Feel free to argue amongst yourselves, but despite The Beatles' Sgt Pepper's, Marvin Gaye's What's Going On, Dylan's Blood On The Tracks or The Clash's London Calling, the ultimate desert island disc and the proud possessor of the title "best album of all time" belongs to Pet Sounds by the Beach Boys.
Remarkable not only for the fact that it still tops the critics' poll of polls more than 30 years after its release, but also that it was composed by Brian Wilson when he was only 24 and already deaf in one ear. It's somewhat of an anomaly as creative masterpieces go, as Wilson was relatively sane and not under the influence of drugs when he recorded it.
You don't need to be an anorak to appreciate the re-release next Monday of Pet Sounds as a four-CD set - besides the original mono mix of the album, there's also a new stereo mix, a vocal mix and an instrumental mix. A tad extravagant maybe, but then again the sophisticated compositions, resonant lyrical expression and classical overtones on the album are worthy recipients of this unprecedented honour - this, after all, is the first white "spiritual sound" album.
A commercial disaster on its release, Pet Sounds was texturally far removed from the Beach Boys' traditional Californian sound. Prior to this, they had shown themselves to be deft hands at memorable melodic hooks and heavenly uses of vocal harmonies, but they remained at times a bubblegum band, with their vacuous tales of "fun in the sun" experiences - the album released immediately before Wilson's landmark effort was called Party!
It was in response to the British invasion of the US that Wilson first pushed the parameters of his creative ability. After The Beatles had released Rubber Soul, he said "when I heard it, there was definitely a challenge for me. I saw that every cut was artistically interesting and stimulating. I immediately went to work on the songs for Pet Sounds". Wilson had always shown an unhealthy interest in the Beatles' career and was particularly obsessed with Paul McCartney whom he called his "twin" - they were born within two days of each other and both played bass guitar.
In response, when McCartney first heard Pet Sounds he knew his band had been beaten: "It flipped me, man" he said at the time, "I thought the God Only Knows track was the best song ever written and it was a big influence on me because of the musical invention. I just thought `oh dear me, this is the album of all-time. What are we gonna do?' It was my inspiration for making Sgt Pepper's". Others were similarly affected. The Rolling Stones' manager, Andrew Loog Oldham, took out full-page ads in the music press declaring that Pet Sounds was "the best album ever released".
It wasn't just the mature lyrical expression, the use of new recording techniques or the neo-classical chord progressions and key transpositions that elevated the album to its current unassailable position, it was also thematically a cleverly constructed "loss of innocence" work of art. From the opening track, the jaunty, wistful Wouldn't It Be Nice, Wilson goes on the aural equivalent of a road movie, starting out on a Californian beach and ending up on the embittered final track, Caroline No in Nowheresville - "that final track was written because Brian was saddened to see how sweet little girls turned out to be kind of bitchy, hardened adults," said the album's co-lyricist Tony Asher.
Along the way there are stops for the desperately plaintive You Still Believe In Me, the chilled out splendour of Don't Talk (Put Your Head On My Shoulder), one of the finest mid-tempo songs written in I Know There's An Answer and the prophetic I Just Wasn't Made For These Times. By layering the sounds and rhythms to express his feelings and combining the heartfelt words with the emotional music, Wilson, as a critic of the day noted, "bled directly onto the vinyl".
Pet Sounds was made on what would now be regarded as primitive studio equipment. The instrumental tracks were recorded on four-track machines (these day they're 48track) and were then mixed on to one mono track of an eight-track machine - the other seven tracks were kept free for the sumptuous harmonies. Funnily enough, today's sophisticated studio equipment was created so bands could try to emulate the sounds Wilson was creating in mono on an eight-track machine. Few have come near.
The incidental stories behind the album's recording include the first use of the Theramin as a pop instrument on I Just Wasn't Made . . . and the accidental recording of a band conversation (about cameras) during the instrumental break on Here Today - which was left on the finished product; just before recording God Only Knows, Wilson led the rest of the group in prayer, asking for "spiritual guidance, maximum love vibes and a hit single".
Clearly not an album for the average Beach Boys fan, Pet Sounds stiffed on its release, not even going "gold" in the US. It damaged the band for a number of years, not least because its record company was opposed to the direction that Wilson was taking and wanted more "beach" type music out of him.
In the time it took Wilson to feel vindicated (a few years after the album's release) he had become more than a bit insane. He started using heavy amounts of LSD, had paranoid delusions that Phil Spector wanted to murder him, developed close friendships with vegetables and believed that his songs were able to trigger fires in nearby buildings.
Now 54, there are signs that he has recovered a degree of mental stability. He says he wants to do a new Beach Boys album and has already written 40 songs for the band. But really, it doesn't matter. Pet Sounds has already assured him of a place in musical history. Not only that, but he made a record in 1966 that was so far ahead of its time that nobody has yet to catch up with it. And probably never will.
The Pet Sounds Sessions are released on Monday on the Capitol label.