Fans from the pre-"Pet Sounds" era?

[shelter]

Are there any people here who were already Beach Boys fans before (or around the time that) "Pet Sounds" came out? I was born in the week that "MIU Album" was released so I obviously missed the most interesting years...

I'd like to know how the long time fans personally experienced the stages that The Beach Boys went through. Like: what was your first impression of "Pet Sounds" when it came out? What where your expectations of "Smile" when Brian was still working on it? Did it worry you that it took Brian so long to finish the follow-up to "Pet Sounds"? What did you think was going to happen after "Smile" got shelved? Did it bother you when everything that the group released in the late 60s and early 70s flopped? Did you think they would ever make a comeback? And so on...

Looking forward to reading how it was to be a Beach Boys in the mid- to late 60s...

[Jon Stebbins]

I guess I meet your criteria about as well as someone who is 50 years old can. I had teenage sisters in the house when i was 5 or 6, and that's when I became aware of the Beach Boys...1962/63. I heard the Surfin Safari single on the radio, i remember that clearly. Even more clearly I remember my sister bringing home two new LP's in 1963 Freewheelin' Bob Dylan and Surfin U.S.A. I remember what it was like when the Beach Boys were the hugest rock band in the U.S. and the Beatles were unknown. The Surfin U.S.A. LP was a giant hit, nearly every teen in my neighborhood had it or wanted it. The next few BB's LP's came out so rapidly they didn't make as big an impression. Surfer Girl was on the radio a lot...but not like Surfin U.S.A. By the time Fun Fun Fun hit...which was pretty huge too...the Beatles had arrived and they pretty much obscured everything until All Summer Long and I Get Around. ASL was everywhere, I Get Around was Giant. It really competed equally with the Beatles. The '64 Concert LP was also massive...As a first and second grader I probably played the ASL LP and the "64 Concert LP as often as I did the four or five Beatles LPs that I owned. Those '65 singles that followed Dance Dance Dance, Do You Wanna Dance, When I Grow Up, Help Me Rhonda were very big and got big airplay in the S.F. Bay Area where I lived, but the British Invasion and upcoming U.S. bands (Byrds, Spoonful, Mamas and Papas) really made the Beach Boys seem more average in their stature. '63 and '64 were really the BB's years...'65 wasn't. Cal Girls was another big one but the competition was so immense. Not as many people bought those '65 LP's, you just didn't see them as often in people's houses like you did with ASL and Concert. Barbara Ann was a novelty...nobody seemed to take it seriously. By early '66 hearing new Beach Boys singles on the radio was kind of a rarity in my area, Wouldn't It Be Nice was there but not that big really, God Only Knows even rarer to hear. Good Vibrations was HUGE, but it seemed like a different band, and in a way it seemed like a one off. There was no follow up, no momentum created for their stature. Pet Sounds...only a few people i know had it, and it was really the last new BB's LP that you'd see in friend's houses. They had definitely dropped off in popularity...it was obvious. Nobody in my world knew anything about Smile. That was off the radar entirely. Really the next time the B's came onto the radar in my world was I Can Hear Music and that was very minor. The late '60's and early '70's LP's were more of a cult thing. You did see the BB's getting hipper bookings, appearing in ads for the Fillmore and doing festivals. The hippier image registered with me but i didn't digest that period's music until later in the '70's. Sail On Sailor got a lot of FM radio play in the S.F. Bay Area, and California got a bit too. I went to my first BB's concert in 1975 when I was 17. I was a GIANT fan and bought absolutely every scrap on vinyl i could find. saw them again in '76, met Dennis in '78, met Mike and Bruce and Brian in '79 etc... started writing about them in 97.

[JimC1702]

My story is quite similar to Jon's.   I have a brother four years older than me, and he bought each Beach Boys album as it came out and played them a LOT.  So I got used to all the songs and not just the ones that got radio play.  Of course, as a young boy, the car stuff was appealling and the southern California surfing stuff was new and exciting  to a kid from upstate NY.

