DON'T FORGET TO REMEMBER: The Official ILM Track-By-Track BEE GEES 1968-1981 Listening Thread

Track No. 17: Sir Geoffrey Saved the World (US b-side to "Massachusetts" single, 1967)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LUyxmrRhwqI

A descending sing-song melody wrapped around a bunch of frilly-cuffed psych nonsense, with a few tasteful bells and whistles in the arrangement thrown in. Like a dreamier "Penny Lane" or Ray Davies throwaway, evocative of a very specific kind of British nostalgia.

Pretty vocal by Robin on this one!

lol the psych blog Marmalade Skies ranked this the #2 greatest toytown psych song ever

It is good. Melody's somehow familiar.

Maybe the glitch in the video just tricks your brain into a feeling of deja vu?
I agree though. The first time I heard it, it already sounded familiar... maybe the aforementioned "Penny Lane" similarities.

Track No. 19: World (Released as a single in December 1967, prior to inclusion on "Horizontal", 1968)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gaDmKAJHAss

The second single released ahead of the album. A good melody and arrangement, but the repetition of the refrain gets tiresome. In addition, this is the first of many tracks on the LP where you can detect a division of duties between the two ostensible lead vocalists in the band - subsequent tracks will often feature only solo vocals by Barry or Robin, with no deployment of the band's undeniably greatest strengths, their harmonies. Here they do a kind of Righteous Brothers-split on the lead, with Barry singing the first two-thirds and Robin the latter third but honestly I dunno that that really brings anything to the song. Melouney (for once) gets off some passable licks in the background, before reverting to just playing the melody behind the vocal. Not among their best efforts imo.

A good melody and arrangement, but the repetition of the refrain gets tiresome.

OTM.

no idea what compelled them to issue this as a single and place it as the lead-off song on the album

Not to derail this thread, and I've been debating whether to share them, but I've been doing vocoder versions of one song from each album we go over (as part of my "Sad Robot Covers") -- and yeah, that was the challenge I had with this one: the refrain is kind of monotonous. That said, I really like the B-section of this -- there's a really longing quality that makes the song work for me.

There's very little I could say about 'Massachusetts' what hasn't already been said - it's an absolute classic. There's a performance they did of this on Parkinson in the '80s, just them singing and Barry and Maurice playing acoustic and they could just pull off those gorgeous harmonies so effortlessly.

Catching up a bit ... agreed, this is a great performance:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HlkchsloKZA

I dunno, there's something about "World" that, for me, makes it the perfect lead-off song on the album. Just the weird structure of it, it feels like a statement of purpose to place it as the first song on the second album, like just letting you know that this band's sound is going to keep moving and changing. The opening line is like, our first album was a success and we've been out in the world and now we're back to share the great wisdom that we've acquired, but they're these weird fucking alien people so you get this sub-stoner nonsense...and then they immediately launch into the second section of the song, letting that line hang there in such a way that you know they meant it to be profound.

This band is so dumb and I love them so much.

Melody's somehow familiar.

... the melody of "Sir Geoffrey Saved the World", that is. I don't think this is why but nonetheless...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XWQMMPFtoG4

Track No. 20: And the Sun Will Shine ("Horizontal", 1968)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OH9eX5Odeog

Robin delivers a beautiful solo vocal, reportedly done in one take with some of the words improvised on the spot (which, tbh and in the context of their other material at the time, is not particularly apparent. these lyrics are pretty good actually!)

