I somehow don't think the world was waiting with baited breath for the next Beach Boy's album. They were pop stars, but not cultural icons like the Beatles and were never as merchandised. Musically I believe the Beatles album for album made better ones then the Beach Boys. I realize that The Beach Boys made quite a few more then the Beatles, but I'd say you can count the good Beach Boy albums on one hand.

Still their hits collectively and the direction Brian was pulling the band into during the 60s has left a very strong mark on music. I think both bands are still very influential even to this day.

Plus, the Beach Boys were actually set up to play the Monterrey Pop Festival, and just had a platinum hit leading up to their next album. So at least Smile was as greatly anticipated and put the Beach Boys in the position to be icons like the Beatles. But I think Brian Wilson alone has garnered such a title since his influence on McCartney Beatles is pretty damn clear.

To be fair, it was the Wall of Sound and the genius of phil Spector that drove Wilson to a breakdown.
The answer is The Beatles, although The Beach Boys come in a close second. Hell, even Kokomo is very musically gratifying.

I think I'd need more than one hand to count the good Beach Boys albums, but I'd definitely only need one hand for the good Beatles albums.

"The Beatles were multi-instrumentalists who played almost every instrument themselves?" Get a grip on some facts. John Lennon was still playing banjo chords well into their recording career. George Martin and Brian Epstein seriously considered replacing the Beatles as instrumentalists for their recordings at the time Beatle George and Paul were knifing Pete Best in the back. Right till the end of the Sixties, GEORGE MARTIN composed whole missing passages of songs, made the song 'A Day in the Life' out of two messes of songs by John & Paul; made their first big hit 'Please Please Me' -- all the Beatles had to do was follow the template. George Harrison almost mastered sitar. But just compare drummer for drummer: Dennis Wilson was the multi-instrumentalist and brilliant composer; Ringo almost talentless in every other department, as he shows trying to sing and write songs to this day. Yes, the moptops were great for merchandising Beatle toys, just like Capitol had done with Bozo the Clown before them. Brian Wilson used some session musicians to fill in while the group was out touring -- something the Beatles did once every summer, I think, and only the lucrative markets around the world: stuff their home town, Liverpool. Even London -- that was just a place they puttered around most of the year, rubbing shoulders with other fashion plates and politicians. Then they would go in to the studio with fragments of songs roughed out -- none could write music let alone arrange it -- for Martin to fix up. They lived cosseting themselves in palatial estates, adopted by the upper crust as pets and media favourites.

Ok they didn't play orchestral instruments on song like Yesterday, but The Beatles did more than play one instrument. John played guitar, harmonica and melodica, Paul played bass guitar piano and drums, George played electric guitar, sitar and classical guitar and even had a master class with Andrés Segovia, and Ringo besides playing drums played the plucky comic relief guy.

Wes Montgomery before he started playing guitar at 20, played on a four course tenor guitar which btw so happens to be tuned like a tenor banjo. Roger McGuinn also played banjo before he played the electric 12 string Ric. They took what he knew about chord shapes and technique and applied it to guitar. When they did it, they were hailed as a geniuses.

Oh yeah, well look at Yes, what the Beatles did pales in comparison. And besides there's no rule in Rock that says at some point in its band history they must stick to that one line-up. Even the Beach Boys had line-up changes.

John, Paul and George were mates from early on even before they had a Rock band or needed a drummer. Pete came in later on, and there were instances where Paul played drums. Stu was part of the group too, he opt out to pursue art. Martin might had his doubts about the whole band in the beginning but that was because it would a way to insure a hit, I don't that thought lasted long. And anyway the Beach Boys actually did what Martin and Epstein only thaought about doing. They admit they could had handled it better, but it was done after's George Martin's suggestion who wanted a better than Best. They met up with Ringo playing the circuit and were chums with him more so than Pete.

That only proves one thing: George Martin - the fifth Beatle.

Give the man a break he had a tough choldhood, he suffered from pleurisy, peritonitis, and tonsilitis as a child. Ringo isn't a complete failure that didn't leave his mark on society as you might want people to think. When The Beatles appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show, h sold more drums then anyone at the time. They was such an increase in drum sales and Zildjian cymbols were on back order for a year at that time.