Pet Sounds was definitely a larger departure from the car/surf sound than anything released previously, but it had pleasant tunes on it (Wouldn't It Be Nice?).  We didn't realize at the time how ground breaking it really was.    I do remember talk of Smile at the time.   At that time, I reallly migrated to The Beatles and put the Beach Boys and Jan & Dean on the shelf.  I think Wild Honey was the last album that we bought and we were uneasy about where the group was headed.  I'm not sure if I realized at the time that Smiley Smile was something totally different than Smile was supposed to be.  I think it was Carl who said "Montery changed it all".  After the Monterey Pop Festival music changed and Beach Boys no longer were part of the scene.

Then for many years, it was mostly nostalgia, picking up Endless Summer and Spirit of America.   I saw the Beach Boys live around '76 or '77 and again in the 90's.   I also bought the Good Vibrations box set.

When BW '88 came out, it renewed my interest.  I had just gotten into CDs and replacing a lot of LPs with CDs.  I pcked up all the "two 'fers" and that was the first I heard most of the later Beach Boys music.  I became a rabid Brian Wilson fan through the mid to late 90's and picked up each of his CDs.   I read "Wouldn't It Be Nice", watched "An American Band"  and anything else that came out about the Beach Boys.  Now I enjoy the later music and probably listen to it more than the oldies.

I anxiously awaited Smile 2004 and went and saw it live.  I continue to listen to Brian/Beach Boys music more than any other.

Sorry if some thing are jumbled up, I'm doing this while I'm supposed to be working.

[gxios]

I grew up on the east coast, and my first memory of the Beach Boys is hearing the Surfin USA 45.  I don't remember Surfin Safari on the radio at all.  By the summer of 1963 I remember Little Deuce Coupe getting more airplay than Surfer Girl- and I thought they were singing "Little Loose Goose" through my little radio.  I was only casually attentive to the band at that time since I didn't buy that many 45's then but I listened to the radio constantly, so my memory of most of the chart records from those days is vivid.  I liked Be True To Your School and really liked Little Saint Nick.  By Fun Fun Fun I was more into the Beatles, but I Get Around was a monster hit and everyone liked that one.  The summer of '64 was the best- great new tunes pouring out of the radio daily. The first Beach Boys 45 I actually bought was California Girls- I couldn't get enough of that one.  In contrast to Jon above, I probably heard and saw the 1965 albums more than the 1964's.  Teenage girls had portable players by then and I could request stuff-  they all had records and were happy to play them for you (and dance a little which was a nice extra). I liked the Little Girl I once Knew single but it disappeared too fast- I never knew why.  Barbara Ann was huge in my 6th grade class-  it was one all the boys liked.  Sloop John B was a bit of a letdown for me- I had a version of it by Jimmy Rodgers from 1959 so it didn't have any novelty.  The Pet Sounds album was a bit mysterious  to me-  I heard things about it-  there was some kind of buzz around that I paid little attention to.  I bought the Wouldn't It Be Nice single and played the hell out of it- but I still didn't buy the album.  I actually didn't hear the whole thing 'till the fall of 1967 when my first girlfriend (who had got hers at a school dance as a giveaway) played it for me.  I liked it a lot.  I read a lot about Smile in the teen magazines and waited for Heroes and Villains as impatiently as I waited for Sgt Pepper- and I still play the hell out of that original 45 today.

[NHC]

Been a fan since the beginning, or within a year, maybe. That was a golden time, growing up in (Northern) California with the Boys in my eyes and ears.  So much so that my car CD the past few days has been LDC/ASL.  I can only think of one song except for perhaps some of the filler on Surfin Safari  which I don't necessarily dislike but basically ignore, that i truly did not like over the first 12 albums through Pet Sounds (and even that one I've grown to tolerate - You're So Good To Me, or whatever it is).  The music, the words, all of it. Younger people who object to the lyrics didn't live in that time and maybe just don't get it that those songs were exactly what was going on in our lives - cars, the beach, sports, school, romance, the whole deal.  They absolutely nailed it and the music is beautiful.

