Heroes and Villains


"Heroes and Villains" is a song written and produced by Brian Wilson with words by Van Dyke Parks, recorded by the American rock band the Beach Boys. Envisioned as a three-minute music comedy, it was the follow-up single to the group's "Good Vibrations" and intended as the centerpiece to the unfinished album Smile. After the album was shelved, the song was rearranged and issued as a single in July 1967 with "You're Welcome" as the B-side. It charted at number 12 on the Billboard Hot 100. Two months later, it was placed as the opening track to the studio album Smiley Smile.
Parks said that he modeled the lyrics after "El Paso" and denied a popular theory claiming that "Heroes and Villains" was a song about the Vietnam War. Though the lyrics are distinctly Western with some allusions to the Indian massacres, then-wife Marilyn Wilson said that Brian meant the "heroes" and "villains" to represent those in his life.
Like "Good Vibrations", "Heroes and Villains" was produced using the same unorthodox method of recording a surplus of interchangeable musical sections at multiple Hollywood recording studios. Only during its final production stages would the song then be reduced and assembled into a coherent structure. This proved difficult for Wilson, who grew increasingly frustrated with the virtually limitless number of possible song edits. Bandmate Al Jardine later expressed dissatisfaction with the final composite, calling it "a pale facsimile" of Wilson's original vision, and believed that he had "underproduced" the song at the last minute. Jimi Hendrix dismissed the single as a "psychedelic barbershop quartet".
"Heroes and Villains" was the first piece written for the Smile project and was originally written as a standalone song, but eventually led to the creation of more Western-themed music. Reflective of its complicated production history, many significantly different alternate versions have seen release on subsequent Beach Boys compilation albums, along with numerous pieces that were initially written as potential sections of the song. These include "Gee", "Do You Like Worms?", "I'm in Great Shape", "Barnyard", and "My Only Sunshine".

Origins

Brian Wilson intended "Heroes and Villains" to eclipse the Beach Boys' previous number one hit "Good Vibrations", taking inspiration from Phil Spector's productions of "River Deep - Mountain High" and "The Bells of St. Mary's" — specifically the former's bass line. Composed in early May 1966 mostly in a large sandbox holding a piano built in Brian's living room, "Heroes and Villains" was the first collaboration between Wilson and Van Dyke Parks in tandem with the later-to-be-excised "Barnyard" and "I'm in Great Shape". When Wilson first played the melody to him, Parks devised the opening line on the spot, modeling its lyrics in the style of Marty Robbins' "El Paso". Wilson credits Parks with the title, while Parks credits Wilson, explaining: "I think he made that up. I think it was a great title, and he suggested it. To me, 'Heroes And Villains' sounds like a ballad out of the Southwest. That's what it was intended to be—as good as any of those—and, really, to be a ballad. This Spanish and Indian fascination is a big chapter in Californian history, and that's what it's supposed to be—historically reflective, to reflect this place. I think it did it."
Then-wife Marilyn Wilson said: "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. The song was thought to have been written about the Vietnam War, but Parks clarified: "'Heroes And Villains' had nothing to do with Vietnam, but with the Indian thing we 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? He had religion beat into him, and I did in my own way, too. So there's a lot of thinking about belief, and you can hear it in the section with 'Child Is Father of the Man'." Although "Heroes and Villains" was originally written as a standalone song, it eventually led to the creation of more Western-themed music associated with the Smile album, including references to eggs and grits, barnyards, cabins, and railroads.

Recording

Despite its early genesis, the recording of the song was a difficult and protracted process. Wilson halted work on the other Smile tracks at the end of 1966 and concentrated on producing a version of "Heroes and Villains" for single release. However, despite holding at least 20 recording sessions for the song over a period of several months and assembling several different edits of the track, he was unable to complete the work to his satisfaction until after the May 1967 announcement that Smile had been shelved. It underwent many changes during its production, and countless discrete pieces were obviated from the final edit. Vocal arrangements were recorded, discarded, and remade throughout its sessions.
The first attempt at tracking "Heroes and Villains" was on May 11, 1966, and was deemed unsatisfactory and subsequently taped over; it apparently included "My Only Sunshine" as a section of the song according to one of the session musicians.
In January 1967, the Beach Boys recorded a cappella sections labelled "Do a Lot", "Mission Pak", "Bridge to Indians", "Pickup to 3rd verse", "Children Were Raised", and "Whistling Bridge". Instrumentals entitled "Bag of Tricks", "Part 1 Tag", and "All Day" were also recorded, and so was a keyboard/vocal section called "Bicycle Rider". "Cantina", recorded between January and February 1967, was an unused section of "Heroes and Villains" that lasts about 30 seconds. It was projected to serve as a bridge between the second verse and the "Children Were Raised" section. The instrumentation features prominent use of a tack piano arranged in the style of old Western saloons. February and March saw the recording of stylistically diverse sections entitled "Fade", "Organ Waltz/Intro", "Prelude to Fade", "Part 2", "Part 3", "Part 4", and the song's "piano theme". The backing track for the song's verses was also remade in February, but was quickly discarded.
Capitol Records had scheduled January 13, 1967 as the release date for the single. Al Jardine believed that Brian sabotaged the song once it was destined for Smiley Smile.
After Smile was scrapped, the remainder of the track was worked on throughout June. The month's sessions involved scaling down sections such as "Prelude" and "Children Were Raised", into "Barbershop" and "Children Were Raised ". June's sessions were largely sourced for the song's final edit, which included revised vocals and Baldwin organ overdubs. The final edit also sources the verse backing track recorded on October 20, 1966 and the chorus backing track recorded on February 27, 1967.

