T2580 - The Beach Boys finish Smile

[Guajolote]

THE MONKEES - LISTEN TO THE BAND (1968)

Side One
I'll Be Back Upon My Feet
My Share Of The Sidewalk
As We Go Along
Lady's Baby [1]
Tear The Top Right Off My Head
Magnolia Simms

Side Two
Little Girl
Someday Man
Merry Go Round
You And I
Rosemarie
Goin' Down
Listen To The Band

"There was a point up until the mid-60s when teen pop and pioneering rock were pretty much the same thing. Just as The Monkees started, those two strands started to separate. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that if Brian Wilson hadn't finished Smile, that separation would have come much earlier. There were rumours that when Brian was hospitalized, the new Beach Boys album would be cancelled as no-one knew how to finish it without him.

"But it wasn't a miracle. We weren't exactly accepted by the heads, y'know, we were just less unacceptable. The attitude from San Francisco turned to kind of patronizing instead of hostile. So instead of the counterculture using us as an example of everything wrong with pop, they used it to build themselves up. 'The counterculture is so amazing, even The Monkees want to be part of it'. The old 'they can't play their instruments' thing was replaced with 'they learned to play their instruments'. That was bullshit, too, but any port in a storm, right?

"So with all that happening, Listen To The Band was The Monkees album it was OK to like."

[1] Take it as read that ITTL, Peter hasn't spent endless sessions recording this one, meaning there isn't the bad blood between him and Nez over the cost

 

[Guajolote]

"It had been hanging over us since Sgt Pepper, the idea that we were no longer 'honest'; we were too dependent on studio trickery. Wild Honey didn't help. The Beach Boys beating us to the punch a second time. So we thought we'd beat the Beach Boys at their own game. Record an 'art' album and an 'honest' album at the same time. But we all got locked into our own little things and the songs all sounded like they came from fifteen different albums, not two, so we just put them all out at once. Then Get Back was going to be honest, but we got sent home."

- Paul McCartney, Anthology, 1995

"They make it sound like I stormed in and laid down the law, but it was nothing like that. The boys knew I wouldn't make a creative suggestion and anyway, they wouldn't take it if I did. All I did was go down to Twickenham Studios and effectively hold an impromptu board meeting of Apple. They had all these very ambitious creative ideas, but they'd started rehearsals without a business plan. They were spending Apple money on rehearsals with no definite plan on how the investment was going to pay off.

"I felt guilty about reminding them of their responsibilities, but they weren't 19-year-olds who'd been slipped amphetamines anymore. They were grown men, parents and businessmen.

"I feared the group was on the verge of splitting up and that it was my fault. I could have run Apple my way, but it was their company. If Apple was running everything, then I thought I should tell them how, why and where their money was being spent.

"Anyway, whatever happened, it was nothing like that bloody silly film."

- Brian Epstein, Anthology, 1995

[Scene: "The Beatles" are jamming in something that's supposed to be Twickenham Studios. "Brian Epstein" walks in and unplugs a suspiciously modern looking UK plug. The music stops]

Epstein: Go home, boys. You're wasting your time, money and talent.

(The Beatles: The Greatest Show On Earth, TVM 1985)

[The Beatles (the real ones) are being interviewed together]

George: Did we really record Abbey Road thinking it was going to be the last album?
Paul: It was an insurance policy. Record something epic, just in case we were going to give up. [1]
George: I didn't think we were on the verge of splitting at all.
Paul: Oh yeah, not like that. But we all been seeing shrinks and the fire was going out a bit [2]. I certainly thought we weren't going to be THE BEATLES who put out an amazing album or two every year. I could see us being the Apple board for a few years. Basically what we ended up being in the late 70s.
George: A gang instead of a band.
John: What we are now. The next Beatles project is a vegan chilli sans carne and DVD night.
Ringo: Sounds good.
John: At Ringo's.
Ringo: Ya bastard!

(Anthology, 1995)

[1] Whether this was the case in OTL is arguable, but relations between The Beatles are different here. The possibility of ending the group doesn't mean ending the friendship, so they're more able to face the idea.
[2] It's something of an all-purpose butterfly. Brian Wilson's open enthusiasm for conventional psychiatric medicine has caused a lot of people to dabble and some of the issues that cut short careers have been lessened. This will just bring a different set of problems. I want this timeline to be better than OTL, but it won't be the best case scenario.

