jblum's Journal

Very short review of tonight's show:

That Lucky Old Sun is, in some ways, better than Smile. Where Smile was a sort of cubist collage, a bricolage, a kaleidoscope of staggering musical fragments which kept rearranging itself into new patterns for nearly forty years, Brian Wilson's new album-to-be is together. It's not as mindblowing, but it's full of clever stuff and passionate, unexpected chord changes, evoking past glories only to use them as a starting point. It's a summation statement of the California dream which he defined and chronicled, and of the heights and depths and new heights of his own life. And he sings it like he means it. Smile was the work of an exuberant, creative man on the edge of madness. That Lucky Old Sun is the work of an exuberant, creative man who's been over the edge and back.

He's not "cured"; that doesn't happen -- but with Scott Bennett and Van Dyke Parks and his band surrounding him, he's achieved something which isn't just not-bad-for-a-guy-who's-been-through-all-that, something which reaches that genuine wow from Planet Brian and brings it back to us on Earth.

At 25 I turned out the light
Cause I couldn't handle the glare in my tired eyes
But now I'm back drawing shades of kind blue skies...

They're going into studio to record this next month. I never thought I'd see the day. And if Brian can do something that's worthy of his best creative work at 65, there's hope for me yet. :-)

Proper review later, along with the story held over from yesterday. But in a nutshell -- this concert was Brian being more together on-stage, more loose and relaxed, more confident and playful, and more freewheeling with his performance than I've ever seen him.

Now to go pick Peter Hollo's brain about the mayhem that went on at soundcheck...

Current Music: Brian Wilson, "Midnight's Another Day"