Brian Wilson - 2019 Tour Thread

[baseball95]

baseball95,
I definitely understand where you're coming from. In fact, before I read your comment I was preparing to post that I wish Dance, Dance, Dance would be swapped out for something else.

I completely understand Brian playing I Get Around. His first number one, and more than that, Brian flexing his songwriting/production muscles at a time when The Beatles had just "invaded". At a time when most American acts were cowering to or copying The Beatles, Brian was doing his own thing, and totally progressing. I'd almost be shocked to see a BW show without I Get Around.

As for Deuce Coupe and Shut Down, they can feel really inconsequential and like filler in the greater context of BW's career. I'm not the first person to say this, so I can't take credit for the idea, but the way I see it, is Brian must like playing Rock N Roll, feel like a teenager again, which was something he didn't get to do a lot of during his career with The BBs. He quit touring so early on, and of course had struggles with touring in the 70's and 80's. His solo career has been his first chance, when you think about it, for him to play his songs, comfortably, under his own conditions. Playing those car songs sure looked like fun in the 60's and Bri probably includes them in there cause he gets a kick out of playing them. Either that, or he and his team have deemed them necessary crowd pleasers, which is a nice pivot to Dance, Dance, Dance.

I dig Dance, Dance, Dance. It has a great bassline and it's a totally fun song. But given the potential tight setlist we'll be getting with the double booking, I would like to see Dance, Dance, Dance swapped out with something else. That doesn't mean it needs to be replaced with a deep cut or anything heavy, but maybe just rotate it with some other rockers. Just to keep things fresh. Even Mike has switched songs like It's OK, Farmer's Daughter, Still Cruisin, Good To My Baby, etc around during his equivalent "getting the crowd warmed up with the fun songs" part of the show. Some songs I'd be happy to hear instead, that could still work in that context are Hawaii, Be True, Surf City, Catch A Wave... you get the point, other classic crowd pleasers to warm the audience up, I'm growing a little tired of DDD. Although, if BW personally really likes playing it I'm fine with it staying.

It's funny how Mike still gets criticized for being the traveling jukebox when his and Brian's setlists are getting increasingly similar, with Mike's actually having a little more variety. I understand the accusation in 1999, when Mike was playing "Duke of Earl" while Brian was playing "The Night Was So Young". Things have clearly changed since then. We now have BW shows with only one solo BW song and BBs shows with 3 or 4 ML solo songs, who woulda thunk ? Personally, I'm fine with Mike sprinkling in multiple solo songs, and I'd be fine with BW doing the same.

That's a very good point, the "Mike's greatest hit jukebox" was more to keep the masses happy who still feel this is the case in order to get my point across haha. But you're 100% right Mike's setlists have gotten deeper and more in depth. The double billing is certainly going to keep the setlist around 30 or so. I don't get why Brian will do Honkin' or Night Was So Young for 5 shows and then cut it, that's been a few years back but still hasn't come back, I think Blondie on Long Promised Road might be interesting, I wonder if he might be on the stage for more or all of the show, I still don't understand why he isn't on stage for the whole show, still makes me mad.

[HeyJude]

Looking at recent setlists, including the most recent “non-Pet Sounds/Christmas Album” shows, as a basis for an ongoing setlist, and keeping in mind it’s a double-billed tour with the Zombies, as well as remembering the “core” songs they always do, I’d guess this Friends/Surf’s Up-infused setlist will look something vaguely like this:

1.   California Girls
1.   Dance Dance Dance
2.   I Get Around
3.   Shut Down
4.   Little Deuce Coupe
5.   Surfer Girl
6.   Don’t Worry Baby
7.   Meant for You
8.   Friends
9.   Wake the World
10.   Busy Doin’ Nothin’
11.   California Saga: California
12.   Darlin’
13.   ‘Til I Die
14.   Surf’s Up
15.   Lookin’ at Tomorrow (A Welfare Song)
16.   Long Promised Road
17.   Feel Flows
18.   Wild Honey
19.   Sail on Sailor
20.   Do It Again
21.   Wouldn’t It Be Nice
22.   Sloop John B.
23.   God Only Knows
24.   Good Vibrations
25.   All Summer Long
26.   Help Me Rhonda
27.   Barbara Ann’
28.   Surfin’ USA
29.   Fun Fun Fun
30.   Love and Mercy

