Reviews of The Beach Boys in Concert! book

[Jon Stebbins]

Cripes! Let me turn that on its head and ask when Dennis peaked as a live perfomer (on stage, you cheeky Madame!)

I think the book makes it clear that Dennis was often singled out by reviewers and concert goers as a focal point of the group's shows in in 1964/65 as a drummer...and in 1965 and 1966 when his vocals on Do You Wanna Dance and You've Got to Hide Your Love Away were often cited as a highlight or peak audience reaction moments of the band's sets. Even though its early and he hadn't blossomed as a songwriter yet, he may have hit his peak as an audience favorite in that '64 - '66 era.

[Eric Aniversario]

I knew there'd be some errors.  Hopefully there mostly minor. That was one of the first college tours

Got my book in the mail a could days ago, and I'm very very impressed with the detail and the beautiful pictures and the overall layout. Of course there are bound to be some minor errors, but this is of little consequence (one that I did notice is one that is widespread...my name is misspelled in the acknowledgements...but this is literally everywhere...bbfc, badman book, Esq, etc) :-) But I'm just grateful to have a mention in there! There is literally no one else who would have been as thorough and meticulous in making sure details about the different speed were correct than you! Congrats on a job excellently done! :-)

[Eric Aniversario]

I knew there'd be some errors.  Hopefully there mostly minor. That was one of the first college tours

Got my book in the mail a could days ago, and I'm very very impressed with the detail and the beautiful pictures and the overall layout. Of course there are bound to be some minor errors, but this is of little consequence (one that I did notice is one that is widespread...my name is misspelled in the acknowledgements...but this is literally everywhere...bbfc, badman book, Esq, etc) :-) But I'm just grateful to have a mention in there! There is literally no one else who would have been as thorough and meticulous in making sure details about the different speed were correct than you! Congrats on a job excellently done! :-)

[STE]

Al Jardine talks about the book!

http://youtu.be/NVS8pydRbVE

[Ian]

Eric, thanks again for yourr help. The site is great

[PrayForSurf]

FYI - -

Link to a new post and links for a new podcast with Jon Stebbins on the just released BB in concert book (he discusses Badman, Beachboysmaina and the BBs legacy)

Post:
http://prayforsurfblog.blogspot.com/2013/07/exclusive-podcast-with-jon-stebbins-on.html

Podcast:
https://archive.org/download/BeachBoysJuly320134/BeachBoysJuly320134_vbr_mp3.zip  Download zip file
https://archive.org/download/BeachBoysJuly320134/BeachBoysJuly320134_vbr.m3u    Download
https://archive.org/stream/BeachBoysJuly320134    Stream

[Ian]

Looking forward to doing my interview with you today! Great job

[Emdeeh]

My copy arrive in the mail today. It's beautiful -- very nice job Jon and Ian!

I have a question for both of you -- would you like us to send you guys dates for any concerts we don't see listed in the book? Especially the early shows?

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

The thing I loved about the book was finding out how hostile some of the crowds were in the early 70s when they weren't playing the older songs. In hindsight it is kind of amazing the BB held off as long as they did.

[MBE]

I admire that they all (Mike very much  included) told the people who go to Beach Boys shows to "PARTY" to effectively f off. Too bad they caved, but it had to have been almost impossible not to. I still think had they stayed the course and set up the shows like 1974-75, box set shows in 1993, or 2012 it would have been a happy middle ground. I mean at the second C50 show I saw in Milwaukee most of the crowd loved the WHOLE show, but there was this asshole booing and heckling everything he didn't know. He was so clueless he booed some of the hits too. Shows what they were up against and reminds me of Dylan when he changed his style over the years. Difference is Dylan never cared about being popular so much as playing music to people who "got" it. Maybe if the Beach Boys had not been so clueless money wise, they would have been in the same position to do so. At least maybe they would not have gone so far the other way.

[Ian]

Emdeeh, Yes please send them to me-in addition to any possible future updated edition-I will continue to contribute to AGD's website-where our list of gigs/sessions is continually updated as we find stuff.  I think that we have 95% of the shows in the book-but I'd sure love to find that other 5%!!!

