20/20 The Beach Boys Artist

{|20/20|} was not a proper album, being compiled from singles and leftovers in order to fulfill contractual obligations to {|Capitol|}. Nonetheless, it's one of their better post-{|Pet Sounds|} records, with a couple of good medium-sized late-'60s hi... Read more

{|20/20|} was not a proper album, being compiled from singles and leftovers in order to fulfill contractual obligations to {|Capitol|}. Nonetheless, it's one of their better post-{|Pet Sounds|} records, with a couple of good medium-sized late-'60s hit singles, {|Do It Again|} and {|I Can Hear Music,|} that were fun retro sort of exercises. {|Time to Get Alone,|} with its unusually shifting, jazzy melody, was one of {|Brian Wilson|}'s last outstanding compositions. {|Never Learn Not to Love|} is far more notorious, not for the music (which is average), but for the fact that it was, according to some sources, composed by {|Charles Manson|} (although the song is credited to {|Dennis Wilson|}). The highlights, however, were a couple of {|Smile|}-session-era tunes, especially {|Cabinessence,|} a suite-like collaboration between {|Brian Wilson|} and {|Van Dyke Parks|} that gives some idea of the complex directions that were being explored during that ill-fated project. Therein lay the group's dilemma: as hard as they were trying to establish their identity as an integrated band in the late '60s, their new recordings were overshadowed by the bits and pieces of {|Smile|} that emerged at the time. [{|Friends/20/20|}, a {|Capitol|} two-fer CD, combines this and its predecessor {|Friends|} onto one disc, adding five bonus tracks also cut in the late '60s, highlighted by the minor hit {|Break Away,|} {|Dennis Wilson|}'s oddly spacy {|Celebrate the News,|} and a cover of {|Walk on By.|}] ~ Richie Unterberger Less