Sunflower/Surf S Up [2on1] [Import]

As I write this review I am listening to 'Sunflower/Surf's up' for about the zillienth time since I perchased it at Reading festival 3 years ago. 2 years prior to that perchase I was still under the illusion that there wasn't much depth to the Beach Boys music and that they were just an irritating 60's american pop band that churned out hit after annoying hit (i.e. 'Help me Rhonda', 'Fun Fun Fun', 'Surfin USA' ect) Being raised on The Beatles from an early age didn't help as no other 60's outfit was gonna take prefference over them! Then I heard these 2 albums. My friend from school was determined to change my mind about the Beach Boys and played me some of their more experimental/less commercial offerings in the form of Friends/20/20. An experimental Beach Boys!?! At the time the idea seemed obsurd but I listened and eventualy liked them ('Cabinessence' in particular) then after 'getting used to' Sunflower/Surf's up, LOVED the band! Immesureabley!
Both albums filled me with the same emotions as hearing the Beatles for the first time as a little boy. Although an entirly different band, the level of geniouse and origionality expressed on these records equals and sometimes surpasses that of The Beatles. For example on tracks like 'Surf's Up' 'This Whole World' (the sweetest 2 mins of pop your ever likly to hear!) the dark, sad 'Till I Die' and the odd but very beautifull 'Day in the Life of a Tree', the songs (after you look under the suface) churn your emotions till you can't take it anymore. I actualy had nights where I used to stay awake wondering how a record could be so deeply moving. If you don't beleve me, keep listening!! I still find hidden treasure in the songs that I wasn't sure about at first. For example the song "At my Window" seems twee and a bit pointless on the surface, but let it wash over you and it soon reveals itself as a beatifully subtle, dreamy piece of music. I love the highly sung etherial "fly aways" at the end of song. Magic. The rest you'll have to hear for yourself.

My next perchase was 'Pet Sounds' which, although more consistant (and still a masterpiece!) has only one track that 'moves' me in the same way as most of the stuff on these albums, 'Don't talk put your head on my shoulder'.

Just a few more things. For those of you who think you've got the band sussed cause you've heard stuff like 'I get around', 'Do you wanna dance' or even the masterfull 'Good Vibrations', THINK AGAIN. There is a whole other side to this amazing group (the less commercial side in fact) and in Dennis Wilson, a songwriter as brillient and as heartfelt as brother Brian. Enjoy!

After pet sounds not many beach boys CD's gain the critical acclaim or commercial success they deserve. However on this bargain CD two of the Beach Boys finest albums ever are gathered. First to Sunflower, which some reckon even better than Pet Sounds. What it is better than Pet Sounds for sure concerning this album is that it's a group effort. Dennis Wilson decisively shows himself as the second most talented Beach Boy with the funky Slip on Through and one of the most beautiful songs of all time , Forever. Brian however still hangs on as the main man with classics such as This Whole World, Add some Music and All I wanna do.
Surfs Up is nearly as brilliant as Sunflower and only has one bad track. The truly awful Mike Love song Student Demonstration Time. Brian steals the show, even though he's now a peripheral figure in the band on the verge of mental illness.Until I die and surfs up are wonderful. Although the extended version of the former found on the Endless Harmony compilation and performed by brian at his solo shows is that much more awe inspiring. Please take a chance on these two beautiful albums.

Best songs on Sunflower: "All I Wanna Do", "This Whole World", "Forever", "Cool, Cool Water", "Deirdre"

Best songs on Surf's Up: "Feel Flows", "Disney Girls (1957), "Surf's Up", "Til I Die", "Long Promised Road"

Erratic they both may be, but Sunflower and Surf's Up are my two favourite albums by the Beach Boys....yes, better than Pet Sounds! Sunflower was tipped to be the band's major comeback following some commercially dry years following the seminal "Good Vibrations" single; it wasn't quite the hit it should have been, and I stress SHOULD have been. We're talking some of the most fantastic pop music ever created here. And, admittedly, some not so great tunes. But the brilliant more than outweighs the banal, and the result is one that's deservedly become a fan favourite. It's also the most musically democratic of any of the Beach Boys albums; with Brian Wilson retreating from the limelight (though still contributing some absolutely fantastic songs), the likes of Dennis Wilson and Bruce Johnstone shine the brightest on Sunflower, while Carl Wilson would come close to stealing the show on Surf's Up.

Anyway, back to Sunflower; after delivering some very strong songs on Friends and 20/20, Dennis Wilson's finest hour within the band was here on this album; the opening "Slip on Through" is uplifting, glorious and a perfect opening. Brian meanwhile delivers what he does best on the breathtaking "This Whole World", which feels like a glorious summer's morning in all of its wonderful two minutes; boasting more melodic beauty and sweeping loveliness than pretty much all of Pet Sounds, I'd go as far to say that this song is the man's most delightful song ever. "Add Some Music to Your Day" isn't really a favourite of mine; the lyrics are pretty grating, though the vocal harmonies and musical melodies are as peerless as ever. Instead, skip right to the next song; "Got to Know the Woman" is a total delight, another Dennis song and one that crackles and struts along wonderfully from start to finish; I don't think the rest of the band could have sung this song as convincingly, as Dennis appeared to be the only one of The Beach Boys would exuded any kind of sex appeal. The swaying, summery and romantic "Deirdre" is one of the band's most underrated; absolutely wonderful music, gorgeous atmosphere and a lovely lead vocal from Bruce Johnstone; on this album and Surf's Up he too would emerge temporarily as a formidable element of the band. He'd later vanish into the background, but for a while, his songs were delightful. Another Dennis Wilson song arrives with the exciting, rocking "It's About Time", and this is followed by the Parisian-tinged "Tears of the Morning", which is a melodramatic but entertaining Johnstone ballad, which has a really lovely, haunting finale.

Sunflower's most beautiful song arrives in the form of "All I Wanna Do", which is, bar none, my favourite Beach Boys song ever; vocal-wise, I never found Mike Love to be my favourite in the band, but his singing here, coupled with some of Brian's most atmospheric, swooning, intoxicating and gorgeous music, is something to fall head over heels for. Evocative of a warm midnight summer swim, this is the kind of maddeningly underrated song that makes post-Pet Sounds Beach Boys music the treasured things of cult beauty they are. Even though they're one of the most famous bands of all time, they're also one of the most overlooked in regards to their wilderness era of 1968-1973. "Forever" is often regarded as Dennis Wilson's finest song ever, and the fans are right all the way; embellished with the kind of simple, heartfelt lyrics that really are quite lovely; it has some massively effective, building, rising yet subtle crescendos which thankfully fall short of the kind of bombast that would make his contributions on 1972's Carl and the Passions album a little tougher to digest. The tender, smitten "Our Sweet Love" is a glorious Brian Wilson gem; crammed with so many lovely moments that it's hard to resist. The Al Jardine sung "At My Window" is a little overly sentimental, but real pretty with it too. One of the more intriguing songs to be created during Brian Wilson's ill-fated Smile sessions, the closing "Cool, Cool Water" is magnificent, an evocative, surreal and strange suite, swirling with great vocals and some very impressive structural experimentation. One of the weirdest and most charming Beach Boys songs ever, it makes for a delightful close to a truly delightful album.

One year later and the band were almost a commercial proposition again, and they were even almost back in the realm of cool; this was mostly thanks to the terrific Surf's Up, which really could have been the start of a whole new era for the Beach Boys (despite Dennis` near total absence from proceedings)....if only had they hadn't spoiled it all with a distinctly below-average album after this one. Though the sentiments sometimes come across as naïve, the opening "Don't Go Near the Water" marked an interesting, environmentally concerned new direction; there are some interesting and entertaining musical and vocal flourishes. The album really takes off with the splendid "Long Promised Road", which is the first of Carl Wilson's formidable contributions to the album; featuring a dizzying, spellbinding musical interlude which sounds a lot like Pink Floyd but in a good mood, this is epic, spacious and really quite exciting, with one of the best-ever choruses the band ever composed. Hmm, I'm not so sure about "Take a Load of Your Feet"; it's charming in its own innocuous way, despite the often banal lyrics.

Luckily, the album really, really, REALLY gets better with "Disney Girls (1957)", which is Bruce Johnstone's absolute peak and a truly adorable thing of nostalgic wonder; I wasn't even alive in 1957, but this song just gets me in a way that makes me pine for similarly carefree, innocent summer times. Absolutely stunning harmonies, smile-inducing keyboard parts, a truly dreamy mid-section and a truly winsome chorus make this one a true Beach Boys classic, as good as the very best Brian, Dennis or Carl songs. True to Surf's Up erratic nature, we're jolted back into rough and ready rock with Mike Love's "Student Demonstration Time", which is a re-working of an old rock and roll staple, and actually, listening to it now, it's not as bad as I remember it being on first listen. Maybe it was because it followed "Disney Girls" that it seemed like a let down, and to be honest, it's nothing special, but it's not too bad at all.

Carl's majestic "Feel Flows" was featured in Cameron Crowe's utterly charming film Almost Famous, and it was watching this film and being entranced by this song that made me venture further into the Beach Boys more obscure era; as a result, I'll always have a special place in my heart for this song, it being more or less responsible for discovering the multitude of wonderful songs this most wonderful of bands have created. A song of ethereal, magical, beguiling power, it rises and rises into some kind of unheard of plane....when I say that this album could have marked a whole new era for the band, it's this song that establishes this truly miraculous new direction the best of all. Words defy me trying to encapsulate just how good this song is; for me, you can keep your "God Only Knows", "I Get Around", "Good Vibrations" and "California Girls", this is the kind of song I think of when I think of truly, truly brilliant Beach Boys songs ever. Well, we're on a high at this stage, and Al Jardine's rather fine , brief interlude "I've Been Waiting for Tomorrow" is an eerie, haunting folky lament, effectively dressed up in a spooky, echoing production. One of the oddest Beach Boys songs ever follows; "A Day in the Life of a Tree" is indeed told by the viewpoint of the eponymous subject; it's a miracle this song even comes to close to working successfully, but it does, and Brian's decision to select the band's manager as singer was an inspired moment of lateral thinking. Two eternally magnificent Brian creations close the album; "Til I Die" is utterly haunting, moving, heartbreaking and yet bizarrely life-affirming; it's as though the song is resigned to the laws of nature and life/death, but not crushed by such harsh truths; startling, direct lyrics, astonishing singing.....it's a true gem. Amazingly, this is surpassed by the truly brilliant title track, which was the centrepiece of the Smile project and reworked here to include that same album's "Child is Father to the Man" segment and with new vocals by Carl Wilson during its first half; it's a regal, magisterial, wintry and truly strange creation, given an oblique, bizarre edge by Van Dyke Parks' painterly, poetic lyrics and during the captivating second half (which features the original Brian vocals), a simultaneous sense of melancholy and comforting beauty....the "I heard the words, wonderful thing, a children's song...." moment is pure crystallised loveliness.

These are two great, great albums, an absolute must and perfect introduction for those wishing to know more about the Beach Boys beyond Pet Sounds and their early, radio-friendly surf/hot rod staples. There are some truly beautiful moments to savour here....listen and be entranced.