Waronker and Seymour Stein, the President of Sire Records, encouraged Wilson to make an impressionistic collage that had made Smile an interesting listening experience.
However, it was Lenny Waronker who insinuated to Brian to undertake a more complex, revealing, and provisional composition with an Old West theme [3] inspired by the Howard Hawks film Red River and also the movie Rio Grande.
"[4] Work on "Rio Grande" began on October 1, 1987, which happened at the same time as a major Los Angeles earthquake that resulted in eight deaths and $350 million in property damage.
[6] According to Paley, "Brian was really into writing this as a survival thing, the idea of a little man against the big men and making it on your own … the misunderstandings that must have happened between travelers on the same trail and how scary that must have been.
"[7] In her review of Brian Wilson, critic Deborah Wilker highlighted "Rio Grande" as "the kind of immensely fulfilling progressive pop with which art-rock bands such as Yes and Genesis formerly toyed, but rarely brought to satisfying completion.