The Beach Boys - Sunflower / Surf's Up
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Free Music Notes for Sunflower / Surf's Up
Free Music Review: My favorite Beach Boys CD!
Hit: 5 Stars
Yes, I admit it: This is my FAVORITE Beach Boys CD. Pet Sounds and Today/Summer Days and Summer Nights are strong contenders, but Sunflower/Surf's Up is at the top of my personal Beach Boys chart. Like Pet Sounds, Sunflower/Surf's Up shows the Boys branching out into more mature, spiritual, "meaningful" music --not that I don't love their early radio hits as well-- but they retain the beautiful vocals and innocent yearning of their beginnings. Brian, of course, contributes to the greatness of this double album CD, and the other Wilson brothers spread their wings as well-- Carl wrote "Long Promised Road," one of my favorite Beach Boys songs of all time, and Dennis contributes the surprisingly moving "Forever." One of the things I've come to appreciate about this CD is the strength of the lyrical content. I've gotten about 4 "signature quotes" (those taglines at the end of emails) just from this CD! A stanza from "This Whole World" (one of Brian's best songs, IMO) has been my closing statement for about 2 years now... just too perfect to change. The Beach Boys of Sunflower/Surf's Up are as lyrically satisfying as they pleasurable to listen to.
The question begs itself: But what about the NOT so good songs?? As even the most die-hard Beach Boys fan will admit, not everything that was released on their numerous albums is quality music. Sunflower/Surf's Up has a few clunkers, but the word to stress is FEW. I can pop this CD in the player and listen to it pretty much from beginning to end, skipping over the Bruce Johnston tunes and "At my Window" etc. Despite the mockery of Amazon's editorial review, I happen to like "Don't Go Near the Water," which is an ecologically-minded song, yes, but not nearly as horrible as Mike Love's "California Saga" eco-preachiness on the Holland album.
While purchasing Sunflower and Surf's Up seperately might carry a few caveats, when they're packaged together you have nothing to lose! The strength of the good and great songs --everything I've mentioned plus the awesomely dark "Till I Die," the Van Dyke Parks weirdness of "Surf's Up," Carl's poetry on "Feel Flows", the dreamy "All I Wanna Do" and many others-- more than cancels out the weak and/or corny songs.
This is a strongly recommended buy-- a must-have for the Beach Boys fan whether you're a completist or just want their best stuff.
Free Music Review: "Sunflower", one of the Greatest LP's , Surf's Up Spotty
Hit: 5 Stars
"Sunflower" has to be the most overlooked and forgotten LP of all time, but it is also one of the greatest Lp's of all time. It ranks up there with the critics favorite "Pet Sounds" but for some reason you never hear anything about it. The album featuressome of the best songs the Beach Boys have ever recorded, but for some reason they are some of the least remembered, probably because the bottom line is that you are not going to hear these songs on the radio, the songs were not hits, maybe because some of the songs are too short in playing time for radio, who knows, it definitely is not on the basis of Quality, these songs stand out. One song, from the "Should have been a hit but wasn't files" is Dennis Wilson's "Forever"which is worthy of No. 1 status, a great ballad but not even remembered or known of by most Beach Boy fans, in fact to hear it, if you don't have the album, you have to watch reruns of the Family show, "Full House" and hear John Stamos (Uncle Jesse's) version in which his character sings it to his tv wife at their wedding. Stamos does a respectable job on the song, but you shouldn't have to watch reruns on tv to discover or rediscover a song that should have been a hit many years before by a band that itself is one of the most popular bands of all time. Other great songs that should have been hits also are "This Whole World, a uptempo, midrange rocker, the perky "Add Song Music To your Day" and Tears in the Morning. "Sunflower" is the finest of the Beach Boy albums in the 70's and is essential to any collection
"Surf's Up, the followup LP to "Sunflower" released in 1971, is spotty in places, like most of the Beach Boy albums to follow.
Surf's Up's best tracks are "Long Promised Road", "Disney Girls", "Feel Flows", the mournful "Til I Die" and the title track. The track "Lookin at Tomorrow is ok, but the rest of the album are true throwaways, 2 tracks, "A Day In the Life of A Tree" and "Take A Load Off Your Feet are weird,irrevelant and should have never been recorded or even thought off. Surf's up as a whole is a average album, but worth having and coupled with the great album "Sunflower" is a must for any music lover's
collection!!!
Free Music Review: The Beach Boys at their absolute creative peak!!!!!