 

[RedBeetle]

THE MONKEES - LISTEN TO THE BAND (1968)

View attachment 543999

Side One
I'll Be Back Upon My Feet
My Share Of The Sidewalk
As We Go Along
Lady's Baby [1]
Tear The Top Right Off My Head
Magnolia Simms

Side Two
Little Girl
Someday Man
Merry Go Round
You And I
Rosemarie
Goin' Down
Listen To The Band

"There was a point up until the mid-60s when teen pop and pioneering rock were pretty much the same thing. Just as The Monkees started, those two strands started to separate. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that if Brian Wilson hadn't finished Smile, that separation would have come much earlier. There were rumours that when Brian was hospitalized, the new Beach Boys album would be cancelled as no-one knew how to finish it without him.

"But it wasn't a miracle. We weren't exactly accepted by the heads, y'know, we were just less unacceptable. The attitude from San Francisco turned to kind of patronizing instead of hostile. So instead of the counterculture using us as an example of everything wrong with pop, they used it to build themselves up. 'The counterculture is so amazing, even The Monkees want to be part of it'. The old 'they can't play their instruments' thing was replaced with 'they learned to play their instruments'. That was bullshit, too, but any port in a storm, right?

"So with all that happening, Listen To The Band was The Monkees album it was OK to like."

[1] Take it as read that ITTL, Peter hasn't spent endless sessions recording this one, meaning there isn't the bad blood between him and Nez over the cost

So are they still going to break up in 1970 or are you going to keep them together a bit longer?

 

[Guajolote]

I want to find out a bit more about their contract before I decide where to take them.

 

[johnnyzoom]

Great thread! Was 'Good Vibrations' released ITTL?

 

[Guajolote]

Yes, GV comes out in October '66 as per OTL, the POD is a vocal session in December '66.

 

[MatthewFirth]

Yes, GV comes out in October '66 as per OTL, the POD is a vocal session in December '66.

And would feature on SMiLE?

 

[Guajolote]

Yep, just like it says on the cover.

 

[MatthewFirth]

Yep, just like it says on the cover.
View attachment 544328

Which stays the same as OTL. I personally dislike the cover, but it's your TL so it's fine.

 

[Guajolote]

THE BEACH BOYS - SUITE SIXTEEN (1969)

Side One
Loop De Loop
San Miguel
Celebrate The News
Deirdre
A Time To Live In Dreams
Break Away

Side Two
Got To Know The Woman
All I Wanna Do
The Nearest Faraway Place
Persuasion
Forever
Time To Get Alone

"Terrible."

- Dennis Wilson

"Great songs, but it nearly broke us."

- Al Jardine

"We did the best we could."

- Carl Wilson

"A real drag."

- Mike Love

"I'm proud of what they did. I like listening to that one. The songs are really good, but I think people thought we were kind of square and that's why the other Beach Boys don't like it."

- Brian Wilson

"There's always been something a little unhip about The Beach Boys and that's fine. Do It Again and Suite Sixteen are very honest Beach Boys albums. But because Brian had pulled back a little, the critics started claiming the rest of the band had smothered Brian's 'art'. Not true at all. For a start, he was much more involved with Suite Sixteen than he was with Do It Again. It's just that he seemed to get tired quickly and it was very difficult to get any sort of response out of him, good or bad. One thing you couldn't say about Brian in the old days was that he was cold, but that's what he was becoming towards the end of the 60s. Mike would sometimes try to get a rise out of him and Brian would just say 'You can quit the group at any time. Brother Records would be happy to put out a solo album from you'. The business side of things was a great way for him to avoid confrontations. He always had a financial report to go over whenever his father would stop by.

"Anyway, Suite Sixteen is full of great pop songs and one really weird thing from Brian [1]. But we look kinda goofy on the cover and it's clear Brian isn't part of the original picture. The title is both kind of dumb and pretentious at the same time. And who celebrates their 16th album anyway? So I guess it gave some critics a get out clause. They could excuse their looking down on The Beach Boys despite Smile knocking everyone sideways by saying the good stuff was purely Brian and since Diamond Head we hadn't let him do his own thing. Depressing."

