Try as I might -- and I have tried very hard -- I just don't get the "genius" of this album. I know that George Martin said that Sgt Pepper would have never happened without Pet Sounds, but I don't think the two are even in the same league. What am I missing?
Your list of early artists who fail to move you is interesting in that 3 of the 5 you list would make my top 10 list of rock music that actually survives. In fact, Chuck Berry would nail the #1 spot without a moment's hesitation. I find his music far more compelling today than almost any other rock musician's. Buddy Holly is only a half-step behind Berry and Brian Wilson is in there somewhere. IMHO, Orbison and Presley were more notable as singers than writers (and Presley was obviously a cultural phenomenon in so many ways; from sex symbol to early racial cross over music).
If you find that these musicians are more interesting as "historical artifacts", it says more about your personal preferences than it does about the music. No criticism is implied there. I like some Bel Canto opera, but can't abide more than 5 minutes of Wagner. I assure you that this fact says more about me than it does about Wagner's music.
Either way, I must admit that I find it curious that anyone who likes rock music doesn't find Berry's music essential. Rock is a reductionist/primitivist art form which isn't really complicated. You got your blues, your country, and your gospel. From the blues, I find that Berry distilled pure, nearly perfect rock n roll. From country music, Holly performs a similar transformation and for Gospel, you might look to Little Richard.
Wilson is a bit different in that his gift was expanding the "vocabulary" of rock music. He looked backward to the '50s vocal music (doo wop) and forward to incorporate exotic technology. IMHO, in this repect, he's the father of "art rock".
It's not merely that the Stones and Beatles (and just about everyone else) were inspired by this music, it's more that between Chuck Berry, Buddy Holly, and Brian Wilson you will find the core of almost everything the Beatles and Stones produced over the course of their careers (with the possible exception of the Disco/Funk elements of the Stones which nods toward gospel music and Little Richard). And from there, you will will find that so much subsequent r'n'r music goes back to those 2 bands.
I think George Thorogood put it best. When asked why his band didn't perform any original music, he replied: "Because Chuck Berry has already written all the great rock n roll songs".
OTOH, you're certainly entitled to not dig it and it certainly doesn't prove that Pet Sounds is a great record.
It's so flagrantly overrated, that I find it incredible that people fall for the droll boring sound of any of the beach boys music, on top of which it's just sad that the cultural powers that be convinced a few generations this was surf music. Yikes.
As for Pet Sounds, it will outlive you..and me I breathe surf culture every day stop by sometime station #34 Carlsbad North Jetty of the powerstation.....
What brought this thread back to life ten years later?! I could say a LOT about Pet Sounds, but why bother? If one doesn’t "get" the album, so be it. Having said that, I will in fact say a few words about it; I owe that much to Brian Wilson.
I can understand why a person would find Pet Sounds underwhelming; it sounds very "old fashioned", and isn’t at all Rock music. In addition, it’s recorded sound quality is mediocre at best; it’s so veiled as to make hearing "into" the music difficult. In spite of that, it remains Paul McCartney’s all-time favorite album. Go figure! Dave Alvin (The Blasters, solo, work with John Doe of X, new album with Jimmy Dale Gilmore) said a while back that he himself never understood why others he respected liked Brian Wilson and/or The Beach Boys so much. Until, that is, very recently, when all of a sudden he had the epiphany, finally hearing what others had for decades. Better late than never!
For anyone interested in understanding why "God Only Knows" is considered one of the three greatest Pop songs ever written (by someone "close" to me ;-), head over to You Tube and find the video wherein a music professor (well la de da) sits at a piano, breaking down the song, demonstrating and explain the brilliance of it’s composition. Not as dry and academic as that may sound. Thrilling, actually. I would provide a link to the video, but remain stubbornly computer illiterate.
Up above one listener characterized Pet Sounds as depressing; I think of it rather as melancholy. Another said it was influenced by Brian Wilson’s discovery and use of LSD. Only somewhat; the Smile recordings (the never-completed follow-up album to Pet Sounds), on the other hand, are dripping with the stuff. In the Smile album (a musical dramatization of Manifest Destiny), Brian had finally found a lyricist---the brilliant Van Dyke Parks---his equal.
it's a great record, but for me a bit monochromatic in mood and tempo to be considered the GOAT. my main issue is for all the ambitious arrangements it's always sounded compressed and a bit off to me--it just doesn't have the dynamic oomph of say, forever changes or abbey road.
