Interview With Beach Boy Brian Wilson

http://www.brianwilson.com/media/words/nyt.html ^ | July 4, 2004 | Deborah Solomon

[Zack Nguyen]

My apologies! :)

[Zack Nguyen]

Although incidentally, Dennis may have been the most musically-inclined member of the group aside from Brian. He did a solo album in 1977 called that got rave reviews, though I don't think it sold overwhelmingly. Some consider it a minor classic. You can hear it ont he internet, as I don't think it's available on the market anymore.

[Zack Nguyen]

It's called Pacific Ocean Blue.

[LakeLady]

My half of the country definitely agrees!

[Revolting cat!]

Interrrresting interrrrview, though not much of an interviewee. Will have to check out Wilco. The two BB albums immediately following Pet Sounds were perfectly good and have been reissued on a single CD, I see no point in revisiting Smile, though it can't be worse, I suppose, than the atrocious Let It Be Nekkid. He and we oughta let go, it's only pop music...

[Zack Nguyen]

Well, I gather Smile was much further to completion than Let it Be, which I think had several hits and some great music. Smile had only tantalizing bits and pieces.

Was Let it Be NakeD a re-recording of the album itself?

[Zack Nguyen]

LEt me rephrase that last comment. I gather that Let it Be, which yielded some classic music, was much closer to completion than Smile.

[Revolting cat!]

No, Let It Be Naked was the original Let It Be with a different song order and minus the Phil Spector Wall of Sound (strings and things) production done to salvage the unfinished album. I think it's unlistenable. Others, obviously, disagree.

[Joe Hadenuf]

Face it, you got old and just don't listen anymore. It happens to most of us.

Well everything grows older daily.

However I met that the RR we listened to in the 60s and 70s are still played by the younger set today.

They use them on top commercials, and it's played everywhere in the media. My kid cranks on the electric guitar, plays Hendrix star spangled banner almost perfectly etc. He says what many of his age say, that most stuff from the past few decades just sounds like sh*t. The lyrics sucks, the tunes suck, there is just nothing there. Most of the better noise being produced today, has all been done before. Heard it, seen it, been there done that.

I agree with my kid, as do most others in their 40s and 50s........It just plain sucks....

[GodBlessRonaldReagan]

God bless Brian Wilson and all who sail with him....

How I love that man's music. He and the Beach Boys will alway be #1 with me. He's coming to my area in October - can't wait!

[185JHP]

The admirable and the best thing about the Beach Boys was the cleanness of their music. They might have taken drugs and done evil things but their music didn't espouse it. They could have gotten away with putting a lot of nasty stuff in their music but didn't. Their stuff wasn't palpably "destroy innocence" oriented. It would have hurt people. How many young people today even know what "Wouldn't It Be Nice!" is about.

[Zack Nguyen]

Yu know, that's a great point. The Beatles clearly wrote songs about LSD trips and so forth. Brian came down from an LSD trip and wrote California Girls, the ultimate fun-in-the-sun, beach babe song.

I'm no psychologist, but clearly Brian needed, almost pathologically, to reach somewhere innocent and happy in his music to get away from his sad life. The Beatles perhaps didn't need that.

[Joe Hadenuf]

My half of the country definitely agrees!

You bet. Bands like the Beatles, Stones, Led Zep, Beach Boys, Ray Charles, Hendrix, Animals, The Who, etc were great groups and seemed to be a one time deal spanning over a decade or so. They were historical in a RR sense. Most all the crap that followed was just noise like the inside of a machine shop. Then talk rap came along for the brain dead, easily amused and the ignorant and those that like hand gestures.

Even my kid said there will be no great RR bands to follow like those of the 60s and 70s. It just aint there.

[LakeLady]

Both of my boys, born in '69 and '70- (yes, I was busy there for awhile!) know every band, every song, every lyric and every chord to all the pre-80's greats. They have never liked the music from their era. You and I must have done something right with our kids!

[185JHP]

Even after the Brit Invasion the BBs didn't get surly/nasty with their music. There's lots of nasty witchcraft in lots of music. A lot of the metal stuff is essentially sorcery - attacks on young minds that lack discernment. Thanks and FReegards.

[Joe Hadenuf]

They have never liked the music from their era.

My kid is 20, and he completely agrees. Too bad, but music produced from the 60s and 70s will never happen again. Only copied. Kinda strange who that happened. We just watched some Japanese car commercial and the Who was blasting in the background. The can't find nothing else to match. LOL!

[Joe Hadenuf]

Er, kinda strange *how* that happened.

[Joe Hadenuf]

*They* can't find nothing else to match. LOL!

Jezzz, talk about getting old.....Hehe....

[LakeLady]

That's OK. Old rockers sometimes have finger farts on the keyboard.

[7.62 x 51mm]

Bingo. It's *noise* looking for a category, JH. Rock 'N Roll ended in the early 70s. I mourn its loss, and cherish the "oldies"...