Gosh i'm so sick of Brian doing these 4 songs in a row:
1.   Dance Dance Dance
2.   I Get Around
3.   Shut Down
4.   Little Deuce Coupe

Al sounds great on the car songs I know but those are two Al leads that could be used on something better, I Get Around you have to play I get that but Brian went years without playing Deuce Coupe and Shut Down. Dance Dance Dance seems  more unnecessary to me, I know it was Top 10 and i'm essentially removing 3 well known songs but come on leave those songs to Mike's greatest hit jukebox lol

Yep, I certainly wouldn't mind seeing other songs subbed out. I was just putting together a realistic setlist, and they've been doing variations on that dance/car-centric opening run of songs for a good four or five years now.

I think the frustrating part is that they won't deviate more on the non-Brian leads even when those other singers, by all appearances and indications, would gladly change it up and do other stuff. I don't think Al would mind singing "Susie Cincinnati" or "Lookin' at Tomorrow" and drop "Shut Down", etc.

Al is finally doing solo club gigs, which is great. But his "Storytellers" format, length of shows, and three-piece band is making it difficult to bust a ton of rarities out.

I think they should strike some sort of balance and do stuff like give Al "Heroes and Villains" to sing, and maybe go back to Blondie singing the bridge on "Surfer Girl" like they experimented with awhile back for a few shows.

And/or, let Blondie/Matt/Darian/Al do a song or two or three solo or with a two or three-piece or something.

[roffels]

We now have BW shows with only one solo BW song and BBs shows with 3 or 4 ML solo songs, who woulda thunk ? Personally, I'm fine with Mike sprinkling in multiple solo songs, and I'd be fine with BW doing the same.

The first Brian Wilson show I went to, Brian introduced Imagination with something along the lines of "Here's a song called Imagination, I don't like to play it, but they told me I should anyways."

[tpesky]

They might do Feet as they both sang lead on that . DGNTW is another potential

[Lonely Summer]

We now have BW shows with only one solo BW song and BBs shows with 3 or 4 ML solo songs, who woulda thunk ? Personally, I'm fine with Mike sprinkling in multiple solo songs, and I'd be fine with BW doing the same.

The first Brian Wilson show I went to, Brian introduced Imagination with something along the lines of "Here's a song called Imagination, I don't like to play it, but they told me I should anyways."

I used to think Brian was being talked into doing the oldies, but now I think maybe he just doesn't have the energy and attention to focus on newer music.

[HeyJude]

Regarding Brian doing the “meat and potatoes” stuff, the “oldies”, I’ll reiterate what I’ve said in the past.

Understanding why Brian may do those songs requires some context, both in terms of the band and Brian’s history, and the history of Brian’s solo touring since 1998/99.

First and foremost, Brian does the car songs/oldies because they’re also HIS songs. For all the deep cuts and focus on esoteric, post-surf/car songs in Brian’s shows over the years (more on that in a moment), it has to be remembered that Brian doesn’t hate his old songs. They’re all HIS songs, and he is proud of “Shut Down” and “Little Deuce Coupe” too, and so on.

