The Smiley Smile Message Board

In all the decades of touring that The BBs have done, I wonder how many times the band members, flying to their next show, have experienced severe airplane turbulence (to the point where they thought they were in real danger)? As much touring as Mike and Bruce do, I wonder how immune to things like turbulence they've become?

For that matter, I wonder how Brian has learned to cope with flying as much as he does. I don't know if he ever had a specific phobia of flying (or it was just too much travel/pressure/expectations all crammed together that led to the infamous airplane breakdown incident).

My question pertains to traveling by air, as well as by bus or any other means. How many times have the Boys been in danger due to weather, drunk drivers, etc? It seems with as much touring as they've done, they must have had some close calls at some point.

These days when traveling on the road, do they just zone out and listen to iPods?

I bet they must have a few stories to tell!  The kind of thing that might get discussed over a beer with mates (if they ever do that kind of thing anymore!).

I remember Bruce saying in a UK interview early 90s that touring is easier now because they travel first class everywhere etc and have gym's in their hotels and stuff.

Although some of the C50 footage looked as though they were carrying bags and stuff through train stations and airports!  Like us 'normal' folk! ;D

My book with Jon Stebbins the beach boys in concert (backbeat books 2013) detailed some crazy experiences like that. Not asking you to buy it but maybe someone who has it handy can find a few. I know there was a crazy one in 1978 flying over the Rockies

A bit of a weird topic, but I can throw in a quick story.  I saw the band on Labor Day weekend in 1983 & they came on stage very late.  Mike announced that their charter plane had trouble & had to return to (I think Allentown, PA) shortly after take off.  He said they had to borrow Willie Nelson's private jet in order to make the gig.  He mentioned they were pretty scared & were thankful to be alive.  Strange thing is, Mike said there wasn't enough room on the jet for Brian or Dennis, but I don't think either of them were touring with the band at the time anyway.

lol, talk about lifestyles of the rich and famous

Guessing with all the spring/summer shows through the Midwest US over 50 years, they've dance dance dance"d" their way through a few tornado warnings.
Especially driving in a bus to the next gig.

That would have been...

3 - State Fair, Allentown, PA [2 shows]
4 - Garden State Arts Center in Holmdel NJ

No Brian or Dennis at either of those two venues.

Hi Ian, I proudly own the book, love it, and have read it (I also helped contribute some info about a previously-unknown 1962 show to Jon!)... but I might have skimmed a few sections here and there and don't recall this topic too well. I'll have to go back and re-read it.

I suppose that most everyone must get a bit freaked out when flying from time to time, but when that happens to me, I try to think about how many times The Boys, for instance, have flown as passengers in an airplane, and how they must have just found a way to quell their nerves and not let flying get to them too much.

Thinking about how often they must fly, and how they just have to find a way to deal with travel, often makes my nerves get better - even if I, unlike them, don't have a BB paycheck waiting for me at my destination!

I imagine the band members must have some travel secrets, Rick Steves-style.

I once heard Ed Carter tell a story about being in a plane in a European country (forget which one) when a highjacking was in progress at the airport. Needless to say, the BBs were kept grounded in their plane until the all-clear.

I do know that Carl loved flying, he even subscribed to Aviation Weekly.

Hi Ian , I also have your excellent book but haven't read it all the way through.  I've bought quite a few Beach Boys books over the last few years and haven't read any of them front to back!  I used to in my younger years but now I don't seem to have as much time.  :(

Brian's adaptation to flying?  It was those fresh-baked chocolate chip cookies in FC on American.  I think anyone could relate to that.   ;)

Here is the Rockies :) incident in summary, detailed in Ian and Jon's book, p 237:
Tuesday, July 18, 1978: Stampede Corral, Calgary, AB, Canadia, with Zingo

Phil Shenale recalled Dennis trapped Carl in Carl's hotel room by jamming in a whole load of furniture from other rooms (while Carl was catching zzzzz's), making the entourage miss the Commercial flight - they leased 8 to 10 4 seater (little) planes to fly from Seattle to Calgary, an act of madness. 

Bobby Figueroa added "they" were having trouble breathing in his plane and pinged the pilot about it - the pilot said the oxygen gauge reads full, then he tapped the gauge and it went down to EMPTY.  Somehow they all survived, the end.

