How much did drugs do to brian's mind?

[Newguy562]

:/ certain interviews that I see of him now puzzle me and make me sad ...This is a genius that came up with some of the most beautiful music ever created by a human being.
It's bizarre how a regular conversation/interview with him can seem like such an obstacle but he can create a very complicated yet beautiful song like it's nothing, that's truly a gift.
In an interview Brian said LSD shattered his mind and he doesn't know how much of his mind came back :/...i wonder how much of his brain were destroyed by drugs :[
Thank goodness he didn't wind up like Syd Barrett.(may god bless his soul)

[hypehat]

Eugene Landy did more to destroy Brian Wilson's mind than LSD, amphetamines, cocaine, booze, marijuana, or heroin ever did.

[amateurpharmacist] Whilst those drugs do bad things to your brain, there's always a way back 'mentally' if addiction can be bested - see countless old 60's geezers still in control of their faculties - but the drugs that Landy forced Brian were much more dangerous abused in those quantities.

Look at it this way - Brian took cocaine for most of the 70's but while he himself was 300lbs and a psychological mess, his brain was still functioning somewhat underneath the levels of intoxication - he was self-medicating, seems to be the case. After the 80's, with little recreational drug use (well, at the start of the decade) but regular and abusive doses of anti-schizophrenia medication (per Landy's misdiagnosis), Brian had tardive dyskinesia - the shakes, effectively, because those drugs were literally eroding his brain. His manners of speech changed, his memory was stunted, and so on. He had changed mentally - any interview footage from the Landy years should tell you as much, and the damage is quite clear in I Just Wasn't Made For These Times. I hate watching that doc, he still seems so ill. He's much better nowadays. [/amateurpharmacist]

LSD is a red herring, really, for Brian. He had, at most, two full doses (he claims he had a smaller dose than the first one in the Tom Wolfe interview, I think?). Compare to The Beatles, who were reportedly tripping 24/7 at points in 1967. Mental illness and Eugene Landy are much better signifiers of his condition.

[Wild-Honey]

I agree,  Landy was the main offender drug wise.  I can't remember which documentary it was on, but there was an interview with Brian and Landy, and Landy was saying that someone (also can't remember who)  was worried that Brian was going to end up like Elvis. Brians reaction and the way Landy talked to him (like a small child) is very, very disturbing. It's criminal what he did to Brian.

[Lowbacca]

I agree,  Landy was the main offender drug wise.  I can't remember which documentary it was on, but there was an interview with Brian and Landy, and Landy was saying that someone (also can't remember who)  was worried that Brian was going to end up like Elvis. Brians reaction and the way Landy talked to him (like a small child) is very, very disturbing. It's criminal what he did to Brian.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-K-n5op9nI

[Chris Brown]

I agree,  Landy was the main offender drug wise.  I can't remember which documentary it was on, but there was an interview with Brian and Landy, and Landy was saying that someone (also can't remember who)  was worried that Brian was going to end up like Elvis. Brians reaction and the way Landy talked to him (like a small child) is very, very disturbing. It's criminal what he did to Brian.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-K-n5op9nI

All of the second Landy-era interview clips are disturbing, but this one may take the (birthday) cake.

[Wild-Honey]

I agree,  Landy was the main offender drug wise.  I can't remember which documentary it was on, but there was an interview with Brian and Landy, and Landy was saying that someone (also can't remember who)  was worried that Brian was going to end up like Elvis. Brians reaction and the way Landy talked to him (like a small child) is very, very disturbing. It's criminal what he did to Brian.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-K-n5op9nI

All of the second Landy-era interview clips are disturbing, but this one may take the (birthday) cake.

Yep that's the interview I was talking about.  Landy makes me skin crawl.  I read that he only got banned from practicing in California, I find that odd, that you can be banned in one state but still practice in others,  If you've done something bad enough to be banned from practicing you should have your license revoked period. Not sure if I'm correct on this though.

[The Heartical Don]

I agree,  Landy was the main offender drug wise.  I can't remember which documentary it was on, but there was an interview with Brian and Landy, and Landy was saying that someone (also can't remember who)  was worried that Brian was going to end up like Elvis. Brians reaction and the way Landy talked to him (like a small child) is very, very disturbing. It's criminal what he did to Brian.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-K-n5op9nI

All of the second Landy-era interview clips are disturbing, but this one may take the (birthday) cake.

