Produced, composed and arranged by Brian Wilson, it is often consider to be a Brian Wilson solo album with the Beach Boys name attached. In 1965 Wilson withdrew from live performances after suffering form panic attacks, instead he would focus more on composing and recording. After hearing The Beatles’ album Rubber Soul, Wilson decided to expand on the music he created, coincidentally the music he was inspired to write would then inspire McCartney. Pet Sounds is said to have brought on the age of albums, LPs no longer had to be a reason to promote singles, but they could be conceived as a whole piece of work and the singles could promote the album. Some would say it was Sgt Pepper that did this but Beatles’ producer George Martin has said that without Pet Sounds there would be no Sgt Pepper.
The Beach Boys had moved away from the beach theme in the previous album The Beach Boys Today and wanted to expand on the sound introduced in that album. The songs in Pet Sounds would use instruments not normally associated with the genre such as electro-theremin, bongos and accordions. There are psychedelic elements throughout such as the echo, reverb and choice of instruments evoking a dream-like or otherworldly sound, this experimentation with sound and recording has caused debate as to whether Pet Sounds should be categorized as psychedelic rock. The album cost $70,000 to produce, over $500,000 in today’s equivalent, which was unheard of in 1966.
On it’s release in America the album received a tepid reaction while across the pond in Britain it was praised, remaining in the top ten for six months. A two-disc coloured vinyl set was released in 2006 that includes two mixes of the same album, one stereo mix on a green LP and one mono on translucent yellow.
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