The latest review…and it’s a great one. https://psychobabble200.blogspot.com/2026/01/review-smile-rise-fall-resurrection-of.html#more
More SMiLE reviews and podcasts from August-December 2025
This is a great way to start the year…knowing that the SMiLE book has connected with one reviewer.
Cameron Crowe and I together…very cool.
January 8, 2026 by Steve Matteo
California Revisited: 2025’s Best Books on the West Coast Rock Scene
Steve Matteo surveys 2025’s best rock books on the West Coast rock scene, sharing praise for Cameron Crowe, David Leaf and Jude Warne. Click through the book titles for purchase information:
CAMERON CROWE – ‘THE UNCOOL’: One of the most engaging memoirs of 2025 is Cameron Crowe’s The Uncool (Avid Reader Press/Simon & Schuster). Crowe is the award-winning screenwriter and director of such films as Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Say Anything, Jerry Maguire, Vanilla Sky and maybe most famously, Almost Famous. Almost Famous was a thinly veiled autobiographical coming-of-age story about an unassuming California-based, teenage rock fan who wrote for Rolling Stone magazine during their ’70s heyday.
Crowe’s memoir takes us through his life, mostly from birth to just as his movie career was taking off, with the end of the book bringing us up to today; it works as the perfect textual, non-fiction companion to Almost Famous. Fans of classic rock will thrill to Crowe’s affectionate and honest account of being at the center of the ’70s music firmament as a starry-eyed, yet surprisingly grounded kid. Crowe calls his book The Uncool, which is the only thing misleading about it. While he stresses his awkward teenage years and early 20s as a time when he was grappling with growing up and dealing with complicated family dynamics, he ends up being quite cool.
It’s his honesty and passion for rock ‘n’ roll and his connection to the exalted rock stars he wrote about, during those heady salad days of the rock scene, that forced him to grow up and face the world. He never brags about his cool times or wallows in recounting tales of dabbling in the sex-and-drugs rock star excesses of that era. Naturally, this is a very readable and engaging memoir.
Crowe walks a very fine line here between recounting his experience as a wide-eyed teen in love with rock ‘n’ roll and revealing the sometime conflicted nature of the rock gods he writes about so eloquently. His times with Gregg Allman, David Bowie, Kris Kristofferson, Tom Petty, Gram Parsons and members of the Eagles and Led Zeppelin, to name a few, are both insightful about those musicians and a snapshot of a brief time when true rock gods roamed the Earth. Cameron Crowe: very cool!
DAVID LEAF – ‘SMiLE: THE RISE, FALL AND RESURRECTION OF BRIAN WILSON’: David Leaf has become perhaps the foremost chronicler of the life and music of Brian Wilson. His newest book SMiLE: The Rise, Fall, and Resurrection of Brian Wilson (Omnibus Press) looks at the up-and-down professional career and personal life of Brian Wilson, the Beach Boys’ de-facto leader and visionary and one of the true geniuses in pop music history. Leaf has written eloquent and knowledgeable books on the group’s history and on Wilson’s iconic and misunderstood Smile album, as well as a definitive biography on Wilson, among many other books and projects.
What makes his new book such a welcome addition to his books and scholarship of Wilson and, ultimately, of the Beach Boys, is that this book is an oral history. Rather than re-telling the same Wilson and Beach Boys story, or hearing some critic’s opinion on the music, this book allows the people who were there and, in many cases, closest to Wilson, tell the story. Leaf allows a wide variety of voices to come through, painting a full picture of an artist who was not always as easy to nail down as some critics and historians would like to make people think.
The book is like a this-is-your-life, no-holds-barred epic tale of not only Wilson, but of the Beach Boys, as well as of the ups and downs of pop music stardom and falling and being resurrected. It also serves as a social and cultural history of a time and place and tells how the ’60s and beyond in California became a metaphor and petri dish of music, lifestyle and new ways of living. This may be Leaf’s best book yet and more of these oral histories on pop and rock music would be welcome.
There were a bunch of great interviews and podcasts in the latter half of 2025. Here are some links.
See this Instagram post by @davidhmandel: https://www.instagram.com/p/DOFx-XSDthC/?igsh=ZGUzMzM3NWJiOQ==
SMiLE podcasts Part 1 and 2
https://youtu.be/Bau5X36LGmA?si=1zxPUqnGMfNeVuHw
https://youtu.be/5JzvWTLYI-Q?si=zRnlGmm-U21SXsro
The Gen-X Muse https://open.spotify.com/episode/3W5LlfIif8F0sIaByGJV69
Garage to Stadiums. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cQM779lJy6o&feature=youtu.be
Word In Your Ear https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=do7_GqRadh8
Biff Bam Pop https://biffbampop.com/.../exclusive-interview-author.../...
Hold Onto the Colours https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H0E53YXIiOU
Baxie’s Musical Podcast https://rock102.com/.../baxies-musical-podcast-david.../
2025 Podcasts and Reviews of SMiLE: The Rise, Fall and Resurrection of BrianWilson through July, 2025
Podcasts * Events * Reviews
UCLA event
https://ucla.zoom.us/.../luEcq1LL-LmboyUTH2eORGrcoo...
Passcode: Nrn=9%e*
Giggens https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q9SYKJuC6s4&t
Setlist Kitchen https://www.setlistkitchen.com/post/really-good-vibrations-inside-brian-wilson-s-smile-with-david-leaf or
https://www.setlistkitchen.com/.../really-good-vibrations...
Full interview with Jenny Jamball
https://youtu.be/DeDpvFJfXJs?si=qkBX_EqHlT45p41L
Beach Boys Reddit Video Teaser (excerpt of Jenny Jamball’s interview)
Abigail Devoe’s Vinyl Monday https://youtu.be/vtkTDgthhs4?si=W7y-cLorVpu_BIOD
Jokermen Podcast https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/jokermen/id1519299517?i=1000703578600
Good Day Austin (Short TV piece)
Elliot Roberts https://youtu.be/YJEZnJsvLh0?si=_Yc7fBbcDcYZKQLX
BELOW HERE ARE GOOD PODCASTS AND INTERVIEWS BUT IT CAN GET REPETITIVE AND MORE BEACH BOYS ORIENTED.
