New article on Dennis

[Cam Mott]

Clearly there is a disagreement in the band but my reread is it was mostly a thing between the "siblings" with Brian on one side and Carl and Dennis on the other [with a Stan Love/Dennis/Jardine sideshow]. Apparently Brian's vote was under his own control as Dennis says it was settled when Brian did not use his vote. Presumably creating a tie, if Al was a full voting member at the time [don't remember the dates for Al].

[Lonely Summer]

What's intersting, and what I had forgotten in the many years since I'd last read that article, is that Stan yells at Dennis for wanting to LEAVE the band...like, "Oh great, now you're quitting on us! You quitter!"  And Al's remark is also apparently in response to Dennis' threat to leaave...like, "OK fine, you wanna leave? Well go ahead, we can do this without you."  (note, these are deliberate paraphrases on my part, not deliberate misquotes)

Well...I think it's pretty obvious what is going on here is that Dennis and Carl are suddenly being outvoted on everything. The Wilson's (first Murry...then BW, CW, DW) had basically been in control of the Beach Boys business and creative choices since the beginning. CW/DW had been relatively in control since Brian stopped caring ('68ish). That's not to say that the others didn't have input, they had plenty...but when it came down to the bottom line it was always the Wilsons in control. It was at this point (mid '77) that instead of deferring to his brothers Brian's vote was essentially given to Mike (reportedly by Marilyn). I was told by both Schilling and Guercio that Dennis and Carl felt their only leverage was to either adhere to the Love's control or threaten to leave the group unless the balance of power was restored to the Wilson bros. or at least a 50/50 type split. But they were suddenly getting overruled 3 to 2 on everything. And when they said this is not acceptable to their surprise they were told..."Go ahead and quit, we'll replace you...no problem." And it's Brian's lack of action on their part that Carl alludes to as the underlying problem.

Carl's quote...
Carl replied, "He (Dennis) knew more about it than I did. When I found out what he knew, I realized it was over. I can't tell you exactly why because of legal problems. But when I heard about what they were planning to do, the replacements they were planning to bring in for us. I heard Buddy Miles mentioned as a possible replacement for Dennis, and I suppose they felt they didn't need to replace me with another guitarist. Brian could have realized what was going on and done something about it." He didn't elaborate, but since all of the band's decisions are made by a five-man vote, he may have been referring to Brian's swing vote. It really didn't seem as though they were heading for their last concert. I asked Carl if he felt anything. special. "I feel incredibly sad," he said, Shaking his head. "My heart is broken."

I honestly think that in Aug/Sept '77 Carl and Dennis felt that the Love camp had in a sense kidnapped their brother and as long as they had him in their "possession" they didn't need the other Wilsons to hold on to the Beach Boys mantle. This was an incredible shock to the brothers. As time went on they took two different approaches to handling the fact that things would never be the same. Carl at first went off the rails, then he cleaned up, left the group, went solo, came back and went with the flow from there on. Dennis resisted as much as possible, went off the rails and never really came back. By '79 he was essentially done fighting for the upper hand ...but he needed a job so he hung in there as a drummer, for awhile, sometimes.

This is the first thing I have read that finally helps me understand how Carl went off the rails in 77/78. Dennis, well, I sort of had a sense of that before, it seemed like he was gonna self destruct at some point anyway, but Carl had always been Mr. Stability. What a blow to both of them. Thank you for sharing, Mr. Stebbins.

[KittyKat]

So, it was evil Marilyn Wilson in cahoots with the evil Loves.  And the evil Al Jardine. And Carl decided to take heroin and drink more due to it all, and Dennis became a substance abuser, leading to his drowning. 

