Not made for these times.
“Why don’t you listen to the Beach Boys anymore?” my wife asked me, as we watched an awkward, white-suited, Brian-less lineup of the band play “Good Vibrations” on some “best of” the musical acts on The Ed Sullivan Show that was playing on PBS. The question took me by surprise. In our 22 years together my wife, who’s appreciation of the Beach Boys can be described as “mild” and does not extend beyond that song and the two big songs off Pet Sounds (“Wouldn’t It Be Nice” and “God Only Knows”), had never expressed concern for the well-being of my Beach Boys fandom.
“You don’t listen to the Beach Boys anymore,” she continued, as I sat slightly stunned at this glaring lack of musical self-awareness. “You used to listen to them all the time.”
I guess I did. I remembered the early days of our relationship, when I’d spin Pet Sounds frequently, often gracing (or so I thought) her return home from work with the album that I thought celebrated our love and gave her further insight, in case she was not certain, into just how sensitive I was. Side two headed downhill fast, but playing out this drama through spinning the album seemed kind of brave of me, like I was staring down another man’s failure while building off the best bits of Brian’s triumph of love.
“You don’t like them now,” I looked up, “do you?” As soon as that that question left my tongue I felt a little queasy, like she would take this opportunity to suggest we join a swingers’ scene.
“No.”
I was relieved and went back to contemplating the full implications of her question.
“I don’t really like that album the way you do,” she told me one day, probably about 3 years into our relationship. I was as shocked as I would be a year later, when she acknowledged that she’d never seen Apocalypse Now, and I was more than a bit crushed. I didn’t hide it well. “The band played ‘Wouldn’t It Be Nice’ at our wedding!” I protested.
“Yeah, I love that song and ‘God Only Knows,’ but the rest of it sounds like Muzak,” she explained.
I then launched into my whole “But that’s the sound of middle-class American aspirations falling apart” routine, the same explanation I give friends who don’t understand my love of Dionne Warwick‘s ’60s classics, and possibly more importantly, don’t share my deep associations with my parents’ brutally crumbling marriage in a living room full of heavy wood furniture, velvet drapes, Dutch Masters reproductions, and a giagantic, wood-encased stereo console loaded with the day’s slick, sophisticated AM hits.
“I don’t know,” I once more snapped back into the present, “I still love those records, but I don’t feel that way very often these days.” I wanted to go into more detail about my grittier, bluesier, more down-to-earth music tastes these days, but that would have been pointless and pathetic in our 20th year of marriage. She knows what I listen to, and much more importantly she knows who I am.
“They look really awkward in those white suits,” she said as the Ed Sullivan clip reached the end.
I continued to listen to Pet Sounds and my other Beach Boys albums regularly for another 10 years after her admission, usually on my own. Then my need to spin those records began to taper off. Hearing a song at a time on Oldies radio still gives me a thrill, and the most fascinating Beach Boys record, “I Get Around,” never gets old for me, but while getting deeper into my own fine, sometimes too-real life I no longer needed to pinch myself or regularly put myself through a musical It’s a Wonderful Life-like horror in order to better appreciate my once-newfound love. The Beach Boys and Pet Sounds, in particular, have served their purpose, at least for now. Also, during these waning years, I felt it was best to disassociate myself from desparate Beach Boys obsessives trying to convince themselves that L.A. (Light Album) “has its merits.”
Replace “The Beach Boys” with “Elvis Costello” and this could be practically be a scene from my home.
Funny, while writing this I was reminded of the “give me back my sadness” line from “Kid About It” that so often comes to mind when I think of the changing tides of life and music listening.
What a great post, Mod. Kudos! My current relationship is a relatively new one, so little of the music that inspired us during courtship has fallen away. I suppose one day, I won’t understand the Pernice Brothers album I used to obsessively listen to as I drove back from her place, head swimming. At least not in the same way. Love and music are funny things.
Brian’s music, particularly post-Pet Sounds, got me through a really tough period in my life about 8 or nine years ago. For whatever reason, that music connected me in ways I cannot fully explain. For that, I have an unconditional love for the man and his music. I guess I would call myself one of those “obsessives,” although I will admit to never defending L.A. for any reason. I like wild Honey. Friends is underrated. I do love Sunflower and think it’s even comparable to Pet Sounds. It certainly makes the case for the collective powers of The Beach Boys as opposed to Brian juggerbaut. I think Surf’s Up is a cool record. I like the Blondie Chaplin and Ricky Fataar period. Love You is a gas. Beyond that, it gets real spotty. “Kokomo” is fine enough, but I recognize it as fluff. It doesn’t give me stomach pains, but I never go to it on my own. I enjoy Brian’s solo stuff. I would consider myself a Brian fan first. I like Dennis and Carl. Mike Love just makes me angry.
