MLT Club Member Jung Roe
MLT Club MemberForum Replies Created
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Hi JP
Yeah you can feel that Paul and John were best of friends first and foremost before the Beatles, and the same is true with Georg Harrison. Despite the rivalry and the bickering towards the end, you could see a family like bond in the band. I remember in an interview after the Beatles break up John said about Ringo something to the effect “we were all worried about Ringo, but after seeing his recent work, we knew he would be OK”. There was a genuine care and concern for each other even after they went their separate ways. What a touching story this video reveals.
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David Bennett posted another great video on Bach, the father of all music, past, present and future. Seeing this, I am thinking perhaps to save music for the future, the schools should include Bach in their music curriculum to instill some music appreciation and what great music is. It’s obvious many of the great rock and rollers of the 60s, 70s, and even 80s and 90s realized in the height of their careers the significance of Bach (Beatles, Kinks, Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin and on and on), and why/how a piece of music can be timeless and move people. Then the younger generations today would be more discerning and seek out good music of the great rock legends of the past, and inspired artists today like Mona and Lisa, and not passively accept the canned pop music being pushed by the music industry. Last weekend I listened to a local radio station that plays only “todays top chart hit songs”, and I almost gagged. It is really that bad, it’s not a generational thing. There was so much great music in the previous decades that music education was not necessary as kids could just listen to the hit radio station and find some good music, but that’s not the case today. Todays music industry is really trashing music.
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That looked like a lot of fun Sara!
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MLT’s San Francisco brings me joy to no end. To think this and the other two California Dreaming songs started it all off for MLT on Youtube. Their San Francisco was my first MLT experience, and this one will be forever special to me. It show cases the absolute super natural beauty of Mona and Lisa’s musical talent that can stir and move the soul, that carries on in everything they do to WHY? today. In 2017 this video was at 600K views, and now at 2.4M quadrupled.
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Hi Jacki, really beautiful, I feel a songbird connection with the Wings of MLT. Real creative magic poetry! Thanks for this.
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Did you know Brian Wilson employed the Hammond organ and Leslie speakers in Good Vibrations. The description below of the studio work the Beach Boys did to create Good Vibrations, to me is like listening to Mona, Lisa talk about their work in the studio on WHY? with Papa Rudi.
The Beach Boys to the Beatles to Good Vibrations and beyond.
As a young boy, Wilson’s mother often talked to him about the “cosmic vibrations” in the world, and a dog barking is often in response to a person’s bad vibrations. With lyrics written by both Wilson and Beach Boys lead singer Mike Love, Brian Wilson wanted to create a magnum opus about good cosmic vibrations. Brian’s brother Carl sings lead, and the song begins with no introduction. The first thing we hear is the trademark falsetto Beach Boys sound. Time is kept by a Hammond organ fed through a spinning Leslie speaker and a repeating counter melody on the bass.
I, I love the colorful clothes she wears
And the way the sunlight plays upon her hair
I hear the sound of a gentle word
On the wind that left her perfume through the airA snare drum kicks in with the third line with accentuating sleigh bells, and we are brought into the chorus. But this just isn’t any chorus, this is the chorus to “Good Vibrations!” This is the chorus where the song finds its footing while breaking all the rules. This is the chorus that harkens back to the vocal groups of the 1950’s while somehow sounding like something from the future. This is the chorus that has cellos, full tonal steps with every line, and a kick-ass rock band in the background moving everything a long at a rapid clip. Mike Love sings the bass part to start things off, then we hear the comfortably familiar shimmering Beach Boys harmonies coming in behind him, sounding just like a doo-wop group standing under the corner street lamp.
