Brian Wilson – No Pier Pressure (2015) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz]

Brian Wilson – No Pier Pressure (2015)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 51:01 minutes | 1,07 GB | Genre: Rock
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Capitol Records (CAP)

Brian Wilson is one of popular music’s most deeply revered figures, a legendary writer, producer, arranger and performer of some of the most cherished music in pop music history. Indeed, it is no exaggeration to call Brian Wilson one of the most gifted and influential composers of the past 50 years. For the release of his 11th solo studio album, titled No Pier Pressure, Wilson has returned to Capitol Records, his original label home with The Beach Boys.

For the No Pier Pressure sessions, Brian Wilson reunited with longtime collaborator Joe Thomas, with whom he co-produced The Beach Boys’ No. 3 Billboard album That’s Why God Made The Radio for the iconic band’s 50th anniversary reunion in 2012. In addition, Wilson was  joined at Hollywood’s Ocean Way Studios by talented musicians he personally invited to record with him, including his former Beach Boys bandmates Al Jardine, David Marks and Blondie Chaplin, as well as Kacey Musgraves, fun.’s Nate Ruess, She & Him’s Zooey Deschanel and M. Ward, Peter Hollens, Capital Cities’ Sebu Simonian, and trumpet master Mark Isham.

Wilson has also brought in session all-stars Don Was, Jim Keltner, Dean Parks, and Kenny Aronoff.  Members of Wilson’s longtime touring band, including Scott Bennett, Paul Mertens, Darian Sahanaja, and Probyn Gregory also participated in the sessions, along with Matt Jardine, son of Al Jardine, and former bandmate Jeffrey Foskett.

That’s Why God Made the Radio provided a bittersweet coda to the Beach Boys’ career but the soothing sounds of the 2012 reunion didn’t linger long before they were soured by the internal fighting endemic to the band. Mere weeks afterward, Mike Love announced Brian Wilson wouldn’t join the Beach Boys for any dates after the summer 2012 tour, leaving Brian free to capitalize on the good press of That’s Why God Made the Radio. He headed into the studio with guitarist Jeff Beck and producer Don Was in 2013 with the intention of cutting a full album but that collaboration quickly fell apart, leaving Wilson to re-team with his longtime collaborator Joe Thomas to turn these abandoned sessions into what turned out to be No Pier Pressure. Caught halfway between a back-to-basics move along the lines of TWGMTR and a star-studded extravaganza, No Pier Pressure certainly doesn’t have much to do with the high art that’s marked Wilson’s new millennium; there’s nary an echo of the SMiLE revival or the Van Dyke Parks collaboration That Lucky Old Sun. This is all sand, sun, and Saturday night nostalgia, a sensibility goosed by the addition of Al Jardine, David Marks, and Blondie Chaplin — the part of the Beach Boys camp that threw in their lot with Brian — who help give their numbers (“What Ever Happened,” “The Right Time,” “Sail Away”) a bit of the classicist AM pop sheen that made That’s Why God Made the Radio so soothing. It’s a nice anchor for the record and, frankly, No Pier Pressure needs such a grounding force because it often threatens to drift far away on the surging tides of showbiz schmaltz. When She & Him breeze in to deliver some Caribbean camp on “On the Island,” the results are agreeably camp but “Runaway Dancer,” a collaboration with Sebu Simonian of Capital Cities that seems determined to revive the arch camp peak of Stock, Aitken & Waterman, feels like a half-imagined Ibizaian hangover. By any measure, “Runaway Dancer” is bizarre but by arriving second on No Pier Pressure, it throws the whole feel of the album out of whack, turning such otherwise nice moments as Kacey Musgraves’ “Guess You Had to Be There” cloying. By the time Nate Ruess of Fun. shows up for “Saturday Night,” a throwback that seems to belong the early-’80s soft rock glory days of Carole Bayer Sager and not American Graffiti (and is the better for it), No Pier Pressure seems genuinely weird, as it’s perilously perched between the best and worst of Wilson’s pop talent and Thomas’ showbiz instincts. –Stephen Thomas Erlewine

Tracklist:

01. Brian Wilson – This Beautiful Day (01:24)
02. Brian Wilson – Runaway Dancer (feat. Sebu) (03:58)
03. Brian Wilson – Whatever Happened (feat. Al Jardine & David Marks) (02:51)
04. Brian Wilson – On The Island (feat. She & Him) (02:14)
05. Brian Wilson – Half Moon Bay (feat. Mark Isham) (03:22)
06. Brian Wilson – Our Special Love (feat. Peter Hollens) (03:43)
07. Brian Wilson – The Right Time (feat. Al Jardine & David Marks) (02:54)
08. Brian Wilson – Guess You Had To Be There (feat. Kacey Musgraves) (03:23)
09. Brian Wilson – Don’t Worry (02:42)
10. Brian Wilson – Somewhere Quiet (03:02)
11. Brian Wilson – I’m Feeling Sad (02:17)
12. Brian Wilson – Tell Me Why (feat. Al Jardine) (03:40)
13. Brian Wilson – Sail Away (feat. Blondie Chaplin & Al Jardine) (03:42)
14. Brian Wilson – One Kind Of Love (03:34)
15. Brian Wilson – Saturday Night (feat. Nate Ruess) (03:30)
16. Brian Wilson – The Last Song (04:36)

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