This is the thread where we discuss how completely sweet the third side of Endless Summer is!

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Side Three of Endless Summer by The Beach Boys gets my vote for the best album side. Endless summer is great because you get four sides, five songs per side. The problem is that the other three sides all have some throw away tracks to wade through. But side three is heat from start to finish:

1.I Get Around
2.The Girls On The Beach
3.Wendy
4.Let Him Run Wild
5.Don't Worry Baby

This is the all time perfect track order. It builds to a peak. Side One has Warmth Of The Sun, Side Two has In My Room, and Side Four has Girl Don't Tell Me and Your So Good To Me. If you were to combine the best bits of the other three sides into a single record with side three you would have one of the best records of all time.

I think a condensed version of Endless Summer would easily compete with Smile and Pet Sounds. I think Wilson's productions sounded best during the period before Pet Sounds when he was making more complicated singles that still fell within the formalistic constraints of pop music. I think he worked best within those boundaries. Pet Sounds has more complicated writing, but the one afternoon mix that wound up being released was no where near as good as the earlier single as far as sound quality was concerned.

Smile was more spaced out, but it doesn't sound as good either (outside of Surf's Up) as the earlier singles. Don't get me started on the remake. The writing is better but it sounds like it was made in a modern studio. The best part of Smile was the room sounds recorded on Tape.

So I think Side Three of Endless Summer is totally sweet. Who is ready to shoot me down for their own amusement??? :)

― Disco Nihilist (mjt), Thursday, 21 April 2005 17:27 (twenty years ago)

I think you are right on, "In My Room" is my favorite Beach Boys song, and the sound of the harmonies on Endless Summer is beautiful.

― mrjosh (mrjosh), Thursday, 21 April 2005 18:25 (twenty years ago)

What throw away songs?

― Zed Szetlian (Finn MacCool), Thursday, 21 April 2005 18:34 (twenty years ago)

always loved "Let Him Run Wild."

― edd s hurt (ddduncan), Thursday, 21 April 2005 18:43 (twenty years ago)

Yes, this is their best period -- except Endless Summer is in stereo, isn't it? The mono mixes sound several hundred times better.

― Burr (Burr), Thursday, 21 April 2005 20:52 (twenty years ago)

From Amazon Reviews:

5 out of 5 stars I love this CD, July 12, 2003

Reviewer: A music fan (Detroit, MI)
I just wanted to say that this is my favorite Cd ever, and I was really dissapointed with the news I just heard. I just heard that this CD is out of print, nad its really hard to get now. I am 16 years old nad I just have to say that I am so sick of the goth ... that is coming out, and that its just such a shame that the good music out there is disappearing. I honestly curse all satanic music, and if I could I would take all of the satanic artists who call themselves artists and I would purposly screw their careers in. I miss the good old music that was based on friendship and good spirits. I almost wish I had not been born in this generation of musical disaster. I wish that everone who reads this and shares the same feelings as me to write to the music companies and demand reprints of the music that deserves the title of being music, as I will try my hardest to do also. I must just say this, Beach Boys, You ROCK!

― kyle (akmonday), Thursday, 21 April 2005 21:05 (twenty years ago)

I thought this thread was going to be about Gary Hoey.

― Jordan (Jordan), Thursday, 21 April 2005 21:06 (twenty years ago)

I *heart* Detroit!!!

― Disco Nihilist (mjt), Thursday, 21 April 2005 21:12 (twenty years ago)

Compilations=cheating

― Geir Hongro (GeirHong), Thursday, 21 April 2005 22:07 (twenty years ago)

I didn't realise Mike Love lived in Detroit!

"based on friendship and good spirits" - should we break the news to him gently?

There's an upcoming 3CD Beach Boys Platinum Collection thing coming out at the end of May which is a purely mainstream, punter-pleasing comp but does have four of these five tracks on CD1 - sadly not "Let Him Run Wild." The track listing on CD3 is truly mind-boggling, but for interested parties here it is in full:

CD1

1. I Get Around
2. Don't Worry Baby
3. Surfin' USA
4. In My Room
5. Little Deuce Coupe
6. Surfer Girl
7. Fun Fun Fun
8. When I Grow Up (To Be A Man)
9. The Girls On The Beach
10. All Summer Long
11. Wendy
12. Dance Dance Dance
13. Be True To Your School
14. The Warmth Of The Sun
15. Little Honda
16. Surfin'
17. Surfin' Safari
18. Do You Wanna Dance
19. Please Let Me Wonder
20. Then I Kissed Her
(no "Shut Down" either)

CD2

1. Good Vibrations
2. California Girls
3. Sloop John B
4. Barbara Ann
5. God Only Knows
6. Wouldn't It Be Nice
7. You Still Believe In Me
8. The Little Girl I Once Knew
9. Caroline No
10. You're So Good To Me
11. Girl Don't Tell Me
12. Help Me Rhonda
13. Heroes And Villains
14. Wild Honey
15. Darlin'
16. Friends
17. Bluebirds Over The Mountain
18. Breakway
19. Beach Boys Medley (terrible Stars On 45-type cut-and-paste job, and they could easily have put both of the abovementioned two omissions in its place)
(N.B. all the Pet Sounds tracks are stereo mixes)

CD3

1. Do It Again
2. Cottonfields
3. I Can Hear Music
4. Tears In The Morning
5. Sail On Sailor
6. Disney Girls (1957)
7. Long Promised Road
8. Forever
9. Surf's Up
10. 'Til I Die
11. Marcella
12. Student Demonstration Time (??????????????!!!!!!!!!!!)
13. Lady Lynda
14. California Saga: California
15. Sumahama
16. Rock & Roll Music
17. Here Comes The Night (the '79 disco remake kids, co-produced by Bruce Johnston and Curt Boettcher (!) and which I rather like)
18. Kokomo
19. Wipe Out (with the Fat Boys, sadly not the extended 12" mix with Mike Love's infamous "rap")
20. California Dreamin'
21. Fun Fun Fun WITH STATUS QUO - what a way to end, as Calimero used to say

― Marcello Carlin (nostudium), Friday, 22 April 2005 06:51 (twenty years ago)

endless summer suffers from some awful, pointless remixes - "fun fun fun" in particular just sounds plain WRONG to me. the good vibrations box set is just about perfect (though disc 4 is inevitably bad, loaded with crap like "rock and roll music" - has there ever been a worse chuck berry cover?), despite the weird absence of "let him run wild." most underrated song: "don't back down."

― J.D. (Justyn Dillingham), Friday, 22 April 2005 07:07 (twenty years ago)

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