skip to main |
skip to sidebar
...most of the tracks here were laid down in early 1964 and it's where brian starts in ernest on his musical journey...the surf and rods are being left behind in the quickly receeding past as now it's time to find a place where the kids are 'hip', or at least as hip as they'll ever be...sure there's some looking back on a couple of tracks but mainly brians love of the studio (and spectorism) is coming into its own...some nice keyboard fills crop up here and there and carl gets to show off his guitar grooves on the last surf instro they recorded...nice evidence the reefer has made itself known and the striped shirt square days of chug-a-lug are disappearing down that lonesome dragstrip...
...with one too many trips running through his nervous system, the abandonment of 'smile', the rest of the combo (dennis apart) dissing all brians studio efforts, complaining the music was too complicated for the roobs to understand and therefore not a revenue generator, the pulling out of the monterey fest. as they knew the material they did have was wayfully out of date for the emerging counterculture, 1967 marked the year everything went to the wall for the boys, their time in the sun was over, newer more 'relevant' sounds were now catching the ear of teenys and hippys...all that don't stop this wax being a real nifty earfull, with some reworked smile grooves, and some new calm sounds just right for exploring the inner universe...
...in 1967 when the boys pulled out of the monterey pop fest they signed their death warrant as far as being any sort of relevant force in rock'n'roll, especially in the newly emerging hippy stratosphere where relevance was the be all and end all...the fabs 'pepper' had upped the game to such a degree no one stood a chance of catching up, not even the beatles were going to top this biscuit as cultural icon, talisman for the spaced out youth generation...with 'wild honey' brian and the boys went back to the roots, not their roots so much as the gospel R&B naturalness of rock'n'roll, here they were grooving in a memphis vibe, getting cooled out and funky with some hotcha grooves and lazy- stretched-out-but-tight...its kind of like digging them in a chilled basement full of heads kicking the gong around, with no 'hipper-than-thou' socialite hippys dissing the sound (who're really the latest dressed up fad that the squares have latched onto)...this is the beach boys important statement for the summer of love patrons, it says 'GET BACK', just as bob and the band were doing with the basement tapes that was happening at the big pink house at around the same time...both these yankee outfits were getting back due to pressure from square society that was going down in the mid '60s, brian had the press saying he was the yanque equivalent of the fabs and as such was expected to generate the same quality and amount of work the beatles were laying down only the fab4 worked as a unit, brian had to work against his band ignoring him, unable to get to grips with brians groove they complained the music couldn't be replicated on stage, they didn't try to mold brians ideas into combo rocking so brian had to ignore THEM which in turn made his writings all the more obtuse, getting further from the source and closer to his inner mind...bob 'retired' after falling off his cycle and making this slight accident an excuse to get away from the college students/newspapers calling him the spokeman for a generation who had all the answers to combat the downpresser man...wild honey is a great collection of tunes, maybe more listenable than 'pet sounds/SMiLE' when the mood is hazy and distant and recognised as such by the fabs who dug this wax to the upmost, ironically being the exact thing the boys thought they weren't which was relevant...
...follow up to wild honey and they're still in a 'get back' mood only the maharishi meditation and granola seeds are taking effect with this effort being a stripped down singalong having little or nothing to do with rock'n'roll, psychedelic it weren't, blues choogle it weren't, it was nothing the hippys or squares could get a handle on, they just couldn't dig it, nor did they want to...the boys were slipping well below the radar of cultural chatter, they were in a place and space that was yet to be mapped, reinventing 'folk' music for a generation that didn't know they existed...this is camp fire noodles for tripped out inner space journeys, much more flipped out than any amount of channel panning studio phasing (good as that usually is)...this is folk music for cats who don't dig the square connotations folk strumming brings on, this is for cats who 'turned on' and floated downstream, this is for open receptive heads who dig the lazy vibe but not the jive...if this disk had got more attention back in the day a whole heap of laurel canyon personal whining wouldn't be needed, as this disk is personal and worldly, it goes where its needed...
...when the boys signed on at warner bros. the first version of this LP was rejected as not having strong enough material so instead of having another 'smile' style 'no show' on his hands brian preceeded to knock out some more tracks and then everyone was happy...a superior disk and totally worthy of their name (which at that time was mud in countercultural standing and not much better with the cubes), with no really embarrassing dips to put a cat off...the boys seem very much into the whole thing and dennis gets 3 tracks which is a bonus that's real cool and welcome...top way to kick off the new decade, with some superb spiritual grooves coming through giving off yet more good vibrations...
...the seventies were under way when this wax came down the pike with new artists and old re-inventing for the future...though the title's a holdover from 'smile' the listening position and time is the opposite, this is for digging when the surfs down and out, a time when the board is leaning against the wall awaiting another day...with its address on the state of amerikkka, with its wasteful useless products, pollution of land and sea and destruction of youth who may wish a different lifestyle it picked up some hippy radio airplay that had been denied for years (in fact FM radio had blanked the combo since its formation)...brian writes three songs and overall things are looking up and maybe they could become a force in music once more, only time would tell...
