BRIAN WILSON: PET SOUNDS LIVE (2002)
1) Show Intro; 2) Wouldn't It
Be Nice; 3) You Still Believe In Me; 4) That's Not Me; 5) Don't Talk (Put Your
Head On My Shoulder); 6) I'm Waiting For The Day; 7) Let's Go Away For Awhile;
8) Sloop John B; 9) God Only Knows; 10) I Know There's An Answer; 11) Here
Today; 12) I Just Wasn't Made For These Times; 13) Pet Sounds; 14) Caroline No.
Every single review of this album inevitably
asks the question «why?». Five of
these tunes had only just recently been heard on the Live At The Roxy album. There was no question in the minds of
anyone who cared that Brian's backing band was awesome and inspired enough to
reproduce the musical magic of Pet
Sounds on stage. The shows were warmly received, the people were thrilled.
But Pet Sounds Live in their entirety,
as a special separate CD? Is this an acute case of «hanging on to your ego» or
what?
It is true that the band is excellent, yes. The
album was played and recorded over three different nights at the Royal Festival
Hall in London, with probably the best particular versions picked from the three
shows, and the musicians do a fabulous job — I think that even a diehard Pet Sounds fanaticist who has every
single frequency memorised to a tee will not find much to complain about or to
cringe at. As for Brian, who now has the task of regularly stepping in not just
for brother Carl, who at least had a somewhat similar vocal timbre, but also
for cousin Mike, he does everything as best he can — changing the tonality
where it has to be changed, but never getting off-key and never once sounding
uninspired (well, after all, why should he? it's not as if anyone was forcing him to go through his own
masterpiece).
The emphasis, however, is on reproducing the
sacred original as closely as possible: the band has so meticulously dissected
and thoroughly studied all the parts that I wouldn't be surprised to learn they
also featured those empty Coke bottles for percussion right on stage. This can
occasionally be instructive — for instance, some parts that were intentionally
lowered deep in the mix, when played live, come out much louder (the trilling
guitar parts on ʽDon't Talkʼ, for instance), so that the adoring fan of the
album might pick on some nuances that he/she may have missed earlier. But if
you are not that awed over Brian's
original mastery of texture, you will be, like me, rather disappointed that not
a single song gets any extra «twists» where we could see it open up to any new
dimensions or perspectives. Only on the instrumentals, where the band is
showcased per se, without the lead singer stealing away attention, do they occasionally
stretch out beyond the original limitations — like on the extended percussion
jam on ʽPet Soundsʼ — but then it was exactly those instrumentals that we
already had the pleasure of enjoying on Roxy
just two years ago.
Additionally, there is something vaguely
embarrassing about Brian's stage behaviour this time: we can hardly blame him
for preserving that «innocent child» mentality, but it is somewhat different
when the entire audience gets mistaken for little kids as well. Here are some
typical introductions from the horse's mouth: "Track number TWO!"
(ʽYou Still Believe In Meʼ — what is this, a foreign language audio course?
fortunately, he drops this schtick very quickly, but still...); "You can
close your eyes if you want to for this song!" (ʽDon't Talkʼ — thank you,
Mr. Wilson, we can decide for ourselves); "Here's an instrumental with no
voices, okay?" (ʽLet's Go Away For Awhileʼ — sure we know what an instrumental is, and did somebody warn you of
potential audience disturbances at the perspective of hearing a song with «no
voices»?); "This next song, my friend Paul McCartney told me it was his
favorite song" (gee, this guy is friends
with Paul McCartney himself? like, no shit!); "this next one sounds
like a Bob Dylan lyrics' tune, I think you'll like it" (ʽI Know There's An
Answerʼ — actually, no, it doesn't); "now we have another instrumental...
NO VOICES JUST INSTRUMENTS!!!" (uhh... okaaaay...), and so on.
Honestly, that
is annoying. I would advise anyone who does develop an odd taste for this
performance to just cut those intros out in their digital versions (there is
also a particularly ridiculous section where the old guy decides to have a
shouting match with the audience, as if he were Bruce Dickinson or someone like
that). Or, better still, just leave the record for what it is — a historical
curio that may have had some personal importance for Brian at a particular
juncture in his life. Or get the video (you can currently watch it on YouTube
for free) — the band is quite hot to watch in many senses of the word,
including sexist ones (ah, that Taylor Mills!). But if you miss out on this one
altogether, that will hardly be a tragedy.
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