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First review I've come across, sounds incredible :

http://consequenceofsound.net/2013/09/brian-wilson-jeff-beck-david-marks-and-al-jardine-debut-tour-at-south-floridas-hard-rock-live-927/

Wow what a great review!! 8) 8)

Many thanks... oh how I wish this combination will tour Europe after the U.S......

"Mike Love’s well documented transgressions against human decency"

I stopped reading after that; this reviewer is bullshit.

lol oh boy this is gonna be good

You might have learned something.
Great review. Thanks for posting!

Nice review. I still don't get what's supposed to be appealing about the pairing of BW and Jeff Beck. Good to know they're doing fine, though. I'm not an electric-guitar guy but thought his playing on the Surf's Up rendition I saw was done in remarkably good taste.

Sounds great ... but is Blondie only evident for the ONE song (albeit SOS) ?? Does he stay on and contribute anything significant for the other songs in the set ?

I did learn something; the reviewer is bullshit. :P

I only like reviews when they restate my own opinions, it's never interesting to hear other opinions. I don't see the need for other opinions, frankly.

Yes, brother Ontor, the Professor as well. . .

And any review that tropes on that old chestnut about Mike is dead in the water. Anything short of the 5 BB together is just a big nothing for me

This guy says that Mike ending the reunion tour was a potential threat to Brian's sanity.  To me, that's a slight against Brian as much as it is to Mike. The guy also says Brian appears disinterested, and seems to have to look hard that Brian is not disinterested. I'm not sure Brian comes off that well in the review, either, other than the fact he wrote the songs.

I love other opinions. The only opinions I reject out of hand are those who have to bash other performers to elevate the status of their chosen god. I was in sales for many years and one of the first things I learned is do not bash the other product; tell why yours is better.

+1

It's going to be a BIT of an uphill struggle to cleanse all writing about Brian Wilson of snippy comments about Mike Love. Especially post C50... imagine what they are going to be saying as the album, memoir, and movie come out! Whew. I imagine stock in Kokomo will dip a bit.

Gonna be lots of articles you guys will have to stop reading two sentences in, I guess.

I notice they tacked this up on BW's site.

Yes, and the reviewer's contention that Mike's shows are a mockery is patently false, as the set list and musicianship are heralded, as we all know. I hope B, A, and D (my favorite BB) are happy and feeling fulfilled, but I wont (neither will Dave as I read in his interviews) condemn Mike. Please get back together fellas.

I read the whole review but stopped taking the guy seriously after the second paragraph where he (a) claimed Mike 'fired' 3 of the Beach Boys and (b) implied that Mike ending the C50 Tour could have sent Brian back to the rubber room.

Also it seems as if Blondie is being underused.

Most of the anti-Mike stuff is coming from smaller websites and blogs. It's inside baseball type of opinions from unabashed fans of Brian. I don't think more legit journalists are going to go in that direction, or at least they will be more subtle about it if they do have biases. I don't think Brian's biopic or new attempt at an autobiography are going to affect people's opinions of Mike any further in a negative direction than they are already. There is already the Leaf book and Brian's previous autobiography that have done that. I just don't understand why people feel the need to "champion" Brian over and over. He's a big boy with lots of money and a full complement of lawyers, plus his life has been much happier for a long, long time.  People (or at least some people, such as this reviewer) seem to have the impression Brian is in the same condition he was in the '70s.

In some respects he's much, much better and in other ways much, much worse. And either way, Mike is precisely 0% accountable for Brian's mental health problems.

‍

I thought all Canadians did nothing but say "I'm sorry".  :lol

Indeed, and worse, it's very badly written bullshit.

Exactly. When I think of "well documented transgressions against human decency", Michael Love is among the last people to come to mind. But since Brianistas compare him to Hitler I think we can give this intellectual pygmy of a "journalist" the benefit of the doubt, idiotic as he may be.

Ok, I agree the reviewer goes into unnecessary and much-debunked let's-bash-Mike-he-fired-everyone-except-Bruce territory, and that stuff is indeed bollocks, but what about the actual review of the gig itself ? How about the content of the show as described in the review ?

That's all invalid due to the You Must Be Fair To Mike Love Act of 2012, which barely squeaked through the Senate. I'm afraid that makes it impossible to be glad Brian and Co. got a rave review on their first night.

If someone sees things through rose colored glasses and I'm not wearing them, our perceptions or color will be vastly different. A reviewer should be 100 percent nonbiased to present a credible review.

