*Merged* Brian Wilson current album thread

[Pinder's Gone To Kokomo And Back Again]

Why wouldn't Mike be able to write a song by himself? Because he probably can. Not a great one, but you don't need to know how to play a musical instrument well to be able to write a song, including chord changes. Mike learned to play the sax at one point (barely), he grew up with a grand piano around the house, had a musical mom, and mentioned in his Ella acceptance speech that he could read the chord charts when they were making the Beach Boys Christmas album. It only takes beginner level skill to be able to know a few simple chords with chord changes/relationships and write a melody. Mike has written small melody parts for "I Get Around, " "Good Vibrations," and "Kokomo." Not the whole song, but a whole song is not a stretch if you can write a part here or there. Where it gets more difficult to write a completed song is setting it out rhythmically so that other players can play it and it will have a proper beat, so he may have gotten some help with that.

Lots of "non instrument playing" singers/people in bands have written songs/received sole songwriting credit throughout music history without any uproar.

Even though Mike (for all we know) doesn't play an instrument, I'd still be willing to bet he's capable of saying "It goes from A to C to D" or whatever

[Gabo]

Chord progressions are part of the arrangement, just like riffs. The melody and words are what count.

[Wirestone]

Chord progressions are part of the arrangement, just like riffs. The melody and words are what count.

Sometimes. But increasingly, riffs and chords and arranging get credited too. There have been some court cases (A Whiter Shade of Pale comes to mind) over this exact point ...

[Awesoman]

Why wouldn't Mike be able to write a song by himself?

Wasn't "Everyone's In Love With You" a sole Michael Love writing credit?  And I believe "Brian's Back", as lyrically malignant as it is, was also only credited to him.

[Dancing Bear]

Melinda Love (his daughter) once told that his dad played "Brian's Back" to her on a guitar. I bet Mike can play all the major, minor and seventh minor chords on the guitar. Probably 70% of his board can too, it's not so amazing.  

I hear that he also likes to write songs using only the vocal melody. If you know what you're doing it's easy. About "Daybreak", my untrained ears tell me the chords are simple, so Mike may have done everything on his own back in the late 70s. "Big Sur" for example seems to have juicier chords.

[HeyJude]

Chord progressions are part of the arrangement, just like riffs. The melody and words are what count.

Disagree, and people who write instrumentals probably would too, especially those without a lead melody.

[Andrew G. Doe]

Why wouldn't Mike be able to write a song by himself?

Wasn't "Everyone's In Love With You" a sole Michael Love writing credit?  And I believe "Brian's Back", as lyrically malignant as it is, was also only credited to him.

"Big Sur" too.

[Mike's Beard]

Mike can play basic guitar and piano and I'm guessing can sing/hum his melody ideas. No reason to doubt his solo credits.

[Ron]

None of them really have the personality (or are selfish enough) to write songs by themselves.  Even Brian.  A guy like Rivers Cuomo can write songs by himself because he's a loner... but Mike Love is a really charismatic guy, he's always got people around, most of them are musicians, and it'd be a lot easier and natural for him to write a song with one of his buddies playing guitar or something.  Same thing with Brian and Scott, or Darian, or whoever he feels comfortable working with.

I think that's Mike's whole thing, he doesn't want to write songs with Brian just to make money, he loves Brian and his best memories of Brian are when they were sitting around writing songs, just the two of them in 1964 or whatever.  Mike's written what, 100 songs he's recorded and never released on anything? 

He's as much of a songwriter as Brian is, just nowhere near as talented.  I'd even say they both have the same artistic intentions.  Brian's just better at it (in pretty much every measurable way). 

Ever since 1965 everybody in Brian's life has wanted him to be like the old Brian, and the old Brian they all have in their head is writing hit records and perpetually recording "California Girls".  I honestly believe Mike's insistence on writing with Brian is he still has it in his head that it would prove Brian's healthy to him.  Meanwhile, 50 years slipped away.

[Pinder's Gone To Kokomo And Back Again]

Why wouldn't Mike be able to write a song by himself?