Beach Boys Basement https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-MPRL9au2qo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FzKl9nmRr_8
Pray For Surf https://prayforsurfblog.blogspot.com/2025/03/smile-in-three-words.html
TuneX https://banana-and-louie.org/2025/03/30/episode-25-farther-down-the-path-was-a-mystery/
Pet Reads Part 1 https://podfollow.com/petreads/episode/8a2eb7dd4eb024c22125a504fd3faf81353fd257/view
Dec4 podcast https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZFdAEq5xeg
ESQ (four-part podcast) https://www.youtube.com/@esqeditor229
Brewster’s Musical Heroes Part 1
https://youtu.be/6X3ANbp9OdE?si=xb87UHfPJAyaTI54
Brewster’s Musical Heroes Part 2
https://youtu.be/QJW5B4wLYok?si=Gvu-cemp1J8ObR18
Brewster’s Musical Heroes Part 3
https://youtu.be/ReOgg123zZc?feature=shared
The Lives They're Living (episode about Van Dyke Parks and SMiLE) https://open.spotify.com/episode/2vLIBNb7VR6DFMfxFBaBiG
Plastic EP https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ItmGK3C0G04
Rock Talk Radio (audio review, not an interview) https://www.buzzsprout.com/2061662/episodes/17103758?fbclid=IwY2xjawKgPb1leHRuA2FlbQIxMQBicmlkETFaOXdQNkVBbUpMdmVpdDV2AR7l5RFG6iP97HzQwLjKssxOLBWZX47VOgZONohOVkhAebQX5FZE9367HtkkYw_aem_G3FrNpxPoSX5OpOqWLCwsA
Word In Your Ear https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=do7_GqRadh8
My Rock Moment: https://www.myrockmoment.com/listen
Biff Bam Pop
Hold Onto the Colours
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H0E53YXIiOU
Baxie’s Musical Podcast https://rock102.com/mornings/baxies-musical-podcast-david-leaf-smile-the-rise-fall-resurrection-of-brian-wilson/
The Gen-X Muse https://open.spotify.com/episode/3W5LlfIif8F0sIaByGJV69
Garage to Stadiums. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cQM779lJy6o&feature=youtu.be
Mark Dillon
Jeremiah Higgins: https://apple.co/4kV5XL2
Chris Charlesworth
https://justbackdated.blogspot.com/2025/01/smile-rise-fall-and-resurrection-of.html
Endless Summer Quarterly review
“Smile: The Rise, Fall & Resurrection of Brian Wilson”
May 13, 2025
Spread Love
There are very few musicians Paul McCartney would consider his equal, let alone his artistic superior, but in his heyday, Brian Wilson was one such exception. He employed all sorts of chords and creative devices to complete his art, culminating in such dazzling symphonic pop ballads as “God Only Knows” and “You Still Believe In Me.” McCartney wasn’t the only one blown away by Wilson’s abilities; Bob Dylan was another fan. “Jesus, that ear,” Dylan remarked. “He should donate it to the Smithsonian.”
All high praise indeed, and David Leaf makes no effort to suppress his inner fan regarding the songwriting bassist. Leaf’s Smile: The Rise, Fall & Resurrection of Brian Wilson peers at the artist from all angles, and although the work stems from a place of admiration and love, the author doesn’t hold back any punches, especially in the chapters regarding mental health. Carl Wilson had to watch with sadness at his brother’s decline during the recording of Smile, describing the compromised alternative Smiley Smile as a “bunt instead of a grand slam.”
Curiously, Leaf avoids casting therapist Eugene Landy as the ogre Paul Giamatti characterised him as in 2014’s mediocre film Love & Mercy. Recognizing that it would have been “a kinder experience for Brian” had someone else led him through recovery, the writer highlights the psychologist’s ability to mend the musician to the point he could be “publicly presentable as a Beach Boy.” By returning to the spotlight, Wilson returned to his place as a popsmith of high repute; 1988’s jaunty “Rio Grande” captured the weirdness of 1967’s single “Heroes & Villains” almost perfectly.
Wilson reunited with Van Dyke Parks for the achingly beautiful Orange Crate Art, a record dotted with the singer’s spectral vocals. And despite his reticence – Wilson compared resurrecting the album to the Titanic – the composer issued Brian Wilson Presents Smile in 2004, completing a journey decades in the making. It was well received: Rolling Stone magazine listed it fourth in their year-end poll.
Occasionally, Leaf overdoes it with the superlatives (Wilson’s music is both “indescribably beautiful” and “otherworldly”), but the passion is infectious to read, as is the research. Peter Carlin points out that it is not difficult to “romanticize a record that doesn’t exist,” as it would combine all the flavors and flair of many iterations of a band. Irish guitarist Sean O’Hagan pens an affectionate story that features during the closing section of Smile: The Rise, Fall & Resurrection of Brian Wilson. Witnessing Wilson’s performance of the mythological album live on stage, O’Hagan felt transported to an ebullient place. ” I left the theatre a happier person,” O’Hagan writes, no doubt grinning as he did so.
Like he did for Landy, Leaf makes a commendable case for Mike Love, the irascible frontman disliked in some quarters of Beach Boy lore. Love resisted some of the lyrical changes Wilson presented to the band during the 1960s, which was fair considering that their oeuvre consisted of tunes about surfing and summer vibes. In 1995, guitarist Carl Wilson suggested that Love found the new work “airy-fairy” and “abstract,” but Brian Wilson fans will likely say that’s the reason why Smile, Smiley Smile, or Brian Wilson Presents Smile is such a triumph. Sadly, Love tried to bring Wilson to court in the 21st century; ultimately, this suit was dismissed in 2007 as there were “no triable issues of material fact.”