Classic Robin, the oldest and gloomiest 18 year old in Swinging Sixties London.

haha yes

it's interesting to me how this song is *all* melody. Everything in the arrangement, the fluctuations in tempo and time signature, the little call-and-response countermelodies, are built around this one solo lead vocal.

classic staging on this TV performance
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g7xi7kl4RVY

^^ Smothers Brothers, apparently

Track No. 21: Lemons Never Forget ("Horizontal", 1968)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=piB7d85G4CY

This one feels like rather unique territory. Or, put another way, I can't quite make out who they were trying to sound like here - it's a little Lennon-esque (psych fruit song!), but not overly so. The numerous rhythmic shifts are built around the pounding piano, with the drums never playing a straight beat for more than a few bars at a time, and the fuzz guitar hiccupping along in the background. The lyric is again impenetrable nonsense, hung around some kind of fruit metaphor and apparently meant as some kind of warning or admonishment...? Who knows! Held together by a solid melody, but again lacking their distinctive harmonies (although I think I detect Robin singing a low harmony on the bridges, buried in the mix). A solid, perplexing little bauble of a song imo.

I really like this one. It may be nonsense, but opening the verses with "incidentally...", as though we're resuming a conversation, is immensely pleasing somehow. Horizontal is quite good so far!

haha yeah the first two lines sound like someone's boss delivering a dressing-down... but then the next couple of lines happen

I can't quite make out who they were trying to sound like here - it's a little Lennon-esque (psych fruit song!), but not overly so

I beg to differ, it's more than a little and is overly so. Barry and Maurice were both very good at Lennon. The song is great and the lyrics are nuts.

Intro reminds me of Peggy Lee's "I Go to Sleep" and the keyboard sound is like the one in Pink Floyd's "Cymbaline" which it's in the same key as, though it goes to completely different places

The Lennon aspects strike me as being later Lennon, though. If it was recorded in the fall of '67, I don't know which Lennon songs from earlier it could be said to evoke.

Sgt. Pepper was out, so maybe "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" and "Mr. Kite," I dunno.

Strawberry Fields?

I agree it does sound curiously like later Lennon.

"And the Sun Will Shine" is one of my fave early Bee Gees tunes. They should have improvised more lyrics.

Lennons already forgot

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3rLBkaBgc4I

P cool!

Track No. 21: Lemons Never Forget ("Horizontal", 1968)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JfG4L_ql20M

Four songs in to their second record and the brothers still haven't sung a note together, this time ceding the spotlight to Robin for a weepy multiple-hanky tearjerker apparently written about his experience in the Hither Green Rail Crash, although I'll be damned if I can detect any direct connection in the lyrics. Not particularly fond of this one, the accordian, orchestration, and melodrama make me think it has kind of a French chanson feel to it. A decent enough melody but kinda boring.

Yes, definite chanson feel to this, he gets even weepier on later albums.

we aren't going to get to all the unreleased/outtakes from this record but it blows my mind that they would leave off stuff like Words, Out of Line, Ring My Bell, Swan Song, and Sinking Ships to make room for some of the tracks that *did* make it onto the record, including this one

I do get why they cut Deeply, Deeply Me tho lol

first, a correction

Track No. 22: Really and Sincerely ("Horizontal", 1968)

and today's track:
Track No. 23: Birdie Told Me ("Horizontal", 1968)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Q-g0VINa-4

Probably my favorite track so far. Love the electric guitar fills. Harmonies, according to wikipedia, are all Barry...?

what, is everybody tired of these gossamer strains of pop majesty already

hey y'all! i've had this bookmarked since the holidays but that golden day to sit down and just catch up on everything hasn't arrived. I intended to just put the one album on and write some quick thoughts at the end but I’ve ended up liveblogging “bee gees 1st” track by track, sorry.

my background is i know the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack inside and out, plus "tragedy" and probably some other gibb stuff in the late 70s. and, thanks to my mom, i know "massachusetts," "i started a joke," and "i've gotta get a message to you" so i was aware they had some kind of sensitive-poet/bubblegum/pop-rock past before that. otherwise i know nothing.

at first listen, this material lives up to that latter zone comfortably. yes, chamber pop, bygone eras, all that. the lite, “play this underneath well-dressed young lovers frolicking” end of psychedelia that owes it all to “penny lane.” “turn of the century” isn't exactly a great example to my ears, and the repeated insistence on the on-the-nose title makes it feel like a simpsons parody of this kind of song… but it's nicely produced. this kind of thing must have commercially been riding right at the edge between sales of rock and pop albums, and of easy-listening and exotica albums.