- Bruce Johnston

[1] Persuasion being better known as He Gives Speeches. ITTL Brian has revisited the idea and done a full length song.

(I know the cover looks like garbage, it's meant to)

 

[oberdada]

Beach Boys Cover Art is rarely great.
It's more about inside values ;-)
Suite Sixteen looks real
Do it again looks weird, with the font more like from the early 80s.
But maybe the Beach Boys were once again shared of their time.


A 1970 Mike Love solo album could be something
Mike Love, not War was an idea he had

 

[Guajolote]

I used the Westminster typeface, which was in vogue in the 60s as MICR became widespread. Westminster (or a similar typeface) was used on the title screens of a Doctor Who story in 1966, so I figured it'd be eligible for a Beach Boys cover in 1968.

Westminster (typeface) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[oberdada]

I used the Westminster typeface, which was in vogue in the 60s as MICR became widespread. Westminster (or a similar typeface) was used on the title screens of a Doctor Who story in 1966, so I figured it'd be eligible for a Beach Boys cover in 1968.

Westminster (typeface) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Good job. So it was just me then ...

 

[Guajolote]

"One idea we'd been kicking around since before Changes was doing a double album with a solo side each. I guess if Changes had bombed, that would have been the next thing from us. Changes did OK and bought us a few crumbs of credibility, which is why we had to do Listen To The Band, to prove Changes wasn't a fluke.

"So by 1969 we were four Pinocchios who'd become real boys. Then the arguments started about our future direction and it was Davy who reminded us of the solo project thing. From there we came up with a plan to keep Colgems fed with 'product'.

"We owed Colgems two albums a year until 1973[1]. We kicked around the idea of putting out two solo albums in 1969 and 1970. Lester Sill[2] was not happy with that idea. So then we tried to sell him on the idea of one Monkees album and one solo album. Lester and Colgems were more open to that idea and asked for a Davy solo album. That turned out to be a problem.

"Colgems gave the album a big push and it was a reasonable sized hit. We then realized that what had happened was that the most commercial part of the operation had been separated from us.

"In the fall of '69, the original Monkees series went to reruns on Saturday mornings. That was the death knell. The second album for 1969 wasn't a group effort to balance out Davy's solo album, it was The Monkees' Greatest Hits.

"The execs told us that we could record the remaining 3 solo albums on Colgems dime as long as we did some commercials and interstitials for the Saturday reruns. We asked about further tours, they said 'we'll get back to you' and nothing happened.

"Mike got a hit album, I got a decent selling album and Peter got royally screwed. His album was put out with no promotion and naturally stiffed. He bought himself out of the last three years of his contract and tried to make it on his own.[3]

"Davy and Mike were promoted to being RCA artists, I put out a couple of albums on Bell and each one of us ended up wondering if we should give the other three a call when all the Monkees contractual stuff had expired."

- Micky Dolenz

[1] I gleaned this from the liner notes of the deluxe version of The Monkees Present
[2] The Monkees' musical supervisor post-Kirshner's firing and later president of Colgems
[3] IOTL, Peter bought himself out a year earlier, so ITTL we get Kool-Aid commercials with all four Monkees.

 

[Guajolote]

THE BEACH BOYS - I'M GOING YOUR WAY (1970)

Side One
California Slide
Lady
Where Is She
This Whole World
I Just Got My Pay
Slip On Through

Side Two
Soulful Old Man Sunshine
Susie Cincinnati
Our Sweet Love
Back Home
It's About Time
Wouldn't It Be Nice To Live Again

"It saved us, but it also hurt us. It bought us credibility, but Brian got all the credit. Not his fault and anyway, having Brian take charge is good for The Beach Boys, but…y'know.

"The critics who attacked us over Suite Sixteen thought they'd been proved right. Brian was in charge and more engaged than he'd been for a couple years, but the slightly more rocking direction was Dennis and me."

- Carl Wilson

"There was a heavy sound going around and I hadn't been paying attention. I was too busy playing with my son. So I asked my brothers to give me that sound and I guess it worked. The Moog synthesizer was me, though."