Leaf himself spends very little time or word count on the court case, encouraging readers to visit the Billboard website for more information. The work, the writer concedes, is supposed to be “joyous and celebratory.” Fundamentally, that is what united The Beatles and The Beach Boys. They were bands that knew of a world war that dominated their childhood, but both groups opted to look at the optimism in life. People should love, cheer, and clap. They should also… smile.
-Eoghan Lyng
See this Instagram post by @davidhmandel: https://www.instagram.com/p/DOFx-XSDthC/?igsh=ZGUzMzM3NWJiOQ==
Pre-Publication Interview with David Leaf
prayforsurfblog.blogspot.com
*********************
Pre-publication interview for UK fans
Andrew: David, we’ve been hearing about this book for a while. You had two chapters in The Beach Boys and the California Myth about SMiLE. You made a film about SMiLE. You wrote, albeit briefly, about Brian Wilson Presents SMiLE in God Only Knows. What is SMiLE: The Rise, Fall & Resurrection of Brian Wilson? How is this different and was it really needed?
David: Andrew, big question, lots of answers. Looking at the research and interviews that I did for Beautiful Dreamer: Brian Wilson & The Story of SMiLE, I realized I needed a much larger canvas to take a real deep dive into the story. This book, over 300 pages, gives the reader so much information all in one place. Allows me to tell so much more of the story. And most importantly, as it’s an oral history, give so many other voices an opportunity to tell the story of and talk about SMiLE and Brian Wilson Presents SMiLE. It is, as you well know, a story without precedent, appropriate for music that was and remains groundbreaking. And I think this book is very, very different from anything anybody’s done in a rock book or even non-fiction.
In terms of style, it’s what would be called an “oral history,” but it’s much more. To begin with, the goal of the book was for the story to be told not by me but as much as possible, by those who lived it. The book itself focuses on two key periods of Brian’s career: 1966/1967 and 2003/2004. The story is told by the people closest to the music: Brian and Van Dyke Parks in the first SMiLE era and Darian Sahanaja and Brian’s entire band in the Brian Wilson Presents SMiLE era.
As with the documentary, I felt it was important to contextualize Brian’s place in music history, so we hear from dozens of his contemporaries as well as artists who he influenced.
There were entire interviews that didn’t make it into Beautiful Dreamer from people who were right there, and what they have to say is very important.
Andrew: So this is very different from your last book, God Only Knows? Which, by the way, I thought was quite an important update of “The Myth.”
David: Thank you. Those of us close to the saga of Brian and the Beach Boys know there are two basic Beach Boys stories: one is about a family band, their greatest hits, an amazing body of work the group recorded from 1962-1966 that made them “America’s Band.” Those records – composed, arranged and produced by Brian Wilson, featuring songs primarily written by Brian with his lyricist cousin Mike – have brought joy to the world for over six decades. That’s central to the the story of God Only Knows, especially in The Beach Boys & the California Myth part of that book.
This book is the other story. For Brian Wilson…for music lovers around the world…for SMiLE obsessives like me and you, my friend…this is the tale that matters most. SMiLE is “the holy grail” of the rock era, so I think of this as almost a SMiLE bible.
The animating idea for the book was to celebrates the twentieth anniversary of Brian Wilson Presents SMiLE, the concerts and the Grammy award–winning, critically- and fan-acclaimed best-selling record that was the most unexpected and miraculous creation of Wilson’s heartbreaking and glorious roller coaster of a career. Editing issues delayed it, but as somebody wrote on my Facebook page, that makes sense for anything to do with SMiLE.
Andrew: I’m a bit confused. What is your role in the book? It’s called an oral history, so did you write the book?
David: Yes and no. Think of me as the curator, organizing the storytelling and contextualizing it, too. It closely follows Brian’s artistic explosion in 1966, his annus miraculous, when he composed, arranged, and produced the Pet Sounds album and the “Good Vibrations” single, perhaps the most influential one-two punch in rock history. And he intended to follow that with a new album recorded in the modular style he had pioneered on “Good Vibrations.” He worked on this new record, to be called SMiLE, for about nine months. Then, for a catastrophic list of reasons, he put it on the shelf. Where it tragically remained unfinished for thirty-seven years. It became an almost paralyzing albatross around Brian’s creative neck. Then, in 2004, at the Royal Festival Hall, to the surprise of everybody – to audiences that included lifelong admirers Sir Paul McCartney, Sir George Martin, Roger Daltrey, and Jeff Beck – Mr. Wilson finally presented a 21st Century version of SMiLE to a week of SRO crowds, in what was, as Brian admitted… Well, suffice it to say that his response explaining what it meant to him was to me, so stunning, it’s on the back cover of the book.
Andrew: How much of this is new material and how much of it will be familiar to us SMiLE obsessives?
David: I did over two dozen new interviews for the book. There are generous excerpts from the extended 2004 interviews I did with Brian Wilson and Van Dyke Parks for Beautiful Dreamer that didn’t make the film. As well as outtakes from other interviews I did. Lots and lots of stories and commentary that I think will be brand new even to you.
The central idea of the book is to tell the story of SMiLE by those who were there in 1966 and from the participants in its 2004 resurrection, including all the members of Brian Wilson’s band. It also features fan memories of what it was like to see Brian Wilson Presents SMiLE and what it meant to them. Actually, there’s an entire chapter written by those who were at Royal Festival Hall for the World Premiere and another chapter by those who saw him on another stop on the tour.
There’s a foreword by Brian’s recently-deceased wife Melinda. And something that I think makes the book very different - an anthology of a dozen essays from SMiLE historians, devotees, friends, musicians, and music professors, each with their unique point of view on the subject. Writers who were there like Tom Nolan. Writers who have interviewed Brian numerous times, like Sylvie Simmons.
Overall, because the goal was to hear from everybody else, I think I wrote maybe 25% of the book. There are certain things that had to be by me, such as my “take” on The Beach Boys SMiLE Sessions box set.
Andrew: After all these years, what does SMiLE mean to you? Why would you devote a year of your life to this book?
