Surf's Up (album)

Surf's Up
Studio album by The Beach Boys
Released	August 30, 1971
Recorded	November–December 1966; January 1970; March–July 1971, Sunset Sound, Western, Columbia & Brian Wilson's home studio, California
Genre	Rock, pop
Length	33:56
Label	Brother/Reprise
Producer	The Beach Boys
The Beach Boys chronology
Sunflower (1970) Surf's Up (1971) Carl and the Passions – "So Tough" (1972)
Singles from Surf's Up
"Long Promised Road" Released: May 24, 1971 "Surf's Up" Released: November 29, 1971

Surf's Up is the seventeenth studio album by American rock band the Beach Boys, released on August 30, 1971 on Brother Records and Reprise. The album was released to more public anticipation than the Beach Boys had previously had for several years. The album's title is taken from the song of the same title written by Brian Wilson and Van Dyke Parks for the abandoned studio album, Smile.

Album history

In the fall of 1970, after the relative commercial failure of the Sunflower album, the Beach Boys hired Jack Rieley as their manager. Rieley, a DJ, had impressed the band with his credentials (a supposed Peabody Award-winning stint as NBC bureau chief in Puerto Rico-later discovered to be false) and fresh ideas on how to regain respect from American music fans and critics. One of his initiatives was to encourage the band to record songs featuring more socially conscious lyrics. Rieley also insisted that the band officially appoint Carl Wilson "musical director" in recognition of the integral role he had played keeping the group together since 1967. He also requested the completion of "Surf's Up" for release by composer and erstwhile bandleader Brian Wilson, a song that had taken on almost mythical proportions in the underground press since the demise of Smile three years earlier. He also arranged a guest appearance at a Grateful Dead concert in April 1971 to push the Beach Boys' transition into the counter-culture.

According to Rieley in his 1996 posts to the "Smiley Smile" message board, the band had split into two camps: the artistically inclined, drug using, bashful Wilson brothers and the commercially-oriented, teetotalling triumvirate of Mike Love, Al Jardine, and Bruce Johnston. In his opinion, if the group were to return to their mid-1960s heights, the former group would have to fully assert itself. To this end, Rieley all but ordered Al Jardine to stop work on "Loop de Loop", an intentionally juvenile and childlike collaboration with Brian Wilson that Jardine thought would revive the band's commercial prospects.^{[citation needed]}

Brian Wilson initially refused to work on "Surf's Up", now the eponymous track of the band's new album. In light of this, Carl Wilson overdubbed a new vocal in the song's first part, the original backing track dating from November 1966. The second movement was composed of a December 1966 solo piano demo recorded by Brian Wilson, augmented with vocal and moog bass overdubs.

To the surprise and glee of his associates, Brian Wilson emerged near the end of the sessions to aid his brother and engineer Stephen Desper in the completion of the third movement, which combined the end of the 1966 demo with "Child is Father of the Man" (another Smile outtake) for the coda and a final lyrical couplet possibly written by Rieley. The newly recorded lead vocals - sung by Al Jardine over a choral backdrop featuring all the Beach Boys - were sped up by Desper for continuity purposes in an attempt to make them sound more like they did in 1966.

The album also included "'Til I Die" a song Brian had been working on since mid-1970. Though Mike Love was reported at the time to dislike it,^{[citation needed]} he has praised and performed the song in recent years. Brian Wilson spent weeks arranging the song, crafting a harmony-driven, vibraphone and organ-laden background that closely resembled the halcyon-era sonic tapestries of Pet Sounds.

The artwork of Surf's Up is based on the sculpture "End of the Trail" by James Earle Fraser. Teamed with the title, the art is a self-aware nod to the removedness from the band's surf rock roots.

"Long Promised Road" and "Feel Flows" were Carl Wilson's first significant solo compositions; both songs were almost entirely recorded by him. "Student Demonstration Time" (essentially the R&B classic "Riot In Cell Block #9") and "Don't Go Near the Water" found Love and Jardine eagerly embracing the group's new topical-oriented direction. "A Day in the Life of a Tree" was Brian Wilson's sole new contribution. Several attempts at recording the song were made before the pump organ-led arrangement was settled upon. The slightly faltering lead vocal from Rieley has been praised by reviews as fitting for what a dying tree would sound like personified. Van Dyke Parks and Al Jardine join Rieley to sing the song's coda. According to Al Jardine, Rieley sang the song because "no one [else] would sing it because it was too depressing." Bruce Johnston's "Disney Girls (1957)" was hailed as a masterpiece by Brian Wilson and has been covered by Art Garfunkel and Cass Elliot.