Yep that's the interview I was talking about.  Landy makes me skin crawl.  I read that he only got banned from practicing in California, I find that odd, that you can be banned in one state but still practice in others,  If you've done something bad enough to be banned from practicing you should have your license revoked period. Not sure if I'm correct on this though.

Difficult questions. Landy was a psychologist, not psychiatrist, so he wasn’t formally allowed to prescribe psychotropic drugs at all. However, there was at least one M.D. in his team, who might have been used as a scapegoat. The state-related question I cannot answer, but I’d find it very odd that if Landy was in some way to be found to be associated with malpractice, and/or undue intimate forms of a personal relationship with his client, that he then still was allowed to continue in states other than California.

[Dunderhead]

In the 70s even though he looked and sounded quite depressed he still seemed quite sane. And then in the 80s you start to get this....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_yUFStXQvQ

[Iron Horse-Apples]

That's really sad. His eyes took on a really crazed look during this period.

[southbay]

In the 70s even though he looked and sounded quite depressed he still seemed quite sane. And then in the 80s you start to get this....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_yUFStXQvQ

That's the Sweet Insanity period, early 90's.  Unwatchable.

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

After watching that video, have some observations...


1) How old are children?

2) at him not being able to stop the sound of the theremin

3) How old are children again?!

4).  WTF at 'NO, let me logically convince you that  this record *mumble mumble mumble* we got people over to our art to our houses listening'. That was quite a weird sentence.

5). Children of God are in their twenties.

[EgoHanger1966]

That video is equal parts sad and hilarious. I couldn't contain my laughter when Brian says (at around 2:20), "It was a rock n roll record. It rocked."

Not that it shows him 'better' by any means, but it's a long way off from the monosyllabic answers you get from his modern interviews now...

[hypehat]

That video is equal parts sad and hilarious. I couldn't contain my laughter when Brian says (at around 2:20), "It was a rock n roll record. It rocked."

Not that it shows him 'better' by any means, but it's a long way off from the monosyllabic answers you get from his modern interviews now...

I sorta put the monosyllabic answers down to the 'Gee, did you take all day to think that question up?' kinda thing. Although as Wirestone will probably attest, even deeper questions will probably hit that kinda wall if he's not in the mood to be interviewed. He's better in that his actions and speech are natural, something which didn't really recover (working out his new meds?) until the late nineties, but he's also 20 years older than in that clip. Sometimes I think Brian is just a grumpy old man at times. It explains rather a lot...

[FatherOfTheMan Sr101]

That video is equal parts sad and hilarious. I couldn't contain my laughter when Brian says (at around 2:20), "It was a rock n roll record. It rocked."

Not that it shows him 'better' by any means, but it's a long way off from the monosyllabic answers you get from his modern interviews now...

Sorry to break it to you, but this reminds me a lot of '66 Brian, IMO...

[Puggal]

http://www.americansongwriter.com/2009/01/brian-wilson-gods-messenger/

This interview was done only three years ago and Brian seems just to be just as lucid as he was when he was young. I think Brian just isn't interested in giving interviews anymore and just uses the same stock phrases and stories to get through them.

Edit:

“Surf’s Up.”
That was written with Van Dyke Parks in 1966 and it was done on drugs. We took speed pills. “Surf’s Up” was probably the worst vocal I ever sang.


^
Referring to 2004 version???

[Dunderhead]

I don't know, here he just sounds so normal:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sRFE-24ucxc

I don't really know how to describe it, I'm just so used to hearing interviews with him from the 80s, 90s, and 2000s that when I actually hear him back in the 60s and 70s it seems like a totally different person. Like it actually feels weird to me hearing Brian just speak like a regular person. Nearly all of the interviews he gives today aren't very good, he stammers a lot, he forgets his train of thought, he can't think up the words he wants to say, he lies, if there's another person 'helping' him be interviewed he'll defer answers to them, sometimes he just seems totally phony. He comes off more often than not as crazy, laconic, or even stupid. But every once in a while I'll read some tidbit from an interview and he'll not only give a very lucid answer, but he'll also say things that are incredibly lucid and penetrating. It's so hard to figure out where his head is at most days, has his brain been permanently damaged by drugs? Is he just annoyed? Or is he pulling the interviewers' leg?