David: Because I had to. SMiLE was what brought me to California. The direction of my life was completely changed when I heard “Surf’s Up.” I was so fortunate to be the one who documented 2003/2004, who witnessed it, who was part of it in ways that I reveal in the book, I felt compelled to write this. After all, I worship in the Church of Brian Wilson.
So, if it can be righteously stated that the greatest art (e.g. Michelangelo’s work in the Sistine Chapel) can be seen as a dialogue between the artist and his God, then it can be fairly suggested that in 1966, Brian Wilson had his most intense conversations with his spiritual master, resulting in a year of musical creativity that may be the peak that any composer enjoyed in the 20th Century. In 1966, Brian Wilson was the composer, arranger, and producer of Pet Sounds, “Good Vibrations,” and the songs of SMiLE.
For me, this book is what happened to him as he rose to eternal greatness, fell off the edge of the earth, and then came back to reclaim his place as one of the most significant artists of his time and all time. It’s a story that should mean something to anybody who loves music. And I felt I owed it to him.
Publisher’s Weekly
https://www.publishersweekly.com/9781915841315
Brian Wilson Media
More SMiLE reviews and podcasts from August-December 2025
This is a great way to start the year…knowing that the SMiLE book has connected with one reviewer.
Cameron Crowe and I together…
January 8, 2026 by Steve Matteo
California Revisited: 2025’s Best Books on the West Coast Rock Scene
Steve Matteo surveys 2025’s best rock books on the West Coast rock scene, sharing praise for Cameron Crowe, David Leaf and Jude Warne. Click through the book titles for purchase information:
CAMERON CROWE – ‘THE UNCOOL’: One of the most engaging memoirs of 2025 is Cameron Crowe’s The Uncool (Avid Reader Press/Simon & Schuster). Crowe is the award-winning screenwriter and director of such films as Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Say Anything, Jerry Maguire, Vanilla Sky and maybe most famously, Almost Famous. Almost Famous was a thinly veiled autobiographical coming-of-age story about an unassuming California-based, teenage rock fan who wrote for Rolling Stone magazine during their ’70s heyday.
Crowe’s memoir takes us through his life, mostly from birth to just as his movie career was taking off, with the end of the book bringing us up to today; it works as the perfect textual, non-fiction companion to Almost Famous. Fans of classic rock will thrill to Crowe’s affectionate and honest account of being at the center of the ’70s music firmament as a starry-eyed, yet surprisingly grounded kid. Crowe calls his book The Uncool, which is the only thing misleading about it. While he stresses his awkward teenage years and early 20s as a time when he was grappling with growing up and dealing with complicated family dynamics, he ends up being quite cool.
It’s his honesty and passion for rock ‘n’ roll and his connection to the exalted rock stars he wrote about, during those heady salad days of the rock scene, that forced him to grow up and face the world. He never brags about his cool times or wallows in recounting tales of dabbling in the sex-and-drugs rock star excesses of that era. Naturally, this is a very readable and engaging memoir.
Crowe walks a very fine line here between recounting his experience as a wide-eyed teen in love with rock ‘n’ roll and revealing the sometime conflicted nature of the rock gods he writes about so eloquently. His times with Gregg Allman, David Bowie, Kris Kristofferson, Tom Petty, Gram Parsons and members of the Eagles and Led Zeppelin, to name a few, are both insightful about those musicians and a snapshot of a brief time when true rock gods roamed the Earth. Cameron Crowe: very cool!
DAVID LEAF – ‘SMiLE: THE RISE, FALL AND RESURRECTION OF BRIAN WILSON’: David Leaf has become perhaps the foremost chronicler of the life and music of Brian Wilson. His newest book SMiLE: The Rise, Fall, and Resurrection of Brian Wilson (Omnibus Press) looks at the up-and-down professional career and personal life of Brian Wilson, the Beach Boys’ de-facto leader and visionary and one of the true geniuses in pop music history. Leaf has written eloquent and knowledgeable books on the group’s history and on Wilson’s iconic and misunderstood Smile album, as well as a definitive biography on Wilson, among many other books and projects.
What makes his new book such a welcome addition to his books and scholarship of Wilson and, ultimately, of the Beach Boys, is that this book is an oral history. Rather than re-telling the same Wilson and Beach Boys story, or hearing some critic’s opinion on the music, this book allows the people who were there and, in many cases, closest to Wilson, tell the story. Leaf allows a wide variety of voices to come through, painting a full picture of an artist who was not always as easy to nail down as some critics and historians would like to make people think.
The book is like a this-is-your-life, no-holds-barred epic tale of not only Wilson, but of the Beach Boys, as well as of the ups and downs of pop music stardom and falling and being resurrected. It also serves as a social and cultural history of a time and place and tells how the ’60s and beyond in California became a metaphor and petri dish of music, lifestyle and new ways of living. This may be Leaf’s best book yet and more of these oral histories on pop and rock music would be welcome.
There were a bunch of great interviews and podcasts in the latter half of 2025. Here are some links.
See this Instagram post by @davidhmandel: https://www.instagram.com/p/DOFx-XSDthC/?igsh=ZGUzMzM3NWJiOQ==
SMiLE podcasts Part 1 and 2
https://youtu.be/Bau5X36LGmA?si=1zxPUqnGMfNeVuHw
https://youtu.be/5JzvWTLYI-Q?si=zRnlGmm-U21SXsro
The Gen-X Muse https://open.spotify.com/episode/3W5LlfIif8F0sIaByGJV69
Garage to Stadiums. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cQM779lJy6o&feature=youtu.be
Word In Your Ear https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=do7_GqRadh8
Biff Bam Pop https://biffbampop.com/.../exclusive-interview-author.../...
Hold Onto the Colours https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H0E53YXIiOU
Baxie’s Musical Podcast https://rock102.com/.../baxies-musical-podcast-david.../
2025 Podcasts and Reviews of SMiLE: The Rise, Fall and Resurrection of BrianWilson through July, 2025
Podcasts * Events * Reviews
UCLA event
https://ucla.zoom.us/.../luEcq1LL-LmboyUTH2eORGrcoo...
