Wait...this was supposed to be about Smile, right? Because in the 118 pages of text, I don't recall much being said about the making of the album until around page 100 and anything about even some of the songs themselves until just a few pages before the end. *flips through book* Yep. I wasn't imagining things. I was getting all excited, ready to hunker down and listen the album with a fresh sense from what I learned from this text, but I was never compelled to do so.

I think I'm being generous giving three stars--the context given in the rest of the book is solid enough and a good primer for those who know little about 60s music. But if you know anything about The Beach Boys, The Beatles, Bob Dylan, and Phil Spector, you won't find much new material here. It seems to be the fine line the 33 1/3 books tread--how to present a single album in a unique manner and in a relatively rigid set number of pages. Maybe there wasn't that much to say about Smile itself after all? Sanchez doesn't make a strong point about why it's the penultimate album. He does do a good job at defending Brian Wilson's sincere approach to crafting music and establishing a dichotomy between Wilson v. Spector. He starts getting a little interesting in introducing the trifecta of 1966's Revolver, Blonde on Blonde, and Pet Sounds. And, for me, having never listened to the full albums of early Beach Boys, it was great to seek out "The Lonely Sea"...that's a pretty dang beautiful song. Otherwise, much of the book seems to regurgitate David Leaf's biography of the band, leading me to wonder throughout much of my reading, "Why am I reading this then?" ( )