Around 2007-ish when Brian started leaning a bit more into some of those oldies, some fans seemed taken aback. But I pointed out back then as well as now that, certainly as of the mid-2000s, many fans had probably seen the touring Beach Boys over the years sing those songs more times than Brian had, and certainly more times than Brian had performed them in concert. For Brian, singing those car songs was relatively new and novel. And again, his shows have always been mainly a presentation of his music, his songs. Which leads me to this salient point:

I think some people may have a slightly skewed view of why and how Brian developed his setlists when he went out on tour in 1999. From the fan perspective, there was an up-to-that-point rare and refreshing focus on deeper cuts and non-hits, etc. But I don’t think Brian developed his setlists as if he was setting out to hone in on deep cuts. I think Brian was just doing songs he liked, songs he wanted to do. That selection just so happened to be a mixture of some well-known tracks/hits, and also some stuff that was less common or never heard over the years in Beach Boys concerts. It may be that some of the backing band members helped to suggest deep cuts with more an eye towards focusing more on that stuff and less on oldie hits.

But I think Brian just looks at all of the stuff as his catalog of songs. Why shouldn’t he lay claim to “Shut Down” and “Little Deuce Coupe” and “Catch a Wave”, and so on? They’re his songs.

In terms of where the setlist is at in 2019, I know there are other factors as well. We have some comments from band members that Brian isn’t into singing the verbose tracks these days like “Surf’s Up” and “Busy Doin’ Nothin’.” Also, they’re selling “Pet Sounds” and “Greatest Hits” shows to promoters, and those types of shows surely leave less room to start whipping out a ton of rarities. Additionally, I’m sure there’s a bit of just keeping the ball rolling and path of a least resistance and all of that, it’s easier to keep things well-oiled if the setlist doesn’t change a ton from night to night.

[Cabinessenceking]

I must agree with the sentiment that the oldies make for a better experience when distributed evenly throughout the show.

What I find great about the 1973-75 shows is how they would throw in a "crowd pleaser" oldie every 4 songs or so. Little Deuce Coupe, 4 newer songs, Surfer Girl, 4 newer songs, Catch A Wave, 4 newer songs, etc.

It meant that each oldie had an impact and kept the show going at a very pleasant pace. The C50 shows suffered from having all the oldie hits clumped together in the first set. At some point the sound of the early songs become monotonous. This is especially the case if they play the oldies by theme with 4 consecutive car songs followed by 4 consecutive surfing songs.

[HeyJude]

The C50 setlist was paced just fine as far as I could tell, mainly because it was such a long setlist, so there were always more hits to come. The shortest shows at the beginning of the tour were 42-43 songs. By  mid-tour they were up to 46 or so, and of course they infamously and mind-blowingly just decided to do *all 61* songs at the Royal Albert Hall for the penultimate show of the tour.

I personally wouldn't really want like 4 or 5 car songs peppered through the setlist. Not so much because I'm a fan of the medley-style format of stringing them all together, but more because it's jarring for other parts of the show to shift back to those car songs.

They still did a ton of "hits" in the second set on C50, moving "California Girls" near the end and also of course all of the classic show-enders.

[MyDrKnowsItKeepsMeCalm]

In C50, it also felt like most of the first set was Mike's playground (surf songs/car songs/early 60s covers etc), and the beginning of the second set was Brian's (Heroes and Villains, Sail On Sailor, Pet Sounds tracks and a few deep cuts). Which was kind of a cool balance.

[NateRuvin]

MyDrKnowsItKeepsMeCalm,

That's a really cool observation I never made. Stylistically it was pretty obvious that the first set was more upbeat hits and second set more artistic stuff, but The Beach Boys had so much overlap of artistic songs and hit songs, that the lines are hard to see. Anyway, I think the observation of each half catering to one party (Mike and Brian) makes a lot of sense, in a not to piss anyone off way, or a to keep everyone happy way if you're an optimist. Clearly, if that was the case and purpose, it didn't work, with the tour ending with lots of feelings of dissatisfaction.

Although, we might be getting into the "Mike is the car guy VS Brian is the Pet Sounds guy" territory, due to the fact that its becoming increasingly obvious that Brian prefers to play the hits over the deeper material too. After all, like Hey Jude has said, they are his songs! They were great hit songs that he wrote that were totally unique, and quite frankly changed Rock as a whole. It's easy to look at the car songs as simple, but those songs are pretty advanced- specifically Deuce Coupe and I Get Around, harmonically speaking. To put the V-ii change in a rock n roll song was amazing (Little Deuce Coupe) and I Get Around has very clever modulations and borrows chords from other keys by playing with what we anticipate to be major or minor... Didn't mean to get so off topic, but I feel like the car songs are something for Brian to be extremely proud of, and they're certainly crowd pleasers. 