Though I hold Brian Wilson in as high esteem as anyone, and consider him to have written a fair number of the best songs I’ve ever heard. I don’t love Pet Sounds as much as I am "suppose to". I had loved All Summer Long, but didn’t at all like it’s two follow-ups. The British Invasion had really "toughened-up" white Rock ’n’ Roll, putting Blues back in the mix, and by 1965/6 The Beach Boys already sounded like an oldies act---passe’. By the time of Pet Sounds’ release, I wasn’t even interested enough to check it out; no one I knew did.
But then by way of a fluke (too long a story to recount), in early 1968 I happened to hear Smiley Smile (the watered-down version of the Smile album, which was to be the follow-up to Pet Sounds), and my little teenage mind was blown! There was a lot of acid-drenched music being made in 1968, but SS was more mind-altered than anything else I had heard. Very odd, deeply-revolutionary music. Give a listen to "Heroes & Villains" and "Fall Breaks And Back To Winter (W. Woodpecker Symphony)". Brian Wilson had truly---to quote BB singer Mike Love---f*cked with the formula. Their structures are more akin to Classical compositions than songs. The music on Smiley Smile make Hendrix, Syd Barrett’s Pink Floyd, or any other psychedelic music (except for perhaps the 2nd and 3rd Grateful Dead albums) sound downright traditional in comparison. In my opinion, the collapse of the Smile album is the artistic tragedy of our lifetimes. Am I being too dramatic? ;-)
Definitely not the most overrated album of all time. In fact Pet Sounds was a Buddy Hollyesque step up for popular music in the mid 60s.
However, despite being chock a block full of great songs (Here Today and There Must Be An Answer just to name two) it does kind of feel like an immature work compared to something like their later classic Surf’s Up.
And yes, although its almost sacrilegious to say it, the sound quality is rather poor.
bdp24 Excellent points, as always, all around. Even though it was a long time ago to most of the population, 1965 going into1966, The Beach Boys / The Beatles, were really hitting their song-crafting strides. Next came creativity (genius) on Pet Sounds and Sgt. Pepper respectively. Both bands really did not stop on those historic, concept albums. I feel that both bands finished the 1960's very strongly releases-wise. Happy Listening!
For a while I kept trying to get into Pet Sounds but just can’t. I agree with others that the lyrics are insipid and I personally just can’t stand Brian Wilson’s whiny voice. I grew up with the Beach Boys. I’m 60 and have two older sisters who listened to them almost constantly during the summer months. Admittedly, when I was a youngster I liked a lot of that surf music in the summer time. It went well with the beach, sun and ocean. Now, not so much. I’ve moved on to more interesting music in different genres.
@nicktheknife, the whiny voice in The Beach Boys is that of Mike Love, whom I abhor. Brian sang the high, falsetto parts. Carl Wilson had a nice voice, and it is he singing the melody on "God Only Knows".
Fascinating bio pic on Wilson a few years back. Paul Giamatti plays his dark mgr overlord ahole guy. They recreate the pet sounds sessions in the film respectfully.
For me, the 'masterpiece' that I loathe is trout mask replica. Makes me want to self-harm.
r_f_sayles, Oh boy, Gary Lewis & the Playboys! Those lists made me groan although there were a few excellent songs on them. One of the problems with "oldies" is that there were a tremendous number I didn't like.
My vote for most over-rated album is Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band. The title, the cover---Hell, the very concept---is beyond hokey (it was all McCartney’s idea, of course). Lots of mediocre or worse songs, too much sitar (ANY sitar is too much for me), trying too hard to be "artistic". Just write some good songs, fellas. Then play and sing them like the Rock ’n’ Roll band you are supposed to be.
The very under-rated Beach Boys Sunflower album ("This Whole World" is glorious! A fantastic chord progression by Brian, very Baroque-era Classical in nature) came as a welcome breath of fresh air after the above. Even moreso when contrasted with the dreadful Let It Be, which reeked of death upon delivery. A sad, sorry excuse for an album. That The Beatles managed to follow it up with Abbey Road (which was released before LIB) is remarkable.
By the way: Stereophile writer Ken Micallef has been recording and posting on YouTube a series of LP reviews, primarily but not exclusively of Jazz music. In his recent YouTube review of the Let It Be/Get Back 5-LP boxset, he states that in the out-take/jam recordings he hears evidence of the effect The Band had made on The Beatles. He more broadly proclaims that The Band had started a "back-to-basics" approach to being a Rock ’n’ Roll band, one that had a profound impact on their peers. Eric Clapton for one said as much, both at the time (hearing Music From Big Pink is what lead him to disband Cream) and while inducting them into The Rock ’n' Roll Hall Of Fame.