[Kurosawa]

What's intersting, and what I had forgotten in the many years since I'd last read that article, is that Stan yells at Dennis for wanting to LEAVE the band...like, "Oh great, now you're quitting on us! You quitter!"  And Al's remark is also apparently in response to Dennis' threat to leaave...like, "OK fine, you wanna leave? Well go ahead, we can do this without you."  (note, these are deliberate paraphrases on my part, not deliberate misquotes)

Well...I think it's pretty obvious what is going on here is that Dennis and Carl are suddenly being outvoted on everything. The Wilson's (first Murry...then BW, CW, DW) had basically been in control of the Beach Boys business and creative choices since the beginning. CW/DW had been relatively in control since Brian stopped caring ('68ish). That's not to say that the others didn't have input, they had plenty...but when it came down to the bottom line it was always the Wilsons in control. It was at this point (mid '77) that instead of deferring to his brothers Brian's vote was essentially given to Mike (reportedly by Marilyn). I was told by both Schilling and Guercio that Dennis and Carl felt their only leverage was to either adhere to the Love's control or threaten to leave the group unless the balance of power was restored to the Wilson bros. or at least a 50/50 type split. But they were suddenly getting overruled 3 to 2 on everything. And when they said this is not acceptable to their surprise they were told..."Go ahead and quit, we'll replace you...no problem." And it's Brian's lack of action on their part that Carl alludes to as the underlying problem.

Carl's quote...
Carl replied, "He (Dennis) knew more about it than I did. When I found out what he knew, I realized it was over. I can't tell you exactly why because of legal problems. But when I heard about what they were planning to do, the replacements they were planning to bring in for us. I heard Buddy Miles mentioned as a possible replacement for Dennis, and I suppose they felt they didn't need to replace me with another guitarist. Brian could have realized what was going on and done something about it." He didn't elaborate, but since all of the band's decisions are made by a five-man vote, he may have been referring to Brian's swing vote. It really didn't seem as though they were heading for their last concert. I asked Carl if he felt anything. special. "I feel incredibly sad," he said, Shaking his head. "My heart is broken."

I honestly think that in Aug/Sept '77 Carl and Dennis felt that the Love camp had in a sense kidnapped their brother and as long as they had him in their "possession" they didn't need the other Wilsons to hold on to the Beach Boys mantle. This was an incredible shock to the brothers. As time went on they took two different approaches to handling the fact that things would never be the same. Carl at first went off the rails, then he cleaned up, left the group, went solo, came back and went with the flow from there on. Dennis resisted as much as possible, went off the rails and never really came back. By '79 he was essentially done fighting for the upper hand ...but he needed a job so he hung in there as a drummer, for awhile, sometimes.

So basically this gave Dennis the ammo he needed to destroy himself.

It's really too bad he wasn't just a little more together, or he could have just left and had a solo career. He was completely wasting his time with the Beach Boys anyway. Brian was too messed up at that point to do much as an artist and the rest of the guys were not prolific songwriters. He needed to just quit the band, but of course he wanted to live a self-indulgent rock star lifestyle.

[Jon Stebbins]

So, it was evil Marilyn Wilson in cahoots with the evil Loves.  And the evil Al Jardine. And Carl decided to take heroin and drink more due to it all, and Dennis became a substance abuser, leading to his drowning. 

Subtle

[Mr. Wilson]

 

[The Heartical Don]

What's intersting, and what I had forgotten in the many years since I'd last read that article, is that Stan yells at Dennis for wanting to LEAVE the band...like, "Oh great, now you're quitting on us! You quitter!"  And Al's remark is also apparently in response to Dennis' threat to leaave...like, "OK fine, you wanna leave? Well go ahead, we can do this without you."  (note, these are deliberate paraphrases on my part, not deliberate misquotes)

Well...I think it's pretty obvious what is going on here is that Dennis and Carl are suddenly being outvoted on everything. The Wilson's (first Murry...then BW, CW, DW) had basically been in control of the Beach Boys business and creative choices since the beginning. CW/DW had been relatively in control since Brian stopped caring ('68ish). That's not to say that the others didn't have input, they had plenty...but when it came down to the bottom line it was always the Wilsons in control. It was at this point (mid '77) that instead of deferring to his brothers Brian's vote was essentially given to Mike (reportedly by Marilyn). I was told by both Schilling and Guercio that Dennis and Carl felt their only leverage was to either adhere to the Love's control or threaten to leave the group unless the balance of power was restored to the Wilson bros. or at least a 50/50 type split. But they were suddenly getting overruled 3 to 2 on everything. And when they said this is not acceptable to their surprise they were told..."Go ahead and quit, we'll replace you...no problem." And it's Brian's lack of action on their part that Carl alludes to as the underlying problem.