I wish Brian would write a real autobiography.

[ivy]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_yUFStXQvQ

There is just so so so much going on here. I agree with those before who sad it is mostly sad and scary... but god, it's funny too.

It's funny, just when you start thinking "Oh god there he goes this is going absolutely nowhere" he turns it around and gets his point across pretty well. "Written music with an unwritten sound"? That's pretty frigging beautiful and makes total sense.

The age/children thing..... he didn't get out too well but it goes along with the idea that while writing Pet Sounds they thought of themselves as teenagers in their 20s (I think it was Tony Asher who said this..... or was it VDP about Smile... I forget.) ((And I love how he draws a *very* serious distinction between a 25/26 yr old and someone "rapidly approaching 30"))

The face he is making at 2:33 cracks me up. Like he's saying "Yeah, you know you love it"

Without knowing anything else about Brian, I would say his behavior is consistent with someone who has taken a lot of coke.

And re: how this compares to Brian's present-day persona.... I think how he acts today is a mixture of the voluntary and involuntary. I think most of it is disinterest. But there was that one interview (again, I forget what it's from) where they show a clip of the Mike Douglas show where he's talking about drug use and the interviewer asks him what he thinks of the clip and Brian remarks upon how fast he used to be able to talk when he was young...

[MBE]

http://www.americansongwriter.com/2009/01/brian-wilson-gods-messenger/

This interview was done only three years ago and Brian seems just to be just as lucid as he was when he was young. I think Brian just isn't interested in giving interviews anymore and just uses the same stock phrases and stories to get through them.

Edit:

“Surf’s Up.”
That was written with Van Dyke Parks in 1966 and it was done on drugs. We took speed pills. “Surf’s Up” was probably the worst vocal I ever sang.


^
Referring to 2004 version???

That was a good one. He never liked his 1966 vocal. I think the one for Inside Pop was a tad rough, but the studio version I think he sang great in 1966.

[Dunderhead]

http://www.americansongwriter.com/2009/01/brian-wilson-gods-messenger/

This interview was done only three years ago and Brian seems just to be just as lucid as he was when he was young. I think Brian just isn't interested in giving interviews anymore and just uses the same stock phrases and stories to get through them.

Edit:

“Surf’s Up.”
That was written with Van Dyke Parks in 1966 and it was done on drugs. We took speed pills. “Surf’s Up” was probably the worst vocal I ever sang.


^
Referring to 2004 version???

That was a good one. He never liked his 1966 vocal. I think the one for Inside Pop was a tad rough, but the studio version I think he sang great in 1966.

I just think he's embarrassed of his high voice.

[Wild-Honey]

http://www.americansongwriter.com/2009/01/brian-wilson-gods-messenger/

This interview was done only three years ago and Brian seems just to be just as lucid as he was when he was young. I think Brian just isn't interested in giving interviews anymore and just uses the same stock phrases and stories to get through them.

Edit:

“Surf’s Up.”
That was written with Van Dyke Parks in 1966 and it was done on drugs. We took speed pills. “Surf’s Up” was probably the worst vocal I ever sang.


^
Referring to 2004 version???

That was a good one. He never liked his 1966 vocal. I think the one for Inside Pop was a tad rough, but the studio version I think he sang great in 1966.

I just think he's embarrassed of his high voice.

Which is a shame because I adore his falsetto. I heard an interview where he said "I sounded like a chick, a sick chick"  HAHHA

[Wild-Honey]

I agree,  Landy was the main offender drug wise.  I can't remember which documentary it was on, but there was an interview with Brian and Landy, and Landy was saying that someone (also can't remember who)  was worried that Brian was going to end up like Elvis. Brians reaction and the way Landy talked to him (like a small child) is very, very disturbing. It's criminal what he did to Brian.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-K-n5op9nI

All of the second Landy-era interview clips are disturbing, but this one may take the (birthday) cake.

Yep that's the interview I was talking about.  Landy makes me skin crawl.  I read that he only got banned from practicing in California, I find that odd, that you can be banned in one state but still practice in others,  If you've done something bad enough to be banned from practicing you should have your license revoked period. Not sure if I'm correct on this though.