After PS, its a mixed bag.  Wild Honey, Friends, 20/20, Sunflower - all good.  Smiley Smile - except for the obvious two, unlistenable for me.  Surf's Up, pretty good.  CATPST, well, maybe one or two, the upbeat spiritual ones.  Holland, I wish they'd ditched Steamboat for We Got Love, junked Funky Pretty, and Trader I can do without.  15BO, I like it.  Love You, OK,  LA, all good. MIU, OK (I know, I know). KTSA, 50-50.  So for me, the 60's was where it was at but the next decade had some high points too.  47 years later, can't live without them.

[Jeff]

Younger people who object to the lyrics didn't live in that time and maybe just don't get it that those songs were exactly what was going on in our lives - cars, the beach, sports, school, romance, the whole deal.  They absolutely nailed it and the music is beautiful.

It's not just "younger people" that dislike the pre-Pet Sounds lyrics.  My parents were already in their 20s at that point, and they have always had a hard time liking the Beach Boys because of the words.  The thing is, the Beach Boys themselves didn't even believe in those lyrics, because they weren't surfers (except Dennis) and weren't drag racers.  They may have captured the spirit of the times for a few people, but for many others, the lyrics are ridiculous.  I'm sorry, but you can't just represent your entire generation as approving of the surf and summer fun BS.

I guess it depends on whether you thought of 1962-65 as the 50s or the 60s.  Most of the people I knew who were around during that time thought of it as the 60s, and thus they don't like the BB then-attempt to throw things back to an earlier, very simplistic time.

[NHC]

Younger people who object to the lyrics didn't live in that time and maybe just don't get it that those songs were exactly what was going on in our lives - cars, the beach, sports, school, romance, the whole deal.  They absolutely nailed it and the music is beautiful.

It's not just "younger people" that dislike the pre-Pet Sounds lyrics.  My parents were already in their 20s at that point, and they have always had a hard time liking the Beach Boys because of the words.  The thing is, the Beach Boys themselves didn't even believe in those lyrics, because they weren't surfers (except Dennis) and weren't drag racers.  They may have captured the spirit of the times for a few people, but for many others, the lyrics are ridiculous.  I'm sorry, but you can't just represent your entire generation as approving of the surf and summer fun BS.

I guess it depends on whether you thought of 1962-65 as the 50s or the 60s.  Most of the people I knew who were around during that time thought of it as the 60s, and thus they don't like the BB then-attempt to throw things back to an earlier, very simplistic time.

It wasn't my intention to speak for an entire generation. Of course some people didn't like them then or feel any connection.  I was talking about myself and those of us who loved the Beach Boys sound for the reasons i stated above, which are authentic, plus my own observations from first hand experience and anecdotal history why a lot of later fans didn't care for them.  i lived in the 60's, from the Beach Boys to the Byrds to the Beatles to Butterfield to the Doors to Creedence, Cream, Santana et. al.  and so i don't need any instruction from those who didn't.  Yes, I confess I preferred a simpler time, not the crap that came by the end of the decade.  My brother in law had no use for the Beach Boys for the same reason as your folks.  So what and who the hell cares.   And so what if they didn't "believe" in the lyrics, whatever that means, assuming its true in the first place. Look, I answered a question from my perspective, not anyone else's, and I'm sorry i didn't meet somebody's approval. The lyrics are fine. 

[MBE]

NHC thanks for writing what you think. Personally if I like something how others percieve it means nothing to me. People that can't get into the fun of rock and roll music from the fifties and the early to mid sixties are in my view really missing out. I got a lot of crap growing up in the 80's liking Elvis but hell most people my age that I know came around.