Passcode: Nrn=9%e*
Giggens https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q9SYKJuC6s4&t
Setlist Kitchen https://www.setlistkitchen.com/post/really-good-vibrations-inside-brian-wilson-s-smile-with-david-leaf or
https://www.setlistkitchen.com/.../really-good-vibrations...
Full interview with Jenny Jamball
https://youtu.be/DeDpvFJfXJs?si=qkBX_EqHlT45p41L
Beach Boys Reddit Video Teaser (excerpt of Jenny Jamball’s interview)
Abigail Devoe’s Vinyl Monday https://youtu.be/vtkTDgthhs4?si=W7y-cLorVpu_BIOD
Jokermen Podcast https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/jokermen/id1519299517?i=1000703578600
Good Day Austin (Short TV piece)
Elliot Roberts https://youtu.be/YJEZnJsvLh0?si=_Yc7fBbcDcYZKQLX
BELOW HERE ARE GOOD PODCASTS AND INTERVIEWS BUT IT CAN GET REPETITIVE AND MORE BEACH BOYS ORIENTED.
Beach Boys Basement https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-MPRL9au2qo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FzKl9nmRr_8
Pray For Surf https://prayforsurfblog.blogspot.com/2025/03/smile-in-three-words.html
TuneX https://banana-and-louie.org/2025/03/30/episode-25-farther-down-the-path-was-a-mystery/
Pet Reads Part 1 https://podfollow.com/petreads/episode/8a2eb7dd4eb024c22125a504fd3faf81353fd257/view
Dec4 podcast https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZFdAEq5xeg
ESQ (four-part podcast) https://www.youtube.com/@esqeditor229
Brewster’s Musical Heroes Part 1
https://youtu.be/6X3ANbp9OdE?si=xb87UHfPJAyaTI54
Brewster’s Musical Heroes Part 2
https://youtu.be/QJW5B4wLYok?si=Gvu-cemp1J8ObR18
Brewster’s Musical Heroes Part 3
https://youtu.be/ReOgg123zZc?feature=shared
The Lives They're Living (episode about Van Dyke Parks and SMiLE) https://open.spotify.com/episode/2vLIBNb7VR6DFMfxFBaBiG
Plastic EP https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ItmGK3C0G04
Rock Talk Radio (audio review, not an interview) https://www.buzzsprout.com/2061662/episodes/17103758?fbclid=IwY2xjawKgPb1leHRuA2FlbQIxMQBicmlkETFaOXdQNkVBbUpMdmVpdDV2AR7l5RFG6iP97HzQwLjKssxOLBWZX47VOgZONohOVkhAebQX5FZE9367HtkkYw_aem_G3FrNpxPoSX5OpOqWLCwsA
Word In Your Ear https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=do7_GqRadh8
My Rock Moment: https://www.myrockmoment.com/listen
Biff Bam Pop
Hold Onto the Colours
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H0E53YXIiOU
Baxie’s Musical Podcast https://rock102.com/mornings/baxies-musical-podcast-david-leaf-smile-the-rise-fall-resurrection-of-brian-wilson/
The Gen-X Muse https://open.spotify.com/episode/3W5LlfIif8F0sIaByGJV69
Garage to Stadiums. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cQM779lJy6o&feature=youtu.be
Mark Dillon
Jeremiah Higgins: https://apple.co/4kV5XL2
Chris Charlesworth
https://justbackdated.blogspot.com/2025/01/smile-rise-fall-and-resurrection-of.html
Endless Summer Quarterly review
“Smile: The Rise, Fall & Resurrection of Brian Wilson”
May 13, 2025
Spread Love
There are very few musicians Paul McCartney would consider his equal, let alone his artistic superior, but in his heyday, Brian Wilson was one such exception. He employed all sorts of chords and creative devices to complete his art, culminating in such dazzling symphonic pop ballads as “God Only Knows” and “You Still Believe In Me.” McCartney wasn’t the only one blown away by Wilson’s abilities; Bob Dylan was another fan. “Jesus, that ear,” Dylan remarked. “He should donate it to the Smithsonian.”
All high praise indeed, and David Leaf makes no effort to suppress his inner fan regarding the songwriting bassist. Leaf’s Smile: The Rise, Fall & Resurrection of Brian Wilson peers at the artist from all angles, and although the work stems from a place of admiration and love, the author doesn’t hold back any punches, especially in the chapters regarding mental health. Carl Wilson had to watch with sadness at his brother’s decline during the recording of Smile, describing the compromised alternative Smiley Smile as a “bunt instead of a grand slam.”
Curiously, Leaf avoids casting therapist Eugene Landy as the ogre Paul Giamatti characterised him as in 2014’s mediocre film Love & Mercy. Recognizing that it would have been “a kinder experience for Brian” had someone else led him through recovery, the writer highlights the psychologist’s ability to mend the musician to the point he could be “publicly presentable as a Beach Boy.” By returning to the spotlight, Wilson returned to his place as a popsmith of high repute; 1988’s jaunty “Rio Grande” captured the weirdness of 1967’s single “Heroes & Villains” almost perfectly.
Wilson reunited with Van Dyke Parks for the achingly beautiful Orange Crate Art, a record dotted with the singer’s spectral vocals. And despite his reticence – Wilson compared resurrecting the album to the Titanic – the composer issued Brian Wilson Presents Smile in 2004, completing a journey decades in the making. It was well received: Rolling Stone magazine listed it fourth in their year-end poll.
Occasionally, Leaf overdoes it with the superlatives (Wilson’s music is both “indescribably beautiful” and “otherworldly”), but the passion is infectious to read, as is the research. Peter Carlin points out that it is not difficult to “romanticize a record that doesn’t exist,” as it would combine all the flavors and flair of many iterations of a band. Irish guitarist Sean O’Hagan pens an affectionate story that features during the closing section of Smile: The Rise, Fall & Resurrection of Brian Wilson. Witnessing Wilson’s performance of the mythological album live on stage, O’Hagan felt transported to an ebullient place. ” I left the theatre a happier person,” O’Hagan writes, no doubt grinning as he did so.