Difficult questions. Landy was a psychologist, not psychiatrist, so he wasn’t formally allowed to prescribe psychotropic drugs at all. However, there was at least one M.D. in his team, who might have been used as a scapegoat. The state-related question I cannot answer, but I’d find it very odd that if Landy was in some way to be found to be associated with malpractice, and/or undue intimate forms of a personal relationship with his client, that he then still was allowed to continue in states other than California.

I found this from a New York Times article:

In 1989, after the California Board of Medical Quality Assurance accused Mr. Landy of "grossly negligent conduct" in the Wilson case and others, he voluntarily surrendered his license for at least two years.

[Craig Boyd]

http://www.americansongwriter.com/2009/01/brian-wilson-gods-messenger/

This interview was done only three years ago and Brian seems just to be just as lucid as he was when he was young. I think Brian just isn't interested in giving interviews anymore and just uses the same stock phrases and stories to get through them.

Check out how many times Brian mentions Ding Dang in that interview! 

[adamghost]

I'll tell you guys a funny story, about how I met Brian Wilson.  It was long before I knew anybody connected with him or had any involvement with the band other than being a uberfan.

My girlfriend at the time had expensive tastes and we had driven out to Malibu to grab lunch.  I walk in, wait for a table, look to my left, and the first thing I see is Brian Wilson playing pool with a blonde woman (Melinda, though I didn't know that yet because they had not yet married).  Needless to say, I freaked.

I spent the whole meal working up the gumption to go talk to him.  I finally did.  And as I approached Brian, I realized, I could think of absolutely nothing to say to the man that hadn't already been said.  I just sort of stood there gaping.

Now here's the cool part.  Brian leans in, grabs my hand, and says "I can see you've had some dark times in your life."  And proceeds to take control of the conversation, talks briefly about PET SOUNDS, wishes me well, and sends me on my merry way.  It was every fan's dream encounter with their idol.  The guy was totally good-natured, sweet, real and totally "there", and he bailed me out of an awkward social situation.  That despite the fact that I'd interrupted his pool game.

Now I've been in the same room with Brian since then, by my count, about five times.  We've never said a word to each other other than nodding when we passed each other on the staircase at a show once.  I doubt he knows who I am other than to have a vague bad impression because I used to have punk rock hair or some such thing.  He's always been very standoffish in those situations by my observation.  But the point is, when I encountered him one on one in an environment he was comfortable in, and approached him as a human being with his guard down, the guy was not just normal, he was awesome.  And that dovetails with everything I've ever heard about the man.

Take that observation for what it's worth.

[southbay]

I'll tell you guys a funny story, about how I met Brian Wilson.  It was long before I knew anybody connected with him or had any involvement with the band other than being a uberfan.

My girlfriend at the time had expensive tastes and we had driven out to Malibu to grab lunch.  I walk in, wait for a table, look to my left, and the first thing I see is Brian Wilson playing pool with a blonde woman (Melinda, though I didn't know that yet because they had not yet married).  Needless to say, I freaked.

I spent the whole meal working up the gumption to go talk to him.  I finally did.  And as I approached Brian, I realized, I could think of absolutely nothing to say to the man that hadn't already been said.  I just sort of stood there gaping.

Now here's the cool part.  Brian leans in, grabs my hand, and says "I can see you've had some dark times in your life."  And proceeds to take control of the conversation, talks briefly about PET SOUNDS, wishes me well, and sends me on my merry way.  It was every fan's dream encounter with their idol.  The guy was totally good-natured, sweet, real and totally "there", and he bailed me out of an awkward social situation.  That despite the fact that I'd interrupted his pool game.

Now I've been in the same room with Brian since then, by my count, about five times.  We've never said a word to each other other than nodding when we passed each other on the staircase at a show once.  I doubt he knows who I am other than to have a vague bad impression because I used to have punk rock hair or some such thing.  He's always been very standoffish in those situations by my observation.  But the point is, when I encountered him one on one in an environment he was comfortable in, and approached him as a human being with his guard down, the guy was not just normal, he was awesome.  And that dovetails with everything I've ever heard about the man.

Take that observation for what it's worth.

Hilarious.  What year was that, 1994? (Post Landy, pre marriage)

[adamghost]

Pretty sure it was the first half of '93.