h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I am listening to SMiLE by The Beach Boys. This album is interesting for two reasons.

Firstly, Brian Wilson took the opportunity to continue the work he had begun in Pet Sounds (considered by many to be the first concept album) to produce something unequivocally ground-breaking and revolutionary.

Secondly, it was never released.

Pet Sounds heralded a revolution in production values and the making of pop albums as something more than collections of singles. SMiLE would have cemented that revolution. As it was, Sergeant Pepper was left to do that.

But SMiLE is a work of genius.

How, since it was never released, can I be listening to it?

The answer is simple. All the tracks were released on collections, later albums, or bootlegs. An enthusiast, Ryna Guidry (who can explain himself better than I would at http://users2.ev1.net/~bigrynz/) reconstructed the album from these recordings, known historical details from the time, and a great deal of love and effort.

The emotion this album has apparently evoked in most beach Boys discographers and music fans has basically consisted of a sense of privilege at being allowed to hear something lost combined with a heavy dose of "what might have been".

What might have been if this had been released in 1967 (as opposed to never)? What might have been if The Who hadn't had all their food spiked with acid at Woodstock and Roger Daltrey hadn't started hallucinating at dawn? What might have been if we had made love, not war?

This is a potential world, and, thanks to the likes of Guidry et al, I am lucky enough to be permitted to live there. Here's to the summer of love, as it should have been.