>mogs the Beatles' whole discographyI'm fully English btw
Pet Sounds is special and beautiful but it's an island and a dead end. It's amazing that Brian Wilson, for a brief period, was able to write this music and fully utilize his highly talented vocal-band family to realize it. Pet Sounds and The Smile Sessions are truly, genuinely one of a kind. And this isn't an indicator of quality per se but they are uniquely un-ripoff-able. and I can even get down with all of the pure California pop era pre-Pet Sounds songs about root beer stands and mini corn dogs and girls named Francis, because not only are those songs good, but they are sometimes interesting too.HOWEVER, Brian Wilson was one man, and he couldn't hang. The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was waiting 50 years to put out the Smile material in earnest, because it led a lot of young music dorks astray in a weird way. A sensible person would listen to a 30 song comp, Pet Sounds, and Smile, and boom--that's it. But instead there's a whole class of music dork, some guy who is too young to have been a Led Zeppelin/Wolfmother kid but isn't smart enough to realize that there is no fucking point in poring over shit like Carl and the Passions and 15 Big Ones etc etc. Waaaay back when, it would've been a fun game to pick out the clues and find these mysterious weirdo Brian songs in the midst of them being a totally rudderless commercial group past their prime. But in a world where you can get right to the nut of Brian's unique genius, I can't fathom people listening to what might as well be Chubby Checker and going "is this brilliant? is this le hidden gem? this is better than Caroline, No?" People hate Mike Love for who he is and what he believes but to a great extent, it is also what Brian Wilson believed. Brian just didn't like Mike because he was fucking mean and his fragile psyche couldn't handle that. and who cares about comparisons but The Beatles have a way greater depth of material.
>ruins your album and causes a mental breakdownheh, nothing personal