The Dennis Wilson songs "4th of July" and "Wouldn't It Be Nice To Live Again" were excised from the final running order shortly before release. Although "4th of July"'s elagaic tone and lyrical relevance made it a logical thematic choice, Rieley has claimed that it was met with a reception of "glaring envy" by Wilson's bandmates. The song was duly replaced with an Al Jardine and Brian Wilson composition "Take a Load Off Your Feet", a song worked on in late 1969 during the Add Some Music sessions, but augmented to fit the atmosphere of the rest of the record. In the case of "Wouldn't it Be Nice to Live Again", a disagreement between the middle and younger Wilson brothers resulted in the song being left off the album. Dennis wanted the song to be the final track on the album, segueing out of "'Til I Die", while Carl felt "Surf's Up" should have that place. As a consequence, Dennis took the song out of the album's final running order.

This LP was mixed for Quadraphonic reproduction (also compatible for Stereo). It was to be played back by using the long extinct Dynaco or EV Stereo-4 decoders. However, this recording (LP or CD) can be played back in Quad by most of today's audio-video receivers. The surround sound information can be extracted using the Dolby Pro Logic setting. The Carl and the Passions LP and some of the songs on the Sunflower LP were also mixed with this process.

Reception

Professional ratings
Review scores
Source	Rating
Allmusic
The A.V. Club	positive
Encyclopedia of Popular Music
Pitchfork Media	8.9/10
Mojo	positive
Robert Christgau	B–
Rolling Stone

Surf's Up was released that August to more public anticipation than the Beach Boys had had for several years. It outperformed Sunflower commercially, reaching #29 in the US (their first Top 40 album since Wild Honey) and #15 in the UK. Like Sunflower, Surf's Up was released on EMI's Stateside label internationally.

The album was ranked #61 on Pitchfork Media's The Top 100 Albums Of The 1970s list. It is also listed in the musical reference book 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die.

Accolades

Publication	Country	Accolade	Year	Rank
NME	United Kingdom	New Musical Express Writers Top 100 Albums	1993	46
Pitchfork	United States	Top 100 Albums of the 1970s	2004	61
Rolling Stone	Germany	500 Greatest Albums of All Time	2004	154
Sunday Herald	United Kingdom	The 103 Best Albums Ever, Honest	2001	*

Track listing

Side one
No.	Title	Writer(s)	Vocals	Length
1.	"Don't Go Near the Water"	Mike Love/Al Jardine	Mike Love/Al Jardine/Brian Wilson	2:39
2.	"Long Promised Road"	Carl Wilson/Jack Rieley	Carl Wilson	3:30
3.	"Take a Load Off Your Feet"	Jardine/Brian Wilson/Gary Winfrey	Brian Wilson/Jardine	2:29
4.	"Disney Girls (1957)"	Bruce Johnston	Bruce Johnston	4:07
5.	"Student Demonstration Time"	Jerry Leiber/Mike Stoller/Mike Love	Love	3:58

Side two
No.	Title	Writer(s)	Vocals	Length
1.	"Feel Flows"	C. Wilson/Rieley	C. Wilson	4:44
2.	"Lookin' at Tomorrow (A Welfare Song)"	Jardine/Winfrey	Jardine	1:55
3.	"A Day in the Life of a Tree"	B. Wilson/Rieley	Jack Rieley/Van Dyke Parks/Jardine	3:07
4.	"'Til I Die"	B. Wilson	C. Wilson/B. Wilson/Love	2:41
5.	"Surf's Up"	B. Wilson/Van Dyke Parks	C. Wilson/B. Wilson/Jardine	4:12

Personnel

The Beach Boys

• Al Jardine – lead, harmony and backing vocals; electric guitar; moog; acoustic guitar; bass; percussion
• Bruce Johnston – lead, harmony and backing vocals; upright piano, moog bass; mandolin
• Mike Love – lead, harmony and backing vocals; tambourine
• Brian Wilson – lead, harmony and backing vocals; piano, harmonium, roxichord; snare drum, percussion; harmonica; sound effects
• Carl Wilson – lead, harmony and backing vocals; electric guitar, acoustic guitar, bass guitar; moog, harpischord, organ; drums, tambourine, percussion
• Dennis Wilson – harmony and backing vocals; drums

Additional musicians and production staff

• Steve Desper – sound engineer; moog, moog bass
• Daryl Dragon – rhythm guitar, bass, tack piano
• Mike Kowalski – drums
• Charles Lloyd – saxophone, flute
• Van Dyke Parks – lead, harmony and backing vocals
• Jack Rieley – lead, harmony and backing vocals
• Woody Thews – percussion
• Gary Winfrey – harmony and backing vocals

Sales chart positions

Albums

Year	Chart	Position
1971	UK Top 40 Album Chart	15
1971	US Billboard 200 Albums Chart	29

US Singles

Year	Single	Chart	Position
1971	"Long Promised Road"	US Billboard Hot 100 Singles Chart	89

Chart information courtesy of Allmusic and other music databases.

References

Bibliography

• Sunflower/Surf's Up CD booklet notes, Timothy White, c.2000.
• "The Nearest Faraway Place: Brian Wilson, The Beach Boys and the Southern California Experience", Timothy White, c. 1994.