[buddhahat]

I guess I meet your criteria about as well as someone who is 50 years old can. I had teenage sisters in the house when i was 5 or 6, and that's when I became aware of the Beach Boys...1962/63. I heard the Surfin Safari single on the radio, i remember that clearly. Even more clearly I remember my sister bringing home two new LP's in 1963 Freewheelin' Bob Dylan and Surfin U.S.A. I remember what it was like when the Beach Boys were the hugest rock band in the U.S. and the Beatles were unknown. The Surfin U.S.A. LP was a giant hit, nearly every teen in my neighborhood had it or wanted it. The next few BB's LP's came out so rapidly they didn't make as big an impression. Surfer Girl was on the radio a lot...but not like Surfin U.S.A. By the time Fun Fun Fun hit...which was pretty huge too...the Beatles had arrived and they pretty much obscured everything until All Summer Long and I Get Around. ASL was everywhere, I Get Around was Giant. It really competed equally with the Beatles. The '64 Concert LP was also massive...As a first and second grader I probably played the ASL LP and the "64 Concert LP as often as I did the four or five Beatles LPs that I owned. Those '65 singles that followed Dance Dance Dance, Do You Wanna Dance, When I Grow Up, Help Me Rhonda were very big and got big airplay in the S.F. Bay Area where I lived, but the British Invasion and upcoming U.S. bands (Byrds, Spoonful, Mamas and Papas) really made the Beach Boys seem more average in their stature. '63 and '64 were really the BB's years...'65 wasn't. Cal Girls was another big one but the competition was so immense. Not as many people bought those '65 LP's, you just didn't see them as often in people's houses like you did with ASL and Concert. Barbara Ann was a novelty...nobody seemed to take it seriously. By early '66 hearing new Beach Boys singles on the radio was kind of a rarity in my area, Wouldn't It Be Nice was there but not that big really, God Only Knows even rarer to hear. Good Vibrations was HUGE, but it seemed like a different band, and in a way it seemed like a one off. There was no follow up, no momentum created for their stature. Pet Sounds...only a few people i know had it, and it was really the last new BB's LP that you'd see in friend's houses. They had definitely dropped off in popularity...it was obvious. Nobody in my world knew anything about Smile. That was off the radar entirely. Really the next time the B's came onto the radar in my world was I Can Hear Music and that was very minor. The late '60's and early '70's LP's were more of a cult thing. You did see the BB's getting hipper bookings, appearing in ads for the Fillmore and doing festivals. The hippier image registered with me but i didn't digest that period's music until later in the '70's. Sail On Sailor got a lot of FM radio play in the S.F. Bay Area, and California got a bit too. I went to my first BB's concert in 1975 when I was 17. I was a GIANT fan and bought absolutely every scrap on vinyl i could find. saw them again in '76, met Dennis in '78, met Mike and Bruce and Brian in '79 etc... started writing about them in 97.

Really interesting to read about the Beach Boys' arc of popularity from someone who was actually there at the time and buying (or not buying) the records. Thanks for that. It's strange to think their popularity was waning even before Pet Sounds was released, but in the face of all that competition I can appreciate why. The pressure on Brian to stay 'hip' must have been immense. Your point about Good Vibrations sounding like it was by a different band - a one off - was particularly interesting.

[TdHabib]

NHC thanks for writing what you think. Personally if I like something how others percieve it means nothing to me. People that can't get into the fun of rock and roll music from the fifties and the early to mid sixties are in my view really missing out. I got a lot of crap growing up in the 80's liking Elvis but hell most people my age that I know came around.

I agree, and I used to get a lot of crap for being a Macca fan. He's still my favorite even though I've heard a million cut downs of him.