Wasn't "Everyone's In Love With You" a sole Michael Love writing credit?  And I believe "Brian's Back", as lyrically malignant as it is, was also only credited to him.

"Big Sur" too.

Sumuhama as well.....

[c-man]

Why wouldn't Mike be able to write a song by himself?

Wasn't "Everyone's In Love With You" a sole Michael Love writing credit?  And I believe "Brian's Back", as lyrically malignant as it is, was also only credited to him.

"Big Sur" too.

Sumuhama as well.....

And "Daybreak Over The Ocean". And "Cool Head, Warm Heart". And "Pisces Brothers"?

[rab2591]

A clip from Brian's song with Zooey Deschanel:

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10152548010452241

Sounds great to me!

[HeyJude]

My questioning whether Mike writes his “solo” songwriting credits with no help is just that, simply a question. I will offer the point of logic that multiple songs for which he has a solo songwriting credit doesn’t disprove the *possibility* that they were perhaps actually written with the help of some other musicians, etc. I’m not sure why citing the obvious examples of solo credits is supposed to mean something. That was my whole point. I’m well aware there are songs credited to him alone. That was the evidence in fact that I was using to suggest a possible discrepancy between a songwriting credit and who perhaps should actually get credit.

As to the question of how or if he plays instruments or writes songs completely alone, this is another topic hashed out some time back on this very board and, much like the Stamos discussion in another thread, I already see this slipping back into the same series of contentions from, in some cases, the same series of posters, including myself. We have next to no information on this, especially in the case of many of the solo-credited songs in questions, which haven’t been discussed at length in interviews the way more “famous” songs have.

I’m very interested in the contention that Mike can play guitar and piano and read chord charts. I’ve never heard or seen any reports of this. It would make sense to me that anyone musically inclined in a band like that would pick some of those things up, but I’ve never heard Mike discuss this much either. I find the idea that Mike can write and perform a song 100% on his own on guitar or piano interesting, but I’m skeptical, and I feel some skepticism (not full ignorant doubt) is justified here. If someone can produce a video or audio recording of Mike playing a song from beginning to end on any instrument, I’d love to hear it.

I will offer one anecdote that tells me Mike *appreciates* and can *identify* unique chord changes. The famous circa late 1976 tape of Brian demo-ing “Love You” (and other assorted) material, during which Mike (and perhaps a few others?) are there mostly listening to Brian and occasionally singing along. There is of course the well-known bit where the guys are all (understandably) excited as Brian plays “I’ll Be He’s Nice.” But there’s also an interesting bit when Brian gets to the end of “Let’s Put Our Hearts Together” and plays a nice series of chords changes to end the song. You can hear on the tape that Mike hears this and digs it, and specifically is picking up on the nice chord changes. I wish he had simply kept *that* sensibility over the years, of recognizing great *music*, which this tapes proves he totally is capable of, rather than putting so much emphasis on nostalgic lyrics and what seems “commercial.”

[LostArt]

A clip from Brian's song with Zooey Deschanel:

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10152548010452241

Sounds great to me!

That does sound nice!  A little bossa nova ala Busy Doin' Nothin'.  I'm really looking forward to this album.  Thanks for posting, rab2591.

[HeyJude]

A clip from Brian's song with Zooey Deschanel:

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10152548010452241

Sounds great to me!

Ten seconds makes it a bit difficult to judge much. I’m not particularly digging the Busy Doin’ Nothin’/Bill and Sue vibe that it seems to have. A tropical or bossa nova sort of thing doesn’t interest me. But hopefully a longer clip or full track will yield more interesting results.

[bossaroo]

Brian revisiting the bossa nova sounds great to me. I wonder if he gave Zooey directions to his house? 

[Autotune]

Brian revisiting the bossa nova sounds great to me. I wonder if he gave Zooey directions to his house? 

Appparently yes, as -per Ray Lawlor- she was baby-sat Brian's kids once.

[rab2591]

I'm stoked that it's not a paint-by-numbers BW song. 10 seconds isn't a lot of time to judge, but it's still giving me hope that this album is taking Brian in a new direction.