As far as the other points raised-I heartily agree. One of the things I think is stressed in the book is that the BBs really did try to stay relevant and not become an oldies act (yes-even Mike!!) but were just worn down after three years of actually arguing and fighting with audiences (some of them extremely rude!!)

[MBE]

Cripes! Let me turn that on its head and ask when Dennis peaked as a live perfomer (on stage, you cheeky Madame!)

I think the book makes it clear that Dennis was often singled out by reviewers and concert goers as a focal point of the group's shows in in 1964/65 as a drummer...and in 1965 and 1966 when his vocals on Do You Wanna Dance and You've Got to Hide Your Love Away were often cited as a highlight or peak audience reaction moments of the band's sets. Even though its early and he hadn't blossomed as a songwriter yet, he may have hit his peak as an audience favorite in that '64 - '66 era.

I think that's an interesting perspective. He certainly was in the spotlight those early days and he seemed to take the shows (or being at his best for those shows) so much less seriously by the mid seventies. Of course addiction is a funny thing and I wonder when he stopped "acting up" and it started to be painful or impossible to stay sober until curtain time.

Myself as a listener I tend to like Dennis in the 1968-72 shows best. Simply because his voice and songs were just so amazing during that time, I would pick one of those shows if I wanted to see a really good performance from him. Granted the book makes clear that Dennis' decline was rooted as early as 1971. Dennis had great moments all through the sixties and seventies, just gradually less of them over time. I mean even in 1977 footage he seems different than 1976, and by 1979 I doubt he ever was able to completely hide his ongoing problems. Funny that Australia 1978 seems to be a last hurrah of sorts for him as a performer, considering just how awful things were getting for him and the group it's almost bizarre.

[Ian]

Yeah by all accounts his behavior in australia in 78 was very bad but in the footage from Melbourne we're all familiar with he looks great and in total control

[drbeachboy]

The thing I loved about the book was finding out how hostile some of the crowds were in the early 70s when they weren't playing the older songs. In hindsight it is kind of amazing the BB held off as long as they did.

We have discussed this in other threads throughout the years. It really was incredible on one hand, but rude and disrespectful on the other. I was at a few shows between 1972 and 1975 and saw and heard it first hand. I never blamed Mike entirely for going the oldies route. The band tried for years to keep the shows balanced, but each succeeding year got worse and worse until they gave in and gave the crowds what they wanted to hear.

[SloopJohnnyB]

Does anyone think the huge success of the double album greatest hits 'Endless Summer' played a big part in the Beach Boys going back to the oldies? I was 12 years old in 1974 when it was released and that album was everywhere. That was my introduction to the Beach Boys. 'Spirit of America' was soon to follow. It did prove that people were still interested in the older songs. The Warner 2-fers served their purpose in exposing a new fan like me to albums like 20-20 and Wild Honey.

Unfortunately it was inevitable that the live shows would consist of 'greatest hits' rather than new material.

Fantastic book! I'll post a few comments and questions later. Still going through it!! It's great to confirm shows that I attended.

[SloopJohnnyB]

.

[Ian]

The thing I will fault Mike for is the decision to include silly songs like long tall Texan and little old lady from Pasadena in the set in the early 80s rather than playing anything from the 70s

[drbeachboy]

The thing I will fault Mike for is the decision to include silly songs like long tall Texan and little old lady from Pasadena in the set in the early 80s rather than playing anything from the 70s

Oh, I totally agree with that. I would say up through the 1980 concert season that there wasn't much that they could do, but they at least played songs from their new releases.

[guitarfool2002]

The thing I will fault Mike for is the decision to include silly songs like long tall Texan and little old lady from Pasadena in the set in the early 80s rather than playing anything from the 70s

Growing up we had an 8-track player in the house and one of the few 8-track tapes I had for it was the BB's "Greatest Hits Vol.2" on Capitol, so I actually was more familiar with an obscurity like "Long Tall Texan" through that greatest hits album. I was still a little too young to go to big shows like that in the early 80's but I'm guessing the song had the same kind of familiarity for a lot of other fans who had the greatest hits album(s). I suppose it could have been a case of giving the people a familiar song that was easy for the band to play, odd as the choice may seem now. And it gave Mike a chance to clown around a bit, which for him probably outweighed in some ways doing something musically substantial.

