CREEM ONLINE: Brian Wilson

Brian Wilson
Smile
2004 Nonesuch

I'm by no means Indiana Jones, and I certainly am not interested in a quest for the Holy Grail; I don't believe in them, and certainly not when it comes to music. In that respect, having listened to Smile, the aborted Beach Boys opus-to-be turned recreated Brian Wilson album, I am content that anything that was once innovative about the music is far from the mark in 2004.

Additionally, I am fine with the fact that Wilson's voice is no longer what it once was, and the backing vocals, although excellent, are still not up to par with the Hendrix dubbed "psychedelic barbershop quartet" that was the Beach Boys. The album is still an interesting and entertaining body of work that is better than anything the Beach Boys recorded post-Pet Sounds, and certainly better than the catalogue Wilson's solo career has spawned. As David Leaf, author of The Beach Boys & the California Myth puts it, "the best thing we can do is listen to this music without the burden of history."

The original Smile was produced entirely by Wilson, beginning in late 1966, and put on hiatus the following May. Wilson, obsessed with topping the creative peak of the Beatles and making a "teenage symphony to God," had a nervous breakdown and was declared insane by psychiatrists. Why is shrouded in a bit of mystery: the need to succeed, longstanding family problems, drug abuse… these are all factors. The tapes were reportedly destroyed and the entirely different body of work Smiley Smile became their next album (though that album contains a few bastardized versions of Smile songs). The former statement was later to be revealed as falsified, in light of bits and pieces showing up on compilations and the rarities album 20/20. Regardless, Smile became a legend, a myth, as the liner notes put it, "a cruel tease of lost promise;" what was to be the greatest album of all time. Here I am, burdening the music with it's own history.

What is important: nearly thirty-seven years later when it was suggested to Wilson, who's thankfully no longer a part of the Beach Boys, take Smile on the road. Darian Sahanaja, Wilson's keyboardist/back-up vocalist, brought over every bit and piece of Smile he could and Van Dyke Parks (the album's lyricist) was brought in to help complete the project. Camp was set-up at L.A.'s Sunset Sound (where original "Good Vibrations" and "Heroes & Villains" sessions had taken place) and Smile was reborn.

The album begins with, as expected by rock historians, "Our Prayer," a beautiful choir-led chant that leads into "Gee," an introduction to "Heroes & Villains." It contains an almost Hawaiian feel to it, and its dit-dit-diddy-wah background and "how I love my girl" vocals (from the Crows' "Gee") jumps perfectly into "Heroes."

The album is wonderfully joyous, a testament and time capsule to the innocence that still existed without irony and without trying in the sixties. The music changes courses constantly, and though it's not as quite as perfect as it was when we couldn't hear it, it is still a damn fine record by one of America's greatest modern composers.