same more or less goes for the next few tracks - so far, this is the kind of music i stick in to my “bubble gum, psych and transition rock” playlist alongside the archies, the fifth dimension, mark lindsay solo tracks, the box tops, and tommy james; every playlist needs some “color and texture” type songs to fill it out. put another way: it’s a sound/era i dig but so far i’m just feeling the sound; nothing has grabbed me as a song/hook in itself. i’m not as disinterested as Veg is in the aristocrats-at-teatime play-acting, but the polite romantic poet thing really doesn’t lend itself to in-your-face hook-belting like “gotta get a message to you.”

“in my own time” is kicking things up a notch, if admittedly in a sort of predictable way. it’s like the most muted “taxman” knockoff ever, by the least raved-up garage band. it’s tough when you copy something that closely, it’s hard not to just think “well the beatles were clearly a tighter and more fiery band at this point in time.” we’ve just moved from the frolicking-lovers scene to the big party scene, and now “every christian man etc etc” takes us into the “trippy” scene where nobody is seen doing any particular drugs and nothing particularly trippy happens but the camera spins around and zooms in and out slowly. it’s at least got a *vibe* though. the chants are so corny and stop it dead in its tracks but the droney parts are cool.

okay actual lolz at “craise finton kirk royal academy of art” opening right up with a (low-budget, inaccurate) old-timey vocal filter effect. i get what you mean about the kinks, but…. this is them trying to do syd barrett’s twee-er material right? it’s pretty good! nilsson would have taken it into more interesting places but the “see him go, on his way […] very very nice” bit moves along nicely. i like how spare this arrangement is! definitely my fave track so far.

“new york mining disaster 1941” is definitely one I’ve heard of before though if you’d asked me I would have dubbed it “pennsylvania mining town disaster 1945.” the bag of tricks they’ve collected thus far is working a lot better, giving them different sounds to reach for at different points in the song, with the scratchy psych strumming and thump-thump-thump drum being welcome additions that seem to add something and actually contribute to a genuinely weird, off-kilter vibe since the energy level of the track rises at odd times in the song and the narrative. i could do without dylan’s mister jones showing up but “don’t go talking too loud, you’ll cause a landslide” is a really cool way of phrasing what the song is going for at this point. “mixture of melancholy and longing,” i buy that.

“cucumber castle” is also cool. maybe I’m just getting used to the vibe of this record as i’m sitting with it, but i feel like it’s hitting similar notes to those first few tracks but clicking a lot better. the title is a stupid hippie mad lib though.

“to love somebody,” carrying on decently - - - -- oh shit, wait, I know this. i probably figured it was the Brooklyn Bridge or some one-hit no-name band. i’ve always liked the hook and it should be the title - it’s more evocative and you can project more things onto it. man they have some really weird song-naming instincts, these guys! for the first time the vocal is very clearly the gibb-ness i recognize from years later, specifically on the “if i ain’t got you” part.

“i close my eyes”… this is fine I guess… organ part is dumb. the “nahahahaaaahaaaa” part rules. getting better as it goes. you know maybe the real problem is that their drummer is super boring and hacky all over this album? the slower songs can cover for that on mood and psych overproduction but the ‘rock’ numbers can’t really.

woah the lead vocal on “i can’t see nobody” is pretty interesting! it approaches that “martian voice” you can do by closing up your throat (especially on the “don’t know whys” towards the end) but it’s more like he’s just so emotional he’s swallowing up all his vocals. i think this is him trying to do “soul” but it’s so odd and unique that it ends up less embarrassing than similar efforts by peer acts. i like the idea of switching from that to the clearer, lower, earthier multi-vocal part, but the hook itself is a bit generic. so many of these hooks feel like forced singalong, but of songs the instructor wrote rather than ones that have survived to become campfire standards.