Perhaps the lyrics of Loop de Loop thinly veil/make light of a tale of another near miss ("We'll toss and tumble and sail her right in to the sun").
 

Yes, the show I saw was in Holmdel, NJ.  And according to Ian & Jon's book, Brian & Dennis stopped touring a few weeks before this show.

Wait, the drive from Allentown to Holmdel is like an hour and a half.

Speaking of The BBs' experiences on the road, I wonder how many times the BBs have performed songs without their feet on the ground, as in while in a moving vehicle of some sort? I don't just mean singing to themselves, but an actual performance of some sort for an audience.

Would BB cruise ship gigs + Brian's taxi cab performance be the only examples, or are there more?

I would think that at some point over the decades, there must have been some impromptu live BB performances in the sky, maybe with an instrument or two, while flying to a show in an airplane. 

Something like that.  And I'm guessing the drive from where ever the jet landed to Holmdel was at least a half hour.

Bruce recently related that they don't fly very often because airfares have become too expensive.

Air travel is cheaper than ever really. But I don't know what standards Bruce will be expecting. High-end service is considered premium now and more expensive than ever.

I wonder if M&B have ever flown Ryanair.

Jeez M&B are cheap!

I've heard that one too, and IIRC it was an engine that caught on fire. It may have been related in one of Billy Hinsche's films, now that I think about it.

Of course having never been on tour I don't know all the actual pros and cons, but I would think I would prefer a comfy bus with a sleeping space where I can keep all my stuff and the bus drops me and picks me up at the venue to packing, ride to airport, get through the airport, get on plane, sit there, get off the plane, ride to hotel, unpack, ride to venue, ride to hotel, ride to airport, etc.

You might not wanna take the bus to Europe.

True. Just hire one.

Another one in my book-October 10 1981: "The group's jet had engine trouble in South Bend (Indiana) and they chartered two small planes to get them to Terre Haute (Indiana).  They arrived at the venue considerably late and were greeted with hisses and boos by the restless crowd.  Some of the backup musicians were on a slower plane and missed the show altogether, including (drummer) Bobby Figueroa.  The drummer from (opening act) Red Ryder filled in."

Also May 2 1969-Mike had taken a second trip to India to visit Maharishi and he got snowed in and couldn't get back in time for a gig in Oklahoma, so they played without him (Billy Hinsche was tagging along on that trip-not as a musician but just as Carl's brother-in-law-and he was roped in to help cover Mike's absence.  According to their road manager-no one complained.   It wasn't the last time that Mike missed some shows-but it was a rarity.

Personally my favorite bbs road story is the time a guard wouldn't let you them into the Ohio state fairgrounds until they finally bought tickets.  He simply didn't have a clue who they were and wasn't letting anyone pass through without paying

Sort of on topic...were The Beach Boys on the road on 9/11?

http://www.setlist.fm/search?page=2&query=artist:%28The+Beach+Boys%29+date:%5B2001-01-01+TO+2001-12-31%5D

Thanks. One would assume they had originally scheduled shows between 7th and 14th?

If so, no proof has yet been found.

I wonder what the atmosphere/vibe was like at those first post-9/11 BB shows.

A cached version of the BBFC tour dates page, captured in August 2001, doesn't quite match the setlist.fm website, but it shows nothing between a 9/7 show and a 9/15 show. That BBFC suggests two shows on 9/15 rather than a show each on 9/14 and 9/15 as shown on setlist.fm. The venues/cities for the three or four shows prior don't quite match up either.

Here's the BBFC "archive" link: https://web.archive.org/web/20010802024116/http://beachboysfanclub.com/bbtours.htm

Either way, these two sources both show no shows from 9/8 to 9/13. That sort of gap wouldn't have been uncommon, especially after the big summer tour rush where dates get packed in tighter.

Three shows - one on the 14th, two on the 15th.  According to 10452.

One thing that ticks me off is people quoting from the setlist site (not Eric 's wonderful one) because almost all the old shows they list were copied from the research Andrew and I did for bellagio over the years. Only difference is that when we find an error at bellagio we update it while those other sites that copied us just keep the old errors we've corrected.  What I'm saying is that the only accurate source of such info is the gigs and sessions section of bellagio hosted by esq and compiled by Andrew and I with help and input from friends like c man and bgas

By the way if you check out bellagio gigs and sessions you'll see that Brian canceled a scheduled tour of Japan due to 9/11

Apologies, I was using setlist to look up another artist, and so when I saw that question, I just quickly looked it up on there.

