Dennis as a studio drummer

[mikeyj]

Brian played bass in Susie Cincinatti, recorded in 69, but released in 76. 

It was actually released in 1970 as the B-side of Add Some Music to Your Day

[KokoMoses]

No...It's About Time has Earl Palmer on drums & Dennis Dragon on congas.
Peggy Sue has Dennis Wilson on drums.
[/quote]


wow. the reason I assumed it was Dennis on congas is because of a quote who I can't remember from. whoever it was said that Dennis really worked up a swet playing the congas on that track.... I'll try and figure out who that was who said that.

[Jon Stebbins]

No...It's About Time has Earl Palmer on drums & Dennis Dragon on congas.
Peggy Sue has Dennis Wilson on drums.

wow. the reason I assumed it was Dennis on congas is because of a quote who I can't remember from. whoever it was said that Dennis really worked up a swet playing the congas on that track.... I'll try and figure out who that was who said that.
[/quote]
Dennis did work up a sweat, it just wasn't Dennis Wilson.

[KokoMoses]

ah, well..... I'm sure Dennis was working up a sweat elsewhere while Dragon was laying down them congas

[Joshilyn Hoisington]

Yeah, probably right across the room.

[Aegir]

There's a video on youtube from the mid-70s where Brian is playing bass for Back Home then he gives it to Mike to give to Ed Carter. Before handing it to him, Mike plays a few notes on it.

Bruce on guitar (did he play at all?  I've heard yes and no)

He also sometimes played one of Carl's guitars onstage (late 1978-early 1979). 
He probably just played the bass strings.

I think in one of Bruce's many surf projects before he joined the Beach Boys he played guitar. Can't remember which one it was though.

[Loaf]

There's a video on youtube from the mid-70s where Brian is playing bass for Back Home then he gives it to Mike to give to Ed Carter. Before handing it to him, Mike plays a few notes on it.

Wait... Mike played a few notes? Then he deserves a co-writing credit and money. I smell a lawsuit. Musical inspiration if ever i heard it.

[adamghost]

You know, you just jogged my memory about something, Aegis.

Before we did the MAKAHA session, me and Shawn Bryant sat down with Don Randi and Jerry Cole and went over the old tracks for the songs we were going to do.  While we were doing that, Don and Jerry would try and figure out who was playing on the songs based on their experience (e.g. "Remember Carol had that shitty red bass?" that kind of thing).  We got to one of the Jan & Dean tracks...it was either Sidewalk Surfin' or (more likely) Surf City and Jerry said something like, "that wasn't us...that guitarist is that guy...what's his name...the guy that played in the Beach Boys...Bruce Johnston."

I semi-protested that I hadn't heard of Bruce Johnston ever doing guitar on any surf session, and Jerry gave me an I-was-there-and-you-weren't look and said that in the early days, Bruce and Terry didn't have much of a budget, and that Bruce played a lot of guitar on those sessions, and that there was no great skill involved.  I was dubious because I thought it wasn't likely that Bruce was on Surf City as a guitarist, but Jerry's memory of the general circumstances may well have been correct.  In which case Bruce may well have played some guitar.  He's repeatedly said he'd never played bass before '65, but even though it's a similar skill set (the strings are tuned the same, so any guitar player can usually play rudimentary bass), that doesn't mean he never played guitar before '65.  

If he could play the mandolin, he'd have enough dexterity that it seems likely he could do some basic chords on guitar.  To do the surf stuff, you'd generally just need to know your majors and minors, and you can cover that with a few bar chords.  The trick would be in the picking hand.  Looking at video of Bruce, I was always impressed at how solid his bass playing was...even when he was just syncing something as late as the '80s, he would generally play the right part.  Based on the evidence of Tony Rivers' jam session with Bruce in '66, it seems likely Bruce didn't have much innate ability on the bass (e.g. he probably couldn't improvise or walk or anything like that) but could execute a part just fine.  It's just interesting that you never see these guys playing guitar.

What's more interesting to me is it's very unclear whether Brian had any ability on guitar.  I know only of two verified instances of Brian playing on a track (both '69..."Breakaway" and "Where Is She") and the only picture I've ever seen of him with a guitar is the one with Van Dyke holding down the chords.  We have a lot more evidence that Brian could play drums than guitar, and yet you'd think there'd be more cases of him throwing down a part, given that it's a rhythm instrument.

Al is shown playing the piano in the SURF'S UP interior photos...do we know of any confirmed tracks that he played on?  "Don't Go Near The Water" would be the most likely, but that's actually kind of an intricate little part.

[adamghost]

There's a video on youtube from the mid-70s where Brian is playing bass for Back Home then he gives it to Mike to give to Ed Carter. Before handing it to him, Mike plays a few notes on it.

Wait... Mike played a few notes? Then he deserves a co-writing credit and money. I smell a lawsuit. Musical inspiration if ever i heard it.

It's very funny to watch, too.  He basically plays it the way any bored non-musician pulling down an axe while waiting for their buddy to get done making his purchases at Guitar Center would.

[Joshilyn Hoisington]

me and Shawn Bryant sat down with Don Randi and Jerry Cole

Have you got over the surreality of being able to write that sentence yet?

That is very interesting, that they both remember Bruce playing.  I'll see if we can get Mark Moore to confirm if he was on the contract.

[alanjames]

Brian played bass in Susie Cincinatti, recorded in 69, but released in 76. 

This actually appears to not be true.  The 69 basic track was cut seemingly in Brian's absence.  Carl's too for that matter.  It sounds like Al on guitar, Bruce on Piano, Dennis Dragon on Drums, and somebody who's not Brian on Bass.  The bass style is way out of Brian's vocabulary, for one, and two it's not like Brian to not say a word on a session.

