Beach Boys/Brian Wilson Promo CD Extravaganza: Vol. 1- “A Celebration of Brian Wilson’s SMiLE”
By DJ M on July 4th, 2009
In Brian Wilson/B. Boys
As promised, here’s Vol. 1 of my Beach Boys/Brian Wilson Promo CD Extravaganza. First up is a simple CD-R printed by Nonesuch in conjunction with the 2004 release of “Brian Wilson Presents SMiLE.” I first blogged about this disc at UNCANNY MARK 1. The picture on the old blog was pulled from the web. I did the scan on this blog. The shadow somewhat hides the Nonesuch symbol, but otherwise is a fair reproduction. Given the printing on the top of this disc, "Non Commercial Version, For Broadcast Only, Not for Sale," I assume that this disc was sent mostly to radio and other broadcast media outlets. Below are the notes I posted back in 2005.
"A Celebration Of Brian Wilson's SMiLE" combines narration of Brian’s life story by someone named Dennis Elsis (sp?) with excerpts of interviews from the Beautiful Dreamer documentary, various Beach Boys tracks, ’04 Smile studio tracks, a few live recordings from the live Smile premier, and an interview with David Leaf. The text read by Elsis contains nothing new.
The interview w/ David Leaf is more interesting. While Leaf divulges no new revelations, he succinctly summarizes the Smile story. This promo CD was produced by Paul Rapport, Mitch Macatansky and Jim Fahey. (Do these guys work for Nonesuch?)
There is one very interesting tidbit. Before the studio ’04 version of Wonderful, we hear Brian (from ’67?) say, "I’m all set. 1….2….3….4", as he counts down the beginning of the song for the musicians. Judging from the sound of Brian’s voice, I’m willing to bet that this brief session excerpt comes from 1967.
This is my transcription of the promo:
1. Intro by Dennis Elsis (sp?)– "We’ve been waiting for this for most of our lives; Brian Wilson’s Smile."
2. Our Prayer – Gee – Heroes & Villains – Roll Plymouth Rock
3. Brian Wilson (from Beautiful Dreamer) on learning the boogie-woogie
4. California Girls
5. David Leaf – "The release of Rubber Soul in the fall of 1965 really inspired Brian both creatively & competitively. And the 1st result of that sense of competition he was having with the Beatles was Pet Sounds. In response, the Beatles raised their game and Revolver came out. Good Vibrations was the next production from Brian Wilson and the Beach Boys, and that in turn let the Beatles know that there was a guy in town who was making records that were blowing their minds and they knew they needed to make something that would blow the world’s minds too. And their next production was Sgt. Pepper. Unfortunately, Brian never finished Smile in 1967 and released it. So we have no way of knowing how that would have effected the world at that time. But at the time, in ’65, ’66, ’67, there’s no question that Brian in America and the Beatles in England were producing the most important records."
6. Brian Wilson (from Beautiful Dreamer) on the Beatles
7. David Elsis
8. David Leaf – "Because Brian worked w/in the context of a group, meaning the Beach Boys, his family band, people didn’t think of him as a singer songwriter. But he really was. And what he did that was incredible, from the very beginning, is that he took what was going on in his life and he expressed it in beautiful, heartbreakingly sweet and harmonious and sometimes melancholic art."
9. Wouldn’t It be Nice
10. David Leaf – "Growing up in the music business in the 1960s, all the great artists who had commercial success, the Beatles & the Beach Boys, later on groups like the Bee Gees; part of how they knew they were being successful, was that people were buying their records, that people were hearing their records on the radio. And there’s no way for artists who grew up in that environment to separate the success of the artistic achievement from the success of the commercial achievement. And I think that’s one of the biggest challenges facing all artists who work ion the record industry, is satisfying themselves in the studio but also satisfying the demands of the marketplace."