- Brian Wilson

"That album was a real mixed blessing. Brian getting all the credit for the rock sound hurt Carl and me, but oh man, those layers and layers of synth Brian put down. It was really beautiful.

"Wouldn't It Be Nice To Live Again was meant to be my song but Brian stole it from under me and I'm glad he did. That huge waterfall of synthesizers to end the album. He nearly wore the tape out adding overdubs. At some point he gathered us all together and said 'We need our own studio'. So Brother Studios came out of it."

- Dennis Wilson

"Suite Sixteen is meant to be an embarrassment and I'm Going Your Way is meant to be a masterpiece. What's the difference? We're not smiling on the cover of I'm Going Your Way , so everyone figured it was more serious. As far as I can tell, they might as well be a double album"

- Al Jardine

 

[C. McKay]

It's cool to see that you are covering not only the Beach Boys but the Monkees, Guajolote. Is Mike's solo album similar to Magnetic South, his first album with the First National Band? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetic_South_(album). If so, what were his hits?

 

[Guajolote]

His first solo album, when he's still under the Colgems deal are the kind of things he recorded in his 1968 Nashville sessions and for the (now butterflied) Monkees Present. He's more of an album act, but If I Ever Get To Saginaw Again is a hit single (even though he didn't write it). After that the solo albums from Magnetic South to The Prison are broadly similar, with a few butterflies here and there. From A Radio Engine To The Photon Wing is going to be majorly butterflied. Watch this space.

 

[Guajolote]

[The Beatles are sitting together for a joint interview]

Paul: So, Beatles For Life. Well.
John: Of all of our albums, that was certainly one of them and the music papers let us know it.
Paul: It's fine.
John: We're The Beatles. We're not allowed to be "fine". Let's move onto the next one.
Paul: Yeah, OK. I already explained it in one of my own interviews. And we can cut to that right about…NOW!

[Paul is sitting by himself in a recording studio]

Paul: In 1970, we had a few productive meetings and cleared the air. Apple was very comfortably in the black. We had a couple of singles hanging around from 1969, a few song ideas that didn't get finished. We had the luxury of just recording some songs for an album. We could see if we could combine taking it easy and being Beatles. That's why the album's called that. Beatles For Life. We decided we were going to be The Beatles forever and we were happy with that. [pause] Not many other people were. We ended up with a reputation for laziness in the 70s. Using outtakes for b-sides was meant to be a nice little bonus for the fans, but we got it in the neck for that, too. We weren't the Fab Four any more, we were die Faulen Vier. *winks* Little bonus for our friends in Hamburg, there.

(Anthology, 1995)

THE BEATLES - FOR LIFE (1970)

Side One
Two Of Us
Don't Let Me Down
For You Blue
Maybe I'm Amazed
It Don't Come Easy
Across The Universe

Side Two
What Is Life
The Ballad Of John And Yoko
Oh My Love
Old Brown Shoe
Get Back
Let It Be

Associated singles: What Is Life/Leave My Kitten Alone Let It Be/One After 909

George: I don't think that's why Blades turned out the way it did. It wasn't the bad reviews. I think the 60s had caught up with us. The 60s had gone sour with Altamont and the Spahn Ranch Massacre. We were probably a bit guilty about making it into the 70s. Also, all the arguments had been settled and then…what?
Ringo: The 60s was like a race against time, but then the time was up and I was a 30-year-old Beatle with time on my hands.
John: Even McCartney was miserable.
Paul: For me, it was the bad reviews that For Life had. We did an album of songs with no big production and the same press that had started implying we were getting gimmicky with Sgt Pepper suddenly want to know where the gimmicks went. We lost our underground credentials.
John: Some journalist asked me if I'd "left the movement". What does that even mean?
George: They liked Blades. "Dark" "ominous", those words were in every review.
John: Bully for them. If they like being depressed, they can have it.

Side One
Beware Of Darkness
Anywhere But Here [1]
Jealous Guy
Isn't It A Pity
Another Day

Side Two
Back Off Boogaloo
Too Many People
Gimme Some Truth
All Things Must Pass
Love

Associated singles: The Back Seat Of My Car/Art Of Dying Jealous Guy/Oo You

George: There was also Allen Klein to contend with.
John: Oh, don't! I'm not going to explain it?
George: Paul?
Paul: Ringo?
Ringo: George?
George: John?
John: Susan?
Ringo: G'night John-boy.
Paul: Let's get Eppy to explain that one.