[Dudd]

Gawsh, that's a tough snippet to form an opinion of - bossa nova perhaps isn't the ideal genre to get me pumped. But it sounds fine and I'm looking forward to hearing the finished track.

[Autotune]

I wish he had simply kept *that* sensibility over the years, of recognizing great *music*, which this tapes proves he totally is capable of, rather than putting so much emphasis on nostalgic lyrics and what seems “commercial.”

That's supercilious to me. To submit that Love lost for the rest of his life the sensibility to chord changes that he apparently shows during 10 seconds of a 1977 audio clip is absurd. There is no contradiction between him being sensitive to Brian's musical ideas and being a sensible soul, and coming up with the music he is able to produce. Reportedly he sobs over Wonderful; and while he is probably unable to produce "sensitive" music on his own (Glow crescent glow and a few others seem to contradict this), he seems capable of appreciating it and responding lyrically when requested. Too bad that for TWGMTR he wasn't submitted more "sensitive" Brian songs to write lyrics to. I'm sure he'd love to. He was presented with Beaches in Mind, instead which posseses none of the qualities Mike is enthusiastic about during said clip.

[HeyJude]

I wish he had simply kept *that* sensibility over the years, of recognizing great *music*, which this tapes proves he totally is capable of, rather than putting so much emphasis on nostalgic lyrics and what seems “commercial.”

That's supercilious to me. To submit that Love lost for the rest of his life the sensibility to chord changes that he apparently shows during 10 seconds of a 1977 audio clip is absurd. There is no contradiction between him being sensitive to Brian's musical ideas and being a sensible soul, and coming up with the music he is able to produce. Reportedly he sobs over Wonderful; and while he is probably unable to produce "sensitive" music on his own (Glow crescent glow and a few others seem to contradict this), he seems capable of appreciating it and responding lyrically when requested. Too bad that for TWGMTR he wasn't submitted more "sensitive" Brian songs to write lyrics to. I'm sure he'd love to. He was presented with Beaches in Mind, instead which posseses none of the qualities Mike is enthusiastic about during said clip.

I have little doubt he can still recognize nice chord changes. The sensibility is still there. But he doesn’t prioritize that sort of musical judgment. It’s more about whatever gimmick will get more notoriety or seem more commercial or nostalgic. It’s the sensibility that leads to spending time during shows where John Stamos *isn’t* there reminding people that he’s buddies with Stamos, rather than spending extra time talking about his own band, or other band members. Look at his comments about “TWGMTR.” He doesn’t even get into whether the music is *good* or not. He’s stuck on *who* co-wrote it. He’s more concerned with having not written the song in a room with Brian than discussing the merits of the song. That “Rolling Stone” article where Mike seems flustered or poopy or whatever about the ending suite to the album; he has to immediately relate it to him and how it doesn’t resonate with him because he didn’t write it.

That’s not the same attitude that the guy on that 1976 tape has. That’s a guy who realizes Brian’s writing good stuff and wants to cheer him on, not discuss why he can’t re-write the lyrics. He’s the guy who is enthusiastic about singing “Airplane”, not trying to tell Brian why he needs to make the lyrics different or better.

[RBennett123]

Brian just posted a little clip of him recording vocals for "On the Island" on his Instagram. Sounds pretty awesome to my ears!!!!

[phirnis]

A clip from Brian's song with Zooey Deschanel:

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10152548010452241

Sounds great to me!

Busy Doin' Nothin' meets Kokomo (= Bill and Sue part 2?)

[Wirestone]

Scott Totten has talked about Mike's love for "Wonderful" -- how he was singing it backstage and commenting on the chord changes.

So yes, I think the sensibility is still there. He wouldn't have done such magnificent work with Brian if it wasn't (Good Vibrations alone is a thrilling set of bubblegum psychedelic lyrics, and there are others at that level, although not as many as there should be -- I agree, Mike doesn't prioritize that kind of work).

[Wirestone]

A clip from Brian's song with Zooey Deschanel:

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10152548010452241

Sounds great to me!

Busy Doin' Nothin' meets Kokomo (= Bill and Sue part 2?)

In short: exactly how you'd expect a BW/JT song called "On an Island" to sound.