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| No, "Bull Session with Big Daddy" is not a great new song written by Brian Wilson. |
Side A of All Summer Long was definitely a big step forward for the band in terms of arrangements and instrumentation, but this album is really where the band started firing on all cylinders - making whole albums that were at the very least uniformly good and where all of the songs were immaculately arranged and produced. Now, don't get me wrong, this album isn't perfect! There's still one very obvious piece of filler on it, the sound is still a bit muddy, there are some choices which were perhaps slightly overambitious - but compared to where the band was just a few years ago, it's pretty astounding.
The album starts out on a very strong note with a cover of "Do You Want To Dance" by Bobby Freeman, here given the much less lame title "Do You Wanna Dance". The first thing to note about this song is that it contains a rare lead vocal from Dennis, which ends up serving the song well, even though he's not as technically proficient as either of his brothers. The weird teenage nerviness of his voice ends up fitting the theme of the song perfectly in a way that a more 'choir boy' performance from Carl or Brian wouldn't. It's also self evident that this song is a banger. The arrangement is excellent in its imitation of Phil Spector's 'Wall of Sound', and is one of the first Beach Boys songs to include most of the Wrecking Crew, a famous Los Angeles group of backing musicians that would go on to be heavily used by Brian. (Carl's still playing the guitar, though.)
"Good to My Baby" is pretty traditional Beach Boys fair, a lighthearted song about monogamy and loving women and stuff, and it's also pretty damn good. Maybe it doesn't quite reach the introspective heights as some of the other songs on this record, but it's pretty close to a perfection of the 'Beach Boys formula' with back and forth vocals from Brian and Mike and some moderately surf-y guitar underpinning the whole thing.
"Don't Hurt My Little Sister" has a slightly weirder concept and lyrical conceit than most Beach Boys songs of this era and it becomes even weirder when you realize it's probably about the then-teenage Rovell sisters! (Brian married Marilyn Rovell, with a very concerning age gap, between when the song was recorded and when the album was released.) Which is pretty messed up. Ignoring that, it's a good song, though. Once again, not that notable, aside from the fact Brian gave it to Phil Spector to record and he agreed and then kicked Brian out of the recording session for "substandard playing".
"When I Grow Up To Be A Man" is an unusually introspective single choice for the Beach Boys at this point - the lyrics speak to losing youth and changing in personality as you grow up, a pretty far cry from the "Surfing is fun!" of most of their previous up-tempo hits. It's also got some great harpsichord. I always thought the backing vocals were a bit goofy at the end with the increasing years but it's goofy in an endearing way... if that makes any sense?
"Help Me Ronda" would later be remade as a single for their next album with an added 'H' in the title, and I prefer that version more. But it's a still very fun and catchy song and I get why it did unexpectedly well for an album cut.
"Dance, Dance, Dance" is just pure sugar rush in song form. It feels unfair to criticize this because it's so perfect at doing explicitly what it sets out to do - which is, 'be an incredibly catchy pop song that never once demands you to critically think'. And I think there's a place for that in the world! Also there's a key change in the middle of the verse so that's kind of interesting I guess. I don't know. It's "Dance, Dance, Dance". I think you can surmise what it's about by reading precisely one third of the title.
"Please Let Me Wonder" kicks off the much-acclaimed Side B of this record, AKA the "slow and introspective songs about being in love and also being very sad" side. And indeed it's a beautiful, yearning love song, with some positively ethereal backing vocals. It's also a little bit pathetic - it's basically a song about being in love with an idea of a person versus the actual thing, and preferring not to know the truth about whether or not said person loves you. The arrangement is so perfect and the melody is so wonderfully lilting that it ends up making you feel a little bad for the guy, sufficiently bad enough that Brian actually gets away with whispering "I love you" melodramatically into the microphone at the end.
"I'm So Young" starts off with the line "I have a girlfriend", so you'd think it would be slightly cheerier, but not really! This one is a cover about puppy love and not being able to marry each other yada yada yada. And it's a really good cover too, with some GORGEOUS harmonies and wonderfully reverb-y production. Similarly to a lot of Spector's classic love songs, this is an easy one to get lost in, with so many layers of vocals and guitar work, and an absolutely ethereal Hammond organ underpinning it. It's just beautiful melancholy and honestly one of the highlights on the album for me despite being a cover.
"Kiss Me, Baby" is one of my favorite Beach Boys songs and one of those songs I like enough I have trouble actually writing about it! Just like every other song on this half of the album, it's ANOTHER yearning, melancholic, slightly pathetic love song. I really adore the way syncopation is used on this one and the production is just so wonderfully reverb-y and ethereal. The highlight, though, is the chorus which is absolutely beautiful. I'm pretty convinced that the harmonies in the chorus are what angels sound like. It's one of those beautifully layered Brian Wilson arrangements, with the bass vocals underpinning everything rhythmically and a melodic falsetto soaring over the rest of the song.
"She Knows Me Too Well" carries on the same general themes as the last couple songs, with some really pretty chord changes and an arrangement that does a good job of resisting the obvious. This one would have probably sounded pretty out there to a listener coming hot off the heels of All Summer Long, but in retrospect it suggests where the band would end up heading the year after.
"In the Back of My Mind" has another Dennis Wilson vocal, and I frankly don't think he fits as well on this one. To be fair, the hesitancy of his vocal performance is certainly reflected by the song! It's paranoid and unsure of itself, and unusually mellow and obtuse for a song from a pop group in 1965. The past few songs suggested romantic troubles, but this one seems to be hiding something a bit darker. The narrator has everything he could ever want, but he's terrified of something. His wife cheating on him is sort of implied, but there's a bizarre feeling of dread imbued here, and the ambiguity of the lyrics certainly isn't helping matters. The song ends with Dennis practically yelping followed by the orchestra falling apart on itself, not too dissimilar to what the Beatles would later end up doing with "A Day in the Life". There's no harmonies on this one, even! It would be a creepy, depressing, impactful, and moving ending of the album if it was the end, but in classic Beach Boys fashion, the band refuses to end their album in a normal way and shoves some filler on here to get it to 12 tracks. "Bull Session with Big Daddy" is an interview or something. It's pretty pointless except for the fact there's apparently a Capitol Records executive named "Dick Rising", which is a fantastic name.
I'm going to slap an 8/10 on this one. It's definitely brought down by the fact that the mix is a bit muddy, but considering it's from 1965 and has never gotten a great remaster, that's more or less expected. "Bull Session" has no reason to exist and a few of the songs on Side A don't hold up quite as well as the rest of the album, but it's definitely the best Beach Boys record I've reviewed so far. See you next time for Summer Days (And Summer Nights!!), which is a fantastic album title.
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