[Jon Stebbins]

I guess I meet your criteria about as well as someone who is 50 years old can. I had teenage sisters in the house when i was 5 or 6, and that's when I became aware of the Beach Boys...1962/63. I heard the Surfin Safari single on the radio, i remember that clearly. Even more clearly I remember my sister bringing home two new LP's in 1963 Freewheelin' Bob Dylan and Surfin U.S.A. I remember what it was like when the Beach Boys were the hugest rock band in the U.S. and the Beatles were unknown. The Surfin U.S.A. LP was a giant hit, nearly every teen in my neighborhood had it or wanted it. The next few BB's LP's came out so rapidly they didn't make as big an impression. Surfer Girl was on the radio a lot...but not like Surfin U.S.A. By the time Fun Fun Fun hit...which was pretty huge too...the Beatles had arrived and they pretty much obscured everything until All Summer Long and I Get Around. ASL was everywhere, I Get Around was Giant. It really competed equally with the Beatles. The '64 Concert LP was also massive...As a first and second grader I probably played the ASL LP and the "64 Concert LP as often as I did the four or five Beatles LPs that I owned. Those '65 singles that followed Dance Dance Dance, Do You Wanna Dance, When I Grow Up, Help Me Rhonda were very big and got big airplay in the S.F. Bay Area where I lived, but the British Invasion and upcoming U.S. bands (Byrds, Spoonful, Mamas and Papas) really made the Beach Boys seem more average in their stature. '63 and '64 were really the BB's years...'65 wasn't. Cal Girls was another big one but the competition was so immense. Not as many people bought those '65 LP's, you just didn't see them as often in people's houses like you did with ASL and Concert. Barbara Ann was a novelty...nobody seemed to take it seriously. By early '66 hearing new Beach Boys singles on the radio was kind of a rarity in my area, Wouldn't It Be Nice was there but not that big really, God Only Knows even rarer to hear. Good Vibrations was HUGE, but it seemed like a different band, and in a way it seemed like a one off. There was no follow up, no momentum created for their stature. Pet Sounds...only a few people i know had it, and it was really the last new BB's LP that you'd see in friend's houses. They had definitely dropped off in popularity...it was obvious. Nobody in my world knew anything about Smile. That was off the radar entirely. Really the next time the B's came onto the radar in my world was I Can Hear Music and that was very minor. The late '60's and early '70's LP's were more of a cult thing. You did see the BB's getting hipper bookings, appearing in ads for the Fillmore and doing festivals. The hippier image registered with me but i didn't digest that period's music until later in the '70's. Sail On Sailor got a lot of FM radio play in the S.F. Bay Area, and California got a bit too. I went to my first BB's concert in 1975 when I was 17. I was a GIANT fan and bought absolutely every scrap on vinyl i could find. saw them again in '76, met Dennis in '78, met Mike and Bruce and Brian in '79 etc... started writing about them in 97.

Really interesting to read about the Beach Boys' arc of popularity from someone who was actually there at the time and buying (or not buying) the records. Thanks for that. It's strange to think their popularity was waning even before Pet Sounds was released, but in the face of all that competition I can appreciate why. The pressure on Brian to stay 'hip' must have been immense. Your point about Good Vibrations sounding like it was by a different band - a one off - was particularly interesting.

You gotta remember that my perception of Good Vibrations was that of a ten year old. I specifically remember riding in my dad's truck and listening to it on the radio and thinking to myself, what a strange strange sound...but I also really dug it. I did think it kind of sounded like the old Beach Boys sound, but it also sounded psychedelic like some Beatles Revolver stuff....then when the DJ said it was the Beach Boys I thought to myself whoa...those guys have freaked out!. It made an impact...but it seemed like a million years from I Get Around...I'd really nearly forgotten about the BB's between Cal. Girls and Good Vibrations...a lot happened musically in that period and I was taking it all in in real time because of my teenage sisters. So in that context Good Vibes seemed like a one off...i hadn't really digested their growth, it was if they had gone from All Summer Long to Smile in one jump...and then they disappeared again. I think that's part of what made me get so deeply into them later, I sensed there was some kind of cataclysmic change in them that probably didn't turn out so well. But in my world, from my point of view they were as big, as famous, as iconic as the Beatles...it was those two bands with the Stones running a distant third. Meeting Dennis Wilson and Brian Wilson was like meeting John Lennon and Paul McCartney for me...what I mean is, I couldn't have been any more thrilled to meet anyone else.