Carl's quote...
Carl replied, "He (Dennis) knew more about it than I did. When I found out what he knew, I realized it was over. I can't tell you exactly why because of legal problems. But when I heard about what they were planning to do, the replacements they were planning to bring in for us. I heard Buddy Miles mentioned as a possible replacement for Dennis, and I suppose they felt they didn't need to replace me with another guitarist. Brian could have realized what was going on and done something about it." He didn't elaborate, but since all of the band's decisions are made by a five-man vote, he may have been referring to Brian's swing vote. It really didn't seem as though they were heading for their last concert. I asked Carl if he felt anything. special. "I feel incredibly sad," he said, Shaking his head. "My heart is broken."

I honestly think that in Aug/Sept '77 Carl and Dennis felt that the Love camp had in a sense kidnapped their brother and as long as they had him in their "possession" they didn't need the other Wilsons to hold on to the Beach Boys mantle. This was an incredible shock to the brothers. As time went on they took two different approaches to handling the fact that things would never be the same. Carl at first went off the rails, then he cleaned up, left the group, went solo, came back and went with the flow from there on. Dennis resisted as much as possible, went off the rails and never really came back. By '79 he was essentially done fighting for the upper hand ...but he needed a job so he hung in there as a drummer, for awhile, sometimes.

So basically this gave Dennis the ammo he needed to destroy himself.

It's really too bad he wasn't just a little more together, or he could have just left and had a solo career. He was completely wasting his time with the Beach Boys anyway. Brian was too messed up at that point to do much as an artist and the rest of the guys were not prolific songwriters. He needed to just quit the band, but of course he wanted to live a self-indulgent rock star lifestyle.

I think it is questionable whether he really wanted to live a self-indulgent rock star lifestyle. 'Wanting' implies a deliberate choice of the one over the other (or several others). My idea is that Dennis' was enormously troubled by his childhood; it's not too much to call that childhood traumatic. People who are traumatized need to come to terms with what happened; to grief and mourn over that, and to accept it as part of their life, eventually. I would say that goes for all three Wilson brothers, in fact. And I doubt whether Denny ever was able to do that.

And he had been an addict, from a fairly young age onwards, if I am to believe the stories. Perhaps he had what we now call ADHD, that was not really diagnosed way back then. He was a poly-drug user, IIRC chain-smoking, drinking, and later also cocaine and even heroin.

With what we know nowadays about addiction: he had much less of a choice that is commonly assumed in these matters. Longterm addicts have several changes in their brains, changes that may last very long, for years, even in longtime abstinence (hence the considerable risk for relapse in addicts who abstain). These changes have nothing to do with the bad effects of physical withdrawal. The latter can, with proper help, be achieved in a week (mostly a sedative is given for a week, to quench those bad effects and the general sickness of it).

The changes I mean occur in the so-called 'reward centers' in the brain; areas where drugs (but also food and sex) cause an increase in levels of the messenger molecule dopamine.

But recent findings go further: in our 'prefrontal cortex' there are also changes, serious ones. These occur in areas that deal with: estimating what outcome our actions will have, predicting what kinds of pleasure/reward we may expect from actions, and also: estimating what risks are involved in the things we plan to do. There is more, but this will suffice here.

Longtime addicts have developed this problem: in them, in that prefrontal cortex, a balance has been seriously disturbed. It is the balance that is necessary to choose between short-term and long-term gratification (reward). Short-term gratification is grossly overvalued (even if the actual reward is not that big); and the addict has a very hard time to form a picture of what kind of satisfaction long-term gratification will bring (e.g. doing an oil painting, or working hard at a loving and lasting relationship).

That is why the best experts in the field nowadays make a strong case for calling addiction: a serious illness, and absolutely are against moralizing in terms of: the addict lacks character, will power, is weak (and so on and so forth). And that is why they also are against criminalising the use of drugs (although addicts may resort to transgressions to procure drugs).

In brief: the addict's choices are much more limited than we may think; he or she lacks the capacity to even make a balanced choice.