...much like the fab4s pepper was the work of another combo this LP must be looked at in the same light...it's not the beach boys (brians hardly here) as such, it's carls band 'the passions' who're a way funky rock outfit...knocked together in just over a week with two new members in tow 'the passions' lay down some grungy (in a relative sense) R&B and some urban country funk with a touch of gospel thrown in (the al and mikeTM tune is well gospelly)...dennis has 2 tracks at the end that were to be featured on his semi planned solo effort which by the sounds of these would have been a magnificent droned-out trancefest, but they ended up here...much better than a lot of cats would have it, though doomed from the getgo in the market place as when originally released it was paired up with pet sounds which is totally the other side of where this is at...record co. bean counters showing how they don't know nothing about nothing, and in this case nothing about making bread as it was a dead duck chartwise...another great beach boy LP and 'the passions' greatest work...
...most of the tracks here were laid down in early 1964 and it's where brian starts in ernest on his musical journey...the surf and rods are being left behind in the quickly receeding past as now it's time to find a place where the kids are 'hip', or at least as hip as they'll ever be...sure there's some looking back on a couple of tracks but mainly brians love of the studio (and spectorism) is coming into its own...some nice keyboard fills crop up here and there and carl gets to show off his guitar grooves on the last surf instro they recorded...nice evidence the reefer has made itself known and the striped shirt square days of chug-a-lug are disappearing down that lonesome dragstrip...
...with one too many trips running through his nervous system, the abandonment of 'smile', the rest of the combo (dennis apart) dissing all brians studio efforts, complaining the music was too complicated for the roobs to understand and therefore not a revenue generator, the pulling out of the monterey fest. as they knew the material they did have was wayfully out of date for the emerging counterculture, 1967 marked the year everything went to the wall for the boys, their time in the sun was over, newer more 'relevant' sounds were now catching the ear of teenys and hippys...all that don't stop this wax being a real nifty earfull, with some reworked smile grooves, and some new calm sounds just right for exploring the inner universe...
...in 1967 when the boys pulled out of the monterey pop fest they signed their death warrant as far as being any sort of relevant force in rock'n'roll, especially in the newly emerging hippy stratosphere where relevance was the be all and end all...the fabs 'pepper' had upped the game to such a degree no one stood a chance of catching up, not even the beatles were going to top this biscuit as cultural icon, talisman for the spaced out youth generation...with 'wild honey' brian and the boys went back to the roots, not their roots so much as the gospel R&B naturalness of rock'n'roll, here they were grooving in a memphis vibe, getting cooled out and funky with some hotcha grooves and lazy- stretched-out-but-tight...its kind of like digging them in a chilled basement full of heads kicking the gong around, with no 'hipper-than-thou' socialite hippys dissing the sound (who're really the latest dressed up fad that the squares have latched onto)...this is the beach boys important statement for the summer of love patrons, it says 'GET BACK', just as bob and the band were doing with the basement tapes that was happening at the big pink house at around the same time...both these yankee outfits were getting back due to pressure from square society that was going down in the mid '60s, brian had the press saying he was the yanque equivalent of the fabs and as such was expected to generate the same quality and amount of work the beatles were laying down only the fab4 worked as a unit, brian had to work against his band ignoring him, unable to get to grips with brians groove they complained the music couldn't be replicated on stage, they didn't try to mold brians ideas into combo rocking so brian had to ignore THEM which in turn made his writings all the more obtuse, getting further from the source and closer to his inner mind...bob 'retired' after falling off his cycle and making this slight accident an excuse to get away from the college students/newspapers calling him the spokeman for a generation who had all the answers to combat the downpresser man...wild honey is a great collection of tunes, maybe more listenable than 'pet sounds/SMiLE' when the mood is hazy and distant and recognised as such by the fabs who dug this wax to the upmost, ironically being the exact thing the boys thought they weren't which was relevant...
...follow up to wild honey and they're still in a 'get back' mood only the maharishi meditation and granola seeds are taking effect with this effort being a stripped down singalong having little or nothing to do with rock'n'roll, psychedelic it weren't, blues choogle it weren't, it was nothing the hippys or squares could get a handle on, they just couldn't dig it, nor did they want to...the boys were slipping well below the radar of cultural chatter, they were in a place and space that was yet to be mapped, reinventing 'folk' music for a generation that didn't know they existed...this is camp fire noodles for tripped out inner space journeys, much more flipped out than any amount of channel panning studio phasing (good as that usually is)...this is folk music for cats who don't dig the square connotations folk strumming brings on, this is for cats who 'turned on' and floated downstream, this is for open receptive heads who dig the lazy vibe but not the jive...if this disk had got more attention back in the day a whole heap of laurel canyon personal whining wouldn't be needed, as this disk is personal and worldly, it goes where its needed...
...when the boys signed on at warner bros. the first version of this LP was rejected as not having strong enough material so instead of having another 'smile' style 'no show' on his hands brian preceeded to knock out some more tracks and then everyone was happy...a superior disk and totally worthy of their name (which at that time was mud in countercultural standing and not much better with the cubes), with no really embarrassing dips to put a cat off...the boys seem very much into the whole thing and dennis gets 3 tracks which is a bonus that's real cool and welcome...top way to kick off the new decade, with some superb spiritual grooves coming through giving off yet more good vibrations...
...the seventies were under way when this wax came down the pike with new artists and old re-inventing for the future...though the title's a holdover from 'smile' the listening position and time is the opposite, this is for digging when the surfs down and out, a time when the board is leaning against the wall awaiting another day...with its address on the state of amerikkka, with its wasteful useless products, pollution of land and sea and destruction of youth who may wish a different lifestyle it picked up some hippy radio airplay that had been denied for years (in fact FM radio had blanked the combo since its formation)...brian writes three songs and overall things are looking up and maybe they could become a force in music once more, only time would tell...
No comments:
Post a Comment