Release and reception

A piece recorded by the group on December 15, 1966 entitled "You're Welcome" was chosen as the B-side to the July "Heroes and Villains" single. It is a chant sung by the Beach Boys over a thumpy background track featuring a glockenspiel and a floor tom, with a runtime lasting only. In 1967, Mike Love said of the piece: " incredible. The title is 'You're Welcome'. No other lyrics. I don't know how Brian did it, but there's no accompaniment. 'Heroes and Villains' is going to be released as the first single on our new label, Brother Records…We are finishing it now." Terry Melcher was present for the public debut of "Heroes and Villains," as he recollects:
Wilson is said to have had high hopes for "Heroes and Villains" as the follow-up single to the Beach Boys' previous "Good Vibrations". When the single failed to significantly replicate the success of "Good Vibrations", it destroyed his self-imposed competitive rivalry to the Beatles. According to Jack Rieley, Wilson would often recount in "agonizing detail" about how "Heroes and Villains" was supposed to lift the Beach Boys' public image from "surfing/car songs" to being perceived on "creative par with the Beatles". Wilson interpreted the failure of "Heroes and Villains" as an ultimate rejection by the public to his musical growth and artistry. Mike Love called the song "the last dynamic Brian moment".
The single was dismissed as a "psychedelic barbershop quartet" by seminal rock figure Jimi Hendrix. British rock journalist Nik Cohn wrote in 1970: "It was good that should progress, that he should attempt outside his depth. But he took himself too solemnly, he was mildly megalomaniac about it all. Almost, he was ashamed of pop. He got snob. Running so fast and precious, his hat got away from his head." He then explained that the nature of pop music forces a stalemate on artists who wish to be experimental, because "pop is always teen music", and "the people who finally buy their records, are maybe sixteen years old, and by no means hooked on experiment". In 2012, Eric Luecking of NPR said that while "Heroes and Villains" was more adventurous than "Good Vibrations", listeners could not relate to the song's lyrics, which obscured the single's legacy.
In North America, despite a nine-month wait for this single, the Beach Boys' most adventurous song to date did not roar to the top as had most of their previous hits. Among major markets radio station surveys rated it only as high as No. 3 in Washington DC and Boston; additionally top 6 in isolated cities only across the Midwest and in Toronto and Ottawa in Canada. It began an era through which the group was better appreciated overseas. Although scoring No. 8 in the US Cash Box and Record World surveys, it was No. 5 in the All-Japan Top 20 and top 10 in the national charts of the UK, Italy, Australia and New Zealand, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Sweden, Norway, Israel, and Malaysia.

Chart performance

Variations

The intended "Heroes And Villains" single was originally assigned as Capitol 5826 and issued with a white picture sleeve showing six pictures of the group members. However, Brian Wilson was still experimenting and creating further concepts for the song, thus the Capitol single was never pressed. By the time of the final single mix, the Beach Boys created their own Brother label and issued "Heroes and Villains" as its first single with the cartoon picture sleeve. The picture sleeve for the unreleased Capitol single is a rare, highly sought item among Beach Boys collectors.
Innumerable alternate edits of the song exist; several so far have seen release. One Smile-era version was released as a bonus track on the Beach Boys Smiley Smile/Wild Honey two-fer in 1990. A 2001 stereo mix appears on Hawthorne, CA. On the Endless Harmony Soundtrack, there is a demo of the song which incorporates "I'm in Great Shape" and "Barnyard". In 2011, The Smile Sessions were released containing many alternate mixes of the song, plus extensive session highlights.
The song was part of "The Cocaine Sessions", an informal name for recordings made between Brian and Dennis Wilson circa November 1982.
Wilson recorded a new version of "Heroes and Villains" for his 2004 album Brian Wilson Presents Smile.

Two-part edit

There have been persistent rumors of a far longer two-part edit, reputedly running for six, seven or even ten minutes, and that this edit was intended for single release, split across the two sides of a single entitled "Heroes and Villains: Part One" and "Heroes and Villains: Part Two". Author Domenic Priore has said that when he questioned engineer Chuck Britz on the matter, he revealed that Wilson intended the 1990 variation to have served as the single's A-side, while the B-side was to have been three "Heroes and Villains" vocal chants strung together. During the 1960s, double-sided singles with different takes or different parts of the same song were common, and had been executed by Bob Dylan with "Like a Rolling Stone" and even Parks with "Donovan's Colours". These rumors have been said by some to have been a falsehood purported by Priore. However, it is possible that this rumored long edit, if it exists, may in fact have been an acetate disc meant to showcase different fragments of the song for Wilson's friends and family. A newly constructed two-part edit was packaged as a bonus 7" vinyl for the limited box set edition of The Smile Sessions.