Hit: 5 Stars
It took an awfully long time but Capitol finally released "Sunflower" and "Surf's Up" as a two-fer package back in 2000. While I always enjoyed the music of the Beach Boys I became much more interested in them in the early 1970's when they tossed aside the formula hits they had been so successful with and began experimenting with more daring and intricate harmonies. "Sunflower" was released in the fall of 1970 and was met with a collective yawn by the record buying public. The album peaked at #151 on the Billboard Top Pop Album chart and the two singles released from the LP "Add Some Music To Your Day" and "Tears In The Morning" did not fare much better. But you will find a number of other fabulous tunes on this LP including "Slip On Through", "Our Sweet Love" and two of my favorites "Deidre" and "Forever". Make no mistake about it...this was a truly remarkable album for its time.About a year later "Surf's Up" was released with great fanfare and this time people paid a lot more attention. "Surf's Up" was one of my favorite LP's of the 1970's. The album featured a wide variety of styles including the lush and lovely "Disney Girls", the hard driving "Student Demonstration Time" and other great tunes like "Long Promised Road", "Don't Go Near The Water" and of course the title cut "Surf's Up". While "Surf's Up" fared considerably better than "Sunflower" and the groups next LP "Holland" was reasonably well received it appeared that in commercial terms at least the groups most successful days might well be behind them. But the Beach Boys would prove to be a resilient bunch and would continue to have chart success to varying degrees for many years to come.
Now if you enjoy great harmonies like I do and you somehow missed these albums back in the seventies like many people did, it would certainly behoove you to give this package a try. Capitol has provided a marvelous 24 page booklet replete with lyrics, photos and other relevant information. You will not be disappointed!!! Highly recommended.
Free Music Review: This SUNFLOWER Dazzles
Hit: 5 Stars
On December 26, 2007, television audiences had the privilege of seeing Brian Wilson receive one of five Kennedy Center Honors Awards for 2007. I predict and hope that this prestigious, well-deserved lifetime achievement award will create a resurgence of interest in the Beach Boys. For anyone interested in the Beach Boys, SUNFLOWER is a must-hear, must-have. Along with PET SOUNDS and TODAY, SUNFLOWER belongs on the Beach Boys honor roll. It's wrong that this gem is obscure in the U.S., and it's high time the oversight is corrected.
The album cover provides the first clue as to what's inside. The Beach Boys are posed on the lawn with their miniature offspring; only Bruce and Dennis are child-free here, although I believe both men were fathers as well by then. Others have complained that the lyrics on SUNFLOWER are trite and childish. I disagree. The lyrics reflect the presence of children in the Beach Boys' lives as well as a distillation of the Beach Boys' personal values: the importance of music, love, spirituality, and respect for nature. Childlike innocence and light pervade SUNFLOWER, and the title is quite apt; the overall effect is dazzling in a subtle way...except for those moments when the criminally underappreciated Dennis Wilson seriously rocks the house. Then we're just plain dazzled.
SUNFLOWER utilizes the talents of all the members of the band. I can't think of another group that has worked in such a fully collaborative fashion, with such impressive results. And the emphasis on complex vocal arrangements and harmonies for which the band is famous, is as present and as rich as ever.
SURF'S UP, while not as uniformly excellent, provides some of the best material the Beach Boys ever recorded: "Long Promised Road" and "Feel Flows," both of which feature Carl as composer and lead singer, and two timeless Brian Wilson masterpieces, "'Til I Die," and "Surf's Up."
Whether you're an old fan or a newbie, this disk belongs in your collection.
Free Music Review: Triumph of the Great Experiment
Hit: 5 Stars
Preface: To glean the most out of this review you must read the whole thing.The first time I heard this compilation I didn't like it. What I later discovered was I wasn't ready for it at that time. Now, I love it and spend hours on end listening to it. So what made the quality change for me? Knowledge of Beach Boys musical progression. They started out as mostly a lets have fun surf band. But then they grew and had a lot more to say about the world than having fun in the sun. So they started to experiment with more mature sound and lyrics found in Pet Sounds album. Capital Records fought them on changing, they wanted them to stick to just teeny-bop. But Brian Wilson pushed the experiment forward and climax with the infamous Smile album. Smile was too different for Capital (I must admit some Smile track are still too weird for me) and Brian crashed from the strain, so the Beach Boys were without a label and a composer. Smile got chopped up and most of it has been released in fragments and altered forms on later albums. This could have been the end for them and is the end in many people's minds. Instead a new group dynamic grew from the experience. They realized that the early surf band was part of who they were and synthesized it with their experiment of a mature sound and understanding. Also each of the members started song writing instead it all leaning on Brian. From this comes the reintegrated and much matured Beach Boys heard in Sunflower/Surf's Up. Once I had this mental and listening knowledge behind me this compilation opened up to me. Maybe not everyone else has to mature with the Beach Boys sound like I did to love this album, but they won't regret they journey. Some of my favorites are Add Some Music To Your Day, Tears In the Morning, Forever, Long Promised Road and Disney Girls. And I truly believe in a head to head competition between Student Demonstration Time and The Beatles song Revolution, an unbiased listener would go for SDT hands down.