[NOLA BB Fan]

A few years ago I saw Brian singing "Little Honda" and he looked to be really into it.

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

Here’s a mindblower... Brian’s been a touring solo artist almost as long as he was a Beach Boy and if we’re being technical about it, longer

[Debbie KL]

Here’s a mindblower... Brian’s been a touring solo artist almost as long as he was a Beach Boy and if we’re being technical about it, longer

Oh, Billy, thanks for noticing this. It gives some perspective.

Brian will probably continue to do oldies that the "non-niche fans" (? is that a thing?) lap up and dance to. They were still good songs. I'm afraid, as a long-time niche fan, I have fun watching the crowd enjoying those songs and relish the rarities. We'll probably get a mix as long as he chooses to tour.

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

That’s one of the reasons why I’m excited about this Zombies tour. With the idea that Friends and Surfs Up are being pushed, it’ll be great listening and possible increased exposure for that side of Brian due to the increased attention on the Zombies with them being inducted into the Hall of Fame

[HeyJude]

Here’s a mindblower... Brian’s been a touring solo artist almost as long as he was a Beach Boy and if we’re being technical about it, longer

I'd say, being as liberal as possible in counting the years, Brian really only spent about 10-11 years as a full-time member of the touring band. 1961-1965, 1976-1982, and 2012. There are other appearances sprinkled in there, especially the random appearances between 1983 and 1990. But he also wasn't even always there in the late 70s and early 80s (nor of course '65).

We'd have to look at Ian and Jon's "In Concert" book to start counting the dates, but I'm curious if Brian has literally been on stage for more total solo shows than Beach Boys shows.

But certainly, in terms of number of years logged, he has logged more years as a solo touring artists than as a member of the touring Beach Boys.

[tpesky]

Just saw on Facebook that Brian added a date on 9/27 at the Palace in Waterbury.  I wasn't planning to go to see this tour but now it's 10 minutes from my house .  I just don't think I can pass that up.

[RubberSoul13]

Hoping for more east coast dates as this is fresh, exciting, and THE ZOMBIES! He'll be 20mins from me at the Hippodrome for the *second* final performance of Pet Sounds at the very same venue he played the final performance in Baltimore for three years ago    In 2016, it was near sold out...now, nearly a week out from the show it is less than half sold. I've been watching, wondering if prices will be slashed as the date approaches...but when there are no seats under $100, I can't justify a fourth Pet Sounds performance from Brian in current form.

[roffels]

Hoping for more east coast dates as this is fresh, exciting, and THE ZOMBIES! He'll be 20mins from me at the Hippodrome for the *second* final performance of Pet Sounds at the very same venue he played the final performance in Baltimore for three years ago    In 2016, it was near sold out...now, nearly a week out from the show it is less than half sold. I've been watching, wondering if prices will be slashed as the date approaches...but when there are no seats under $100, I can't justify a fourth Pet Sounds performance from Brian in current form.

I did this for Brian's Christmas show. I ended up getting a 3rd row ticket for $12 about an hour before the show.

[HeyJude]

Notated on the top post that the June dates are postponed. We obviously don't know what's next, so I'll just leave those dates in red until or if something changes.

[B.E.]

Are ticket refunds only available if the show is ultimately cancelled? What's the standard procedure?

[HeyJude]

Are ticket refunds only available if the show is ultimately cancelled? What's the standard procedure?

I don't have any specific info about these dates, but generally once a show is postponed, refunds are made available. My guess is they'll either offer refunds to those who don't want to wait to see if the show is rescheduled, or they'll just refund everyone.