With Little Old Lady..., that one doesn't make sense, actually the Beach Boys doing any J&D tunes besides maybe Surf City still seems kind of silly when they had so many more to choose from. And the flip side of that is the Jan and Dean concert I saw, late 90's, where if I remember they did just as many if not more Beach Boys songs than their own material! That was another head-scratcher.

[Ian]

Yeah-it's true, however, that bands are often pretty lazy when it comes to set lists.  I mean the Stones have tons of great sixties and seventies tracks that they never, or hardly ever, play.  You can be guaranteed of hearing Satisfaction or Jumping jack Flash,  but you'll hardly ever get Parachute Woman or Heart of Stone or Play With Fire.  Similarly-Ray Davies wrote tons of great stuff in the late 60s that he didn't think worked in concerts-so it wasn't till five years ago that he played Shangri-La on stage!! 

[guitarfool2002]

I give those bands that do dig deep into the archives to pull out those hidden gems for the fans a lot of credit - it's definitely not the easy way out! But I see it as a gift for the core fans at those shows, somehow. I can only imagine the outrage if a less-devoted fan paid 500 dollars for a Stones ticket and they didn't do Satisfaction! 

I also go back to the BB's free Philly July 4th show '95, and in all honesty the song "Summer In Paradise" almost brought the energy of the show to a dead stop. They just kept repeating the damn hook at the end and it seemed like it would never end, and I think 3/4ths of the crowd didn't know what they were hearing. That kind of free outdoor show is where the "play the hits" mentality isn't only expected, it's all but required!  And there's Mike repeating a borderline song he had been plugging endlessly for the previous 2-3 years with no result.

The book has not arrived yet but I'm obviously looking forward to reading it!

[PrayForSurf]

Both Ian and Jon confirmed this when I interviewed them. THe late 60's and early 70's shows were very balanced and included current album cuts:
      "The band tried for years to keep the shows balanced, but each succeeding year got worse and worse until they gave in and gave the crowds what they wanted to hear."

[PrayForSurf]

I assume you are asking Ian and Jon (authors of the BBs in Concert book) ... Ian indicated an interest when I interviewed him for a podcast...

My copy arrive in the mail today. It's beautiful -- very nice job Jon and Ian!

I have a question for both of you -- would you like us to send you guys dates for any concerts we don't see listed in the book? Especially the early shows?

[guitarfool2002]

Both Ian and Jon confirmed this when I interviewed them. THe late 60's and early 70's shows were very balanced and included current album cuts:
      "The band tried for years to keep the shows balanced, but each succeeding year got worse and worse until they gave in and gave the crowds what they wanted to hear."

Definitely, the outlook/scope of the setlist was much different earlier than it became into the 90's. At the same time, there were those large-scale free shows like July 4th '95 (sorry to keep referencing that one...) where no one paid admission and a lot of the audience members were there to party no matter who was on stage, so doing something like Summer In Paradise was a questionable choice when the gig was specifically a free "play the hits" kind of show.

And there is a backstory to the Philly '95 free show that perhaps isn't worth getting into the politics behind it, but to sum up the choice of the Beach Boys as the headline act that year created something of a controversy, and in the weeks before and after the show there were letters to the editor in Philly papers and various calls to talk radio complaining about the choice of the Beach Boys to headline - and not at all for the reasons that drove the 1983 dust-up in DC. As a major Beach Boys fan, to say the least it was infuriating to read them being picked apart before the actual show because some in Philly wanted someone else for their free show before the fireworks. And the Beach Boys never did another July 4th in Philly, which is too bad because the show was actually pretty good despite being a bit too heavy on the Stamos. 

[CJS]

Ian and Jon,

Thoroughly enjoying looking through your book.  Today I took my list of 35 shows I attended
from 1967-1997 and had a great time locating them in the book.  It brought back alot of good
memories.  And yes... all 35 were documented in the book.  You guys did a really nice job, and
it is certainly a great reference/collectable to have on the book shelf...

Best regards,

CJ