Worst Beach Boys Song on Carl and the Passions (So Tough) - Part 6 in an Ongoing Series

Opening track is so bad ass - great lyrics, wonderfully layered combo of synths and acoustic sounds, weird rhythmic turnarounds - can't beat it. I've never really seen it talked up anywhere, sadly. Worst may have to be... um, Hold On Dear Brother, maybe? Its not bad at all, but seems to maybe have the least to recommend it.

"Marcella" is also pretty brilliant -- great, great tag to that one as well.

I think the best songs on here might be Dennis': "Make It Good" and "Cuddle Up" which are his first orchestral compositions with Daryl ("the Captain") Dragon and amazing.

can't decide if He Come Down is the worst on here - I like it okay but as far as Mike Love moments go its pretty typical, ie, some combo of cringeworthy and lolsome ("the Maharishi teaches us to MEDITATE!" I wonder if David Lynch and Mike Love are buddies...)

Don't like this one much. Mess of Help and Marcella are indeed great. The Ricky/Blondie songs are bland and even Dennis' songs -- quite incongruous here -- don't do much for me. But tie for worst has to be between He Come Down and All This is That for the 'spiritual' lyrics. Voted He Came Down.

yeah the Dennis songs sound like they were taken from a completely different album

...but they're amazing.

yeah its good stuff. I'm a big Dennis fan.

He Come Down by quite a margin. Rest of this album is fine to great.

Just re-listened to this 'cos I realised I could hardly remember any of the songs - it's a really good album on the whole, far, far better than I thought. 'He Come Down' is a waste of time, however, so I'll be voting for that.

Agreed -- the thing was really eviscerated when it was released, but today sounds of a piece with Holland (Dennis stuff here notwithstanding) with it's slinky arrangements and synths. I like it.

Agreed -- the thing was really eviscerated when it was released

Bundling the album w/a new pressing of Pet Sounds had something to do with it.

haha yeah that's a serious wtf marketing strategy

http://www.rollingstone.com/artists/thebeachboys/albums/album/157219/review/5946641/carl_and_the_passions_so_tough

Dennis Wilson's two songs are both delivered in an irritating nervous tremolo which isn't at all helped by Brian's big-toned symphonic accompaniment to his troubled brother's heavy-handed lyrics and rudimentary piano playing. The more trite and tortured the lyrics, the louder the strings become, until both "Make It Good" and "Cuddle Up" are swallowed up in a lugubrious Mahleresque crescendo.

"He Is Come" (arranged by Brian) is a gospel-flavored celebration of Maharishi consciousness (to each his own, I admit) and is pretty neat for its tight, six-voice choral singing and the crackling energy of the vocal jamming on repeated choruses at the end.

there seem to be a number of credit details wrong there...? but maybe I'm misremembering things

You mean, like, Brian having ANYTHING to do with those Dennis songs?

I find the idea that Brian had something to do with a song called "He Is Come" amusing.

You mean, like, Brian having ANYTHING to do with those Dennis songs?

Yeah, definitely that - but the reviewer in general seems to vastly overstate Brian's involvement, which I find rather befuddling

I like that "Marcella" is about some x-rated masseuse Bryan used to go to, so they had to, er, trim the lyrics some.

lolz I've never heard that one

S'in Heroes and Villains, I think, which—trashy tho it is—is still the best book on the BB's.

Easy. "He Come Down". Everything else is great.

I always saw this as a drop in quality between Surf's Up and Holland. A lot of it is just plain MOR blandness and the much-beloved Dennis songs really grate on me. My favourite one is actually 'Here She Comes' which doesn't sound like the Boys at all and is instead a great bit of Neil Young-style '70s rock.

I like that "Marcella" is about some x-rated masseuse Bryan used to go to, so they had to, er, trim the lyrics some.

― Naive Teen Idol, Wednesday, 13 May 2009 21:13 (Yesterday) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

I believe this was Deirdre from an earlier album. Friends? Sunflower?

Deirdre (from Sunflower) is a Bruce Johnson song.

Co-written with Brian

Yeah, but "Marcella" is the masseuse song.

S'in Heroes and Villains, I think, which—trashy tho it is—is still the best book on the BB's.

man the opening chapters about Dennis' last days in that are super-tabloid tragic

The bit where Mike Love goes crazy and carries around a jug of apple juice for days on end is entertaining

there's something great about the sound of this album

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Are they supposed to be paying a tribute to Get Back in that video or what?

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

What idiot said "Marcella" is the worst song on this?

An outlier in a discography of outliers. Sounds like a completely different band to the one on Surf's Up the year before and Holland the year after. In my head it came out a lot later than 1972. My favourite is "Here She Comes", which doesn't sound like the Beach Boys in any way whatsoever.

This is the weakest of their 66-73 run. The two singles are fun, and the Chaplin/Fataar songs are adequate Manassas tributes. The silliest song is "He Come Down", the dullest is "Cuddle Up".

kind of want to feed the opening chord/note of 'Make It Good' into a sampler and make a house tune out of it

Got a sudden urge to hear "Here She Comes" the other day, and hadn't realised there's been another one of those extensive reissues covering 1972 (So Tough and Holland).

Never loved So Tough but I find myself revisiting both this and Holland a fair bit in recent times

Actually think Dennis ones are the weak link here (which is not usually the case)

Maturity is admitting this is your favourite Beach Boys album

I'd so vote "All This Is That" nowadays

The Dennis songs, much as I want to like them, are sadly let down by his voice

You need a mess of help to stand alone qft

No wait, this is WORST songs. I wouldn't vote All This Is That as worst, I'd vote it best

Haha I can't remember writing those last few posts, and judging by the 3am Saturday timestamp there's probably a reason for that.

I would strongly renege on saying this is my favour8te BBs album, far from it. But it's definitely grown on me a lot.

When I first encountered it, I thought "Yes this is the first truly bad BBs record".

It didn't even really sound like them, with this driving classic rock sound. Just a different band entirely, and I saw it as a huge blip between the excellence of Surf's Up and Holland.

But no, there's plenty to love. "Here She Comes" might not sound like the Boys at all, but it's got a great groove and I always enjoy it. 'All This Is That' has some lovely backing vocals that come in towards the end.

Still can't get into the Dennis songs. He sounds gravely ill and I can't convince myself of the pathos.