I don’t listen to it as much as used to, but I will go through a period where I will dust those records off and give them a spin. I’ll do Pet Sounds at least once a year, but that’s never been one that I could listen to casually.
I wish I could “get back” to The Beatles sometimes. I used to listen to those records obsessively. When older fans would tell me how sick of them they were, I would think were crazy. How can anybody ever get tired of The Beatles? I still love them. I just don’t get the same thrill from that music like I used to.
TB
Funny, I started playing The Beach Boys again once my son was born. We listen to The Beatles and The Beach Boys more than anything else (as MY dad and I did in the early 1970’s).
As I stated in a previous post, I own a lot of the BB’s stuff. I always felt they had some really groovy hits, but along with those came an awful amount of filler on every album, so it’s no surprise to me that Endless Summer has remained such a giant hit in their catalog since it was first issued.
I went through a phase where I was captivated by all that Smile-era “Brain’s genius” hoo-ha, but it quickly faded. While I can’t argue the man has an incredible talent for melodies, arrangement, production, harmonies, etc., I also can’t help but feel so much of that was squandered on sheer goofiness as well. Granted, if you have some psychological problems and then throw acid on top of it and have a bunch of bandmates that for the most part can’t relate to what you want to do or your problems, then things are only going to get worse.
The Boys never had the group identity the Beatles, the Stones, et al, did. Since Brian was mainly using session cats (and rightly so), and Mike Love was more interested in being a dork and singing about girls and cars forever, the whole thing was a muddle. I’m aware, Mr. Moderator that you’re not a big fan of The Fabs’ White Album, but when everyone went off to India in 1968 and the Beach Boys came back with Friends…well, I think that speaks for itself. Like Elvis, the Beach Boys were lost at sea as the ’60s progressed.
And that whole “Brian is Back” thing of the ’70s was utterly depressing as well. A lot of fans herald Love You as some “return to form” but if I want to hear goofy Brian songs, I’d much rather listen to “I’d Love Just Once to See You” or “Busy Doin’ Nothin'” than the likes of “Johnny Carson.”
I think for a lot of folks, a compilation of the Boys is fine and dandy, and I don’t necessarily think that’s a terrible thing in their case. At least with those you don’t have to sift through crap like “Pom Pom Play Girl” or “Amusement Parks USA.”
I think you nailed the essence of the Beach Boys: they became obsolete. Thanks, in part, to Mike Love’s commercial pandering, the Boys are forever seen in that endless summer singing about cars and girls. While those things will always be relevant to Americans in some way, it has hampered the public’s ability to appreciate “Surf’s Up” or “Cabinessence.” It’s okay (and expected) for The Beatles to be brilliant and evolving, but The Beach Boys cannot.
My lady told me recently that The Beach Boys are “cheesy.” Her verdict is based solely on that thing that tours the world over and over as “The Beach Boys.” I thought they were cheesy, too.
TB
What We Talk About When We Talk About The Beach Boys.
Nice post, Mr. Mod.
Mod, my own Beach Boys trajectory (while not fraught with emotional baggage of any kind) is rather the opposite. Except for a few songs–Good Vibrations, Help Me Rhonda, Wouldn’t It Be Nice, and (weirdly) Sail On Sailor–the Beach Boys were a reason to change the radio station. I had no use for all that fake cheerful, warmed-over Chuck Berry, hotrods, California sun and surf crap. Later, I rolled my eyes at the semi-annual Q magazine/Mojo gushing over the genius of Pet Sounds and the lost masterpiece Smile.
I still have no interest in all that that fake cheerful, warmed-over Chuck Berry, hotrods, California sun and surf crap. It irritates me, and conjures up Mike Love’s face, which turns the irritation into active loathing.
But at some point, in the past decade or so, I actually listened to Pet Sounds. And guess what? It’s really wonderful, a beautiful record. Muzak? I don’t think so, but whatever! It’s a a delight. I even find myself enjoying Sloop John B, which I had always hated, maybe because I remember having to sing it in music class in the 2nd grade. The Greatest Pop Record of All Time? No, but just great! And Smile–about which I could not have been more dubious, I enjoy very much, in all its wonderful weirdness.
Unlike some here, I have never warmed up to the post-Smile Beach Boys, apart from a couple songs here and there. Most of it I find creepy or mawkish or mawkishly creepy or badly produced or just plain dull.
Still, all in all, I have found the Beach Boys to be much more interesting than I ever would have supposed at one time, even if I still do not like much of their music.
Love those 60s Dionne Warwick singles, though.
The important thing is that we can all agree that whatever the problem is, it’s Mike Love’s fault.
I disagree. I think Love was one of the most underrated frontmen at that time. Beside Dennis Wilson, who was stuck behind the drums and didn’t play much anyhow, Love brought the pubic hair to that band. He was the only guy with swagger. Without him up front in their first few years they go down in history as some faceless band like The Association, or maybe Bread.
