Recommendations of the Editorial team
The Most Disappointing Albums of All Time (7): The Beach Boys – “Smiley Smile”
A winning streak cannot last forever. And when you’re a successful recording artist with a long career, there inevitably comes a time when fans and critics are disappointed with a new album.
This may be because a big experiment didn’t pay off as hoped. The taste changed quickly. You are suddenly dismissed as a relic of the past. For creating something so bold and innovative that its genius will only be appreciated in years to come. Or that you simply produced a dud due to a combination of physical and creative exhaustion. The unbearable stress of trying to surpass yourself. And perhaps the influence of certain chemical substances.
For truly great artists, a disappointing album can be just a bump in the road to a long, successful career. Bob Dylan has many albums that can safely be described as “disappointing.” And they only made the sequels even more impressive and interesting. The same could be said of David Bowie, Madonna, Jay-Z, Stevie Wonder, the Rolling Stones, and other artists whose careers span multiple generations.
Rating: Also depends on the time
The American ROLLING STONE has compiled a list of the 50 most disappointing albums in music history. There are some important caveats that need to be made before various armies of fans make plans to set our offices on fire. Or unleashing SWAT teams on our homes. We absolutely love some of these albums. An album can be seen as disappointing the moment it comes out. And later be reevaluated forever.
This mainly has to do with the timing and the critical consensus at a particular point in time. And an album that’s considered B+/A- is still disappointing when it follows a string of A/A+ albums.
Also, a disappointing album from an incredibly talented artist like Radiohead or U2 would be considered a masterpiece if it had been published by almost anyone else. (We had a really hard time deciding to include “The King of Limbs” and “Songs of Innocence” here. But we ended up including them.)
(And if you’re going to storm our houses because we recorded your favorite band here, can you at least do it during the day? It’s annoying when they storm in in the middle of the night. Plus, “The King of Limbs” is damn good. Get a grip, Radiohead-Army.)
The Most Disappointing Albums of All Time (7): The Beach Boys – “Smiley Smile”
On its own, “Smiley Smile” is a charmingly strange low-fi experiment. d’This stands out as one of the best Beach Boys albums in their extensive catalog. But this was the follow-up to “Pet Sounds” and “Good Vibrations.”
Brian Wilson was determined to surpass these two masterpieces by creating a “teenage symphony to God” called “Smile.” But he was struggling with severe mental health issues at the time. And finally gave up on the project.
The Most Disappointing Albums of All Time (7): The Beach Boys – “Smiley Smile”
His bandmates simply took Wilson’s songs and quickly created quickie versions in his home studio that lack the lush, subversive brilliance of the originals. In a way, it’s like looking at a Polaroid of the Mona Lisa.
However, Smiley Smile is still a wonderful musical experience because the underlying songs are so strong. But it’s just a pale reflection of the original. As fans learned, the original Smil’e tapes slowly surfaced as pirated copies before Wilson finally ended the project in 2004.
“We hit a bunt,” Carl Wilson said, “instead of a grand slam.”