(Anthology 1995)

"Allen Klein was always interested in managing The Beatles. He kept sending messages to them, making all sorts of innuendos about my business acumen. But Apple was being run very differently from NEMS. I was trying to include them on every decision. I'm not a business genius, but I do have a certain amount of professional pride. NEMS had part ownership of Apple, but Apple wasn't mine to play with. NEMS was the family business; at Apple, the Beatles were my bosses.

"Anyway, Robert Stigwood had bought into NEMS pre-Apple, in the hope of becoming the Beatles' manager. There was a revolt over that suggestion. Klein bought Stigwood's share of NEMS, but he couldn't really get anywhere with it. He could send these messages, but the Beatles knew where the money was coming in and going out. Also, the boys have always been loyal. To me, to George Martin, to Neil, to Mal. There have been disagreements, but it's always a mistake to test their loyalty."

- Brian Epstein, Anthology 1995

George: So Klein didn't get us, but it did leave us a bit shaken.
Paul: Well, at least he got the Bee Gees.
John: He got two Bee Gees. Robin had already fallen out with them and the Klein deal couldn't bring him back. Robin went off and did another solo album. Very weird, that one. I still like it.

(Anthology 1995)

[1] In my mind this is Momma Miss America, but with lyrics that are mainly from John

 

[C. McKay]

His first solo album, when he's still under the Colgems deal are the kind of things he recorded in his 1968 Nashville sessions and for the (now butterflied) Monkees Present. He's more of an album act, but If I Ever Get To Saginaw Again is a hit single (even though he didn't write it). After that the solo albums from Magnetic South to The Prison are broadly similar, with a few butterflies here and there. From A Radio Engine To The Photon Wing is going to be majorly butterflied. Watch this space.

Thanks much for the info and the heads up, Guajolote. I hope that he has a few hits from Magnetic South. That is one of my favorite albums.

 

[Guajolote]

THE BEACH BOYS - CALIFORNIA (1972)

Side One
Hawthorne
Monterey
Big Sur
Topanga

Side Two
Sierra Nevada
Hollywood
Big Bear
Pacific Coast Highway [1]

"It finally felt like we'd won. I'm Going Your Way being well received was a shot of energy to Brian. And we had our own studios, so there was time to experiment and the cost could be covered by hiring out whichever studio we weren't using. Carl and me were still smarting a bit from the press coverage, but Brian was now totally sure his progressive cred was unassailable and he was going to pick up the whole band and take us with him. And. He. Did!!!"

- Dennis Wilson, The South Bank Show, 1989

"Written, performed and produced by The Beach Boys. That's what it says on the cover. If you like it, thank all six of us, because it took all six of us to do this."

- Brian Wilson, press conference 1972

"As an album, I look back at it as a great triumph, but on a personal level, it's kinda sad. We were winning our last battle and we were beginning to turn our tensions inward.

"We'd been fighting this battle for respect. Brian had won that with Smile and Diamond Head, but it wasn't over until the respect had been won for all of us. We'd been putting 'Produced by The Beach Boys' on the albums since Do It Again but the message wasn't getting through. During the sessions for this album, Brian called everyone together and told us of his plan to credit the album 'Written, performed and produced by The Beach Boys'. Brian was still the leader and I was fine with that. Some members were beginning to chafe.

"What happened was we'd work up some material individually and then Brian and Carl, who was now definitely deputy leader, would work on it, arrange it and then co-produce it with whoever had come up with the original song. But egos started to inflate. The album came out and was a success, but disenchantment had started to set in.

"There's a lot of significance placed on no single coming off that album. We weren't becoming an album band, Brian just couldn't face the argument that would break out over whose song got picked. I think I got the lead single off the next album as a kind of punishment to the others."

- Bruce Johnston

[1] I did have OTL analogues worked out for each of these songs, but I thought I'd leave you gazing into a mostly unfamiliar part of this universe