Wilson's Old Album Finally Gets Its Dallas Debut

By Thor Christensen

Some Beach Boys fanatics claim Smile is one of rock's greatest albums – as good as italics Sgt. Pepper's, maybe even better.

That's a stretch. But it is a mind-bending piece of music – and way ahead of its time – as Brian Wilson showed Monday night at Nokia Theatre, where Smile finally made its Dallas area debut.

Mr. Wilson composed Smile in the mid-1960s in the wake of Pet Sounds but before Sgt. Pepper's ushered in the era of art-rock. But he scrapped the project before it was done – partly because of his worsening mental problems but also because the other Beach Boys told him it was too bizarre to put out.

They were right about utter weirdness of Smile. As Mr. Wilson sang about vegetables and wind chimes Monday night, members of 18-piece band squawked like chickens, waved carrots in the air and sawed on piece of wood. Like, far out, man. Can you dig?

But as silly and dated as the 45-minute piece could be, there were also moments of brilliance – like the stirring classical suites of "Heroes and Villains" and the Brahms-like lullaby of "Song for Children." Like the album – which finally came out this month in re-recorded form – Smile ended in concert with "Good Vibrations," one of the most awe-inspiring rock songs ever written. Mr. Wilson once said he was trying to write "teenage symphonies to God," and on Monday night, the Big Kahuna was surely looking down and grinning.

As unlikely as it was hearing Smile after all these years, it was just as surprising seeing Mr. Wilson onstage having a blast.

He quit touring in the '60s because of his fragile mental state, and when he finally returned to the stage in the '80s, he looked stiff and sounded rusty. But he was much looser Monday than he was four years ago at Smirnoff Music Centre – bouncing on to the stage, waving his hands through like a maestro and cracking a scripted joke or two.

Like his previous solo tour, he performed seated behind a keyboard that he barely played all night. And again, his impeccable band did all hard vocal parts, leaving Mr. Wilson to fill in the gaps. Occasionally, he stumbled over a high note, but he mostly sounded steady.

The show started with an hourlong set of new songs and Beach Boys classics. After Smile came an encore full of greatest hits: "I Get Around, "Surfin' U.S.A.," "Fun, Fun, Fun."

To quote the old album title, it felt like an endless summer, and a near-perfect one at that.