What could Denny have done, then? He would have had to accept the gravity of his situation; and then surrender totally to the care and control of an expert team of doctors and therapists. In a clinic, on a 24/7 basis, for a long time.

(...and I don't mean the Landy way of treatment).

Perhaps he simply was not able any more to do just that.

Kurosawa, please don't see this as any harsh criticism. I just wanted to add some insights that I recently came across in my studies.

And to all: if I made factual errors, you are invited to rectify these, needless to say.

[Autotune]

What's intersting, and what I had forgotten in the many years since I'd last read that article, is that Stan yells at Dennis for wanting to LEAVE the band...like, "Oh great, now you're quitting on us! You quitter!"  And Al's remark is also apparently in response to Dennis' threat to leaave...like, "OK fine, you wanna leave? Well go ahead, we can do this without you."  (note, these are deliberate paraphrases on my part, not deliberate misquotes)

Well...I think it's pretty obvious what is going on here is that Dennis and Carl are suddenly being outvoted on everything. The Wilson's (first Murry...then BW, CW, DW) had basically been in control of the Beach Boys business and creative choices since the beginning. CW/DW had been relatively in control since Brian stopped caring ('68ish). That's not to say that the others didn't have input, they had plenty...but when it came down to the bottom line it was always the Wilsons in control. It was at this point (mid '77) that instead of deferring to his brothers Brian's vote was essentially given to Mike (reportedly by Marilyn). I was told by both Schilling and Guercio that Dennis and Carl felt their only leverage was to either adhere to the Love's control or threaten to leave the group unless the balance of power was restored to the Wilson bros. or at least a 50/50 type split. But they were suddenly getting overruled 3 to 2 on everything. And when they said this is not acceptable to their surprise they were told..."Go ahead and quit, we'll replace you...no problem." And it's Brian's lack of action on their part that Carl alludes to as the underlying problem.

Carl's quote...
Carl replied, "He (Dennis) knew more about it than I did. When I found out what he knew, I realized it was over. I can't tell you exactly why because of legal problems. But when I heard about what they were planning to do, the replacements they were planning to bring in for us. I heard Buddy Miles mentioned as a possible replacement for Dennis, and I suppose they felt they didn't need to replace me with another guitarist. Brian could have realized what was going on and done something about it." He didn't elaborate, but since all of the band's decisions are made by a five-man vote, he may have been referring to Brian's swing vote. It really didn't seem as though they were heading for their last concert. I asked Carl if he felt anything. special. "I feel incredibly sad," he said, Shaking his head. "My heart is broken."

I honestly think that in Aug/Sept '77 Carl and Dennis felt that the Love camp had in a sense kidnapped their brother and as long as they had him in their "possession" they didn't need the other Wilsons to hold on to the Beach Boys mantle. This was an incredible shock to the brothers. As time went on they took two different approaches to handling the fact that things would never be the same. Carl at first went off the rails, then he cleaned up, left the group, went solo, came back and went with the flow from there on. Dennis resisted as much as possible, went off the rails and never really came back. By '79 he was essentially done fighting for the upper hand ...but he needed a job so he hung in there as a drummer, for awhile, sometimes.

Jon, even if this explains Carl's and Dennis' attitude at the time, how does this explain Carl's "go with the flow" attitude of later times? ... Unless the explanation is that he did not want to fight. Wasn't the political situation inside the band totally different? Wasn't the Mike-Al camp weaker or non-extant by the mid 80s? And wasn't Brian pursuing an agenda of his own (or Landy's, who had no trouble antagonizing the rest of the world)? Wasn't the 1985 album Carl's baby in a way?

Anyway, my take is that if this tarmac episode explains the attitudes Carl and Dennis took, this does so for a limited term. It is not entirely clear to me how the ramifications of this era of family bitterness (including a number of "family secrets" being unveiled, like the fact that Brian let Dennis into the band only at Audrey's request) remained 10 years later or so.

