The Bitch Boys
- Thread starter Rockadelic
- Start date
I like several eras of their music (the early pop stuff, the compulsively over-arranged studio lunacy of the mid-60s, the basket-case goofiness of 1977's Love You album), but for me their sweet spot is Wild Honey-- great songs arranged in relatively simple fashion and sung really well.
I love the Beach Boys, for me a large part of it is definitely sentimental. "Barbara Ann" and "When I Grow Up to Be a Man" were literally the first records I remember listening to, my dad's old 45s on my grandma's giant un-grounded stereo. As I've grown up I've realized pretty much any of their early material that wasn't original was better in its original form. That said I still celebrate their entire catalog, and "Surf's Up" is one of the greatest songs ever written.
Mongo_Slade said:I like several eras of their music (the early pop stuff, the compulsively over-arranged studio lunacy of the mid-60s, the basket-case goofiness of 1977's Love You album), but for me their sweet spot is Wild Honey-- great songs arranged in relatively simple fashion and sung really well.
Yes! After a period of obsession with Pet Sounds/Smile one really ought to dig into that mid-period:
# Wild Honey (1967)
# Friends (1968)
# 20/20 (1969)
# Sunflower (1970)
# Surf's Up (1971)
Although I don't remember how necessary 20/20 is. It's been a while.
Friends may be my favorite? :grin:
Yes! After a period of obsession with Pet Sounds/Smile one really ought to dig into that mid-period:
# Wild Honey (1967)
# Friends (1968)
# 20/20 (1969)
# Sunflower (1970)
# Surf's Up (1971)
Although I don't remember how necessary 20/20 is. It's been a while.
Friends may be my favorite? :grin:
NachoManCandySandwich said:Mongo_Slade said:I like several eras of their music (the early pop stuff, the compulsively over-arranged studio lunacy of the mid-60s, the basket-case goofiness of 1977's Love You album), but for me their sweet spot is Wild Honey-- great songs arranged in relatively simple fashion and sung really well.
Yes! After a period of obsession with Pet Sounds/Smile one really ought to dig into that mid-period:
# Wild Honey (1967)
# Friends (1968)
# 20/20 (1969)
# Sunflower (1970)
# Surf's Up (1971)
Although I don't remember how necessary 20/20 is. It's been a while.
Friends may be my favorite? :grin:
20/20 is great. i would DEFINITELY add Smiley Smile to that list, and maybe Pet Sounds, although it's easily my least favorite of the bunch. i don't really understand the hate on ANY of the albums on the list above.
i also think the Beach Boys are overrated.
Yes! After a period of obsession with Pet Sounds/Smile one really ought to dig into that mid-period:
# Wild Honey (1967)
# Friends (1968)
# 20/20 (1969)
# Sunflower (1970)
# Surf's Up (1971)
Although I don't remember how necessary 20/20 is. It's been a while.
Friends may be my favorite? :grin:
20/20 is great. i would DEFINITELY add Smiley Smile to that list, and maybe Pet Sounds, although it's easily my least favorite of the bunch. i don't really understand the hate on ANY of the albums on the list above.
i also think the Beach Boys are overrated.
Guest
NachoManCandySandwich said:Mongo_Slade said:I like several eras of their music (the early pop stuff, the compulsively over-arranged studio lunacy of the mid-60s, the basket-case goofiness of 1977's Love You album), but for me their sweet spot is Wild Honey-- great songs arranged in relatively simple fashion and sung really well.
Yes! After a period of obsession with Pet Sounds/Smile one really ought to dig into that mid-period:
# Wild Honey (1967)
# Friends (1968)
# 20/20 (1969)
# Sunflower (1970)
# Surf's Up (1971)
I would suggest adding the following to your list:
# Holland (1973)
Yes! After a period of obsession with Pet Sounds/Smile one really ought to dig into that mid-period:
# Wild Honey (1967)
# Friends (1968)
# 20/20 (1969)
# Sunflower (1970)
# Surf's Up (1971)
I would suggest adding the following to your list:
# Holland (1973)
The_Hook_Up said:djwaxon said
et Sounds > any Beatles album
you sound like you hate rock music
haha not at all - i love the Beatles, i was a real stan as a teenager. But i don't think any of their albums start to finish are amazing, and I think Pet Sounds is far more consistent than any of them. i think Rubber Soul is the most consistent of their albums tbh.
et Sounds > any Beatles albumyou sound like you hate rock music
haha not at all - i love the Beatles, i was a real stan as a teenager. But i don't think any of their albums start to finish are amazing, and I think Pet Sounds is far more consistent than any of them. i think Rubber Soul is the most consistent of their albums tbh.
B
bull_ox
Guest
The_Hook_Up said:djwaxon saidet Sounds > any Beatles album
you sound like you hate rock music
The Beatles have a lot of baggage associated with them. While I agree that they are definitely more important in the scheme of rock and pop overall (and I actually think that as far as straight-up rock bands almost everything that came after them was introduced by them) I would probably rather listen to an early BBs album than an early Beatles (the hits are less played-out, the Beatles early albums have too many lame covers) and I will never listen to any single Beatles record as much as I have Pet Sounds or Smile.