Like he did for Landy, Leaf makes a commendable case for Mike Love, the irascible frontman disliked in some quarters of Beach Boy lore. Love resisted some of the lyrical changes Wilson presented to the band during the 1960s, which was fair considering that their oeuvre consisted of tunes about surfing and summer vibes. In 1995, guitarist Carl Wilson suggested that Love found the new work “airy-fairy” and “abstract,” but Brian Wilson fans will likely say that’s the reason why Smile, Smiley Smile, or Brian Wilson Presents Smile is such a triumph. Sadly, Love tried to bring Wilson to court in the 21st century; ultimately, this suit was dismissed in 2007 as there were “no triable issues of material fact.”
Leaf himself spends very little time or word count on the court case, encouraging readers to visit the Billboard website for more information. The work, the writer concedes, is supposed to be “joyous and celebratory.” Fundamentally, that is what united The Beatles and The Beach Boys. They were bands that knew of a world war that dominated their childhood, but both groups opted to look at the optimism in life. People should love, cheer, and clap. They should also… smile.
-Eoghan Lyng
See this Instagram post by @davidhmandel: https://www.instagram.com/p/DOFx-XSDthC/?igsh=ZGUzMzM3NWJiOQ==
Pre-Publication Interview with David Leaf
prayforsurfblog.blogspot.com
*********************
Pre-publication interview for UK fans
Andrew: David, we’ve been hearing about this book for a while. You had two chapters in The Beach Boys and the California Myth about SMiLE. You made a film about SMiLE. You wrote, albeit briefly, about Brian Wilson Presents SMiLE in God Only Knows. What is SMiLE: The Rise, Fall & Resurrection of Brian Wilson? How is this different and was it really needed?
David: Andrew, big question, lots of answers. Looking at the research and interviews that I did for Beautiful Dreamer: Brian Wilson & The Story of SMiLE, I realized I needed a much larger canvas to take a real deep dive into the story. This book, over 300 pages, gives the reader so much information all in one place. Allows me to tell so much more of the story. And most importantly, as it’s an oral history, give so many other voices an opportunity to tell the story of and talk about SMiLE and Brian Wilson Presents SMiLE. It is, as you well know, a story without precedent, appropriate for music that was and remains groundbreaking. And I think this book is very, very different from anything anybody’s done in a rock book or even non-fiction.
In terms of style, it’s what would be called an “oral history,” but it’s much more. To begin with, the goal of the book was for the story to be told not by me but as much as possible, by those who lived it. The book itself focuses on two key periods of Brian’s career: 1966/1967 and 2003/2004. The story is told by the people closest to the music: Brian and Van Dyke Parks in the first SMiLE era and Darian Sahanaja and Brian’s entire band in the Brian Wilson Presents SMiLE era.
As with the documentary, I felt it was important to contextualize Brian’s place in music history, so we hear from dozens of his contemporaries as well as artists who he influenced.
There were entire interviews that didn’t make it into Beautiful Dreamer from people who were right there, and what they have to say is very important.
Andrew: So this is very different from your last book, God Only Knows? Which, by the way, I thought was quite an important update of “The Myth.”
David: Thank you. Those of us close to the saga of Brian and the Beach Boys know there are two basic Beach Boys stories: one is about a family band, their greatest hits, an amazing body of work the group recorded from 1962-1966 that made them “America’s Band.” Those records – composed, arranged and produced by Brian Wilson, featuring songs primarily written by Brian with his lyricist cousin Mike – have brought joy to the world for over six decades. That’s central to the the story of God Only Knows, especially in The Beach Boys & the California Myth part of that book.
This book is the other story. For Brian Wilson…for music lovers around the world…for SMiLE obsessives like me and you, my friend…this is the tale that matters most. SMiLE is “the holy grail” of the rock era, so I think of this as almost a SMiLE bible.
The animating idea for the book was to celebrates the twentieth anniversary of Brian Wilson Presents SMiLE, the concerts and the Grammy award–winning, critically- and fan-acclaimed best-selling record that was the most unexpected and miraculous creation of Wilson’s heartbreaking and glorious roller coaster of a career. Editing issues delayed it, but as somebody wrote on my Facebook page, that makes sense for anything to do with SMiLE.
Andrew: I’m a bit confused. What is your role in the book? It’s called an oral history, so did you write the book?
David: Yes and no. Think of me as the curator, organizing the storytelling and contextualizing it, too. It closely follows Brian’s artistic explosion in 1966, his annus miraculous, when he composed, arranged, and produced the Pet Sounds album and the “Good Vibrations” single, perhaps the most influential one-two punch in rock history. And he intended to follow that with a new album recorded in the modular style he had pioneered on “Good Vibrations.” He worked on this new record, to be called SMiLE, for about nine months. Then, for a catastrophic list of reasons, he put it on the shelf. Where it tragically remained unfinished for thirty-seven years. It became an almost paralyzing albatross around Brian’s creative neck. Then, in 2004, at the Royal Festival Hall, to the surprise of everybody – to audiences that included lifelong admirers Sir Paul McCartney, Sir George Martin, Roger Daltrey, and Jeff Beck – Mr. Wilson finally presented a 21st Century version of SMiLE to a week of SRO crowds, in what was, as Brian admitted… Well, suffice it to say that his response explaining what it meant to him was to me, so stunning, it’s on the back cover of the book.
Andrew: How much of this is new material and how much of it will be familiar to us SMiLE obsessives?
David: I did over two dozen new interviews for the book. There are generous excerpts from the extended 2004 interviews I did with Brian Wilson and Van Dyke Parks for Beautiful Dreamer that didn’t make the film. As well as outtakes from other interviews I did. Lots and lots of stories and commentary that I think will be brand new even to you.