[Jon Stebbins]

What's intersting, and what I had forgotten in the many years since I'd last read that article, is that Stan yells at Dennis for wanting to LEAVE the band...like, "Oh great, now you're quitting on us! You quitter!"  And Al's remark is also apparently in response to Dennis' threat to leaave...like, "OK fine, you wanna leave? Well go ahead, we can do this without you."  (note, these are deliberate paraphrases on my part, not deliberate misquotes)

Well...I think it's pretty obvious what is going on here is that Dennis and Carl are suddenly being outvoted on everything. The Wilson's (first Murry...then BW, CW, DW) had basically been in control of the Beach Boys business and creative choices since the beginning. CW/DW had been relatively in control since Brian stopped caring ('68ish). That's not to say that the others didn't have input, they had plenty...but when it came down to the bottom line it was always the Wilsons in control. It was at this point (mid '77) that instead of deferring to his brothers Brian's vote was essentially given to Mike (reportedly by Marilyn). I was told by both Schilling and Guercio that Dennis and Carl felt their only leverage was to either adhere to the Love's control or threaten to leave the group unless the balance of power was restored to the Wilson bros. or at least a 50/50 type split. But they were suddenly getting overruled 3 to 2 on everything. And when they said this is not acceptable to their surprise they were told..."Go ahead and quit, we'll replace you...no problem." And it's Brian's lack of action on their part that Carl alludes to as the underlying problem.

Carl's quote...
Carl replied, "He (Dennis) knew more about it than I did. When I found out what he knew, I realized it was over. I can't tell you exactly why because of legal problems. But when I heard about what they were planning to do, the replacements they were planning to bring in for us. I heard Buddy Miles mentioned as a possible replacement for Dennis, and I suppose they felt they didn't need to replace me with another guitarist. Brian could have realized what was going on and done something about it." He didn't elaborate, but since all of the band's decisions are made by a five-man vote, he may have been referring to Brian's swing vote. It really didn't seem as though they were heading for their last concert. I asked Carl if he felt anything. special. "I feel incredibly sad," he said, Shaking his head. "My heart is broken."

I honestly think that in Aug/Sept '77 Carl and Dennis felt that the Love camp had in a sense kidnapped their brother and as long as they had him in their "possession" they didn't need the other Wilsons to hold on to the Beach Boys mantle. This was an incredible shock to the brothers. As time went on they took two different approaches to handling the fact that things would never be the same. Carl at first went off the rails, then he cleaned up, left the group, went solo, came back and went with the flow from there on. Dennis resisted as much as possible, went off the rails and never really came back. By '79 he was essentially done fighting for the upper hand ...but he needed a job so he hung in there as a drummer, for awhile, sometimes.

Jon, even if this explains Carl's and Dennis' attitude at the time, how does this explain Carl's "go with the flow" attitude of later times? ... Unless the explanation is that he did not want to fight. Wasn't the political situation inside the band totally different? Wasn't the Mike-Al camp weaker or non-extant by the mid 80s? And wasn't Brian pursuing an agenda of his own (or Landy's, who had no trouble antagonizing the rest of the world)? Wasn't the 1985 album Carl's baby in a way?

Anyway, my take is that if this tarmac episode explains the attitudes Carl and Dennis took, this does so for a limited term. It is not entirely clear to me how the ramifications of this era of family bitterness (including a number of "family secrets" being unveiled, like the fact that Brian let Dennis into the band only at Audrey's request) remained 10 years later or so.

It's just a fork in the road that marks the point when the Wilsons lost the dominant hand they'd enjoyed from the band's beginning through the mid '70's.

[SMiLE Brian]

The fans could also tell from the stage show becoming tacky with ML's gimmicks  from 1978-1998.

[Foster's Freeze]

So, this has sat for a while but I've been waiting to hear if there has been any word from the Jim Guercio camp regarding the POB tour rehearsal tapes?

[Jon Stebbins]

So, this has sat for a while but I've been waiting to hear if there has been any word from the Jim Guercio camp regarding the POB tour rehearsal tapes?

No

[Foster's Freeze]

So, this has sat for a while but I've been waiting to hear if there has been any word from the Jim Guercio camp regarding the POB tour rehearsal tapes?

No

Jon I was going to ask you what you thought the chance are that we will ever see their release but that's unfair to you.

I'll just keep my fingers crossed.

Thanks for the update!

