Could there be a more intimidating musical task than the one Brian Wilson took on five years ago when he decided to resurrect his storied masterwork Smile, the long-abandoned Beach Boys project that had plunged him into an abyss of psychological torment?
Well, how about completing Smile to widespread acclaim, only to find himself face to face with perhaps an even more daunting challenge: "What next?"
Wilson's answer is That Lucky Old Sun, the next step in the unlikely return of the musician whose life virtually created the blueprint for the rock 'n' roll prodigy/flameout.
The new album is another song cycle, a loosely thematic work that examines and revels in life in Southern California.
It celebrates a culture that Wilson helped define in the 1960s with his ebullient songs of surfer girls, sandy beaches and endless good vibrations.
Smile was perhaps the most ardently debated "lost" album in pop music history before Wilson revived it.
By comparison, That Lucky Old Sun arrives with no history and infinitely fewer expectations.
That made it more fun to create for the 66-year-old sole surviving Wilson brother - Dennis, the band's true beach boy, drowned in 1983.
Sweet-voiced Carl died in 1998, of cancer.
"This is more of a pop album than Smile was," Wilson says.
Does he know how much his music has meant to so many people over the years?
"Not really," he says matter-of-factly.
"I'm not sure what it means. I would imagine they think some of it's pretty good."
Nutrition and fitness, issues that loom prominently in his life these days, feature in a couple of the songs on That Lucky Old Sun, including Morning Beat and the rock march Oxygen to the Brain.
"You could do a Brian Wilson compilation of exercise songs," says Scott Bennett, the multi-instrumentalist who wrote many of the lyrics for Wilson's newest songs.
Although Bennett has been part of the Brian Wilson band since he put it together in 1999 to make his return to the concert stage, it was only last year that he and Wilson started writing songs together.
Wilson came to Bennett's home studio with a new song he wanted some help on, liked what Bennett came up with and just kept coming back with more songs.
"He was in an intensely creative place," Bennett says.
"In my nine years with him, I hadn't ever seen him this on fire."
Initially, Wilson wanted to make a new album of upbeat rock numbers. Then he got a call from officials at the Royal Festival Hall in London, which had hosted the world premiere of Smile in 2004.
They asked him to create a work and premiere it there, requesting that it follow the Smile blueprint.
Wilson turned to his Smile lyricist, Van Dyke Parks, for a string of narrated vignettes about life in Southern California.
Wilson and Bennett then set about adapting some of the songs they'd already been working on.
Bennett figured he had an opportunity to delve into the wider range of thoughts and emotions he'd experienced working alongside Wilson for the better part of a decade.
"Some of the first lyrics he brought me were, 'I'm embarrassed to tell you that I never got out of bed.' When I heard that, I knew he'd be willing to be a bit confessional, that he might be willing to address the dark chapters. Because this was turning into a semi-autobiographical piece, we couldn't ignore the fact that he checked out for a while."
That resulted in Goin' Home and Forever You'll Be My Surfer Girl, a touching reflection on that first song Wilson composed.
He also sings of the band he formed so long ago with Carl and Dennis, cousin Mike Love and their Hawthorne neighbourhood pal Al Jardine in the bittersweet ballad Southern California.
The album's emotional centrepiece is Midnight's Another Day, a solo piano-driven ballad that opens with a disarmingly honest self-assessment.
That Lucky Old Sun is punchier and lyrically more straightforward than Smile but less deeply resonant.
It's the difference between the work of a 24-year-old wunderkind and a 66-year-old battle-scarred survivor.
"As you get older, you appreciate the little things more: a walk in the park, a sip of Champagne, a kiss on the cheek ... those things you might not have noticed when you were younger."
- Randy Lewis
