Shut Down

The Beach Boys' third and fifth albums make a good pairing on one CD, different as they are in content and origins. Surfer Girl was the album on which the group's and Brian Wilson's sound blossomed, and it did so on several levels. The title track was the first song that Brian ever wrote, and it's lucky that he saved it for this stage in their history, for it features surprising elegant and lush harmonies. The usual assumption is that, because of Wilson's hearing loss in one ear, the group's records work best in mono, but on this, their second album in stereo, the mixing makes inventive use of the two-channel separation, even on "Surfer Girl" (which, as a single in those days, would have been conceived in mono from the get-go).

Another erratic early album from the Beach Boys; few other rock LPs have such a wide gap between the best and worst material. On the good side, you have absolute classics in the Chuck Berry-ish "Fun, Fun, Fun" and the superb "Don't Worry Baby," one of the most advanced pop productions of 1964 with its breathtaking harmonies and unusual lyric…