[Jon Stebbins]

So, this has sat for a while but I've been waiting to hear if there has been any word from the Jim Guercio camp regarding the POB tour rehearsal tapes?

No

Jon I was going to ask you what you thought the chance are that we will ever see their release but that's unfair to you.

I'll just keep my fingers crossed.

Thanks for the update!

I haven't talked to Jimmy Guercio in a good while so it's hard to gauge his current interest in a new DW package. I know there is a Caribou film project he's focused on among other things. I also know he loves Dennis' material and would like to see it get it's due. But I can relate to having too many projects in the queue, and I think that's probably the case right now.

[Kurosawa]

What's intersting, and what I had forgotten in the many years since I'd last read that article, is that Stan yells at Dennis for wanting to LEAVE the band...like, "Oh great, now you're quitting on us! You quitter!"  And Al's remark is also apparently in response to Dennis' threat to leaave...like, "OK fine, you wanna leave? Well go ahead, we can do this without you."  (note, these are deliberate paraphrases on my part, not deliberate misquotes)

Well...I think it's pretty obvious what is going on here is that Dennis and Carl are suddenly being outvoted on everything. The Wilson's (first Murry...then BW, CW, DW) had basically been in control of the Beach Boys business and creative choices since the beginning. CW/DW had been relatively in control since Brian stopped caring ('68ish). That's not to say that the others didn't have input, they had plenty...but when it came down to the bottom line it was always the Wilsons in control. It was at this point (mid '77) that instead of deferring to his brothers Brian's vote was essentially given to Mike (reportedly by Marilyn). I was told by both Schilling and Guercio that Dennis and Carl felt their only leverage was to either adhere to the Love's control or threaten to leave the group unless the balance of power was restored to the Wilson bros. or at least a 50/50 type split. But they were suddenly getting overruled 3 to 2 on everything. And when they said this is not acceptable to their surprise they were told..."Go ahead and quit, we'll replace you...no problem." And it's Brian's lack of action on their part that Carl alludes to as the underlying problem.

Carl's quote...
Carl replied, "He (Dennis) knew more about it than I did. When I found out what he knew, I realized it was over. I can't tell you exactly why because of legal problems. But when I heard about what they were planning to do, the replacements they were planning to bring in for us. I heard Buddy Miles mentioned as a possible replacement for Dennis, and I suppose they felt they didn't need to replace me with another guitarist. Brian could have realized what was going on and done something about it." He didn't elaborate, but since all of the band's decisions are made by a five-man vote, he may have been referring to Brian's swing vote. It really didn't seem as though they were heading for their last concert. I asked Carl if he felt anything. special. "I feel incredibly sad," he said, Shaking his head. "My heart is broken."

I honestly think that in Aug/Sept '77 Carl and Dennis felt that the Love camp had in a sense kidnapped their brother and as long as they had him in their "possession" they didn't need the other Wilsons to hold on to the Beach Boys mantle. This was an incredible shock to the brothers. As time went on they took two different approaches to handling the fact that things would never be the same. Carl at first went off the rails, then he cleaned up, left the group, went solo, came back and went with the flow from there on. Dennis resisted as much as possible, went off the rails and never really came back. By '79 he was essentially done fighting for the upper hand ...but he needed a job so he hung in there as a drummer, for awhile, sometimes.

So basically this gave Dennis the ammo he needed to destroy himself.

It's really too bad he wasn't just a little more together, or he could have just left and had a solo career. He was completely wasting his time with the Beach Boys anyway. Brian was too messed up at that point to do much as an artist and the rest of the guys were not prolific songwriters. He needed to just quit the band, but of course he wanted to live a self-indulgent rock star lifestyle.

I think it is questionable whether he really wanted to live a self-indulgent rock star lifestyle. 'Wanting' implies a deliberate choice of the one over the other (or several others). My idea is that Dennis' was enormously troubled by his childhood; it's not too much to call that childhood traumatic. People who are traumatized need to come to terms with what happened; to grief and mourn over that, and to accept it as part of their life, eventually. I would say that goes for all three Wilson brothers, in fact. And I doubt whether Denny ever was able to do that.

