The Smiley Smile Message Board

Obviously the subtraction of any member from that peak 1964-71 period would be a big loss, but which would be the least damaging to the group's abilities?

Ricky and Blondie

Al...

(http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8305/7796321618_b0ea91677c_z.jpg)

Zeppo Wilson.

Bruce

None of them.

Gosh. Least essential?? Hmm...

I'd probably say Dave or Ricky, as you don't really hear all that much of either, and neither sang lead on any essential songs, although to be honest, I really dig "Here She Comes", and I like Ricky's voice a lot. Yes, in reply to a future

However, if it was up to me that one member of the band had to go, that's an easy one. Bruce Johnston. He's the king of schlock and for a while it's seemed like he's tried to play up their lame "oldies cheeseball" image. Plus, he's probably the worst writer in the band, even worse than Al. He has a few nice things, but I would take material written by Brian, Dennis, Carl, Mike, Al, Blondie, Ricky, or Dave over his most of the time.

Would have to say Bruce, given the parameters that you set up.  They would've needed another guy for the touring band to play bass/keys/sing falsetto early on.  Once they started to augment the touring band, then Bruce was expendable.

I almost wrote Stamos, but then I noticed you said 1964-71.  Damn.   :lol

At what point did Dennis become irreplaceable: Friends, Sunflower, or back in 1964?

When he came up with the idea to write a song about surfing.

Stamos isn't a Beach Boy, so your point would have been invalid to begin with.

I'd have to say Bruce then.  Nearest Faraway Place, Tears in the Morning and Disney Girls (1957) do not qualify him as essential.

Bruce's vocals on California Girls and God Only Knows alone qualify him as essential, in my book.

Brian Wilson. Fuckin' fatty layabout birthday cake disposal coke fiend, abdicating his responsibileries within the band JUST when they needed him the most because he was "sad" or some shit. It's like... quit yer daydreamin', melonhead.

Have you seen that photo of him wearing a Mickey Mouse shirt? Can you believe he'd support such a company? Brian needs to learn more about the responsibileries within the consternation camps before he starts funding Nazis. More like Brian "I luv Nazis because I'm such a fuckin' fatty layabout birthday cake disposal coke fiend, abdicating his responsibileries within the band JUST when they needed him the most because he was "sad" or some shit" Wilson IMFO.

This is the funniest post. Maybe ever.

To answer the question: Bruce Johnston, though it's tough because as previously mentioned, his vocals, especially on California Girls and God Only Knows among others, are pretty great.

Probably Rickey.
But, if you're looking only to the "core" members, which voice was needed least in the harmonies during that time? Dennis perhaps?

Zeppo Wilson.

As Mr.Spaceman alluded to, imagine a world without Dennis Wilson. The guys go in to sing "Their Hearts Were Full Of Spring". It tanks. The people say they want to hear something original. Brian is ready to turn tail and run (again abdicating responsibileries). Suddenly, Al Jardine steps forward.

"Hey! We got an original song... it's just not quite finished yet."
"Oh yeah? What's it about?"
"It's about... dentistry."

Keep in mind that Bruce did leave the band in the early 70's, and it didn't affect the band one bit (at least negatively), so I'd say he was the least essential one. Even though I love his 65-71 contributions.

Dennis was easily the most popular member of the band with the girls who filled their concerts beginning in '63, and the numbers of his fans grew and grew while they kept screaming for him through '64 and '65. If you took him away you'd have lost a major part of the band's magnetism...right from the beginning. As the band became less popular, '67 - '72 Dennis' magnetism was still there but not such an important factor. The BB's teen-girl fan base had dwindled, and having a teen-idol type of figure in their ranks was part of their yesterday, like so many other things about them. But by that point Dennis had become a prolific songwriter so he was still important, just not as important as he was in '64/'65.

Plus.........Dennis had by far the largest schwantz, so that made him one of the essential members of the group.

Well, Passions kinda sucks in comparison to the one before it. But Ten Years' Harmony certainly wouldn't have made it a better album.

For some reason all I hear in my head as I'm reading this is the Adult Child version of Shortnin' Bread.

Zing! This kind of makes him the most essential Beach Boy.

Such a downer thread for a fantastic year........ :(

Dig the Simpson reference.

Granted, but blaming Passions' relative suckiness to Bruce would be giving him way too much credit.

Difficult question.  If we set the parameters up to 1974, I'd say Ricky, not to say that he wasn't great and didn't contribute, but just relatively less than anyone else. 

But up to '71?  I'd have to say Dave...  mostly just because the BB's are a vocal group above all, and he didn't sing much in the studio.  Also, he did not contribute any songs.  He does deserve a lot of credit, with Carl, for helping develop the band's guitar sound, though, and did seem to have been a pretty important part of the band's live show when he was in it. 

Al is pretty essential because of his voice alone, plus he was important in the formation of the band, and he contributed a fair bit to the songwriting starting in about 1968.  His vocals on stuff like "Cotton Fields" and "Help Me Rhonda" are pretty essential BBs stuff, and he was extremely important as a lead singer live.  Bruce quickly became important to the band's vocal sound, and I can definitely hear the difference after he left.  And while he didn't write much, and sometimes what he did write wasn't very good, stuff like "Nearest Faraway Place" and "Disney Girls" is pretty important.   Still, I would put him as the second least essential after Dave.   

