Given the band's in-fighting, the approaching storm of chief songwriter Brian Wilson's mental illness, and the complete abandonment of the now famously unreleased SMiLE album (until 2004, that is), it's a surprise Smiley Smile ever came together enough to be released at all. And yet, it did...sort of.
Let's talk about SMiLE first, because I feel that a large part of Smiley Smile's value comes from its epically troubled and unrealized first draft. Basically, it was dubbed by Brian Wilson to be his 'teenage symphony to god,' and intended to be the album that picked up where Pet Sounds left off. An unprecedented studio experiment in pop music, humor, and recording techniques, it ultimately became the source of turmoil amongst Brian Wilson's bandmates. Then its release date was pushed back a few times by the record label, then a few times more. Then Brian Wilson lost confidence when The Beatles released 'Strawberry Fields Forever' as a single. Then Brian Wilson's lyricst quit the project. SMiLE was finished.
After a frantic re-recording schedule through the summer of 1967, The Beach Boys unleashed Smiley Smile upon its listening audience. Instead of starting over, the boys instead chose to rehash and recycle SMiLE ideas into a sequenced patchwork of melodies, interludes, and random oddities in between. Here, we have songs about heroes and villains, vegetables, a reinterpretation of the Woody Woodpecker theme, a girl losing her hair, Hawaii (I think), good vibrations, love, windchimes, hunger, love, and whistling. Apparently, the idea was to record a potpourri of different ideas, and then compress those ideas down into concise pop gems. However, the closest Smiley Smile comes to offering anything in the way of pop songs is 'Good Vibrations.' Everything else...required some effort.
As disjointed as it could be at times, I managed to find quite a bit of beauty within the chaos. I mean, with Smiley Smile, you're still listening to The Beach Boys, which means a bountiful supply of velvety angelic harmonies. And thank god, because each song's vocal melody kept me initially intrigued, and provided something in the way of cohesion throughout subsequent visits with this unmatched batch of orphans. Ultimately, the problem and the merit of this album are inextricably bound; it never gets off the ground and it's oddly inconsistent, and yet I found myself enamored with its allure and its potential. Plus, I was truly haunted by the creative SMiLE turmoil that managed to leave imprints of itself throughout Smiley Smile. I was fascinated, repulsed, bewitched, and a little freaked out each time I listened to this album.
So, the ideas on this album are certainly good ones, even if they were worked into songs that are not so good. And as of the drafting of this post, I have yet to listen to the official '04 release of SMiLE, but I'm not so sure I want to. Maybe some things are better off left as unfinished secrets hidden away from the world. The hints left on Smiley Smile indicated to me the possibility for something so much greater than what it became in its completed form, but to venture any further could spoil its appeal. Its charm is its folly is its charm, and I'm ok with that.
Of course, if you need a warm up for the challenge, do yourself a huge favor and check out Pet Sounds first.
No comments:
Post a Comment