That is a proclamation I (and others) have been making for years, mine here on Audiogon producing a lot of blow-back. Sorry fellas, you’re simply mistaken. The release of Music From Big Pink in June of 1968 signaled the death of "Psychedelic h*rsesh*t" (the term Atlantic Records president Ahmet Ertegun used to describe Cream’s Disraeli Gears album when they turned in the tapes), the release of The Band’s S/T follow-up (the "brown" album) the blueprint for how to do it right. EVERY good musician I knew in ’68 and ’69 felt that way, and had their musical path completely and absolutely redirected. We were not alone.
"Lots of mediocre or worse songs, too much sitar (ANY sitar is too much for me)"
It would seem as if Sgt Pepper is obviously not for you then.
Neither it appears are songs such as
Norwegian Wood Paint it Black Love You To Tomorrow Never Knows Green TambourineHurdy Gurdy Man Games People Play etc
1967 seems to me to be a year of numerous classic albums and SPLHCB stands as one of the very best.
I see it more as a novel exploration of transcendental states than pretentious psychedelic bullshit.
Perhaps it’s all down to the interpretation, isn’t it?
Dylan of course went from one extreme to the other with Highway 61 Revisited/ Blonde on Blonde all the way to The Basement Tapes / John Wesley Harding.
In any case shouldn’t we try to judge any work of art within its own frame of reference?
If so, then Pet Sounds, in the summer of 1966 must have been mind-blowing in the world of popular music.
I do not like the word "overrated". The media might have pushed "Pet Sounds" due to the popularity of the British pop invasion? I was only 2 years old so I’m speaking from a historical(research)l viewpoint. Yes, Pet Sounds is clearly the Beach Boys best album up until then if lyrical content is regarded. When considering 1967 album releases in context... The Doors, Jimi Hendrix and even Surrealistic Pillow(not as timeless?) IMO crush "Pet Sounds"
Fun thread! Makes me want to drink beers with you all, put some tunes on the 'table and diss the heck out of each other's tastes. I admit to liking Pet Sounds a heck of a lot. Pretty tunes; beautiful voices; beautifully recorded. I even enjoy the LP's liberal use of the now frowned-upon practice of overdubbing. My older sister and even-older cousin were buying 45 rpm singles at the time, and I grabbed most of them when they wanted to throw them away. I have some of my parents' 1940's pop singles, as well. A high school buddy had a sitar and took lessons from Ravi Shankar when Ravi was living in L.A. Another buddy played the tabla and took a lesson or two from Alla Rakha. Somebody PLEASE take my laptop before I embarrass myself still more...
@edcyn: Do you like the scent of patchouli oil too? ;-) Far out, man. Gawd did I despise the hippie era, both musically and culturally. And too many guys with "attempted" mustaches (thank you Loudon Wainwright !!! ;-) . Now, young girls wearing thin tank tops with no bra, that was a different story.
What do any of us ultimately have, if not our memories?
I sometimes prefer Surf's Up (better sound quality at least) but Pet Sounds with its Spectorish production and the Wrecking Crew on board was no doubt pretty far out. I suspect Pet Sounds will retain its appeal for some time to come.
It is a near perfect historical snapshot of an America that may have been fictional but nevertheless still holds considerable charm, especially for those living overseas.
Perhaps one of the most overproduced albums of all time. Actually it is a masterpiece but in a way not normally associated with other music and not in the way I hold most dear.
Its only most overrated if one accepts the premise of it being a greatest masterpiece.
In my view its a pretty nice album, not up to level of Sunflower and Surfs Up. I certainly don't understand trashing the album, unless melodicism and harmony aren't your thing.
I'm 69....and was there as a teenager during the 60s..I grew up in LIC.NY..Now it's the place to live ...lol.it was a working class area,full of Factories.The Beach Boys ,the were West coast Summer Time Beach Music.The Four Seasons were Bigger here.When I heard Sg Pepoers it was totally different, but it was like Roaring Twenties Stuff....The Band ,that was different to but like country western hillbillies crap.Hendrix ,Cream,that was different but Good.It was like 60s Rock and Roll Am radio music DIED....for me anyway...
One of my favorite things about Pet Sounds is how the album ends: with the far-away sound of a train running down the tracks, a dog barking in response. Brilliant! So evocative, so nostalgic, so sentimental. The album’s theme is all about becoming an adult, looking back at childish innocence, with a feeling of loss, of longing and yearning.
From the time I was a few months old until seven, we lived in a house a few blocks south of San Fernando Blvd. in Pacoima, California (SoCal residents will know the street), on the other side of which are a set of railroad tracks. I awoke early every morning to that exact sound, and hearing it as side two of Pet Sounds fades to silence takes me back to my early childhood, exactly as Brian intended.
