Heroes and Villains

"Heroes and Villains" is a song by the American rock band the Beach Boys from their 1967 album ''Smiley Smile'' and their unfinished ''Smile'' project. Written by Brian Wilson and Van Dyke Parks, Wilson envisioned the song as an Old West-themed musical comedy that would surpass the recording and artistic achievements of "Good Vibrations". The single was Brother Records' first release and failed to meet critical and commercial expectations, although it was a hit record, peaking at number 12 in the U.S. and number 8 in the UK.

The song was Wilson and Parks' first collaboration. Parks characterized the song as "historically reflective" and a "visual effort" that was meant to match the ballads of Marty Robbins. He said the lyrics were based on the early history of California, including references to the involvement of the Spanish and American Indians. Some accounts suggest that the song developed partly from a Wilson reworking of the standard "You Are My Sunshine". Early versions included sections with lyrics about farm animals ("Barnyard") and physical health ("I'm in Great Shape").

"Heroes and Villains" had the most complex making of any song in the band's history. Recording spanned virtually the entire ''Smile'' sessions as Wilson experimented with at least a dozen versions of the track, some of which ranged in length from six to eight minutes. Wilson discarded almost everything that was recorded, with expenses totaling around $40,000 (equivalent to $ in ). Most of the final composite was produced in three days at his makeshift home studio. The chorus featured a theme that was cannibalized from another ''Smile'' track, "Do You Like Worms?".

Wilson's bandmates and associates later voiced dissatisfaction with the released version, believing that the mix was vastly inferior to his earlier, lengthier edits. Commentators blame the record's failure on the esoteric lyrics, the "muddy" sound quality, and the late timing of the release. It remains one of the lesser-known songs in the Beach Boys' catalog. For Wilson, the single's failure came to serve as a pivotal point in his psychological decline, and he adopted the song title as a term for his auditory hallucinations. In 2004, Wilson remade the song and its related pieces for ''Brian Wilson Presents Smile''. In 2011, ''The Smile Sessions'' was released with an entire disc devoted to the song's original recording sessions.

Background

Wilson had been working on "Heroes and Villains" for some time before he asked Parks to be his lyricist in mid-July 1966. Al Jardine surmised that the song derived in part from the group's improvised scat singing exercises from early in the band's existence. In a 2000 interview, he stated, "We all became instruments for Brian's barbershop concept. He said, 'Let's all do this, let's sing this idea.' Carl would be one instrument, I'd be another. Mike would be another instrument. ..With none of us really being players, we would just scat in the car going to a show or something or going to school, anywhere." Musician Al Kooper, writing in his 2008 autobiography, recalled that Wilson played him a rough mix of "Heroes and Villains" shortly after the release of ''Pet Sounds''. Kooper remembered that the song had "evolved, I believe, from a Wilson revamping of 'You Are My Sunshine.'"

"Heroes and Villains" was the first song that Wilson and Parks wrote together. As with the others that they wrote for the ''Smile'' album, Parks wrote the words while Wilson composed the music. When presented the descending melody at the initial writing session, occurring a few days after their first meeting, Parks was reminded of the Marty Robbins' 1959 song "El Paso" and immediately conceived the opening line: "I've been in this town so long that back in the city I've been taken for lost and gone and unknown for a long, long time."

Wilson told Parks that he had thought of the Old West when conceiving the melody. Journalist Domenic Priore speculated that Wilson may have based the verses on Phil Spector's productions of " River Deep - Mountain High" and "The Bells of St. Mary's" – particularly the former's bass line. Asked in 2004 about the influence of George Gershwin's ''Rhapsody in Blue'' on the recurring melodies and themes on ''Smile'', Wilson responded: "A little bit, not much. It influenced 'Heroes & Villains' and a couple of others." He credited Parks with some of the music and arrangement on "Heroes and Villains".

In Parks' recollection, all but one section of "Heroes and Villains" was written entirely "in one sitting". The success of the pair's collaboration led to them writing more songs with an Old West theme, including "Barnyard" and "I'm in Great Shape". It became an integral track for the ''Smile'' project and, later, was often called the album's "centerpiece". Wilson envisioned "Heroes and Villains" as a three-minute musical comedy that would surpass his achievements with "Good Vibrations". In a 1977 radio interview, he offered an anecdote in which he told his father, Murry that he was going "'to make a record that's better than 'Good Vibrations', something that ''you'' could never do. I don't know why in the hell I said that."