I also think that had Brian Wilson not had his breakdown that the BBs would have continued to be seen as neck-and-neck competitors w.the Beatles in the late 60s (which they were for only Pet Sounds and the singles immediately following it), which could've changed things in the 70s...
et Sounds > any Beatles albumyou sound like you hate rock music
The Beatles have a lot of baggage associated with them. While I agree that they are definitely more important in the scheme of rock and pop overall (and I actually think that as far as straight-up rock bands almost everything that came after them was introduced by them) I would probably rather listen to an early BBs album than an early Beatles (the hits are less played-out, the Beatles early albums have too many lame covers) and I will never listen to any single Beatles record as much as I have Pet Sounds or Smile.
I also think that had Brian Wilson not had his breakdown that the BBs would have continued to be seen as neck-and-neck competitors w.the Beatles in the late 60s (which they were for only Pet Sounds and the singles immediately following it), which could've changed things in the 70s...
Guest
djwaxon said:The_Hook_Up said:djwaxon saidet Sounds > any Beatles album
you sound like you hate rock music
haha not at all - i love the Beatles, i was a real stan as a teenager. But i don't think any of their albums start to finish are amazing, and I think Pet Sounds is far more consistent than any of them. i think Rubber Soul is the most consistent of their albums tbh.
"Consistent" is the lamest and most useless critical buzzword there is.
et Sounds > any Beatles albumyou sound like you hate rock music
haha not at all - i love the Beatles, i was a real stan as a teenager. But i don't think any of their albums start to finish are amazing, and I think Pet Sounds is far more consistent than any of them. i think Rubber Soul is the most consistent of their albums tbh.
"Consistent" is the lamest and most useless critical buzzword there is.
PelvicDust said:djwaxon said:The_Hook_Up said:djwaxon saidet Sounds > any Beatles album
you sound like you hate rock music
haha not at all - i love the Beatles, i was a real stan as a teenager. But i don't think any of their albums start to finish are amazing, and I think Pet Sounds is far more consistent than any of them. i think Rubber Soul is the most consistent of their albums tbh.
"Consistent" is the lamest and most useless critical buzzword there is.
Yeah, I prefer records that only have one or two good songs on them to ones that are good all the way through.
et Sounds > any Beatles albumyou sound like you hate rock music
haha not at all - i love the Beatles, i was a real stan as a teenager. But i don't think any of their albums start to finish are amazing, and I think Pet Sounds is far more consistent than any of them. i think Rubber Soul is the most consistent of their albums tbh.
"Consistent" is the lamest and most useless critical buzzword there is.
Yeah, I prefer records that only have one or two good songs on them to ones that are good all the way through.
Guest
bull_ox said:I also think that had Brian Wilson not had his breakdown that the BBs would have continued to be seen as neck-and-neck competitors w.the Beatles in the late 60s (which they were for only Pet Sounds and the singles immediately following it), which could've changed things in the 70s...
This thread has now entered the realm of fan fiction.
I think, like, if Hendrix had only slept on his side, he'd eventually have become the emperor of the whole world, man.
This thread has now entered the realm of fan fiction.
I think, like, if Hendrix had only slept on his side, he'd eventually have become the emperor of the whole world, man.
I think if Smile had come out in late 66 as planned it would have blew everything else out of the water and changed the musical landscape. Really wonder if Sgt Pepper would have quite had the same impact when that dropped in Jun 67 if Smile had already been around for 6 months.
Friends for me is their post Pet Sounds classic.
Always loved the 5 tracks on Summer Days (And Summer Nights) LP ie Girl Don't Tell Me, Help Me Rhonda, California Girls, Let Him Run Wild and You're So Good To Me. Nice progression towards the Pet Sounds 'sound'.
Friends for me is their post Pet Sounds classic.
Always loved the 5 tracks on Summer Days (And Summer Nights) LP ie Girl Don't Tell Me, Help Me Rhonda, California Girls, Let Him Run Wild and You're So Good To Me. Nice progression towards the Pet Sounds 'sound'.
The thing people forget about The Beach Boys and The Beatles - in fact, about pop music in the early/mid 60s generally, but those acts in particular - is that they were all making it up as they went along. There weren't any rules or established practices and ways of doing things that they had to cleave to in order to be successful. Nobody was telling them they couldn't do this, that or the other, but nor did they have any idea of what they could do - everyone was pretty much winging it. For all anyone in the music business knew back then, rock music could have been just another trend that would eventually go the way of the big bands. But right there and then, these longhairs were selling a lot of records, so the guys at the labels - who didn't know any better, after all - were happy to give them a free rein.
In recent years, I've noticed how more and more people have begun to judge bands like these by current values, so you get people spouting idiotic shit like "the Beatles were the first boy band", as if a facile, reductionist statement like that is on its own enough to invalidate everything they ever did. Sure, they weren't the only game in town, but nonetheless the continuing attempts to diminish the achievements of certain acts seems to be part of a widespread, that-don't-impress-me-much tendency to take their innovations - manifold and significant - for granted, as if, say, the Pixies or Nirvana could still have existed and gone on to have the impact they did if you were to completely erase the Beatles or the Beach Boys from history.