Remember that we are part of the small minority of people in the world who have a long history of listening to music and acquiring new music. When Mod was listening to the Beach Boys 22 years ago, he had, what, a tenth as much music as he has now? Less?
My point is that we don’t listen to anyone as much as we used to, because any one artist represents an increasingly smaller proportion of our musical universe as time goes on.
And I may be unusual, but I don’t listen to anything because I’m in the mood for it. I’m usually listening to new acquisitions. Listening to back catalogs is more or less random. I listened to Taking Tiger Mountain over the weekend, but it was just because it caught my eye in the Itunes albums list, not because I’m in the mood for it. Maybe I’m not as moody as you guys.
Which would not have been inappropriate. His swagger is repugnant. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MDIBMaCTwFw
BigSteve wrote:
No, probably 60% of core collection was acquired prior to 1988. I don’t keep records, no pun intended, but most of the music I talk about and listen to on a regular basis is stuff I got into in high school through my mid-20s. There’s lots of other stuff I’ve bought since then, but you know my beefs with music made after 1983. I’m not suggesting that my experience is anyone else’s, but I really am a mood-based listener in many ways. Then I also listen to music for various “scientific” reasons, such as music to listen to in preparation for songwriting or recording.
“Back in the day,” when I hung out regularly with some of the guys on this list, I was never a Beach Boys fan. It was just the kind of cutesy, polished stuff I couldn’t stand, and it certainly never spoke to me–my sensitive side, to the extent that I have one, and I do, I swear, preferred Richard Thompson and Sandy Denny.
These days I find myself really enjoying The Beach Boys, in the right time slot, usually at the time of the beginning of dinner preparation and the popping of a craft brew. The music has the aura of a time and place that I never was part of, and that in fact probably never existed, but its evocation of a mythic California, shimmery hummable tunes and relatively propulsive rhythms are enjoyable mood changers for me.
It could be that these days I don’t have as much need, sometimes anyway, of music that speaks to me and my concerns, whatever is left of either of us. But there’s a world in the Beach Boys, and it’s pleasant to hear that world unfold.
An excellent post, Mod–let me join others in congratulating you on it.
Great post — I still listen — and carry quite a bit of baggage.
Growing up, I had a very religious baby sitter who would listen to The Beach Boys and then listen to gospel to make up for her “sin.” That was my introduction to The Beach Boys.
Endless Summer was the first record I ever bought with my own money (at Target!). When I was pre-teen, we used listen to those four sides constantly — part of it had to do with the fact that we grew up in suburban Minneapolis, where it was freaking cold and going to California and cruising around was something we could only dream about in the late 70s. Those songs made a deep impression on me at 11 or 12. “I Get Around” was our anthem one summer.
I bought a lot of their stuff in the cutouts – Beach Boys Concert and then Beach Boys ’69 introduced me to live versions of the late 60s stuff. I still love those albums — as noisy as they are. “Do It Again” on Beach Boys 69 is cool.
Then somebody gave me Dennis Wilson’s solo record Pacific Ocean Blue (a guy’s older brother had promo copy of it) and it blew me away. So I have been hooked for quite a while.
I agree that listening to the Beatles and Beach Boys with young children is a way to connect with them. Perhaps its because we are projecting ourselves on our kids, but it is kind of undeniable that there is something in those old records that connects with little kids and pre-teens.
In fact, I was listening to Sloop John B with my 3 year old last night — he asked me “Daddy, why can he go home?” Good question.
I have found that all music has a limited life span. Once I have heard a particular album enough times, no matter how great it is, I never need to hear it again. The album becomes fully imprinted onto my brain and no further data is needed. When that happens, I will only revisit the album for nostalgia purposes. The best example of this for me is London Calling (and everything by The Who).
That being said, Pet Sounds and Smile still have a few spins left in them for me before they are used up. My early Beach Boys appreciation was focused more on the girls and cars era and I didn’t get into the rest of their work until relatively late.
Awesome question your son had! I like this part of your post too:
That’s kind of hot!
Thank you for this post. I, a Beach Boys obsessive, completely relate and really really appreciated it.
Great post Mod! Thanks.
Wow, a post from Christian and a post from the Great 48, albeit in flashback form. And throw in one from EPG.
It’s like the ghost of Christmas past, RTH style. I’ll be home for Christmas indeed!
The Beach Boys provided a lot of joy in my life but I stopped listening to them the day after I saw Brian Wilson at an embarrassing performance at the Beacon Theater on his first solo tour. He couldn’t play, couldn’t sing, stoned out of his mind on some psychosomatic drug, like a cardboard cutout in front of a band re-creating his hits.
People are using him, he should be home playing with his grandkids…. Thanks for posting, I thought I was alone in thinking this, I wish Carl and Dennis were still alive