The central idea of the book is to tell the story of SMiLE by those who were there in 1966 and from the participants in its 2004 resurrection, including all the members of Brian Wilson’s band. It also features fan memories of what it was like to see Brian Wilson Presents SMiLE and what it meant to them. Actually, there’s an entire chapter written by those who were at Royal Festival Hall for the World Premiere and another chapter by those who saw him on another stop on the tour.
There’s a foreword by Brian’s recently-deceased wife Melinda. And something that I think makes the book very different - an anthology of a dozen essays from SMiLE historians, devotees, friends, musicians, and music professors, each with their unique point of view on the subject. Writers who were there like Tom Nolan. Writers who have interviewed Brian numerous times, like Sylvie Simmons.
Overall, because the goal was to hear from everybody else, I think I wrote maybe 25% of the book. There are certain things that had to be by me, such as my “take” on The Beach Boys SMiLE Sessions box set.
Andrew: After all these years, what does SMiLE mean to you? Why would you devote a year of your life to this book?
David: Because I had to. SMiLE was what brought me to California. The direction of my life was completely changed when I heard “Surf’s Up.” I was so fortunate to be the one who documented 2003/2004, who witnessed it, who was part of it in ways that I reveal in the book, I felt compelled to write this. After all, I worship in the Church of Brian Wilson.
So, if it can be righteously stated that the greatest art (e.g. Michelangelo’s work in the Sistine Chapel) can be seen as a dialogue between the artist and his God, then it can be fairly suggested that in 1966, Brian Wilson had his most intense conversations with his spiritual master, resulting in a year of musical creativity that may be the peak that any composer enjoyed in the 20th Century. In 1966, Brian Wilson was the composer, arranger, and producer of Pet Sounds, “Good Vibrations,” and the songs of SMiLE.
For me, this book is what happened to him as he rose to eternal greatness, fell off the edge of the earth, and then came back to reclaim his place as one of the most significant artists of his time and all time. It’s a story that should mean something to anybody who loves music. And I felt I owed it to him.
Publisher’s Weekly
https://www.publishersweekly.com/9781915841315
Brian Wilson Media
April 2025
With the release of SMiLE: The Rise, Fall & Resurrection of Brian Wilson, I’m happy to report that the reviews have been great. And I’ve also done more than a dozen podcasts. So, this may be way more than you want to hear or read, but here are links to the podcasts (you’ll probably have to copy and past in your browser) as well as reviews and interviews.
Podcasts and Reviews
THESE ARE SOME OF THE BEST ONES
Giggens https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q9SYKJuC6s4&t
Setlist Kitchen https://www.setlistkitchen.com/post/really-good-vibrations-inside-brian-wilson-s-smile-with-david-leaf or
https://www.setlistkitchen.com/.../really-good-vibrations...
Beach Boys Reddit Video Teaser
Full Reddit interview
https://www.reddit.com/.../david_leaf_the_full_length.../
Abigail Devoe’s Vinyl Monday https://youtu.be/vtkTDgthhs4?si=W7y-cLorVpu_BIOD
Jokermenpodcast https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/jokermen/id1519299517?i=1000703578600
Good Day Austin (Short TV piece)
This one is behind a paywall
Elliot Roberts https://youtu.be/YJEZnJsvLh0?si=_Yc7fBbcDcYZKQLX
BELOW HERE ARE GOOD PODCASTS AND INTERVIEWS BUT YOU MAY FIND THEY GET REPETITIVE AND ARE PROBABLY MORE BEACH BOYS ORIENTED.
Beach Boys Basement https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-MPRL9au2qo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FzKl9nmRr_8
Pray For Surf https://prayforsurfblog.blogspot.com/2025/03/smile-in-three-words.html
TuneX https://banana-and-louie.org/2025/03/30/episode-25-farther-down-the-path-was-a-mystery/
Pet Reads Part 1 https://podfollow.com/petreads/episode/8a2eb7dd4eb024c22125a504fd3faf81353fd257/view
Dec4 podcast https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZFdAEq5xeg
ESQ (four-part podcast) https://www.youtube.com/@esqeditor229
Brewster’s Musical Heroes Part 1
https://youtu.be/6X3ANbp9OdE?si=xb87UHfPJAyaTI54
Brewster’s Musical Heroes Part 2
https://youtu.be/QJW5B4wLYok?si=CfpzL-tmkTHLK2qP
The Lives They're Living (episode about Van Dyke Parks and SMiLE) https://open.spotify.com/episode/2vLIBNb7VR6DFMfxFBaBiG
Plastic EP https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ItmGK3C0G04
REVIEWS
Chris Charlesworth
https://justbackdated.blogspot.com/2025/01/smile-rise-fall-and-resurrection-of.html
Endless Summer Quarterly review
prayforsurfblog.blogspot.com
Pre-publication interview for UK fans (with Andrew Doe)
Andrew: David, we’ve been hearing about this book for a while. You had two chapters in The Beach Boys and the California Myth about SMiLE. You made a film about SMiLE. You wrote, albeit briefly, about Brian Wilson Presents SMiLE in God Only Knows. What is SMiLE: The Rise, Fall & Resurrection of Brian Wilson? How is this different and was it really needed?
David: Andrew, big question, lots of answers. Looking at the research and interviews that I did for Beautiful Dreamer: Brian Wilson & The Story of SMiLE, I realized I needed a much larger canvas to take a real deep dive into the story. This book, over 300 pages, gives the reader so much information all in one place. Allows me to tell so much more of the story. And most importantly, as it’s an oral history, give so many other voices an opportunity to tell the story of and talk about SMiLE and Brian Wilson Presents SMiLE. It is, as you well know, a story without precedent, appropriate for music that was and remains groundbreaking. And I think this book is very, very different from anything anybody’s done in a rock book or even non-fiction.
In terms of style, it’s what would be called an “oral history,” but it’s much more. To begin with, the goal of the book was for the story to be told not by me but as much as possible, by those who lived it. The book itself focuses on two key periods of Brian’s career: 1966/1967 and 2003/2004. The story is told by the people closest to the music: Brian and Van Dyke Parks in the first SMiLE era and Darian Sahanaja and Brian’s entire band in the Brian Wilson Presents SMiLE era.