Considering they apparently nixed the June dates literally at the last second, I'd imagine they don't know what's going to happen going forward and thus probably won't be rescheduling any dates any time soon.

[HeyJude]

This news story indicates refunds will be offered at point of purchase, and, not surprisingly, no rescheduled dates are available:

https://www.sevendaysvt.com/LiveCulture/archives/2019/06/06/brian-wilson-cancels-burlington-discover-jazz-festival-performance

[ClassicShowsFan]

The message from Brian:

Dear friends,
It is with great regret that I need to postpone my upcoming June tour.
It is no secret that I have been living with mental illness for many decades. There were times when it was unbearable but with doctors and medications I have been able to live a wonderful, healthy and productive life with support from my family, friends and fans who have helped me through this journey.
As you may know in the last year or so I’ve had 3 surgeries on my back. The surgeries were successful and i’m physically stronger than i’ve been in a long time.
However, after my last surgery i started feeling strange and it’s been pretty scary for awhile. I was not feeling like myself. Mentally insecure is how I’d describe it. We're not sure what is causing it but i do know that it’s not good for me to be on the road right now so I’m heading back to Los Angeles.
I had every intention to do these shows and was excited to get back to performing. I've been in the studio recording and rehearsing with my band and have been feeling better. But then it crept back and I’ve been struggling with stuff in my head and saying things I don’t mean and I don’t know why. Its something i’ve never dealt with before and we cant quite figure it out just yet.
I’m going to rest, recover and work with my doctors on this.
I’m looking forward to my recovery and seeing everyone later in the year.
The music and my fans keep me going and I know this will be something I can AGAIN overcome.
Love & Mercy,
Brian Wilson

[marcella27]

Here is the message I received about the Burlington, Vermont show. 

Brian Wilson Cancellation

 

We have received news that Brian Wilson has cancelled all upcoming tour dates due to mental health issues. Therefore, his performance scheduled for Sunday, June 9, 2019 is cancelled. We wish Wilson a speedy recovery and hope to present him at a future Burlington Discover Jazz Festival.
   

All tickets purchased for this show will be refunded. Please contact the Box Office at 802-86-FLYNN (802-863-5966) with your order number and credit card information handy so that we may confirm your refund details. Tickets need not be returned to the Flynn Box Office. All tickets will be refunded to the original method of purchase. Cash sales will be refunded by a check sent to the account address on record. We will be processing refunds over the next several days; please allow a week to ten days for the credit to post to your account or to receive a refund check.
 
We apologize for the inconvenience. If you have any questions, feel free to inquire in person at the Box Office at 153 Main Street in Burlington or by calling 802-86-FLYNN (802-863-5966).

[RubberSoul13]

Wow. The Hippodrome website clearly states cancelled and that refunds are being given. I just checked the tickets again this morning...only about 40% of the tickets had sold for this event. I never bothered looking at other dates and how they were selling, but one would assume the tour had similar sales across the board. I wonder if that was discouraging to Brian and company? I'm not saying they cancelled because they HAD to. I believe every word of what is written by Brian, but I have to wonder if perhaps the lack of enthusiasm shown through ticket sales contributed to pre-existing mental and physical instability and contributed to putting him in a bad place? I apologize if that sounds insensitive, but I know Paul McCartney always says his biggest fear to this day is people getting up and walking out of his show. The audience still means everything to these guys when they are out there, Brian doesn't have to be doing this. I can't say he's always good at showing it, but I do believe he tours because he wants to for physical and mental stimulation, as well as the mutual satisfaction between audience and performer. Anyway, I've seen Brian on C50, Jeff Beck Tour, No Pier Pressure Tour, and three times on the Pet Sounds tour...and never have I been able to leisurely browse the seating chart less than a week before the show and hand pick seats wherever I please. I feel it's a factor somehow.

Praying Brian finds the peace and inspiration needed to carry on with full vigor. I hope he's well enough for The Zombies tour...that idea sounds refreshing.