I’m pickin’ up good vibrations
She’s giving me excitations (Oom bop bop)
I’m pickin’ up good vibrations (Good vibrations, oom bop bop)
She’s giving me excitations (Excitations, oom bop bop)
Good, good, good, good vibrations (Oom bop bop)
She’s giving me excitations (Excitations, oom bop bop)
Good, good, good, good vibrations (Oom bop bop)
She’s giving me excitations (Excitations)And floating above everything is the other-worldly sound of the Electro-Theremin, played by its inventor Paul Tanner. Harnessing electric currents to make sometimes unpredictable noises, the Theremin turned out to be the perfect counter-weight to the 16th notes being played by a cello underneath. Voices come in, layered on top of each other. Traditional rock band and vocal group stylings. Futuristic Theremin noises, beautiful orchestral sounds. In the wrong hands this could have been a sloppy mess, but everything here works. The sounds are logically layered on top of one another, woven together to create a complete sound, escalating to a crescendo until it stops with a sudden tape splice, and we hear Carl Wilson singing by himself for the next verse. The Hammond organ returns, and we hear the now familiar bass melody.
Close my eyes, she’s somehow closer now
Softly smile, I know she must be kind
When I look in her eyes
She goes with me to a blossom worldAgain we hear Carl Wilson’s plaintive voice starting out alone. Again we hear those shimmering melodies coming in at the third line. The lyrics are poetic. Words are bent and shaped to fit the melody, adding to the mystique and mystery of the song.
After another chorus, a chorus filled with futurist 50’s call and response, beautiful harmonies and a killer backing rock band, we come to the bridge, a bridge that leans hard into the ethereal landscape only hinted at in the first and second verses.
The first part of the bridge evokes the first and second verse, but somehow sounds completely different. An aural salad is spinning around in our heads, everything is background, only with the line “I don’t where, but she sends me there” in sharp focus, completely clear and distinct from all else that his happening. Wilson is pounding the piano into smithereens, the cymbals are crashing, the Theremin is wailing.
“(Ahh)
(Ah, my my, what elation)
I don’t know where but she sends me there
(Oh, my my, what a sensation)
(Oh, my my, what elation)
(Oh, my my, what)And then, again, everything stops. Only a quiet tambourine with the organ playing whole notes underneath. Very quiet, very subdued. One voice. Then a bass. Then more voices. Then then very high notes on the organ. The voices fade.
Gotta keep those lovin’ good vibrations a-happenin’ with her
Gotta keep those lovin’ good vibrations a-happenin’ with her
Gotta keep those lovin’ good vibrations a-happenin’“A chorus of harmonic voices comes in as the music comes to as the music stops, and then we are back to the full throated chorus which then dissipates into the rockingest cellos you’ve ever heard. The harmonies return as transition to the fade out ending of the song.
At 3:34 long, “Good Vibrations” is relatively short by today’s standards, but in 1966 it pushed teh envelopes of duration, structure, and instrumentation. Rock and roll music was forever re-defined as a platform for new ideas. For stretching preconceived notions. Embracing the past while mapping the future. There were new rules, and the World War of Rock and Roll was forever won by Brian Wilson and the Beach Boys. Listen to Who’s Next, but then move on. Blonde on Blonde is a truly monumental album. But everything begins with “Good Vibrations,” and people have been trying to catch up ever since.
They were not in a vacuum. Music was changing everywhere. Culture was evolving. The mid to late 1960’s brought a veritable explosion of psychedelia, folk-rock, experimental electronic music, and even the beginnings of heavy metal. The idea of rock and roll was expanding, and the great musical groups of the day found themselves in a creative arms race of talent and ideas. Who would fire the next shot? Who would win the war?
The Beatles. The Rolling Stones. The Beach Boys. The Who. Bob Dylan. Everyone was listening to each other. Everyone was finding inspiration. Everyone was exploring, experimenting, stretching to showcase their creativity, to inspire whoever and whatever would follow.
Listen for the Hammond. You can’t miss it, right from the get go.
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Hi Tim
Good point, many of those actors are multi-talented and we only see their acting part professionally, but I am sure many of them were great musicians too, like Johnny Depp. I always worry a Hollywood producer might see one of Mona and Lisa’s videos and try to snatch them up to be glamorous actresses. Of course I would be there following them on the silver screen with the same passion and enthusiasm as their music. 😁
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Hi David,
I probably did see some episodes with Suzy in it, but I just don’t recall. Happy Days always reminds me of my early high school days. Who could forget Fonzie’s signature “heyyyy” with his two thumbs up. It’s one of the shows like the Brady Bunch where you could see the kids aging and maturing through the seasons, it it kind of felt real at the time as I was going through similar changes, so those shows were kind of special.
