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wendersfan

I would think as far as studio albums go, Smiley Smile, and as a compilation, Endless Summer. I should add a disclaimer that I've never been much of a Beach Boys fan, and that includes Pet Sounds. It's just not my thing, but that of course doesn't stop me from having (and giving) an opinion.

dick_grayson

get the A&E Biography of Brian Wilson. It's great stuff. Also the Pet Sounds boxed set is worth it. The other beachy stuff is great, but his genius really shines on Pet Sounds and what would have been Smile. There's also a good comp. called Classics: Selected by Brian Wilson which is a collection of his favorite stuff.

There was a deal somewhere where if you bought the Pet Sounds boxed set, you get the Biography (VHS) for free. Also, the booklet for the boxed set has lots of insight and is worth it just for that.

cungar

Unfortunately Brian's arty period didn't last long and the Beach Boys pretty much returned to fun in the sun stuff and even worse (Kokomo) later on. There's no White album, no Abbey Road. You're not going to find anywhere near the depth of Pet Sounds or Smile anywhere else in the catalog.

Buford T Pusser

I liked the BB when I was a kid and had forgotten about them. Then I joined Columbia House or BMG? and got all of the twofers of the albums before Pet Sounds and I was hooked.

The compilations are good, but if you really get into them they'll become fairly redundant.


I'll try to post more later. I've gotta get to bed now.

Caliking

you must by the SMILE dvd! the concert sounds amazing...i got chills

Elldubtoo

Surf's Up is good. Til I die and Surf's Up=awesome way to end an album.

whaaat

Sorry to bump this one up so late, but I've got a couple of recommendations, just not from the BB's themselves.

The first is an album contemporary to Pet Sounds: Mark Eric's A Midsummer's Daydream
I consider this one a lost cousin to Pet Sounds, it's got similar 'wall of sound' type production, vocal layering and a bittersweet blend of sunshine and introspection. By 67/68 when this was released, people were starting to get into the heavier sounds of Cream, Jimi, etc. It didn't really go anywhere, and Mark went into acting. Still, this is a beautiful album that blew me away on first listen, and continues to do so.

The second is a modern album by June & the Exit Wounds (don't be frightened by the name) called A Little More Haven Hamilton, Please. It's very obviously influenced by Brian, without being completely derivative of that sound. Like Pet Sounds, it captures a kind of adult innocence that is all too fragile and rare in music these days.

Buttmunker

The Beach Boys did a lot of good cover songs - check out Then I Kissed Her, Why Do Fools Fall In Love, Mountain of Love, and, of course, Barbara Ann.

I recently heard for the first time Do It Again, which is an instant favorite now.

Naturally, hits between the 1962-1966 period are golden. Can't go wrong with California Girls, Good Vibrations, I Get Around, Sloop John B., Wouldn't It Be Nice, or Help Me, Rhonda

Its a beautiful thing to listen to God Only Knows and Don't Worry Baby (one sung by Carl, the other by Brian - both achingly beautiful).

whaaat

Whoah, old thread...

My very favourite albums are:

Today!
Friends
Sunflower
Surf's Up
Holland
Love You

But there are a lot of "deep cuts" on even their later stuff ("Goin' On" and "Maybe I Don't Know" spring to mind immediately).

Sean O'Hara

Really apart from those two albums they were a singles oriented group, so a best-of collection will do you fine. Alternatively, there's a huge box set of all their singles out -- the CDs are $107 at Amazon, but the MP3 version is $43 for 66 songs.

EDIT: D'oh! I didn't realize how old this thread was.

macnorton

Wow awesome choices. That was what I was going to post. Great minds think a like I suppose.

Also for the OP, there are (or at least there were) quite a few double packs that were released on CD a few years back. I snagged a few when I was in LA in 2004.

whaaat

Thanks! You should definitely check out my two recommendations upthread (post 8). The June & the Exit Wounds in particular I never tire of, it's a perfect summer album IMHO.

Duh Vuh Duh

I know this thread is old, but thought I would add this http://www.rollingstone.com/news/sto...the_beach_boys, Lindsey Buckingham explaining the influence of The Beach Boys on him. After reading this, I picked up the Today/Summer Days (Summer Nights) combined cd and it is incredible. Also, I can't get to that link from work, so if anybody could copy and paste the text to this thread I would appreciate it.

Also, reading Brian Wilson's autobiography (Wouldn't it Be Nice) right now and it definitely gives great insight into his mental trouble and all of the dynamics with him, his dad, the band and Capitol Records. Looks like I'll have to check out that A&E biography as well.

whaaat

The Beach Boys showed the way, and not just to California. Sure, they may have sold the California Dream to a lot of people, but for me, it was Brian Wilson showing how far you might have to go in order to make your own musical dream come true.
In the beginning, I was someone who grew up in California and was a lover of the early music that he and the Beach Boys made. Later, I would relate to Brian's struggle as an artist against a machine that tended toward serving the bottom line. Brian fought hard against the industry attitude that if it works, run it into the ground. Music meant much more to him than that. He was trying to do something so much bigger than that with his teenage symphonies to God. In the process, he really rocked the boat and changed the world.