The great thing about this thread and the "overrated" one is that they sent me back to things like Brian Wilson's demo for Surf's Up, which is just astounding to me. It occurred to me that, instead of being all "nyah-nyah-nyah, Be True To Your School sucks, dude", maybe what people ought to be focusing is how in the hell he got from something as insubstantial and throwaway as that to Surf's Up in three fucking years. As artistic quantum leaps go, that could even be greater than She Loves You to Tomorrow Never Knows. It's like people who trash McCartney for occasionally doing little kid's songs and nursery rhymes or cornball shit like Mull Of Kintyre or Ebony and Ivory. Yeah, forget Helter Skelter, She's Leaving Home, Maybe I'm Amazed or Hey Jude - the real measure of the artist is whatever some dorky rock-snob decrees to be their cheesiest moment. I mean, whenever I hear someone using something like The Frog Chorus as a stick to beat McCartney with, I know immediately that I'm dealing with an idiot.
And yeah, if Smile had come out in 1967 as intended, who knows? Certainly there are things on that record that are compositionally light years ahead of anything else in pop at the time. And it's really something else the way that embittered, no-count troglodyte Mike Love (or Fuck Mike Love, as I prefer to call him) has begun to claim that, hey, well, y'know, most of the ideas for Pet Sounds and Smile - the really good ideas - were mine...
Fuck Mike Love.
In recent years, I've noticed how more and more people have begun to judge bands like these by current values, so you get people spouting idiotic shit like "the Beatles were the first boy band", as if a facile, reductionist statement like that is on its own enough to invalidate everything they ever did. Sure, they weren't the only game in town, but nonetheless the continuing attempts to diminish the achievements of certain acts seems to be part of a widespread, that-don't-impress-me-much tendency to take their innovations - manifold and significant - for granted, as if, say, the Pixies or Nirvana could still have existed and gone on to have the impact they did if you were to completely erase the Beatles or the Beach Boys from history.
The great thing about this thread and the "overrated" one is that they sent me back to things like Brian Wilson's demo for Surf's Up, which is just astounding to me. It occurred to me that, instead of being all "nyah-nyah-nyah, Be True To Your School sucks, dude", maybe what people ought to be focusing is how in the hell he got from something as insubstantial and throwaway as that to Surf's Up in three fucking years. As artistic quantum leaps go, that could even be greater than She Loves You to Tomorrow Never Knows. It's like people who trash McCartney for occasionally doing little kid's songs and nursery rhymes or cornball shit like Mull Of Kintyre or Ebony and Ivory. Yeah, forget Helter Skelter, She's Leaving Home, Maybe I'm Amazed or Hey Jude - the real measure of the artist is whatever some dorky rock-snob decrees to be their cheesiest moment. I mean, whenever I hear someone using something like The Frog Chorus as a stick to beat McCartney with, I know immediately that I'm dealing with an idiot.
And yeah, if Smile had come out in 1967 as intended, who knows? Certainly there are things on that record that are compositionally light years ahead of anything else in pop at the time. And it's really something else the way that embittered, no-count troglodyte Mike Love (or Fuck Mike Love, as I prefer to call him) has begun to claim that, hey, well, y'know, most of the ideas for Pet Sounds and Smile - the really good ideas - were mine...
Fuck Mike Love.
Doc.....good post.....Elvis spawned the "Teen Idol" in R&R, not unlike what Sinatra was in his day. The basics of how to create, groom and market a teen idol was on the books by 1964. The "British Invasion" followed that path.
If the Beatles had released 3-4 LP's and faded away they would have been nothing BUT a "boy band" as we like to call them today.
But they grew, matured and evolved as a band and what they wound up being was a far cry from what they began as. This was, and still is, an oddity, as the majority of pop and rock artists that have come post-64 usually created their best music early on and then got worse due to the stress of record labels insisting they spit out gems every 9 months in some sort of "formula" that the Beatles helped create the blueprint for(and only sustained for 4-5 years).
You are 100% correct in that the Beatles blazed trails at a time when there were no "rules".
A lot of things will have to change if we're ever going to see something like that in popular music again.
If the Beatles had released 3-4 LP's and faded away they would have been nothing BUT a "boy band" as we like to call them today.
But they grew, matured and evolved as a band and what they wound up being was a far cry from what they began as. This was, and still is, an oddity, as the majority of pop and rock artists that have come post-64 usually created their best music early on and then got worse due to the stress of record labels insisting they spit out gems every 9 months in some sort of "formula" that the Beatles helped create the blueprint for(and only sustained for 4-5 years).
You are 100% correct in that the Beatles blazed trails at a time when there were no "rules".
A lot of things will have to change if we're ever going to see something like that in popular music again.
'god only knows' is definitely in the g.o.a.t. conversation, but this jernt right here is the one that always gets me.....
bike horns and all.
bike horns and all.
