The Beach Boys - "Pet Sounds" Vinyl, LP, Album, Reissue, Mono, 50th Anniversary, 1966/2016 (Capital)

I have a copy of The Beach Boys' "Pet Sounds" in Mono, but it's trashed by time and lack of care.  As I was strolling at a local record store in Atwater Village (Jacknife), I found a new copy or edition of this classic in Mono.   I bought it, and in our darkened living room I played the album.  Some records define the time of day, for instance, some recordings work great in the morning, and others in the afternoon. "Pet Sounds" strikes me as a work that is perfect for the late evening.  I'm a firm believer that one should go to, or prepare for bed in a sad state of mind.   "Pet Sounds" is the perfect soundtrack for that mood.

Hearing a fresh new copy is a gift that keeps on giving.  I think one can only listen to The Beach Boys in Mono.  Not only due to Brian Wilson being deaf in one ear, but the aesthetic of the recording needs to come from one direction.   It's a very compressed recording, where you feel the emotion is being put in a tiny room.   Yet the feelings are expansive and vast.  There is lots of tension that runs through the album.  I have written about "Pet Sounds" back in 2013 on this blog.  My feelings are the same, but listening to it last night, strikes me as a very intimate experience.  It's not a record that I'm compelled to share, but to be in a dark room in the middle of the evening - that's the perfect setting for The Beach Boys' "Pet Sounds."

The Beach Boys - "Smile Sessions" 2 x vinyl LP

The Beach Boys – Smile Sessions

2 x vinyl LP 180 Gram, 2011

Capital Records

For an album that caused so much anxiety, madness, and a world being torn apart, is ironically so happy sounding. I would even call it happy-go-lucky. But the truth is it is anything but happy – at least life outside this vinyl or music. But when I put the needle on the record I am transformed into a weird landscape that is for sure America, but America that is transformed into a combination of Walt Disney, psychedelia, and the brash corny humor of “Hee Haw.”

This vinyl set as well as the Smile box set is the official release of this remarkable album. First of all it is hard to grasp all of this after so many years of hearing the bootlegs of these recordings. I have heard so many different versions of this work, that it is sort of like Kenneth Anger, who have consistently tinkered with his films over the years. But what's amazing is that the different mixes, the out-takes, and even the banter while recording the album is equally fascinating. The only people I know who likes Smile are people who have all the bootlegs or just huge fans of Brian Wilson and the boys.

Nevertheless the new (and final?) version is sort of a musical theater placed in one's head. Way more abstract than Pet Sounds which is basically straight forward pop songs, Smile deals with the enjoyment and love of everyday objects and things. “Wind Chimes,” “Vega-Tables,” and even “Good Vibrations” deal with pleasure either through objects, food or spirituality. The lyricist Van Dyke Parks really gets into Brian's head. I know on paper and probably work wise, Parks was a big part of the foundation for these series of songs. But still, I feel it expresses the inner-world of Wilson, a man-child tasting the vegetable for the first time and listening to the wind chimes – and putting on a focus on that act of appreciation. Its really unique in that sense.

Also there is this tension between being healthy and sort of losing it. Almost a hyper attention to getting it together, but of course the sanity of it all is in question. Smile to me is not a downer, but it does expose the dark tinge of disappointment or UN-fulfillment of dreams. But every dark cloud still has that hope attached to it, and Smile is very much a positive outlook on life and how one leads that life.

Smile is very much a set-piece and it has its own narrative, so it's important to hear it from beginning to end. The ambition and scope of this album is pretty grand, and I miss the days when artists went all out to achieve that type of work.    

The Beach Boys - "Pet Sounds" Vinyl Album Mono

The Beach Boys – Pet Sounds

Vinyl LP Mono

Capital Records

The mature masterpiece from The Beach Boys, or one should say Brian Wilson. While the band toured the world, Wilson slaved in a studio with the top L.A. Session players in making a work that is both emotional with that 'gee-wizz how great is that' type of feeling. If there was ever a white blues sound from the suburbs , Brian Wilson should have patented it, because the angst has never felt so dreamily personal and one-so-of-a-kind.

What works and totally fascinating to hear is the many layers and parts that's this record. On one level you have the great melodies, and on another is the arrangements that seem to be complicated but effortlessly done, and third, the brilliant and beautiful voices of The Beach Boys. What we have here is perfection which is technical but has a lot of feeling and tenderness. Very rarely does one hear a sound that is technically perfect in an aurally sense, but the emotion behind it is just a wow. The only thing I can compare it to is Bach. For the reason that Bach seems to add layers, and each layer builds and builds. Or supports another layer. Brian Wilson does that with this album.

For those who are obsessed with the sound of this album there is the Pet Sounds box-set which obsessively documents each take or layer that is put on this LP. Never boring because each piece itself is beautiful. So listening to it is very enjoyable.

Everyone should at least hear this album from the beginning to the end. Hating it is not a sin, but not to acknowledge its greatness is weird to me. It is like seeing a beautiful work of architecture and admiring the structure and how one feels inside that environment. That's Pet Sounds in a nutshell.