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.

Deaths of Dennis and Carl Wilson

In the late 70s Dennis Wilson also began to suffer increasingly from drug and alcohol abuse, and some of the group's concert appearances were marred by Dennis and other band members being drunk or drugged on stage. The band was forced to publicly apologise after a shambolic performance in Sydney in 1979 during which several members of the group appeared to be drunk. In spite of his own frequent drinking, Dennis managed to release his first solo work Pacific Ocean Blue, and to launch the now famed work-in-progess Bamboo, with friend and musician Carli Muñoz.

Related Topics:
Sydney - 1979 - Pacific Ocean Blue - Bamboo - Carli Muñoz

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In 1980 The Beach Boys played a Fourth of July concert on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. before vast crowd. This tradition continued for the next two years, but in 1983 Secretary of the Interior James Watt banned the group from playing on the Mall, saying that rock concerts drew "an undesirable element". http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20040725/news_m1a25timelin.html This drew howls of outrage from the many of the Beach Boys' American fans, who stated that the Beach Boys sound was a very desirable part of the American cultural fabric. First Lady Nancy Reagan apologized, and in 1985 the group appeared on the Mall again. The group most recently appeared on the Mall in 2005 for the Fourth of July concert.

Related Topics:
1980 - Fourth of July - National Mall - Washington, D.C. - 1983 - Secretary of the Interior - James Watt - First Lady - Nancy Reagan - 1985

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Dennis Wilson's problems had escalated in the early 1980s and he accidentally drowned in late 1983 while diving from his boat as he drunkenly tried to recover items he had previously thrown overboard.

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Despite Dennis's tragic death, The Beach Boys soldiered on, and they enjoyed a resurgence of interest later in the 1980s, assisted by tributes such as the David Lee Roth version of "California Girls"; they scored their first #1 in twenty-two years with the 1988 song "Kokomo," which was featured on the soundtrack of the hit Tom Cruise movie Cocktail and which became their biggest-selling hit ever.

Related Topics:
David Lee Roth - 1988 - Kokomo - Tom Cruise - Cocktail

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Members of the band appeared on sitcoms such as Full House (starring sometime drummer John Stamos) and Home Improvement in the 1990s, as well as touring occasionally, but their declining career contrasted dramatically with the massive public interest and rabid critical praise that followed Brian's gradual return to touring in the 1990s. The critically acclaimed documentary I Just Wasn't Made For These Times was very important in restoring Brian's reputation, saw him performing for the first time with his now grown-up daughters, Wendy and Carnie, and included glowing tributes to Brian's talents from a host of major music stars of the '60s, '70s and '80s.

Related Topics:
Sitcom - Full House - John Stamos - Home Improvement - 1990s - I Just Wasn't Made For These Times - Wendy - Carnie

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Tragedy struck the Wilson family again in 1998 when Carl Wilson died from lung cancer. Although Mike Love and Bruce Johnston continue to tour as "The Beach Boys", no other original members accompany them.

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