In a self-penned 1969 article, former band associate Michael Vosse wrote that, during one night at Wilson's home, Wilson played a past-tense variation on "You Are My Sunshine" on piano that deviated into "this weird little riff". Vosse said, "And it hit him, man, right then that he wanted a barn yard—he wanted Old MacDonald's farm—he wanted all that stuff. So he immediately got Van Dyke over and they did a chart for 'You were my sunshine'". Although Vosse admitted that his memory may be wrong, since Wilson "changed things so much", he recalled that the arrangement then "developed into an instrumental thing with barnyard sounds—people sawing—he had people in the studio sawing on wood—and Van Dyke being a duck—and it was marvelous." Asked about Wilson's rendition of "You Are My Sunshine" in 2004, Parks could not remember having been involved with it.

Lyrics

There are conflicting reports regarding who came up with the title. Wilson credited Parks with naming the song, but Parks denied this, saying that he wrote the lyrics around the title that Wilson had suggested. Wilson's then-wife Marilyn commented: "There are so many screwed-up people in the music industry. The good guys and the bad guys ..That's one thing Brian had in mind when they did 'Heroes and Villains. Biographer Peter Ames Carlin interpreted the song as Wilson projecting "all of the feelings sensed inside of himself ..into vibrantly colored, abstract glimpses into another parallel world."

In Carlin's interpretation, the song describes "a lawless boomtown somewhere out on the fringes of the Old West" as told from the perspective of a narrator who "speaks as a man who has become a part of the scene, but not of it, exactly, because he's still so thrilled and terrified by everything he sees." At the song's conclusion, the protagonist "has aged and seen his children grow to adulthood" without knowing if his experiences have turned him into a hero or a villain.

Alternate versions of the song tell a different narrative, as '' Stylus Magazine''s Ed Howard writes, "'Heroes & Villains' told a story, though the actual narrative changed depending on what sections were being added or discarded at any given time." In reference to "I'm in Great Shape", Parks commented: "it's interesting how n the lyricsthere was, all of a sudden, this turning to eggs and grits. It's because it had something to do with the thought of a barnyard, and that related to that place we were trying to come up with in 'Heroes And Villains'. All those lyrics were visual efforts."

Contrary to a popular rumor, the song was not written about the nascent war in Vietnam. Parks said the lyrics were actually centered around an American Indian "thing" in which he and Wilson "were trying to exculpate our guilt, to atone for what we had done to the aborigines of our own place. There's a lot of things about belief in ''Smile'', and its very question of belief is what was plaguing Brian at that time. What should we keep from the structure that we had, the hard-wiring that we had with religion?" Historian Keith Badman speculated that the "you're under arrest" line from an earlier version of the song may have been inspired by Wilson witnessing an attempted burglary of his Rolls-Royce.

Artist Frank Holmes, who designed the ''Smile'' cover artwork, created an illustration that was inspired by the song's lyrics: "The rain of bullets that eventually brought her down". Along with several other drawings, it was planned to be included within a booklet packaged with the ''Smile'' LP. Holmes shared a summary of his design choices in Domenic Priore's 2005 book ''Smile: The Story of Brian Wilson's Lost Masterpiece''. Holmes recalled of the illustration, "the poultry in the right corner is saying, 'Dude'll do,' a reference to a line in the original lyrics: 'She was unafraid of what a dude’ll do in a town full of heroes and villains.' Van Dyke tells me that Brian saw that image and actually got the other Beach Boys to change their singing to ‘Dude’ll do’, based on this. So there's a case of the drawing definitely influencing the work."

Production

Overview

"Heroes and Villains" had the most complex making of any song in the band's history, with dozens of sections and themes recorded for the track. Approximately 30 session dates were devoted to the song. Recording spanned virtually the entire ''Smile'' sessions, with the total production costs estimated at around $40,000 (equivalent to $ in ), a sum that was possibly three to four times greater than that for "Good Vibrations". Wilson also worked on and revised "Heroes and Villains" more than any other track for the LP. He experimented with myriad versions of the song, some of which ranged in length from six to eight minutes. Numerous rough mixes were completed, including at least four substantially different versions. It is the only track on ''Smile'' in which Wilson recorded vocals before the different sections of the song was assembled. Wilson said it was also the only song he ever produced in which the bass drum was the backbeat. "Great boom boom. People across the street were saying, 'Hey—whatever you're doing sounds great!' Thank you very much!"

Some sections that were recorded for "Heroes and Villains" were, at one point, slated to be dedicated songs of their own. In the 1970s, Wilson told biographer Byron Preiss