“please read me” takes me back to that syd barrett version of psych, just in the affectedly lazy/nasal/atonal vocal approach. the chorus is really lovely. that high beach boys oo-wee-oo coming in is a wonderful surprise.

“close another door” - man this type of band was always opening doors, closing doors, asking people to go through locked doors, seeking keys…. there’s those dreadful drums again – or perhaps it’s someone dropping moldy potatoes on damp cardboard boxes. i think this song is okay but I’m getting weary of this record and this isn’t really nailing what i’d want a closing track to do from this kind of band. it’s too…. jolly or something. happy to have the martian vocals back at the end though.

overall this album got much better across the length of it and i’m looking forward to a second listen! i expect i’ll come around on a few tracks now that i have confidence that I basically am okay with this band at this point in their career, their sound, their tics, all that. i think the only things I can sing looking at the titles are “very very nice” and “you don’t know what it’s like” but that’s not terrible for a first pass…
stoked for this thread and hopeful i can keep up. thanks, outic.

yeahhh thanks Doc!

also worth noting is this reverent cover version by Chumbawamba from the year 2000, post-"Tubthumping"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iv9AFfidJZw

"Birdie Told Me" is certainly not a song I would have recognized by its title but, yes, it's pretty good, they were pretty much the world's leading Beatles impersonators at this point - but I prefer them to the Beatles anyhow.

Nice to see the good Doctor weigh in, feel like a tracks thread is not complete otherwise

awww, thanks. yeah i mean everybody else was such an incredible sport with the, i think, rather more demanding billy joel thread, that it'd be in poor form for me to not try and chime in! plus this band is really a genuine blind spot for me, in genres that i like!

have had second listen going on while i work on stuff... "please read me" is jumping out as the standout. it reminds me of some of the deep cuts on the first buffalo springfield album which i got really into a couple years ago.

I never got into Horizontal when I had a vinyl copy, but I'm at least enjoying the opportunity to try again. I know there's stuff I really like on Idea and happen to think Odessa is a masterpiece, so I will be around!

Track No. 24: With the Sun in My Eyes ("Horizontal", 1968)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swxOw3uJNhk

sort of imagine Barry going "oh, Robin gets a weepy solo ballad about the sun? well SO DO I" and writing this in five minutes. The minimal arrangement works well, including that odd suspended chord that the strings end the song on. And so we reach the end of side 1 without the boys having sung a single note together.

I've been kinda hard on Melouney so far in this thread but I think the Doctor does raise some valid points about Peterson's drumming as well. For whatever reason, it doesn't seem like the bros were able to recruit top-flight guys for those roles, and sometimes their sidemen's weird idiosyncrasies work and sometimes they just sound clumsy. At least they could rely on Maurice!

Track No. 25: Harry Braff ("Horizontal", 1968)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KJxHU4dsgKw

Side two opens with the already discussed "Massachusetts" and then leads into this rather dire ode to a race car driver whose name the boys seem to be fond of repeating endlessly. In the vein of their other Beatle-y material but all the dropped beats, time changes, and silly vocal ad-libs can't cover up for the fact that this is an exceptionally weak tune with unusually rough harmonies and little in the way of a decent hook. Low point of the album imo.

Dire? This song is great!

Chequered flag for Harry Naff, more like. A favourite of Oasis, apparently.

Q: Could you write to order, say if Oasis came to you? I'm sure Noel Gallagher is a big fan but if he said, 'Write us a song' could you do that?

Maurice: Funnily enough one of their favourite songs is off our second album, it's called Harry Braff. We know what the expression 'braff' means, don't we? So we wrote this song about a non-existent speedcar racer called Harry Fart. It was just one of the Australian expressions that you pick up and we were using so we used them in our songs. So I guess if we wrote something in that vein they'd probably have a ball with it.