Smiley Smile
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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Smiley Smile is the 12th studio album by American rock band the Beach Boys, released on September 18, 1967. It reached number 9 on UK record charts, but sold poorly in the US, peaking at number 41—the band's lowest chart placement to that point. Critics and fans generally received the album with confusion and disappointment. Only one single was issued from Smiley Smile: "Heroes and Villains". "Good Vibrations" and "Gettin' Hungry" were also released, but the former had been issued a year earlier, while the latter was not credited to the band.
Conceived as a simplified version of their then-forthcoming Smile—a much more elaborately constructed LP—Smiley Smile contrasts significantly with its stripped-down approach and lo-fi production. Following principal songwriter Brian Wilson's declaration that most of the original Smile tapes were off-limits, the majority of recording sessions lasted for only six weeks at his makeshift home studio using what was predominantly radio broadcasting equipment, a detuned piano, electronic bass, melodica, found objects for percussion, and a Baldwin theater organ. The unconventional recording process juxtaposed an experimental party-like atmosphere with short pieces of music edited together in a disjointed manner, combining the engineering methods of "Good Vibrations" with the loose feeling of Beach Boys' Party! (1965).
From 1966 to 1967, Smile was repeatedly delayed as the Beach Boys were subject to a considerable level of media hype that proclaimed Wilson as a "genius". After settling payment disputes with Capitol Records, Smiley Smile was distributed in collaboration with Brother Records, a new record label and holding company founded by the band. The album's production was unusually credited to "the Beach Boys" rather than Wilson alone, marking the point where he began relinquishing his hold as the group's creative leader. Smile was ultimately left unfinished as the group embarked on a brief tour of Hawaii, and then, the recording of their next album, Wild Honey, released only three months later.
Smiley Smile opened a seven-year string of under-performing Beach Boys albums, but has since grown in stature to become a cult and critical favorite in the Beach Boys' oeuvre. Its music is often cited for having positive effects during an LSD comedown, and was used by at least one drug clinic to help relieve users from bad trips. Regarded as a forerunner to certain bedroom pop acts, in 1974, it was voted the 64th greatest album of all time by NME writers, and in 2000, it was one of 100 albums featured in the book The Ambient Century as a landmark in the development of ambient music. Some session highlights from the album are featured on the compilations The Smile Sessions (2011) and 1967 – Sunshine Tomorrow (2017).