Live performances

In late 1967 during sessions for the unreleased live album Lei'd in Hawaii, the Beach Boys recorded a stripped down live-in-the-studio version of "Heroes and Villains". Later, Mike Love and Brian Wilson would overdub this version with a self-deprecating monologue satirizing the song, with Love calling "Heroes and Villains" a "nuclear disaster" and that "being basically masochists, kind of enjoyed having this record bomb." Love also assures the listener that "it's all in fun," despite it harshly criticizing Wilson's musical ability and commercial shortcomings; the recording ends with Love thanking the listener for coming to the Beach Boys' stage performance and throwing objects at the group. Although the track was meant to be taken lightheartedly, it can be interpreted as a reflection of Wilson's extremely low self-confidence as a musician at the time.
The Beach Boys have released four different live versions of the song: on The Beach Boys in Concert; on , as part of a medley with "Cotton Fields"; on the Endless Harmony Soundtrack, and also on the Beach Boys Concert/Live in London twofer, as a bonus track. It is also on Al Jardine's Live in Las Vegas album. While Brian Wilson was absent from the touring section of the group, Jardine sang lead on this song. "Heroes and Villains" was included in the Beach Boys' 50th Anniversary Reunion Tour in 2012 with Wilson on lead, and was cited as one of the concert highlights.

Personnel

;The Beach Boys
;Additional musicians
;Outtake musicians

Related recordings

"Gee"

A brief adaptation of the 1953 song "Gee" by the Crows was recorded by the Beach Boys to serve as an introduction to an unused "Heroes and Villains" vocal motif involving the band singing the lyrics "dit — dit — dit — heroes and villains" in unison. With its master tape labelled "Heroes and Villains: Part 2", the Beach Boys recorded follow-up variations of the piece titled "Part 3" and "Part 4".

"I'm in Great Shape" and "Barnyard"

"I'm in Great Shape" and "Barnyard" were both considered for inclusion in "Heroes and Villains". Within surviving acetates unearthed in 2013, it's evident that Brian Wilson experimented with incorporating recorded sections of "I'm in Great Shape" as part of the projected "Heroes and Villains" single. A number of arrangements for "I'm in Great Shape" were attempted, each featuring significantly different instrumentation. Lyrics were penned for both songs, but never recorded by the group on recordings which have survived. However, "Barnyard" does feature animal noises roared by Wilson's Smile coterie. Participant Danny Hutton recalls: "Actually, the girl I was going with, June Fairchild, she was making all these noises. That was before the Beatles did 'Good Morning Good Morning'." In reference to both songs, Parks said:
Brian stated at one point that there were intentions for what was known as "The [|Barnyard] Suite", explaining: " was going to be four songs—in four short pieces—combined together, but we never finished that one. We got into something else." In his 2004 live performances of Smile, "I'm in Great Shape" begins the third movement of the album, but on The Smile Sessions, it is presented earlier in the first movement as the link between "Do You Like Worms?" and "Barnyard". Brian Wilson Presents Smile music director Darian Sahanaja has explained:

"My Only Sunshine"

A medley of the traditional pop standards "The Old Master Painter" and "You Are My Sunshine" was recorded and considered for inclusion in "Heroes and Villains" under the label "My Only Sunshine". On "My Only Sunshine", Dennis and Brian Wilson bookend the lead vocals. The ending of "My Only Sunshine" is stylistically similar to a scrapped closing section for "Heroes and Villains", which ended up being restored in The Smile Sessions.
During the recording which was engineered by Larry Levine and produced by Brian, the latter remarked that the session players should play as though they're far away, as the lyric suggests. Tying into the persistent spiritual themes in Smile, "The Old Master Painter" suggests God in the lyrics "painted the violets and the daffodils" and "then came his masterpiece and when he was through he smiled down from heaven and he gave me you". "You Are My Sunshine" ends with a string section descending to a low discordance where Brian used the adjectives "snappy" and "draggy" to instruct session players.
When asked about "My Only Sunshine" in 2004, Parks could not remember having been involved with it.

Other songs

"Do You Like Worms?" contains prominent sections of the "Heroes and Villains" theme. In addition, the tracks "Vega-Tables" and "Love to Say Dada" began life as an interpolated section for "Heroes and Villains".

Cover versions

This song was used in the opening of Mr. Robot Season 4 Episode 11 'eXit'.
This song also appears in Wes Anderson's Fantastic Mr. Fox during the Mr. and Mrs. Fox's raid of the pheasant farm early in the film.