From: "Brad Elliott"
Date: Thu Aug 9, 2001 12:45 am
Subject: Re: Heroes, Villains & An Old Theory

Hi, guys! I've been out of the loop for about two months (due to a variety of events in my personal life) and I'm trying to get caught back up. That includes, of course, reading through some 70+ digest of the Cabin! (Good God, you guys go off-topic with only the slightest provocation!)

Anyway, while reading the back issues of the Cabin, I ran across a question that Bill Tobelman posed that appears to have gone unanswered (or, if there was an answer, I simply haven't run across it yet).

Bill wrote:

> I'm pretty sure that Dom's assertion that there was
>a "Heroes And Villains(part 2)" originally came from
>Brad Elliott's book Surf's Up! In the book Brad
>states, "One of the projected cuts, a seven minute
>long Heroes and Villains, was set as a single and
>scheduled for release January 13, 1967. Numbered 5826,
>it was to run both sides of the record - Heroes And
>Villains, Part 1 backed with Heroes and Villains, Part 2.
> Do you know what Mr. Elliott based his original
>claim upon?

The immediate source was Peter Reum's 9-page BB discography in the April-May 1979 issue of "Time Barrier Express." In that piece, Peter wrote, in a footnote about the Brother 1001 release, "Original release was intended tobe 'Heroes & Villains, Pt.1' b/w part 2, Capitol 5826, but was not issued.Picture sleeves outside the U.S. only showed Capitol 5826, printed over with Brother 1001, while all domestic sleeves were correctly printed." Peter was tight (then, as now) with David Leaf, so he had access to a certain amount of inside information and I assume that's where the Part 1/Part 2 info came from (an assumption reinforced by David's later promulgation of the two-part theory in his Smiley Smile/Wild Honey CD liner notes). I also was in possession of a list of unreleased Capitol master numbers, which clearly showed a number assigned to "Heroes & Villains Part 2." In short, it seemed pretty obvious at the time.

But a couple of years later, I gained direct access to Capitol's files while working on the RARITIES album and was shocked to discover that there was nothing in those files to indicate that a two-part "H&V" single had ever been planned. Still, it took quite a few years more -- after enough session sheets had surfaced to be matched up to actual tapes -- before I became convinced that the two-part single really was just a myth.

Just in the past several months, however, with the discovery of the tape labeled "H&V Side 2," I've begun to swing back the other way. I'm fairly certain that when Brian assembled the cantina version of "H&V" for possible release as a single, there was no intention on his part of backing it with a "Part 2." Brian's own comments in the press at that time about a possible B-side prove that. So Dom's theory for what constitutes "Part 2" (comprised primarily of Dec. 1966 and Jan. 1967 recordings) just doesn't wash for me.

But, as Jon and I (and others) discussed on the Smile Shop board a couple of months back, there is some evidence for a two-part single being conceived and executed by Brian in mid-February through early March 1967. Rather than paraphrase what Jon said on this list about the same time as Bill asked his question, I'll just quote Jon:

> There is some interesting and compelling evidence
>FOR a two-sided H&V single, the most compelling of
>which was the recent revelation that the minor-key H&V
>chorus is logged as "Side Two." If the chorus was part
>of a "side 2" I'd say it's likely that some of the
>other things logged in late February as "part 2" under
>a different master number might've been the REST of
>"side 2," and that includes a re-recorded "false
>barnyard," "H&V Intro," and probably "prelude to fade
>aka the country western section." In other words: if
>there ever was a
>"part 2" I'd say it's likely it wasn't in the same
>time frame as the "part 2 variations."

I guess the bottom line is that we really don't know for sure whether there was or wasn't a two-part "H&V." But I think we can lay to rest Dom's theory that the second part was comprised of the majority of "H&V (Sections)" from the Good Vibrations boxed set.

Surf's up!
Brad

If you have any comments on this topic, psychedelismile@yahoo.com and I will try to promptly post any interesting replies.