I would guess it could be Daryl.  It doesn't really sound like Ray Pohlman's bag either.  They were hiring all kinds of session bassists at that time, but this seems self-contained.

I really don't know how good of a Fender Bass player Daryl is, but the line has a casual funky ease to it.

That's not to say Brian didn't O.D. some bass on it, but the original bassline survives to the final master.

Well, look at the 15 Big Ones credits. Brian played bass in Susie. Check this!

[Joshilyn Hoisington]

I'll take my ears over hastily drawn up credits any day, thanks.

[Jonas]

I'll take my ears over hastily drawn up credits any day, thanks.

Get over yourself, please.

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

Well, look at the 15 Big Ones credits. Brian played bass in Susie. Check this!

Credits can be wrong.

[John]

My two cents:

Read somewhere (sorry, can't remember where. Might have been here, actually, if someone wants to run a sarch.!) that Brian's credit for "Susie" is either bass pedals on an organ or a keyboard bassline a la the Doors, rather than a bass guitar, which was someone else. Anyone?

From memory, isn't Al pictured playing organ rather than piano, and doesn't he play the organ on Lookin' At Tomorrow?

[Dancing Bear]

For Susie, the 15 Big Ones' credits were very probably written down 6 or 7 years after the session. In this case, they may be inaccurate.

Al is seen playing piano and singing Sloop John B in the Endless Harmony docu. I think.

I always assumed that Bruce had some basic notions of guitar before picking up the bass, because he started playing it so quickly on stage with the band, after a few gigs playing keyboards only. Even if he was a shitty guitar player, it sure helped.

[joe_blow]

Desper said Brian played guitar on Breakaway.

Did Desper say Brian actually playedguitar on Breakaway? I thought he refered to Brian's guitar part somewhere and meant the guitar part that Brian had arranged. This is what I had thought.

[Aegir]

I know Brian owns a guitar. I saw a picture of him with it once.

[lance]

Desper did say he played guitar on that session. He said he played a lot of instruments. "He's all over those records." He said that Brian wasn't fussy about what kind of guitar; he would pick up whatever was lying about and record a part in a flash of inspiration. As to his guitar playing/instrumental abilities, Desper said he was "a natural."

[joe_blow]

That sounds interesting. The only footage I have seen of Brian playing guitar was that home movie clip shown in the A&E Biography. I think it was in an edition of Mojo a few years ago where they showed Brian on the cover holding the same guitar that was pictured in his music room.

Not that it means anything, but if memory serves me right, in the WIBN book in one part Brian says he can play guitar and in another he tells Landy he can't play the guitar.

[Joshilyn Hoisington]

By all accounts I've seen, Brian provided the guitar on the early Survivor's cut "After the Game".  Among other instrumentation.

Some people are just natural musicians.  If you have a good ear, it's not too hard to be passable on almost anything, particularly if you spend a lot of time around instruments.  I have no doubt Brian could play an oboe or a serpent or a viola d'amour given a few minutes to figure it out.

[the captain]

Some people are just natural musicians.  If you have a good ear, it's not too hard to be passable on almost anything, particularly if you spend a lot of time around instruments.  I have no doubt Brian could play an oboe or a serpent or a viola d'amour given a few minutes to figure it out.

This is very true. The basics of music cross instruments, and because so many instruments fall within so few families of instruments, it gets even easier. Brian Wilson is--obviously--a brilliant musician in terms of his writing, producing and arranging skills. I'd argue that as a player, he's inferior (as compared to the aforementioned), but certainly competent. Remember, to get a degree in music education--in other words, to become a high school band director, for example--you need to pass competency tests in all the basic instruments. This means you can pick up and play at a basic level a trumpet, a clarinet, a trombone, a snare drum, and so on. It's not rocket science. Music is music, and if you can do certain physical things (playing a reed, playing brass, pressing the strings) and understand which keys, strings or holes do what, you're going to be able to figure it out on some level. A lot of Brian's playing is, in my opinion, just that: figuring it out on some level. He's no virtuoso on anything (except in the 60s with his voice, maybe), but he could probably work out whatever he had to do on anything.

[Joshilyn Hoisington]

Luther, I wasn't gonna say it, but it's a salient point: people who are multi-instrumentalists tend be be jack-of-all-trades-master-of-none.  Take, um, myself.  I can play any instrument on a basic level, but I still kind of stink at instruments I've been playing for 25 years.

And I think Brian's the same.  He understands music and harmony so well, there's no way he's not going to be able to figure out how to play an instrument, at least enough to contribute to his vision.  And he understands harmony on the piano in a way that made him a great songwriter.  But he's no virtuoso.  Well, a virtuoso songwriter.

[Chris Brown]

I'm very much in the same box you are Josh.  I can play a bunch of instruments halfway decently, but I'll never be anything near a virtuoso on any of them.  And thats okay by me...you don't need to be a brilliant musician to create music.  A good understanding of chords and harmony goes a long way.

Like you said, Brian has such an innate musical mind that he can pick an instrument up and play at a competent level within a short time.  He'll never be a concert pianist, but he knows enough to be able to communicate his musical vision, which has always been his main focus anyways.

[Joshilyn Hoisington]

To refer to the original topic, I think Dennis was much this way as well.

I think that what we're talking about now is why Brian and the Studio Musicians had such a mutual fondness.  Brian was able to transcend his own abilities instrumentally by giving his ideas to these pros, who were even able to expand on them because of their ability to play anything.  And they liked Brian because he brought in these ideas that were good, and he let them be themselves and feel creative, and also he really wanted to learn from them, too.