When the Beach Boys started, Brian was taking European sensibilities and infusing them into a Chuck Berry format. Those harmonies were based on the Four Freshmen, with a little church element added to it. He put all that on top of Chuck Berry rock & roll, and the result sounded so fresh. I remember hearing "Surfin' Safari" first when I was in sixth grade and the way that record jumped out of the radio. It had the beat, the sense of joy, that explosion rock & roll gave to a lot of us. But it also had this incredible lift, this amazing kind of chemical reaction that seemed to happen inside you when you heard the whole thing.

Pet Sounds is the acknowledged masterpiece, and it's everything it's said to be, with Brian taking some of the influences he got from Phil Spector and making something all his own. But even before that there's Side Two of The Beach Boys Today!, which is really just one ballad after another and is for me one of the great sides on a rock album. Those are beautiful numbers -- "Please Let Me Wonder," "Kiss Me Baby," "She Knows Me Too Well," "In the Back of My Mind" -- that foreshadow Brian's angst and show where he's starting to expose his vulnerability. A lot of what you find later on Pet Sounds or Smile, you could find in a different form early on.

Today it's nice to see that Brian's in a place where he can do what he wants without the pressure of selling or of having to be the support system for so many others. That's great, because he gave the rest of us more than his fair share of good vibrations.

[From Issue 946 — April 15, 2004]

Buttmunker

Is that on DVD? I can't find it..

macnorton

Your welcome. As a good friend of mine used to say, "game recognizes game". Anyone who makes a list like mine is OK in my book.

Yeah I certainly will check that out. On a related note, I have been actually looking for Beach Boy sound alikes and I discovered that The Shins have their moments (Chutes to Narrow to be specific), Panic At The Disco's newest one (yeah there are many moments), Rooney (to a small degree) and Panda Bear - Person Pitch. I highly recommend Panda Bear and The Shins - Cutes to Narrow, and I am sure you own at least one of them.

whaaat

Interesting. I don't have any Shins, but that Panda Bear is on my shopping list. My other BB's soundalike fave is High Llamas (Cold and Bouncy is probably my fave) - a lot of people cite Pet Sounds/SMiLE as their main touchstone, but I hear more of a Friends-era influence. I'll definitely have to check out some of your recommendations...

Rocketdog2000

I'll second all those choices/bands (and the original list of Beach Boys albums made by whaaat). The Shins last album - Wincing The Night Away - also has a heavy Brian Wilson/Beach Boys vibe to it, too. I also heard a goodly amount of Brian Wilson-esque influence on the latest Band Of Horses - Cease To Begin - especially in the vocals.
And if you don't have it, you absolutely must get everything by Jellyfish. No modern pop/power-pop collection is complete without it.

whaaat

Agreed. Without spinning too far off-topic, Jellyfish fans should check out Drake Bell's It's Only Time album. He may have come out of the Disney camp, but this guy's the real deal!

Also along the power pop vein, the Carl Wilson-produced self-titled album by The Flame (South African rock group, two members later joined the Beach Boys) is absolutely essential. I believe that the only CDs out there are boots, but it's still worth tracking down. Interestingly, I hear more of a Beatles vibe from them than Beach Boys (played if for my Mom and she said that but for the fact that she didn't recognize any of the songs, she would have thought it was the Beatles).

macnorton

That is interesting...I found Wincing to be the total opposite of Chutes...and when I first heard Chutes (from a friend) the first thing I said was, "I bet these guys listened to Pet Sounds before they recorded this". Where as Wincing seems to be a little more dreamy, almost like Mamas and the Pappas meets a more layered sound. It is not easy to describe, I just find it to be different.

macnorton

Do yourself a favor and get Chutes Too Narrow, it will not disappoint. As for Panda Bear, I got that when eMusic sent me a recommendation email based on other stuff I downloaded. The cover looked cool so I did. It was a good choice. Although it does take a few listens for it to sink in.

whaaat

Cool, will definitely check it out. I think I'm one of the last people that haven't seen Garden State, so I never got into Shins-mania (plus the snob in me is always wary when something's really popular). I remember reading a good review of Panda Bear in a local indie weekly and being intrigued.

macnorton

Sorry I am from the Garden State so I had to see it opening night ...I was in LA at the time though. How ironic.

I didn't get into Shins-mania either. It was a few years after they were popular that I discovered them (I Garden State was '04 and I didn't get into the Shins until '06). Remember you can always sample 30 seconds on iTunes...that is what I do when in doubt.

cungar

Just for trivia's sake, I am sitting here at work about a quarter mile away from where the Wilson brothers went to high school: Hawthorne High. Let's just say I don't think they would fit in with the current demographic of the school.