Me too. And here is the apposite place to point out that the vast, vast majority of the concert research is Ian's. Which is why I can say without fear of blowing my own trumpet (well, too much...) that said section of 10452 is the very best online resource for Beach Boys concerts information 1961-date. Odd how many posters here seem to either be unaware of it, or ignore it.

Nota bene about the tour listings on BBFC's website, private shows don't get listed there.

Right-but we list as many as we've found on Bellagio

  What year did that happen? I saw The Beach Boys play at the Ohio State Fair multiple times. 1983, 86, 88. I believe they also played there in 74 and 82.

1983

Ummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm... why not try looking on 10452 ?

Instructional thread, in that I generally go to Bellagio before I post anything. However, I usually only reference the Timeline section... Now I know that the show listing located there is also quite exhaustive!

And yes, seeing the bands schedule in September 2001, it's logical, coming off some weekend gigs, that they were off the road until the Vegas engagements the following weekend.

Thanks for the compliment on my site, although it is in major need of updating. I do plan to do a major update at some point. SetlIist.fm is cool in a way, but it's the Wikipedia of setlists. Anyone can contribute and change and edit at will, and with that comes a lot of uncertainty. Part of what takes so long when I post setlists on the archive is that I check to see if things make sense in context, and I try not to post "from memory" setlists unless they are from eras that are underrepresented, and I'll always make a note of it. Undoubtedly, there are still inaccuracies on my site, but I'd like to think the quality control I implemented over the years made a difference!

The 11th was a Tues so unlikely I think.

As mentioned, Sept 14 and 15 in Vegas. Shows rescheduled for Nov that year....


* The Beach Boys, who were to have performed at the Stratosphere's Outdoor Events Center tonight and Saturday, have changed their dates to Nov. 3-4.

http://lasvegassun.com/news/2001/sep/14/several-performers-cancel-las-vegas-shows/

To quote from my book under August 15 and 16 1983: "when the group showed up in their van at 3:30 pm for their Monday appearance at the fair, the security guard at the gate didn't recognize them and refused to let them in until they paid the $4.00 admission price. The beach boys said it was the first time they ever had to pay to get into their own show."

  I was there. If memory serves, the lineup consisted of Mike, Carl, Al, Bruce plus band. Very hot. Aside from the big hits they did "Imagine" w/ Mike on lead and maybe "Rockin' All Over the World" from Carl's second solo LP.

Ian is totally right about setlist.fm. It's a mess there.

What setlist.fm is pretty okay for is *contemporary* setlists; indeed, I think we wouldn't have a number of BW setlists from recent tours (and Mike's tour too) were it not for that website. So when people are going to shows and then posting them on that website, that is generally reliable (though obviously we still have to hope people write it down correctly).

But for old stuff, it's a mess. You can tell someone went through and copied Eric's site, Bellagio, and also copied over info from mis-dated bootlegs. Some people have entered solo Al shows as "Beach Boys" shows, resulting in double entries, and so on. I've gone on there and had them remove non-existent shows and mis-attributed shows. For instance, the 10/19/2000 Brian Wilson show never occurred, but usually appears on tour dates lists because it was part of the main tour announcement.

Also, what I'm seeing more of is some of the "new" setlists are being posted by people, presumably the same people that can just sit home all day and update dead celebrities' wiki pages the moment they die, and are posting setlists based off of random online reports. Or, assuming a setlist for one day is the same as the previous day. There's one "user" on setlist.fm with a BB handle that seems to obsessively change, then un-do, then re-do, then un-do changes to BB and BW setlists, jumping the gun and trying to "correct" people.

As Eric mentioned, it's "Wikipedia" for setlists, and should be weighed accordingly. The only other hypothetical thing I've seen that it's occasionally good for is when people outside of any BB fan communities might have info and post it there. I've seen times when nobody on *any* of the BB-related boards seems to have gone to a gig or can post a setlist, and then it turns up on that website.

I wonder what would have happened if one of the BBs had a copy of one of their albums, and would have pulled it out for the doltish guard to compare/contrast to the actual BBs in front of him :)