And he had been an addict, from a fairly young age onwards, if I am to believe the stories. Perhaps he had what we now call ADHD, that was not really diagnosed way back then. He was a poly-drug user, IIRC chain-smoking, drinking, and later also cocaine and even heroin.

With what we know nowadays about addiction: he had much less of a choice that is commonly assumed in these matters. Longterm addicts have several changes in their brains, changes that may last very long, for years, even in longtime abstinence (hence the considerable risk for relapse in addicts who abstain). These changes have nothing to do with the bad effects of physical withdrawal. The latter can, with proper help, be achieved in a week (mostly a sedative is given for a week, to quench those bad effects and the general sickness of it).

The changes I mean occur in the so-called 'reward centers' in the brain; areas where drugs (but also food and sex) cause an increase in levels of the messenger molecule dopamine.

But recent findings go further: in our 'prefrontal cortex' there are also changes, serious ones. These occur in areas that deal with: estimating what outcome our actions will have, predicting what kinds of pleasure/reward we may expect from actions, and also: estimating what risks are involved in the things we plan to do. There is more, but this will suffice here.

Longtime addicts have developed this problem: in them, in that prefrontal cortex, a balance has been seriously disturbed. It is the balance that is necessary to choose between short-term and long-term gratification (reward). Short-term gratification is grossly overvalued (even if the actual reward is not that big); and the addict has a very hard time to form a picture of what kind of satisfaction long-term gratification will bring (e.g. doing an oil painting, or working hard at a loving and lasting relationship).

That is why the best experts in the field nowadays make a strong case for calling addiction: a serious illness, and absolutely are against moralizing in terms of: the addict lacks character, will power, is weak (and so on and so forth). And that is why they also are against criminalising the use of drugs (although addicts may resort to transgressions to procure drugs).

In brief: the addict's choices are much more limited than we may think; he or she lacks the capacity to even make a balanced choice.

What could Denny have done, then? He would have had to accept the gravity of his situation; and then surrender totally to the care and control of an expert team of doctors and therapists. In a clinic, on a 24/7 basis, for a long time.

(...and I don't mean the Landy way of treatment).

Perhaps he simply was not able any more to do just that.

Kurosawa, please don't see this as any harsh criticism. I just wanted to add some insights that I recently came across in my studies.

And to all: if I made factual errors, you are invited to rectify these, needless to say.

Old post and I don't know how I missed it, but no, I do not take your response as criticism, harsh or otherwise and I would agree with your assessment. My statement was in error.  I do understand that a lot of Denny's self-destructive behavior was due to addictions beyond his control; if he hadn't drowned in 1983, I seriously doubt he would have survived the 80's without major changes in his life. And those changes are ones that I highly doubt could have ever come.

[alanjames]

So, this has sat for a while but I've been waiting to hear if there has been any word from the Jim Guercio camp regarding the POB tour rehearsal tapes?

No

Jon I was going to ask you what you thought the chance are that we will ever see their release but that's unfair to you.

I'll just keep my fingers crossed.

Thanks for the update!

I haven't talked to Jimmy Guercio in a good while so it's hard to gauge his current interest in a new DW package. I know there is a Caribou film project he's focused on among other things. I also know he loves Dennis' material and would like to see it get it's due. But I can relate to having too many projects in the queue, and I think that's probably the case right now.

He can give a license to Rhino, Sundazed or another label to take care of it and make some Dennis's relesses with The POB rehearsal tapes and studio material. If any label would do it, it would be great to see it.

[KittyKat]

Collector's Choice Music might be an option, too. They do over 50 re-releases a year. They say they listen to customer requests, so people who want to hear this can e-mail Collector's Choice and make them aware it exists and maybe they can figure out how to get it out.

[SloopJohnnyB]

Although it would truly be a limited edition collection I'd like to see Rhino Handmade take on the job. They would give the music, notes and packaging some justice. Always a great job by those guys and girls who put those releases together. Maybe the next step is a complete collected works by Dennis including those live rehearsal tracks. I'll bet Rhino Handmade would be glad to take that on with Jim Guercio's approval. They did the Chicago LIVE in'75 box, didn't they?