Brian Wilson, Presents Smile, A Review (2004)

Brian Wilson, Presents Smile, A Review (2004)

By: Ghost Writer

Rock N Roll Animal

It´s still amazing for me the chance of listening to the final edition of Smile, the legendary record that brought Beach Boys´ leader Brian Wilson mind to collapse, 40 years after its originally promised release date, Brian Wilson finally managed to end Smile, many thought it was a revolutionary record, the one to finally defeat The Beatles on the road to pop music perfection, in reality, it wasn’t, but that doesn’t mean that Smile is not an outstanding record, it´s a great record, but it also proves that after Pet Sounds, Wilson was not able to maintain continuum and was easily surpassed by Lennon, McCartney and George Martin, at least in production merits, yes, Smile is an ambitious concept album, but it lacks the ultra-modern sounds of Revolver or the wild experimental edge of Sgt Pepper´s.

 

2004 marked another return to form by Brian Wilson, a couple of tours with his new band, featuring members and fans from pop group The Wondermints were enough to gather confidence on the still fragile psyche of Wilson, thanks to is new band he was able to carry on with a live show for Pet Sounds, an idea Wilson considerate impossible in the 60s, because of the studio nature of the album, but in the early 00s, and with the proper band, Wilson made a brilliant return and many longtime fans were able to hear Pet Sounds in the live format, as Wilson always wished it to sound, instead of the stripped down nature of many live performances of the material played by the band without Wilson in the 70s.

Many demos of the material were already available on many recordings by the Beach Boys, some finished themes surfaced on posterior releases, but the finished form, the way Wilson wanted it to sound in the end of the 60s, was finally met in September 2004, opener Our Prayer/Gee, already appeared in a previous record, Heroes and Villains was already well known by fans of the band, mutilated, not including some passages debuted here, I must say here that I find previous versions of the song superior to this one, perhaps is the nature of the song and the abrupt shift of tempos that I dislike from this 2004 version, sonically is an interesting theme, but it loses some spark here, Barnyard (the same with Vega-Tables), a piece of vaudevillian psychedelia owing more to the 60s sounds awkward in the 00s, even amateurish considering the then relevant work by bands like the High Llamas and the Flaming Lips; the same happens to Cabin Essence, despite a soulful performance by Wilson, and the musical whirlwind perfectly recreated in the second part of the song, a part that already sounded impressive on early versions of the song.

Surf´s Up is one of my favorite tune by Wilson, but is almost superfluous considering the already gorgeous version debuted on the album by the same name in the 70s, nothing new to be heard here and no surprises, and again, the magic of the warm 70s sounds is almost lost here,  On a Holiday gets in synchrony with the rest of the album, connecting great with the circular concept of the album, but for the casual listener, it “sounds like the other song…” instead of adding to the cyclic effect, it´s a circus piece that adds to the American folk nature of the record but nothing beyond that.

Windchimes retains the original beauty of the song, not an overtly ambitious piece, but more a declaration of purity in sound by Wilson, the calm before the storm in the form of Mrs. OLeary´s Cow, a legendary piece I heard somewhere else on record more than a decade before, a piece that as legend goes, costed Wilson´s mind it´s sanity when he thought the music could create deliberated fires somewhere else, and that also reminds a little uncomfortable piece of history considering that Wilson asked the musicians on the original session (the legendary Wrecking Crew) to wear toy fireman helmets when recording the piece, it was conceived to be not a single, but the central and most complex piece on the record, it was considering an outstanding performance by the band on the live setting, and a new proof of Wilson being ready to create some interesting new music.

The record closes again with a little blasphemous move, a re-recording of the classic Good Vibrations, an already well known piece, a legendary piece, I must add, with the Mike Love lyrics removed in order to keep a lawsuit away, another time is a little controversial move, as many of us wished to hear how the original version of Smile was intended to sound like, but with well-known versions of the songs previously record as demos or included in 70s records, is a little bit of an impertinence to change what’s already on the mind of the fans, it was great to know that Wilson was able to finish a work that costed him his own mind, to hear the definitive version of the record in Wilson´s mind, but somehow fans like me, already knew how it was going to sound decades ago, like a book made into a movie, it would have been better to keep it as a book, with the images made by our minds and imagination.