True. Notice that any reviewer who spouts the anti-Myke David Leaf crap often tends not to notice/acknowledge that Brain Wilson is easily one of the worst professional live performers ever.

Bit difficult to tell, given the lapidary prose.

To be fair some of that is political correctness not merely David Leaf drivel.  Everyone knows (or everyone should know) the elephant in the room when it comes to Brian Wilson including reviewers so no writer unless he is looking to ignite a firestorm well beyond what he can handle is going to put down Brian Wilson for not exactly being an engaging live performer up there.  The reason being?  Because once you've made that statement you have to explain why he isn't engaging and there aren't that many professional reviewers that are going to go near that one with a barge pole especially in the politically correct society we live in.  So in essence this all goes back to why Brian Wilson gets the proverbial pass on a lot of issues pertaining to all aspects of his personal and public life.  The reason being is we live in a society now that promotes a great deal of tolerance, empathy, sympathy and understanding towards anyone who has dealt with or is suffering with anything even remotely resembling mental illness.

Please correct me if I am mistaken, but the review was not actually about Mike Love.

As it should be, but political correctness is not a strong point of mine so I have no problem saying this; the elephant in the room is that we have this bizarre situation where the two leaders of the Beach Boys each have their own thing going, each backed by a truly exceptional band and yet one of them veers wildly between being an OK singer and someone who would get booed off stage at karaoke night (often due to his own disinterest) while the other is a competent professional at all times. 
Yet because the former wrote the bulk of the material many moons ago and has well documented 'issues' he is instantly validated as 'the real deal' while the other is put down as a hokey, cheesy tribute act.
Sorry, but if someone pays $100 to see someone play live they should expect 100%. Anyone who gives them a free pass to less than that is essentially giving to charity.
Didn't want to derail this thread but it pisses me off no end that I can't read anything BB related on the net at the minute without this heavy-handed bias rearing it's ugly head within a matter of sentences.

So anyone want to comment on how Blondie sounded during SOS?

It's $100? Glad I saw him in July.

He sounded fantastic. He's a got a much deeper sounding voice these days that served the tune well, and he sang it with conviction. He also added a killer solo at the end on his gold Les Paul. I can see why longtime fans rave about those early '70s shows with him and Ricky, he's got a hell of a presence onstage. He showed up again during Surfin' USA and FFF sharing a mic with Foskett to do backups, pretty sure I heard him pull off a couple'a nice falsettos.

SOS!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJT52IvIxYw

That hateful remark shows that the reviewer has such poor sense of judgement that it is useless to read the review. I'm nonetheless inclined to believe those shows may be very, very good. As I hear M&B's shows are very, very good, but unless they play in my town for free, I won't go and see them.

Blondie does indeed do a fine job.

TWGMTR sounds a bit ropey but that just be the recording...

Missing the point, I think. It's a good review. The reviewer said the show was good. That's the point.

Although I will say his writing is atrocious. I mean:
"Suffice to say, the guitarist lost a few Beach Boys diehards amid the athletic bends and whammy bar theatrics that marked the early half of his set, however, between a rendition of Hendrix’s “Little Wing”, (which brought a nearby audience member to actual tears), an emotionally wrought take on the Beatles “Day in the Life”, and a reading of Les Paul and Mary Ford’s “How High the Moon”, (expertly sung by Lizzie Ball and Jeffrey Foskett), Beck’s counterpoint was a welcome one, if not the most congruent to the lush harmonies and pleasant vibes Wilson and Co had just provided."

TWGMTR always sounds horribly out of tune whenever I hear it live. They need to identify the worst culprits and tell em to shut up  :lol.

Love SOS though, excellent performance by Blondie!

Yeah but the hyperbole made me laugh!

This didn't make much sense:
 "The Beach Boys’ luminary oracle of composition has weathered the abuses of the recording industry, the nefarious intentions of what had been a trusted inner circle, and his own mental instability over the course of a career that has yielded inarguably some of the most important music ever created."

What abuses of the recording industry did Brian undergo?  Is he referring to the 67 Capitol lawsuit, or to Reprise rejecting some of the Beach  boys' submitted albums?  And what were the "nefarious" intentions of his inner circle?  Other than Landy, who was not really his inner circle, I can't imagine whom this refers to.

Well said.

I agree with much of your sentiment as long as you realize (which I assume you do) that putting your name to a published review and putting your name on a bulletin board post are two very different things.  You, me and everyone else on here has far more wiggle room in regards to our opinions on matters than a published reviewer does.  He has much more at stake then we do as well.