Of all the unreleased projects in rock and roll history, Smile dwarfs them all. The Beach Boys intended it to be the album that would forever stamp them as the premier band of their generation. But it collapsed in a heap of drugs, paranoia, and Brian Wilson’s crumbling mental health.
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In 1967, the band tried to salvage something of the project with Smiley Smile. With its modesty and carefree attitude, this record seemed to mock everything that had been intended with Smile in the first place. It’s one of the most fascinating stories in rock. But it’s also one of the saddest.
High Hopes
Brian Wilson could hear it all in his head. Coming off the critical triumph of Pet Sounds, he thought that he could up the ante with a song cycle of dizzying ambition. Touching on themes of history, nature, and spirituality, the record, to be titled Smile, would leave all his contemporaries in the dust.
The Beach Boys hoped that the towering single “Good Vibrations”, released in 1966, would set the tone for the project. Sessions began in 1966 with great anticipation. Wilson chose as his writing collaborator Van Dyke Parks, a budding composer and producer who impressed the Beach Boy with his erudite conversation.
Almost immediately, the hype behind Smile became deafening. Because journalists were often privy to the sessions, reports of Wilson’s grand undertaking started to trickle out. Other musicians were put on notice that they’d all be playing for second once this album arrived. But then the sessions began to drag….
Bad Vibrations
Folks have debated why Smile imploded almost since the moment it was announced that the album was kaput. (Publicist Derek Taylor first referred to the cancelled album in May 1967.) If you’re looking for a general smoking gun, it’s probably that Wilson simply lacked the ability to realize the project as he imagined it, causing him to back away.
The specific details are a depressing laundry list. Other members of The Beach Boys, specifically Mike Love, became extremely skeptical of the accessibility of the project. In their defense, Wilson often treated them in a somewhat bizarre, degrading fashion in an effort to get the sounds he wanted out of them.
Mutual animus arose between Wilson and Parks, causing the latter to leave the project in early 1967. Battles with the record company distracted everyone. Carl Wilson found trouble with the law when he attempted to avoid the draft. Brian Wilson’s overuse of drugs exacerbated mental health issues, causing him to be wildly insecure and paranoid about everything. Smile, instead of a masterpiece, became a black hole enveloping everyone associated with it.
The Aftermath
In the end, The Beach Boys decided to cut their losses. In September 1967, they released Smiley Smile. The album contained some remnants of the Smile sessions, but those songs were largely reduced to fragments of their former selves. (Case in point: “Wonderful”, a majestic song rendered in such offhand fashion on Smiley Smile that it’s completely toothless.)
Over the years, many attempts have been made by the principals to piece together the original Smile, both from existing recordings and recreations of them. Most notable was Brian Wilson Presents Smile, a 2004 live show and studio album wherein Wilson, with Parks once again collaborating, tried to formulate the album as he originally intended. But he admitted at the time that even that project couldn’t quite capture what he had once envisioned.
At least those after-the-fact projects lend a pretty good idea of the scope of what The Beach Boys were trying to do. It’s all a bit esoteric, but individual moments of stunningly beautiful music stand out. In any case, we’ll probably never know all the mysteries of Smile. And we probably won’t ever stop contemplating them.
Photo by Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images
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