!!)
396 points, 18 votes

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F57P9C4SAW4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0a49McFOFp0

love love love the first pic

Shame about Love You - but it's really not a single-song album, more a big fried statement of craziness. None of the songs would really work without each other. It really is like receiving a series of macaroni pictures by a man who lost his mind long ago.

love you suffered from vote splitting

Check out the vocals, if you can, on the acappella California Girls - mind blowing! The baritone "Girls, Girls! Girls, Girls!" on the coda is inaudible in the finished version.

No DLR?

"California Girls" shoulda been top 5, but I get why it's not. It is overexposed...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XxysIUUFlnw

there are like 20 songs that should be top 5

love you suffered from vote splitting

I honestly went for what I thought was the consensus pick in the hopes that it would place (ie the Night Was So Young) :( Curious what other Love You voters went for?

Check out the vocals, if you can, on the acappella California Girls - mind blowing!

where is this...? not on iatee's rarities comp

yeah, " CA girls" is overexposed but still fucking great. the end of this song! is that johnston singing the "wish they all could be" echo part at the end? crazy it was his first recording with the band.

there will be no surprises in the top 7 I believe. there are exactly 5 essential songs left in the BB discography (and 2 big fan favorites)

Shame about Love You - but it's really not a single-song album, more a big fried statement of craziness.

That may be true, but with 70 songs, we could have gotten a couple in. Honkin' Down The Highway fer sure.

All my Love You votes were evicted eventually, but I would have liked to have voted for The Night Was So Young, Johnny Carson and Let's Put Our Hearts Together.

being that it's pretty obv they're not gonna make it, I can be a little spoilery, here's the love you vote breakdown

Love You I Wanna Pick You Up 21
Love You Mona 33
Love You The Night Was So Young 36
Love You Honkin' Down The Highway 26
Love You Roller Skating Child 21
Love You Let Us Go On This Way 18
Love You I'd Love Just Once To See You 12
Love You Mona 33
Love You The Night Was So Young 36
Love You Johnny Carson 14

As a Love You fan, I voted for Honkin' Down The Highway, Roller Skating Child & Let Us Go On This Way. Mona just missed.

Check out the vocals, if you can, on the acappella California Girls - mind blowing!

where is this...? not on iatee's rarities comp

― that mellow wash of meh (Shakey Mo Collier), Friday, 19 August 2011 17:23 (1 minute ago) Bookm

On a CD-R my friend made me unfortunately. I have no idea where it originated. Possibly a boxset?

uh that's total points on the side not individual votes, sorry, I was looking at that wondering why the night was so young didn't place