The Beach Boys

The Beach Boys are a pop music group formed in Hawthorne, California in 1961, whose popularity has lasted into the twenty-first century. The original group comprised singer-musician-composer Brian Wilson, his brothers Carl and Dennis, their cousin Mike Love, and friend Alan Jardine. Many changes in both musical style and personnel occurred in their sometimes stormy career, which has been marked by the mental and drug-induced illnesses of Brian Wilson, the deaths of Dennis Wilson in 1983 and Carl Wilson in 1998, and continuing legal battles among surviving members of the group. The Beach Boys continue to tour, albeit with but a fraction of the original members, as of 2005. They have recorded dozens of top-forty hits, many best-selling albums, and four US #1 singles, and were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1988.

The story behind "Smile"

Shortly after completing "Good Vibrations," Brian met session musician and songwriter Van Dyke Parks, and in late 1966 they began an intense collaboration that resulted in a suite of superb new songs for the Beach Boys' next album, which was eventually named Smile. Using the same methods as on "Good Vibrations," recording began in late 1966 and carried on into early 1967. Although the structure of the album and the exact running order of the songs has been the subject of endless speculation, it is apparent that Wilson and Parks intended Smile to be a continuous suite of songs that were linked both thematically and musically, with the main songs being linked together by small vocal pieces and instrumental segments that elaborated the musical themes of the major songs.

Related Topics:
Van Dyke Parks - Smile - 1967

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But the other Beach Boys--especially Mike Love--found the new music too difficult and too far removed from their established style; another serious concern was that the new music was simply not feasible for live performance by the current Beach Boys lineup. Love was bitterly opposed to Smile and was particularly critical of Parks's lyrics; he has also since stated that he was becoming deeply concerned about Brian's escalating drug intake. The problems came to a head during the recording of "Cabinessence," when Love demanded that Parks explain the meaning of the closing refrain of the song, "Over and over the crow cries uncover the cornfield." After a heated argument, Parks walked out and his partnership with Brian came to an abrupt end.

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Many factors combined to focus intense pressure on Brian as Smile neared completion, including mental instability, drug use, the pressure to perform against fierce opposition to his new music, the relatively poor response to Pet Sounds, Carl's draft resistance, and a major dispute with Capitol. Matters were complicated by his reliance on both prescription and illegal drugs, particularly marijuana and Amphetamine, which only exacerbated his underlying mental health problems.

Related Topics:
Draft - Drugs - Marijuana - Amphetamine

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Just weeks before The Beatles' Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band was released, Smile was shelved. Many tracks ended up on Smiley Smile, in altered form, in what would prove to be a critical and commercial disaster for the group. Over the next thirty years the legends surrounding Smile grew, until it became the most famous unreleased album in the history of popular music. Some of the tracks were salvaged and rerecorded at Brian's new home studio in drastically scaled-down versions. These were released, along with the completed versions of "Good Vibrations" and "Heroes and Villains," on the LP Smiley Smile.

Related Topics:
Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band - Smiley Smile

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Smile itself, in its original conception, did not surface until Wilson and Parks completed the writing and Brian rerecorded it as a solo project in 2004. However, despite the cancellation of Smile, interest in the work remained high and versions of several major tracks--including "Our Prayer," "Cabinessence," "Cool, Cool Water," and "Surf's Up"--were assembled by Carl Wilson over the next few years and included on later albums. The band was expecting to complete and release Smile even until 1972, when it became clear that only Brian would ever be able to make sense out of the endless fragments that were recorded. A substantial number of original tracks and linking fragments were included on the group's 30th anniversary CD boxed set in 1993.

Related Topics:
2004 - 1972

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