I don't think everyone knows who Bozo the Clown is.



The other band members weren't too happy at the time to be relegated to just singingwhile the studio played for the recordings, they want to play as well. And there weren't "some session musicians" some of those musicians were famous in their own right. Like Hal Blaine for instance he played for everyone from the Mumus and the Papas, the Monkeys, 5th Dimension, Simon and Golfuncle and Neil Diamond.

John Lennon never felt that way, he felt like some in English high society "crust" (as you put it) didn't like him because he was a Northerner.

Ok, now I'll piss on the Beatles a little here and there but this is getting hateful.

Firstly, I don't think there can be much doubt that the Beatles were multi-instrumentalists (and pretty damn good ones at that) in the realm of Rock-oriented playing. Guitar, bass, drums, and other bluesy/keys based things were their forte; now, more orchestral sounds? Of course not. I don't think there are many Rock artists that play in their own orchestra- not Brian Wilson, not anyone from Radiohead (maybe Johnny Greenwood), and not even the godlike Beatles.

I also don't doubt the influence of George Martin on the group as well (along with Wilson's); he was the only one in the group with classical training, and brought a lot of those ideas in as early as Rubber Soul ("In My Life," for example). However, each song, with its creation by different members and their experiences at the time, is very distinct, like seeing Lennon's experimentation/sentimentality on "Norwegian Wood," "Lucy in the Sky...," or "Happiness is a Warm Gun" compared to McCartney's poppy nuggets "Penny Lane," "Rocky Rackoon," "When I'm 64," and so on into Harrison's more spiritual and contemplating rock or even Ringo's quirky little pieces - basically, the songs are too unique to each artist to be blown off as the fleshed out compositions of George Martin. That is, unless Martin is some uber-God of pop that just kept it under wraps for this long, which I wouldn't doubt but I don't think is too likely. Personally, I like more of Lennon's material outside of the group, and at that point he was getting his production from a progressively whacked out Phil Spector or his own muses (him and Yoko) and i don't know what else. McCartney even has "Ram," which is a really fun popfolk album thing. Harrison I still have to get into, and I like "Photograph," but my point remains.

Also, as for the Beach Boys being such great instrumentalists and Brian scrounging together "some studio musicians" to fill out parts, that's pretty much untrue. The Boys were only around for vocal arrangements at least by Pet Sounds, and if Brian had his way it would've stayed so. The musicians he was hiring were Phil Spector's best, most precise players, which explains the artful playing on their most hailed albums. Brian himself played piano and organ exactly one time for each instrument on "Pet Sounds," and the other members didn't put much more in.

Well, we'll just have to disagree on this one, hehe. I think The Beatles already managed to release a "good, cohesive whole" of an album in 1964 with A Hard Day's Night, and after that, every album from Rubber Soul onward. With the possible exception of the s/t, which is more of a collection of incredible songs mixed in with a few weak ones. I think I probably have 6 Beatles albums in my top 30 albums ever, so I'm definitely a big fan, even if I don't listen to them much anymore. I will agree with you that Pet Sounds is overrated as an album, but I still love it because of a few tracks, most notably God Only Knows. <3

Ok, you're going into lala-land by now. George Martin did not "make" their first big hit "Please Please Me", recording aside. He disliked the initial arrangement and suggested the boys speed it up, but the rest was up the Beatles themselves, and they radically altered it to the point where it was believed it could be a hit. As for "A Day in the Life", yes that was two seperate songs initially. I don't how good Paul's part could've been on its own, but in my mind John's part would've been great in any case, though together they become something special. Anyway, it was McCartney's idea to join the two pieces via an orchestra. George Martin supported that idea by writing a loose score, but it was not his idea. In general, George Martin was known to suggest a thing here or there, and implement small pieces of music, but to say he was the pop genius behind The Beatles' success is ridiculous. As a producer he was very, very important, but NOT as a writer, c'mon. Your whole attitude towards the band is very telling with your inclusion of "knifing Pete Best in the back", so I shouldn't really take your post seriously, but dammit, good band on good forum needs some defending from silly people. :p