The Best Reissues of 2008 by David Fricke
The most handsome Beach Boy was also, in 1977, the most daring. Dennis Wilson’s only official solo album, Pacific Summer Blue, was the first by any member of the group, and is still the best: 12 songs of gripping need and tortured beauty, sung in a craggy, soulful voice by a surfer dreamboat for whom the California dream was real, but not enough. Pacific Ocean Blue is Dennis’ version of his brother Brian’s triumph, Pet Sounds — an intensely personal masterpiece — while the session material from Dennis’ planned second album, Bambu, is his version of Brian’s SMiLE: a promise aborted and, with his death in 1983, forever unfulfilled.
Check out the rest of David Fricke’s list of the top reissues of the year, including U2’s early albums, Nina Simone and Hank Williams: