 |
GREATEST HITS VOLUME THREE: BEST OF THE BROTHER YEARS
Beach Boys
Welcome to nobody's favourite Beach Boys era, a period marked by sharp declines in commercial fortune and in Brian Wilson's contribution to the group. The sun starts to set here but, for those paying attention, the glow of their early twilight years provides a few final moments of breath-taking, end-of-the-day beauty. The last rays of Brian's pop brilliance are here, especially on the sadly autobiographical 'Til I Die ("I'm a cork on the ocean/ Floating over the raging sea/ How deep is the ocean?") and the sunny, feel-good doo-wop of This Whole World, both featuring incredibly intricate yet jaw-dropping gorgeous vocal arrangements that have rarely been bettered. With Brian's talents increasingly unreliable, however, other members seemed capable of picking up the slack. At least initially. Al Jardine's Susie Cincinnati recalled the band's early, carefree hits; Bruce Johnston's delicate Disney Girls was a wistful evocation of 1950s America; Carl Wilson's Long Promised Road juxtaposed ruminative verses with dreamy, big-production choruses; while short-tenured member Blondie Chaplin provided the lead vocal to Sail On Sailor, the group's last great single even though it barely sounds like a Beach Boys song at all. By the disc's second half, however, darkness has descended. On the dismal Honkin' Down The Highway, Brian's writing reached new depths of banality while vocal harmonies were shockingly grizzled. Apparently, no one could come up with anything better, as the group proceeded to record a series of lifeless covers (Rock And Roll Music, Peggy Sue, Come Go With Me, California Dreamin') signalling the group's transition from orch-pop torchbearers to nostalgia-peddling oldies act. A depressing end to a half-great, half-horrid CD; one that ultimately reminds us the '70s were hardly a complete washout for these boys of summer.
Track Listing
1.Add Some Music To Your Day
02.Susie Cincinnati
03.This Whole World
04.Long Promised Road
05.Disney Girls
06.'Til I Die
07.Surf's Up
08.Marcella
09.Sail On, Sailor
10.The Trader
11.California Saga (On My Way To Sunny Californ-I-A)
12.Rock And Roll Music
13.It's O.K.
14.Honkin' Down The Highway
15.Peggy Sue
16.Good Timin'
17.Goin' On
18.Come Go With Me
19.Getcha Back
20.California Dreamin'