11. I Just Wasn’t made For These Times
12. David Leaf – "Humor has always been extraordinarily important to Brian. And during the Smile era he had the power and persistence to indulge all of his whims. What he was trying to do was create an environment of fun so that environment would then be reflected in the music. And so when he would do things like build a sandbox around his piano or have a tent to have meetings in, he was just having fun."
13. Brian Wilson (from Beautiful Dreamer) on meeting Van Dyke Parks
14. Van Dyke Parks (from Beautiful Dreamer) questioning why Brian chose him
15. David Leaf – "In ’66 the British Invasion was in its 3rd year, and American groups, American artists, really were almost under siege. And in part, Smile was designed as a response. Van Dyke Parks and Brian Wilson created Smile, or parts of Smile, to be an American journey. And that journey was to take place from Plymouth Rock to Diamond Head. Essentially from the eastern most portion of the United States to the western most. When you listen to Cabinessence, you can really hear the Americana theme of Smile really coming through. The 1st piece of Cabinessence, where we’re hearing banjos and other instruments that clearly are American. The second piece is called Who Ran The Iron Horse section, which is about the rail roads and how they changed the country. And the 3rd piece refers to the dams and the harnessing of water & power that allowed this country to grow and become what it is. So Cabinessence really wraps up in one incredible piece of music a big part of the history of this country."
16. Cabinessence
17. Brian Wilson (from Beautiful Dreamer) on why Smile as a title
End of part 1
18. Brian (from ’67?) "I’m all set. 1….2….3….4" -> Wonderful -> Song For Children -> CIFOTM
19. Van Dyke Parks (from Beautiful Dreamer) on Leonard Bernstein
20. David Leaf – "In the early ‘70s, I read an article in Rolling Stone magazine about Brian Wilson, the Beach Boys, and a big part of the article as about the myth of Smile. And at the same time I read that article, I heard an album called Surf’s Up. And Surf’s Up was a song that had performed only once by Brian on a Leonard Bernstein special in 1967. And that had really let the world know that Brian Wilson was doing something very special. When I heard that song, I was blown away and one of the things that’s so special about the documentary is we actually have that original appearance by Brian on the Leonard Bernstein special. And it’s the first time it will have been seen in a long, long time. And I think when you see that you understand why Smile became this mythic piece of art."
21. Surf’s Up
22. David Leaf – "The simplest way to look at what happened and why Smile didn’t come out is that Brian Wilson had a breakdown. And he put the tapes on a shelf. There was an unbelievably complicated set of circumstances which are all laid out and explained in the movie, which may or may not have contributed to the breakdown. But ultimately he did stop working on Smile. In 1966 when the beach Boys 1st heard the tracks that Brian Wilson had recorded for pet Sounds there was some concern that this might not be the right direction for the Beach Boys to go in. That concern was expressed again during the Smile era. But at no point did anybody say anything other than this music is incredible, how did you do this Brian, this is amazing, this is mind blowing. There was only one concern, is this right for the beach Boys and their fans? Bits and pieces of the Smile music have leaked out in one way or another since it was originally created back in ‘66/’67, but the first time I heard it all stitched together, the 1st time I heard the sequence that Brian created, was in late 2003 when I went over to his house and sat in the music room and heard how he had finally figured out the way to make this music flow in a completely natural way. And ironically, one of the challenges that Brian faced in 1967 was that non-linear technology didn’t exist. So if he had dozens and dozens of pieces of music and he wanted to hear how one sounded next to another he would have to take a tape reel down and put another tape reel up or physically cut the tape and splice it together. It was an enormously slow & tedious process, and he would have needed 6 months, a year or so to finally figure out the sequence. Given the world that we now live in, it was a relatively simple matter to load all of those pieces into a computer and then play w/ the sequence until he had a sequence he was happy with. And that’s what I heard in December 2003 and when I heard that I said that’s Smile."
23. Mrs. O’Leary’s Cow (excerpt from live Smile premier) -> In Blue Hawaii
24. Our Prayer/Good Vibrations (from live Smile premier)