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Thanks Tim for sharing that video. I can really see the “cut from the same cloth” feel seeing George Young compared to his two younger siblings. I never knew the family link to AC/DC existed in the Easy Beats until MLT mentioned it when they posted their Cavern Club video of Friday on my Mind. There is that lead in guitar sound in Friday on my Mind that has an uncanny resemblance to Angus Young’s guitar part in Thunderstruck. It’s interesting in an interview Angus talked about how Chuck Berry was one of his guitar influences. The Beach Boys always mentioned Chuck Berry too as a great influence, and yet AC/DC and the Beach Boys are so miles apart in style. I like all of AC/DC music, by my preference is their early Bon Scott days stuff like TNT, It’s A Long Way To the Top, Ride On…. Their early days guitar sounds are so unique and irresistible.
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David, unfortunately not familiar with Suzi at all, but great Happy Days memory lane, thanks. I must have missed that Happy Days episode. It looks like Richie could tear it up pretty good on the guitar, I wonder if it was actually Ron Howard’s actual playing? That scene with Chachi/Scott Baio on the drums at the end, reminded me of my cousin who had huge crush on him at the time.
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Hi Chris
Great article on the Electro Theramin, giving some insight on this invention that is a variation on the Theramin. In the video for Good Vibrations, you can see Mike Love using it in post studio production performance, and I imagine the Beach Boys bought the unit to use in their concerts, until the electronic synthesizer was able to displace it.
With Good Vibrations, while it became the Beach Boys biggest hit song, I think Capital records though did the song dis-service by linking it back to the fun in the sun beach song image in the various ways Capital promoted the song, even though the lyrics has nothing to do with the beach. In a way this image the label tried to link to the song undermined the real artistry, and all the innovation Good Vibrations encompassed. I’ve seen so many videos of people playing beach volley ball, girls laying on the beach in bikinis, and guys waxing down their surfboard to Good Vibration. I think a lot of people dismissed Good Vibrations, despite it’s commercial success and critical acclaim from music critics, to another fun in the sun beach song, and did not give it it’s due credit as one of the great amazing cutting edge influential songs that made a big impact on the future of music for generations.
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Hi Chris. I didn’t know the inventor of the Theramin played on Good Vibrations. That is quite the unique science lab instrument. I remember in last years MLT Christmas Advent Calendars reaction videos, they discussed the Theramin. I agree, not an easy instrument for anyone to pick up, though I think Mona or Lisa have the musical dexterity to do so if they wanted. LOL!
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Hi David
Yes, here is the link to the article: The Beach Boys to the Beatles to Good Vibrations and beyond.
I did a search in Google, “did Brian Wilson use the Hammond organ in Good Vibrations” and got this gem of an article. I really love the description it goes into about the creative rivalry between the Beatles and Beach Boys that created amazing music, sounds, and studio technique/expertise by musicians. In that 2017 MLT video when Mona and Lisa said they were going to take a break from performing and go into the studio to create new music (that led to the creation of Orange and WHY? masterpieces), I immediately envisioned parallels to the Beatles taking a break from touring and focusing in on the studio creating Rubber Soul, Revolver, Sargent Peppers….as well as Brian Wilson stepping back from the band and going into the studio to create Pet Sounds, Smile, and Good Vibrations. In some places Good Vibrations is touted as the precursor to A Day In The Life, and Bohemian Rhapsody.
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Thanks Tom. I never realized until now the Hammond organ in Good Vibrations. It has one of the nicest bass line in any song, just like in WHY. The organ, bass and chorus in Good Vibrations and WHY? are stellar. The string arrangement in WHY takes it another, it is killer.
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Tomas, yeah that key board guy is doing a lot of stuff in the back. At 1:35 you can see him with his left hand playing the Hammond below while his right hand is playing the keyboard above.