Pet Sounds is to my way of thinking the first Pop/Rock, if not concept album, at least theme album. Brian’s next project---the eventually-scrapped Smile---was an ambitious one: Manifest Destiny set to music, lyrics courtesy of Brian’s new collaborator, the genius Van Dyke Parks. I acquired the Smiley Smile album (an abbreviated version of Smile) in early 1968, and had my little teenage mind blown. If you don’t know the Smile saga, you can read all about it in the book Outlaw Blues, written by Paul Williams (not the song writer). The chapters covering Smile were originally published in three issues of Crawdaddy Magazine as the album was being recorded, and are a rivetting account of the evolving and eventually abandoned masterwork.
Around the same time, Leonard Berstein was taping his television special on the new "Artistic" movement in Rock ’n’ Roll. In the show Brian sings and performs "Surf’s Up" on the grand piano in his Bel-Air mansion living room (on Belagio Drive, one block above Sunset. I and a songwriter I was recording with made a pilgrimage to the house in ’75, to see about Brian producing us). Berstein is very effusive in his praise of the song. So much for all Rock music being "garbage", a sentiment one particularly smug and snobby Audiogon member has been spewing.
Lots of interesting comments. They simply show how divergent opinions can be.
I alway considered "Pet Sounds" to be an OK album, but never to the high esteem some place it. I wonder if some revere it just because it was said to influence the Beatles, and who could debut them? ;^)
"The Beach Boys are the greatest American rock band of all time",
Not intending to pick on anybody here, but the above statement is a good illustration of one of the main difficulties of threads such as this: the very strong tendency for we humans to confuse the subjective and the objective. I'd argue that we all do it to some degree, at least some of the time. If something aesthetic conforms to our personal tastes, we assume it must therefore have some sort of objective, universal merit.
Those of us with any sort of artistic training are perhaps more practiced in evaluating art from the standpoint of craft, which is not the same thing as
"I like it-- it's good; I don't like it-- it's bad".
There is a YouTube video in which a pianist sits at his keyboard, explaining and demonstrating the "bones" (chord progression, modulations---aka key changes, melody, counterpoint) of "God Only Knows" as he leads you through the musical construction of what is not only the "best" song on Pet Sounds, but imo one of the best songs ever written. The craft involved in creating that song, the musical knowledge and wisdom required to do so, is far above what most Rock songwriters are in possession of, and apparently far above what some listeners are capable of appreciating, as is the beauty of the song. No offense intended. ;-)
But I completely understand why some don’t care for the Pet Sounds album. It is NOT Rock music, and sounds in a way "quaint". Most Rock music contains at least trace elements of Blues, which gives the music a "hard" edge, which people like their Rock to have. Pet Sounds contains zero Blues, and sounds gentle, soft, very "white". Is it okay to say that? ;-)
One songwriter who DOES appreciate "God Only Knows" is Paul McCartney, who still considers it his all-time favorite song, and Pet Sounds his favorite album.
Once you’ve heard Pet Sounds’ follow-up---the aborted Smile---PS just sounds like Brian Wilson warming up to do Smile. That Smile was not completed in 1967 and released prior to Sgt. pepper---as was intended---is one of Rock ’n’ Roll’s great artistic tragedies. Hope that doesn’t sound too "grand". ;-)
I'm 70 and grew up in the pre-Beatles era, so I've seen and heard a lot of stuff come down the pike. I don't know what is a 'classic' and what is not. I do not know what is overrated and what is not. All I can tell is whether I enjoy listening to something or not. There are lots of things I do not enjoy at all, including entire genres like opera, country, blues, and a few others, that I will not put down for that reason; people have different tastes. Many people who have experienced a lot of music in various contexts have a lot to say about 'Smile'. It's not something I like, but that's not a requirement for being good, but hey, good for Brian Wilson!
The FACT PS is being discussed 12 years since this thread was started is telling.
Few albums are worthy of debate such as Pet Sounds. Nothing contemporary or in the last 40/50 or so years is close to the level of PS-at least in how it influenced musicians who listened to it when it was introduced.
I just watched the David Leaf film Beautiful Dreamer-Brian Wilson And The Story Of Smile. To establish the context for the creation of the amazing Smile album (a subject for another time), Leaf covers Pet Sounds, the album that proceeded Smile. Quotes about Pet Sounds from scenes in the film:
- Jimmy Webb: "Pet Sounds is probably, um, really, the most significant album of our generation." Wow.
