SMiLE, songs by brian wilson & van dyke parks
first listen to 'little pad' uploaded to youtube by somebody...
if you want to hear twelve more songs at least as good as this, read on.
brian left, van dyke to the right, not sure where
in 1966, brian wilson, age 24, & van dyke parks, age 23, met at the home of local impresario/producer/musician terry melcher, age 24. the beach boys had recently released pet sounds, the 1st album under the beach boys moniker, whose performances featured studio musicians instead of beach boys. brian wilson had already announced his intention to record a new album called 'dumb angel' (as yet to be renamed SMiLE). soon after meeting parks, wilson called on him to collaborate on some new material in his house on laurel way in beverly hills, CA.to aid in an approximation of the amount of money brian wilson could afford to burn at the time: in order to get into his house, one needed to crawl through a tree house that he had installed at the front. inside the house was a portable sauna, a tent made of $30,000 worth of fabric that he only used once because it was too stuffy, and a room filled with 7 tons of sand where he kept his grand piano so that he could feel the sand between his toes as he composed.
van dyke parks, on the other hand, having no track record in the recording industry yet, was living in a garage apartment and using a gas station pay toilet. when he arrived at brian's house for their initial collaboration he was offended by the extravagance until brian set him up with a car and $5,000. this is a route van dyke could make were he to leave from his apartment to visit terry melcher, and then brian wilson, in one outing.
after brian acquired $2,000 of fine afghani hashish, the two set to work and over a few months produced what would become the abandoned album that was meant by brian to rival the beatles' revolver. however, mental illness, black market amphetamines, psychedelics, and personal pressure to surpass his previous successes led to brian becoming too distracted and SMiLE was cancelled.
------------------------------------------------------------
this is the cover that was meant for the album:
tracks that were intended for SMiLE have been released on subsequent albums, official outtakes collections, and bootlegs. i've combed through a lot of these recordings and, based on library and internet research, i've put together a SMiLE that contains only the recordings from this period that i would listen to repeatedly. each track is beautifully composed by brian wilson, most with charming, quirky lyrics by brian and van dyke parks.i uploaded it to mediafire & you can download it here at
<this link>.
ALSO:
if you want to download what some of my non-album source material was, or more,
<click here>
Posts
