The Elements: Fire

Composition

Named for Catherine O'Leary of the Great Chicago Fire, "Mrs. O'Leary's Cow" was initially composed for the Beach Boys' unreleased album Smile as the first part of "The Elements" suite: Fire. In Brian Wilson's ghostwritten 1991 autobiography Wouldn't It Be Nice: My Own Story, the circumstances of his second LSD trip were detailed. They were purported to have involved ego death as well as death by burning, which has led some to speculate that the track is a musical adaptation of this LSD trip. According to Wilson with Gold, "It created a disturbing picture that mirrored the screams that had filled my head and plagued my sleep for years." In regard to the existence of its master tapes, "Roughly two minutes of 'Fire' music still exists, locked in the Capitol vaults, where I hope it remains. Not because I still believe it possesses a negative power; that was merely a reflection of how disturbed I was at the time. I hope that segment remains unreleased simply because it's not good music."

At an earlier time, Wilson noted, "It was sick. Weird chords, it wasn't the straight eight and all that. I started thinking, 'Oh God, I'm flipping here.' But I liked it." The music was considered an attempt at "witchcraft" by Wilson, who dismissed it simply a product of the group's excessive drug use. British rock journalist Nick Kent described the track as a "dark, booming, reverb-drenched blur of sound." During the 1970s, writer Byron Preiss was lent an acetate disc of the track, calling it "a mad, impressionistic piece that crept up on you with the emotional chill of a real fire." Author Bob Stanley named it a "terrifying atonal cacophony". According to Wouldn't it Be Nice, "the instrumental track was one long, eerie whine. It built slowly, like the beginning of a giant conflagration, and grew so intense it was possible to picture the kindling catching, spreading, and being whipped by the wind into a raging, out-of-control inferno ... The weirdest was the crash and crackle of instruments smoldering for the final time. Listening to the playback, I began to feel unnerved by the music, strange and eerie."

Recording

Present at the instrumental's tracking on November 28, 1966 was Danny Hutton, Frank J. Holmes, and Dennis Wilson, who filmed Brian as he produced the recording. Other attendants included wife-of-Brian Marilyn Wilson, sister-in-law Diane Rovell, and Beach Boys roadie Arnie Geller. Van Dyke Parks avoided this session "like the plague" due to what he perceived as Brian's regressive behavior during the period. It was recorded under unusual conditions. Wilson instructed Geller to purchase several dozen fire helmets at a local toy store so that everybody in the studio could don them during its recording. Wilson also had the studio's janitor bring in a bucket with burning wood so that the studio would be filled with the smell of smoke. After twenty-four takes, attempts by Wilson were made to record the crackling noises made by the burning wood and mix them into the track. An account of the famous "Fire" story was first reported and published in October 1967:

Another story which circulates involves Wilson attempting to set fire to the tapes only to find that they refuse to ignite, which further frightens him. Al Jardine explained from his point of view: "I wasn't at that session but I think Carl was there. Yeah, there was the rumor that he burned all the tapes. You can’t burn tape, that’s just a myth. We tried it once, because of the rumor that Brian has burned the tapes, and I wanted to see if that would work. We were finishing a song for Surf’s Up and we had some outtakes from the album and I put a match to it, and it wouldn't burn. The tapes weren't burned, and needless to say they do exist for the Smile sessions."

Personnel

People: Instruments

Release

In addition to "Fire" session highlights, a digital mashup of the Beach Boys' wordless "Fall Breaks and Back to Winter" vocals and the "Fire" backing track was eventually released in 2011 as disc 1, track 17 on The Smile Sessions box-set.

Brian Wilson version

As a solo artist, Wilson revisited "Fire" under the title "Mrs. O'Leary's Cow". Still in fear of the track, Wilson left its string arrangement to collaborator Darian Sahanaja, who explained: "I think that's the part that spooked him the most. I told him I'd deal with it." Wilson also instructed that the vocals be modeled from "Fall Breaks and Back to Winter". Although he ended up performing vocals, Wilson avoided attending his band's rehearsals of the track. Ultimately, this was to their relief, as a power outage occurred by happenstance in mid-rehearsal as though to signal a bad omen. Sahanaja speculates that if Wilson had been present for this occurrence, Smile would have been cancelled for the second time. "Mrs. O'Leary's Cow" was released in 2004 for Brian Wilson Presents Smile.