He wasn't allowed to, it should be noted.

Bruce was the least artistically essential.

They were ALL essential to the vocal blend. When Bruce joined, the vocals improved by leaps and bounds. Those 6 voices were a perfect blend. Otherwise, yeah, I'd go with Bruce.

What's up with all the Bruce hate? haha

My vote has to go to Al, I never really liked him and his presence, to me, is not very substantial. I always liked David Marks guitar work better too. 

Since the Mike Love bashing is no longer cool I will go with his robe.

Up to '68, Dennis. After that, Ricky.

Definitely Zeppo.

This is like asking which body part would you miss the least.

No hate for Bruce, but he sang and wrote the least out of the group. Also they did a lot of great work before he joined and in the interm period of 1972-77.
Ricky and Blondie weren't around long but their work was (to me) a lot more interesting than his. David may not have sung much, but his sound left a huge mark (no pun intended) on the group. Al is just too good of a writer and singer for me to consider. Mike and the Wilson brothers are THE Beach Boys on so many levels that it would have been a vastly different group without all of their input.

This x 643891673. I realize it's a "But if you HAD to choose" sorta thing, but everyone was extremely vital to the band at one time or another. Some more than others, obviously, but yeah - way too hard for me to choose.

Blondie and Ricky.

If you like their work, join The Flames' Fan Club. They're not even Beach Boys to me.

+1

tbh Zeppo never did much for the blend in my ears. He might as well never existed since he is close to inaudible on most records and too lazy to meet most photo-shoots. f*** him!

Yeah, plus everyone knows Carole Kaye played all his parts in the studio. Hell, I think she not only played bass, but even sang Zeppo's part on "Barbie."

Honestly, you could get a trained chimpanzee to fill in for Zeppo. Pathetic.

I hate to say it, and everybody can tell me I'm an idiot if they want, but Dennis.  Simply because he didn't sing as much.  His drums were awesome, he was awesome, love him to death, but if he dissapeared nobody woudl notice. 

*cue everybody telling me Dennis was more important than Brian

Only you, Ron.  :)

Bruce.

If you like his work, join The Bruce Johnston Surfing Band Fan Club. He's not even a Beach Boy to me.


David.

If you like his work, join The Marksmen Fan Club. He's not even a Beach Boy to me.


Al.

If you like his work, join The Al Jardine Family And Friends Fan Club. He's not even a Beach Boy to me.


Mike.

If you like his work, join the Celebration Fan Club. He's not even a Beach Boy to me.


Brian.

If you like his work, join The Survivors Fan Club. He's not even a Beach Boy to me.


Dennis.

If you like his work, join The Dennis Wilson And Rumbo Fan Club. He's not even a Beach Boy to me.


Carl.

If you like his work, join the Beckley-Wilson-Lamm Fan Club. He's not even a Beach Boy to me.

Wow.

If we include only the core 5 it would be Dennis.  Vocally he just is not as important as the other 4 guys especially live where he rarely sang when drumming.

If we include all Beach Boys it would be David.  His guitar was easily replaced.  I would list him as less essential than Ricky because Blondie and Ricky are key elements of one of the more interestng periods in Beach Boy history and it probably would have been very different if they were not there.

I think Ron is Mike Love.

It's been already settled that he's John Stamos. Now that renders his opinion extremely shocking.

As my step brother put it, "They would have sucked without Dennis".

def ricky and blondie.

agreed, they were a mistake as BBs.

Ricky, Blondie and Bruce.

I like them. But there's gold in them there 5 Beach Boys...

Is Al Jardine's electric guitar audible on any Beach Boys song?

^I've always wondered why his guitar wasn't turned up on the first live album. It's not like he can't play, right?

It could be that Al was playing the same riff as Carl on the earlier albums, so you might not here him right away, particularly in mono. Like a double-tracked voice. I'm just speaking out of my ass, so I dunno. I have a feeling that as producer, leader and arranger, Brian prized Al's vocal talents far over his guitar talents.
What about later, post-SMiLE albums? Can he be heard on guitar then?

^Alan's originally a folk strummer, so I'm fairly sure it's him on acoustic guitar on a quite a few later tracks. A Welfare Song is all Al, I believe. It's a solid performance.

I don't know if anyone can say for sure when it comes to Zeppo.  We are just now learning about his contributions.

There have been many great threads on this board that go into depth about who played what on Beach Boys records etc... One thing that is a known fact is that Al played bass on many Beach Boys sessions '63 - '65, probably more than he did guitar. On the early albums (the first four) you'd have Carl and David on guitars, Brian on bass or piano,  Dennis on drums, and starting with the third album Al plays bass on a few tracks and remains the primary Beach Boys studio bass player through the All Summer Long sessions, while Brian plays mainly keyboards, Dennis drums, Carl guitars (with David until Shut down Vol 2). That's a general thumbnail with exceptions on some tracks, but generally Al was a studio bassist in the early days.