The Beach Boys

The Beach Boys are a pop music group formed in Hawthorne, California in 1961, whose popularity has lasted into the twenty-first century. The original group comprised singer-musician-composer Brian Wilson, his brothers Carl and Dennis, their cousin Mike Love, and friend Alan Jardine. Many changes in both musical style and personnel occurred in their sometimes stormy career, which has been marked by the mental and drug-induced illnesses of Brian Wilson, the deaths of Dennis Wilson in 1983 and Carl Wilson in 1998, and continuing legal battles among surviving members of the group. The Beach Boys continue to tour, albeit with but a fraction of the original members, as of 2005. They have recorded dozens of top-forty hits, many best-selling albums, and four US #1 singles, and were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1988.

Brian's innovations and personal difficulties

During 1964 Brian Wilson began to suffer anxiety attacks, and withdrew from touring to concentrate on song writing and record production. Bruce Johnston subsequently became a full-time member of the band.

Related Topics:
Anxiety - Bruce Johnston

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Brian's growing mastery of the recording studio and his increasingly sophisticated songs and complex arrangements reached an early peak with the acclaimed LP Pet Sounds (1966). Classic singles from that album, "Wouldn't It Be Nice" and "God Only Knows" (which featured Carl for the second time as lead vocalist, after "Pom Pom Play Girl"), showed Wilson's growing skill as a composer, arranger and producer. "God Only Knows" is said to have been the first pop song ever released in the U.S. to have the word "God" in the title. "Caroline, No," also taken from "Pet Sounds," was issued as a Brian Wilson solo single, the only time Brian was credited as a solo artist during the early Capitol years.

Related Topics:
Pet Sounds - Wouldn't It Be Nice - God Only Knows - Arranger

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The album's meticulously layered harmonies and inventive instrumentation (performed by the cream of Los Angeles session musicians known as The Wrecking Crew) set a new standard for popular music. It remains one of the most evocative releases of the decade, with a distinctive strain of melancholy and nostalgia for youth. The album is still widely regarded as a classic and Paul McCartney has named it one of his favorite albums of all time, often saying that it was a major influence on the Beatles' album, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. In spite of the critical praise it received, the album was poorly promoted by Capitol Records and failed to become the major hit Brian had hoped it would be (only reaching #10). Its failure to gain wide recognition hurt him deeply.

Related Topics:
Session musician - The Wrecking Crew - Paul McCartney - Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band - Capitol Records

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Because of his withdrawal from touring, Brian was able to complete almost all the backing for the album while the Beach Boys were on tour in Japan. They returned to find a substantially complete album, requiring only their vocals to finish it off. There was some resistance to this new direction from within the band. Lead singer Mike Love is reported to have been strongly opposed to it, partly because he feared the band would lose its audience if they changed their successful formula, and partly because he personally disliked the new material, which he famously criticised as "Brian's ego music." At Love's insistence, Brian changed the title of one song from "Hang on to Your Ego" to "I Know There's an Answer." Another likely factor in Love's antipathy to Pet Sounds was that Brian worked extensively on it with outside lyricist Tony Asher rather than with Love, who had written most of the lyrics for their earlier songs and who was the lead vocalist on most of their early hits.

Related Topics:
Japan - Tony Asher

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Seeking to expand on the advances made on Pet Sounds, Brian began an even more ambitious project, originally dubbed Dumb Angel. Its first fruit was "Good Vibrations," which Brian described as "a pocket symphony". The song became the Beach Boys' biggest hit to date, and a U.S. and U.K. # 1 single in 1966—many critics consider it to be one of the best rock singles of all time. In 1997 it was named the "Greatest Single of All Time" by Mojo music magazine, in 2000 VH1 placed it at number 8 on their "100 Greatest Rock Songs" list, and in late 2004 Rolling Stone magazine placed it at number 6 on their "500 Best Songs of All Time" list. It was also one of the most complex pop productions ever undertaken, and was reputed to have been the most expensive American single ever recorded, costing a reported $16,000--more than most pop albums of that time--with sessions stretching over several months in at least three major studios.

Related Topics:
Good Vibrations - Symphony

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In contrast to his work on Pet Sounds, Brian adopted a modular approach to "Good Vibrations"--he broke the song into sections and taped multiple versions of each at different studios to take advantage of the different sound of each facility. He then assembled his favorite sections into a master backing track, and vocals were added. The song's innovative instrumentation included drums, organ, piano, tack piano, two basses, guitars, electro-theremin, harmonica, and cello. The group members recall the "Good Vibrations" vocal sessions as among the most demanding of their career.

Related Topics:
Electro-theremin - Harmonica - Cello

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Even as his personal life deteriorated, Brian's musical output in these years remained remarkable. The exact nature of his problems was a topic of much speculation. He abused drugs heavily, gained an enormous amount of weight, suffered long bouts of depression, and became paranoid as well. Several biographies have suggested that his father Murry may have had bipolar disorder, and after years of suffering, Brian's own condition was eventually diagnosed as schizophrenia.

Related Topics:
Bipolar - Schizophrenia

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