Brian Wilson is arguably the greatest American composer of popular music in the rock era.
http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=11:difrxqr5ldfe
On the basis of what? 2 albums? Pet Sounds and Smile?
I was just thinking looking at the Australian Open Tennis Final today, nobody can argue that Roger Federer is not the greatest tennis player around.
If they argue it, he can just defeat someone in a game of tennis.
But music, on the other hand, is just about opinion. Two artists cannot have a play-off to see who is the "best".
We could measure it by sales alone but there are so many other factors at work, most notably - MARKETING.
So, this is just my opinion, but in my opinion my opinion is a valid opinion.
All any musician can be "judged" on is the output that he/she produces and I despise mythology that builds up around certain artists and ignores the actual output that they produced.
I don't give a shit about the anecdotal evidence about Brian Wilson's musical genius.
Where is the product?
I think Pet Sounds and Smile are decent albums.
I will rephrase that.
I kind of like Pet Sounds and Smile but I don't think they are very special.
You can talk all you want about vocal harmonies but if the genius of the song is not there then who gives a shit about all the vocal harmonies and all the studio trickery in the universe.
Stephen Malkmus and Kevin Barnes and Sufjan Stevens and Beck are just 4 Americans off the top of my head who have produced many more fabulous songs (in my humble opinion) than Brian Wilson (and there are lots of non-Americans I could mention who have done the same).
Peace.
