Sunflower/Surf's Up

1	Slip on Through 2:19
2	This Whole World 1:58
3	Add Some Music to Your Day 3:36
4	Got to Know the Woman 2:43
5	Deirdre 3:29
6	It's About Time 2:58
7	Tears in the Morning 4:11
8	All I Wanna Do 2:36
9	Forever 2:42
10	Our Sweet Love 2:41
11	At My Window 2:32
12	Cool, Cool Water 5:04
13	Don't Go Near the Water 2:42
14	Long Promised Road 3:34
15	Take a Load off Your Feet 2:31
16	Disney Girls (1957) 4:11
17	Student Demonstration Time 4:01
18	Feel Flows 4:49
19	Lookin' at Tomorrow (A Welfare Song) 1:57
20	A Day in the Life of a Tree 3:10
21	'Til I Die 2:44
22	Surf's Up 4:12

Barnes & Noble

Although Sunflower contains at least one certifiable Brian Wilson classic -- "This Whole World," beautifully sung by his kid brother Carl -- the album is a true group effort that showcases the other Beach Boys' talents. Particularly notable is drummer Dennis Wilson's emergence as a confidently soulful songwriter and vocalist on such memorable tunes as "Slip on Through," "Got to Know the Woman," and the heart-tugging "Forever." The Brian-penned "Add Some Music to Your Day," on which Brian trades lead vocals with Carl, Mike Love, Al Jardine, and Bruce Johnston, exemplifies Sunflower's general air of optimism. That sense of positivity largely dissolves into angst on Surf's Up, which finds the group in a surprisingly pensive mood. Though Carl Wilson contributes a pair of strong songs, "Long Promised Road" and "Feel Flows," the album's real selling point is its concluding trilogy of Brian compositions: the oddly affecting "A Day in the Life of a Tree," sung by the band's then-manager Jack Rieley; the heartbreaking " 'Til I Die," an accurate reflection on the precariousness of Brian's frame of mind during this troubled period; and the title track, originally intended as the centerpiece of the band's legendary unreleased 1967 masterpiece Smile. The latter track, which features breathtaking lead vocals by Brian and Carl and hauntingly abstract lyrics by cult icon Van Dyke Parks, is one of the most ambitious undertakings in the band's catalogue and still stands as a tantalizing glimpse of what might have been. Scott Schinder

All Music Guide

After anthologizing the Beach Boys' creative peak with several reissues during the '90s, Capitol turned its attention to the '70s recordings by acquiring the rights to the group's LPs for Warner/Reprise. The first fruits of this campaign arrived (after several long delays) in mid-2000, comprising a single disc with 1970's Sunflower and the following year's Surf's Up. It's a perfect place to begin, too, considering they were certainly the Beach Boys' best albums of the '70s. Sunflower especially is a beautiful work, stocked with excellent harmonies and the best songs the group had written since Pet Sounds; British critics and fans even deemed it a worthy successor. And for listeners more interested in the aborted Smile than Pet Sounds, Surf's Up is an eccentric work that displays the group's increasingly fractured genius. Even aside from the music, pairing Sunflower and Surf's Up provides a fascinating glimpse of a band in search of its identity after several years of commercial shutouts and dwindling critical interest. On Sunflower, the Beach Boys merged their fondness for sun and sand with a growing sense of their own maturity; the cover photo even features the group lounging in a park, playing with their children. Less than a year later, however, that hope for the future is not just replaced but completely obliterated for Surf's Up, as social/environmental paranoia and fatalistic resignation compete for attention on a set of skewed pop songs. These radically different struggles for attention during the early '70s -- whether to reprise the surf-and-sun sound or become a quintessentially '70s "aware" band, whether to ascend the mountain of Brian Wilson's heavenly production sense or surrender to his growing melancholia -- make for two dozen compelling tracks. It surely wouldn't have been quite as compelling if the music hadn't been able to match -- at least to a degree -- the fascinating midlife crisis going on in America's pop band. John Bush