What trips me out is the British perception...they really didn't click with the early stuff in its time, other than I Get Around, it as if just when the people in my world had had enough of the BB's, the British discovered them at the cresting point of their artistic growth. Even though the group's popularity leveled off here...for ''66 and some of '67 they really exploded in the UK. I didn't know that at the time, but I think in a way it extended or solidified their status from an iconic or historical point of view. Its like this, we thought oh..the BB's, yeah they were big in the EARLY '60's, and a little later we found out, well...in a way for a little while they were bigger than the Beatles in the UK in the mid to LATE '60's. Wow. That blew my mind when I learned that little fact, which was probably in '75 or '76. And by addition, adding the fame that I knew and experienced, to the knowledge of the British fame, and then the current resurgence in '75 - '77...all added up it just made them seem even bigger. And...the way their legacy has generally evolved since then has just been erosion in my view. They will never seem bigger than they did in '76, or '64...or '66 I guess if you're a Brit.

[shelter]

Here in the Netherlands the Beach Boys were at their peak in the late 60s too. "I Get Around", "Help Me Rhonda" and  "California Girls" didn't even make the top 25... "Sloop John B" was their first big hit here. But then "Do It Again", "Bluebirds", "I Can Hear Music" and even "Tears In The Morning" were TOP TEN hits... And even "Student Demonstration Time", "You Need A Mess Of Help" and "Marcella" charted pretty high.

[the captain]

I'd love to hear more about people who were early and mid-60s fans but lost interest (although presumably you all regained it sometime, in that you're here now). What did you dislike? Or was it less about disliking, and more about just not hearing anymore (and thus not even really making the decision to like or not)?

[Emdeeh]

My experience is similar to Jon's, although I was the older sibling in my household. I heard the Beach Boys as a new band, each single and album a new, current event. Even tho I was a bit too young to participate in some of the activities the BBs sang about, I could still appreciate that they were singing about the times and what the older kids were doing. I loved the outdoors and could relate to their music that way. I love the mix of rocking guitar and complex vocals in the BB's early sound -- that blend! -- it put the hook in quickly.  Not to mention that the drummer was really, really cute. 

By the time the Beatles came along, I was already a lifetime BB fan, and the best the Fabs could hope for in my personal music pantheon was the no. 2 slot. But, make no mistake about it, the British Invasion shook up the U.S. music charts major league. Listening to the blues filtered through the British bands and Motown, the local rock'n'roll and soul scenes in Memphis, and an NPR station willing to play the blues originals had an enormous influence on my musical tastes.

So Pet Sounds was a something of a disappointment for me when it came out. I liked a couple of songs off of it at the time, nowadays I like half of it. I've come to realize over the years that much of PS is too jazz-oriented for my tastes. I loved "Good Vibrations" and "Heroes & Villains" from the get-go, but got tired of the hype surrounding Smile fairly quickly (Smile OK, hype not). I see PS, like Party, as a "one-off" album in the sense that each one explores different musical territory, same as most BB albums since. I fell in love with Wild Honey on first listen, and it remains my favorite album of all time today. Love those early '70s BB albums too. They didn't get as much airplay (although I certainly did my fair share of calling the request lines and getting tracks played). To me, that's some of the band's best music.

[Emdeeh]

Just wanted to add, my first sense of the BB's resurgence in popularity in the '70s was when I heard In Concert blaring from a college frat house. This from the same guys who showed up at a BB concert during the Holland tour a couple of years earlier (when In Concert was being taped!) and kept screaming for "Barbara Ann" and "Help Me Rhonda" throughout a show chock full of cool rock music. It felt like a sea change comin' on, and that's what it proved to be.