As with the documentary, I felt it was important to contextualize Brian’s place in music history, so we hear from dozens of his contemporaries as well as artists who he influenced.
There were entire interviews that didn’t make it into Beautiful Dreamer from people who were right there, and what they have to say is very important.
Andrew: So this is very different from your last book, God Only Knows? Which, by the way, I thought was quite an important update of “The Myth.”
David: Thank you. Those of us close to the saga of Brian and the Beach Boys know there are two basic Beach Boys stories: one is about a family band, their greatest hits, an amazing body of work the group recorded from 1962-1966 that made them “America’s Band.” Those records – composed, arranged and produced by Brian Wilson, featuring songs primarily written by Brian with his lyricist cousin Mike – have brought joy to the world for over six decades. That’s central to the the story of God Only Knows, especially in The Beach Boys & the California Myth part of that book.
This book is the other story. For Brian Wilson…for music lovers around the world…for SMiLE obsessives like me and you, my friend…this is the tale that matters most. SMiLE is “the holy grail” of the rock era, so I think of this as almost a SMiLE bible.
The animating idea for the book was to celebrates the twentieth anniversary of Brian Wilson Presents SMiLE, the concerts and the Grammy award–winning, critically- and fan-acclaimed best-selling record that was the most unexpected and miraculous creation of Wilson’s heartbreaking and glorious roller coaster of a career. Editing issues delayed it, but as somebody wrote on my Facebook page, that makes sense for anything to do with SMiLE.
Andrew: I’m a bit confused. What is your role in the book? It’s called an oral history, so did you write the book?
David: Yes and no. Think of me as the curator, organizing the storytelling and contextualizing it, too. It closely follows Brian’s artistic explosion in 1966, his annus miraculous, when he composed, arranged, and produced the Pet Sounds album and the “Good Vibrations” single, perhaps the most influential one-two punch in rock history. And he intended to follow that with a new album recorded in the modular style he had pioneered on “Good Vibrations.” He worked on this new record, to be called SMiLE, for about nine months. Then, for a catastrophic list of reasons, he put it on the shelf. Where it tragically remained unfinished for thirty-seven years. It became an almost paralyzing albatross around Brian’s creative neck. Then, in 2004, at the Royal Festival Hall, to the surprise of everybody – to audiences that included lifelong admirers Sir Paul McCartney, Sir George Martin, Roger Daltrey, and Jeff Beck – Mr. Wilson finally presented a 21st Century version of SMiLE to a week of SRO crowds, in what was, as Brian admitted… Well, suffice it to say that his response explaining what it meant to him was to me, so stunning, it’s on the back cover of the book.
Andrew: How much of this is new material and how much of it will be familiar to us SMiLE obsessives?
David: I did over two dozen new interviews for the book. There are generous excerpts from the extended 2004 interviews I did with Brian Wilson and Van Dyke Parks for Beautiful Dreamer that didn’t make the film. As well as outtakes from other interviews I did. Lots and lots of stories and commentary that I think will be brand new even to you.
The central idea of the book is to tell the story of SMiLE by those who were there in 1966 and from the participants in its 2004 resurrection, including all the members of Brian Wilson’s band. It also features fan memories of what it was like to see Brian Wilson Presents SMiLE and what it meant to them. Actually, there’s an entire chapter written by those who were at Royal Festival Hall for the World Premiere and another chapter by those who saw him on another stop on the tour.
There’s a foreword by Brian’s recently-deceased wife Melinda. And something that I think makes the book very different - an anthology of a dozen essays from SMiLE historians, devotees, friends, musicians, and music professors, each with their unique point of view on the subject. Writers who were there like Tom Nolan. Writers who have interviewed Brian numerous times, like Sylvie Simmons.
Overall, because the goal was to hear from everybody else, I think I wrote maybe 25% of the book. There are certain things that had to be by me, such as my “take” on The Beach Boys SMiLE Sessions box set.
Andrew: After all these years, what does SMiLE mean to you? Why would you devote a year of your life to this book?
David: Because I had to. SMiLE was what brought me to California. The direction of my life was completely changed when I heard “Surf’s Up.” I was so fortunate to be the one who documented 2003/2004, who witnessed it, who was part of it in ways that I reveal in the book, I felt compelled to write this. After all, I worship in the Church of Brian Wilson.
So, if it can be righteously stated that the greatest art (e.g. Michelangelo’s work in the Sistine Chapel) can be seen as a dialogue between the artist and his God, then it can be fairly suggested that in 1966, Brian Wilson had his most intense conversations with his spiritual master, resulting in a year of musical creativity that may be the peak that any composer enjoyed in the 20th Century. In 1966, Brian Wilson was the composer, arranger, and producer of Pet Sounds, “Good Vibrations,” and the songs of SMiLE.
For me, this book is what happened to him as he rose to eternal greatness, fell off the edge of the earth, and then came back to reclaim his place as one of the most significant artists of his time and all time. It’s a story that should mean something to anybody who loves music. And I felt I owed it to him.
——————————————————————————————————————————————————
January 2025 After disappointing delays, the release date for my SMiLE book seems firm. April 15, 2025 in the U.S. A dozen days earlier in the UK.
There is an entire Facebook page dedicated to the book. https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61569348715754
Here is the first interview I’ve done about the book. You can read it here: https://acrobat.adobe.com/.../urn:aaid:sc:VA6C2:01216255...
If you want to pre-order the book, here are the links:
Amazon US: https://amzn.to/4fI5kmg
Amazon UK: https://amzn.to/49czwn1
NOTE: All the links have to be copyied and pasted into your browser.
In 2004, I wrote, directed and produced a documentary on the story of SMiLE. You can watch it here https://youtu.be/0SriaRRcA6w?si=-OspSmRJXT9HcwRF
In 2024, I wrote a book called SMiLE: The Rise, Fall and Resurrection of Brian Wilson. It will be published in Spring 2025 by Omnibus Books. You can pre-order it at Amazon.