I hope I'm succeeding in making my list as eclectic as possible. To many, an album like this wouldn't be classifiable as "rock" per se; though there's no other category you could really put it in either. It's simply one of the most wonderful sounding half-hours of music you could ever caress your ears with. Yes, it is not much more than half an hour long, which is a shame, but then, it's better short and perfect than longer with flaws.

A lot of people say that Brian Wilson was the Beach Boys. Or at least, that he was the primary genius behind their sound and artistic output. If ever an album proved that not to be the case it's this one. It's true that the last three tracks are all Brian's. And stunning they are too. But all the other band members on this, the last album they made with the "original" line-up (assuming you know why Bruce Johnston was recruited in the beginning), here show that they were more than simply along for the ride.

The album is strong on ecological themes, plus philosophical whimsy too. The opener, "Don't Go Near the Water" is an Alan Jardine/Mike Love song which boasts lyrics that are all the more relevant today than in 1971, when Surf's Up was first released. "Oceans, rivers, lakes and streams have all been touched by man. The poison floating out to sea now threatens life on land." That's a hell of a long way from "I wish they all could be California girls," eh? Another very touching ecologically themed song is Brian Wilson's "A Day in the Life of a Tree." It's very dirge-like, and musically odd, led as it is by a pipe organ, yet, once you get a few lines into it you're reaching for your Kleenex with genuine concern for how trees, nature's factories, try and cope with the increasingly filthy atmosphere which they are forced to breathe and try to clean for us.

Student Demonstration Time is a full-on rock re-working of Riot in Cellblock No. 9. It's written by Mike Love and very effectively deals with the student riots of the late 60's and 1970, when eventually 4 students were shot and killed by riot police at Kent State University.

Bruce Johnston has arguably his finest moment in the nostalgic Disney Girls (1957). It's a song very evocative of a certain era in North American history, the 1950's, when life was optimistic and families still played together. Feel Flows is the Beach Boys doing Steely Dan, with an extended instrumental break in the middle, climaxing in a synthesised series of chords that ease you back into the beginning of the last verse. Once again, it's a non-Brian song, written as it was by his brother Carl along with Jack Rieley. Incidentally, it's Rieley who does the lead vocal on A Day in the Life of a Tree, not Brian Wilson. Alan Jardine takes the honours for Take a Load off Your Feet and Looking at Tomorrow, both quite different and both very enjoyable. The latter is very short but accomplished enough social comment á la Steinbeck. I find myself wanting the instrumental bits to carry on a while.

What makes Surf's Up a monumentally great album is the production quality, coupled with the vocal genius that comes through particularly on the last couple of Brian Wilson tracks, Til I Die and the title track Surf's Up. The many layers of vocals on both tracks are stunning, the only word for it.

Then there's the refreshingly straightforward Long Promised Road, a very good Carl Wilson song (with the ever present Jack Rieley) which, while still boasting some wonderful vocal overlays, owes its heritage to straightforward rock song structure, and is the better for it.

All in all , Surf's Up is a masterpiece. I'd say that if you thought Pet Sounds was good, you haven't heard Surf's Up. It is the pinnacle of what the Beach Boys were able to achieve, yet another of those albums where the whole is equal to more than the sum of the parts.

If you haven't ever listened to it, grab a copy, play it loud and listen in wonder at just what great heights modern "pop" music (well, 38 year old music!) can reach, albeit rarely.