
Good Vibrations
Brian Wilson's pocket symphony, months and a fortune spent chasing one shimmering theremin line into the sunlight.

Brian Wilson's pocket symphony, months and a fortune spent chasing one shimmering theremin line into the sunlight.

Two takes in different keys and tempos spliced into one, a Mellotron haze over Lennon's Liverpool childhood.

McCartney heard a piccolo trumpet on a Bach broadcast, called David Mason in, and pop had never sounded brighter.

The Phillipses wrote it homesick in a New York winter, and Doherty sang over Barry McGuire's existing backing track.

Starr sang it at dawn after ten takes, having first made them cut the line about thrown tomatoes.

Argent and Blunstone rowed over the vocal at Abbey Road, and the band had broken up before America noticed.

Coyne named his karate warrior after Boredoms drummer Yoshimi P-We, then cast the heroine's disease as pink robots.

John Stewart wrote it after a day of pure daydreaming; Tork's piano and Jones's lead did the rest.

Take four, June 1967 at EMI, with a trumpet added later onto the mono mix and nowhere else.

Argent's working title was "Prison Song", and the sunniest harmonies of 1967 are addressed to someone awaiting release.
Two Frenchmen, an American singer they shared Montmartre with, and the softest thing on Moon Safari.