Thirty second sound samples of the new Brian Wilson record hit Amazon.com late last week, and I have to say, I’m somewhat encouraged by them. This is great news to me because in my opinion, Wilson’s solo career is a mixed bag of highs and lows (mostly lows).
We have to go all the way back to 1966, and “Caroline, No” to chart BW’s solo work to it’s very beginning. Although it appeared on the Beach Boys Pet Sounds album, the 45 release was credited to him as a solo artist. Granted, it’s a tough act to follow, but it hurts me as a fan to realize that other than a few shimmering moments, it’s mostly downhill from there.
It wouldn’t be until 1988 that Wilson would follow this up with his first proper solo LP. “Brian Wilson”, although somewhat drenched in dated production techniques that would soil so much of what was released in the eighties, was still a good and in some instances a great collection of songs. They served to not only bring him back into the public eye, but also boded well for the future.
The follow up, “Sweet Insanity” was rejected by Sire Records and it’s hard to understand why. Perhaps Wilson’s collaboration with his psychiatrist and that doctor's subsequent exposure as someone who was allegedly taking advantage of the man resulted in too much negative publicity. Either way, a pretty decent effort was left to rot on the shelf where it remains to this day.
In the fall of 1994, Wilson released “I Just Wasn’t Made For These Times” , an album of new recordings consisting of some of Wilson’s best loved tunes spanning his entire career produced by the "It" producer of that moment, Don Was. I can still remember my excitement as I walked to the record store on my lunch break to snag my copy on the day it was released. The original versions are still better for the most part, but this was a pretty good record and I actually prefer the versions of “Melt Away” and “Love And Mercy” here over the originals. It was also a treat to hear Wilson singing lead on some of the vocals originally handed to Mike Love back in the day on things like “Meant For You” and “Do It Again”. Overall, a solid effort.
I’m disqualifying “Orange Crate Art” from these proceedings because from a songwriting standpoint, it is essentially a Van Dyke Parks album with Brian on vocals.
That brings us to 1998’s “Imagination”, which is not terrible, but pales in comparison to the quality of the songs Wilson collaborated on with Andy Paley from around the same time frame that were unceremoniously scrapped. These were supposed to be released and for a time were even considered to be the main output of a Beach Boys album to be produced by Sean O’Hagan of The High Llamas. Some reports indicate that Carl Wilson and Mike Love lost interest in the endeavor, causing Brian to just drop the whole project and start over again. Other reports, such as the one in Britain’s “Uncut” magazine, seemed to hint that Wilson’s new wife Melinda, was trying to sway Brian away from the project and more towards the adult contemporary sound that permeates much of “Imagination”. It has some good songs, but the overly slick and antiseptic production kills the good time for me.
Not counting the two live albums (At The Roxy and Pet Sounds Live), it would be another six years before 2004’s “Getting’ In Over My Head” would reach store shelves. This unfortunate effort is mostly a mixed bag of “Sweet Insanity” tracks, and some songs from The Andy Paley collaboration finally seeing their official light of day. Unfortunately, this pot pourii of leftovers never makes it off the ground, despite it’s good intentions.
Hardcore Beach Boys fans know all about 1967’s ill – fated SMiLE project, intended to be the follow up to “Pet Sounds”. The album was never released, falling victim to it’s own lofty ambition, combined with dissension within the band regarding it’s musical approach. Over time, that music would become stuff of legend, as bootlegs would find their way into better record stores and on the internet.
Wilson would finally return to that music in late 2003, recording new versions and most importantly, stringing all the bits and fragments together in a working order to present a finished piece. “Brian Wilson Presents SMiLE” was one of the most positively reviewed records of 2004, and perhaps of all time. Although the jury is still out as to whether or not it was exactly put together the way it was initially intended, it’s miles closer than the tape fragments we had up to this point, and great care was taken to re-record that music as closely as possible to the original tapes, save for a few synthesized orchestral parts that turn up here and there.
After the release of a Christmas album that honestly I never even bothered to spin, Wilson returned in 2008 with “That Lucky Old Sun”. Although the loose concept and at times annoying narratives fall a little flat for me, It can arguably be stated that TLOS is the best collection of new Brian Wilson songs since the 1988 debut. In addition to this, it seems that more care is taken towards the production end of things to make the record sound more natural, without falling victim to some of the unnecessary vocal layering and the overuse of bass harmonicas, sleigh bells, clip clop percussion and other instruments that were purposely used to make “Imagination” and “Getting In Over My Head” sound “Wilson-ey”. In other words, the songs stand on their own a little more during this effort, and it works to the projects advantage.
This brings us to the present day, where we await the release of “Brian Wilson Re-imagines Gershwin” on August 17th. While I intend to review the album properly once it’s available, it would appear (based on the Amazon sound snippets) that the Wilson team has hit upon a winning combination. The songs of course are amazing, all Gershwin classics except for two unfinished pieces that have never been heard before and finished by Brian. The recordings are shimmering and beautiful, but this seems to be brought about by a natural progression and a labor of love rather than incessant turd polishing.
While I continue to reserve judgment until hearing the entire record, I’m once again encouraged by what I’ve heard so far, and combined with the positive buzz that appears to be swelling up around this effort, I’m going to color myself cautiously optimistic.
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