- Burt Bacharach: "I think it is one of the, THE great albums."
- George Martin: "It floored me. I thought it was fantastic, and it gave The Beatles great inspiration. And it gave a challenge to them."
- Rob Reiner: "We used to play that all the time in the writer’s room because we thought this is like the most incredible Rock ’n’ Roll album we had ever heard." Pet Sounds "Rock ’n’ Roll"? Not from where I come from, but okay, maybe I’m taking the phrase too literally.
Are the opinions of the above any more credible than those with whom they disagree? Again, just a matter of opinion.
Pet Sounds & Sgt Pepper...... are not in my collection but I don't use the term over-rated. We all like what we like no matter what Paul Mccartney says. It is my opinion that matters, I don't like being told what to like or dislike. I do like reading about why and what other music fans like or dislike. .
My two favorite Rock albums of all time are Ziggy Stardust and Aladdin Sane, with Television's Marquee Moon and any Ramones album coming in close behind.
I might have said this in another post 'way back when, but in the Mid-Seventies I was a Cat Stevens fan. As a matter of fact, his acoustic guitar style is still a large influence on my playing. Anyway, I went into the Licorice Pizza in West L.A. to get the latest Cat Stevens record, Foreigner. I also bought Aladdin Sane on a whim. I liked the cover It happened to be featured alongside Foreigner at the front of the store. Anyway, I didn't make it more than halfway through the first side of Foreigner. Ack! Ugh! I pulled it off the TT and put on Aladdin Sane. By the time Panic in Detroit was in the throes of its howling, screaming, Mick Ronson outro, I had a new favorite rock artist.
@edcyn: Licorice Pizza! I knew the manager of their store on Sunset (very near the Tower store), and the bassist in my Pop group worked in the store on Topanga Canyon Blvd. That manager eventually got busted for dealing coke out of his office.
"Nothing contemporary or in the last 40/50 or so years is close to the level of PS-at least in how it influenced musicians who listened to it when it was introduced."
Is such a thing even possible now?
Or have all of the undiscovered musical discoveries and developments been discovered and developed?
As a chessplayer I've noticed that since the age of computers very few meaningful novelties (previously undiscovered strong moves in known opening positions) have been found.
This, despite the advent of supercomputers and neural networks which can play the game at far more accurate levels than any human could dream of.
Perhaps music, like chess, seemingly infinite in its expression, is also ultimately finite?
Thankfully, we are not infinite, and we have plenty of music to easily fill a lifetime.
Give Foreigner a chance. It was unlike anything before Catch Bull At Four, but it is an excellent album. Play it 3x and see if that doesn't change your mind. I remember having to give numerous albums a bunch of listens before really liking them. We just don't do that anymore. Thick as A Brick anyone?
Interesting that on an audiophile forum, everyone save a few are judging Pet Sounds on how "good" the song writing itself is. The accolades for Pet Sounds have almost nothing to do with the song writing.
Pet Sounds was so different in that it did two things:
1) It was a complete work of all originals: every song, every note every word mattered. The "normal album" for 1965 was a collection of a few orginals and mostly covers. Look at Hollies 1965 for a good example of this. Rubber Soul was one of the first departures from this approach and Brian was a great admirer of this record. This, plus his own creative abilities, had Brian thinking a complete statement. It was quite novel in its day and hard to imagine in todays terms.
2) It was one of the first times a rock artist combined the idea of multitracking and Phil Spectors "wall of sound" into a single project. The super dense complex vocal harmonies Brian created required many many takes (and tracks) to achieve. This was new. He also did this with intruments, layering unusual elements together to create one sound. He even had the Beach Boys play, but then added Wrecking Crew tracks to build on it and make it more complete. Brian approached this Pet Sounds album in an orchestral way, like an orchestral composer does, hearing each instrument seperately yet together, using specific element combinations to create a specific sound. It is very heady work, and requires a big thinker to pull it off. Back in time, classical composers did this. Today its movie scoring composers who do this, like James Newton Howard and Hans Zimmer.
So production and technology and a unique multi element sonic landscape was what made Pet Sounds so different. Its a lot more than if you like songs. THis was a left turn that changed modern recording and recomrd making forever. Sgt Pepper was very different from Rubber Soul, and it is said that it was due to Pet Sounds that the [Beatles] engineering team went to work to figure out how Brian did it, then replicated it.
Brad
NOTE: It might be fun for forum readers to sit down and listen to Pet Sounds and try to hear all these different layers and parts from different instruments. A pro engineer would follow one voice thoughout the song, then another and another. then one isntrument, another and another. This is also how these records are built.
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