The Smiley Smile Message Board

Along with Daryl Dragon, Ron Brown was the first musician the Beach Boys added to their live band. He played bass and percussion, I believe. But he soon was gone. I couldn't find any infos about him. How got he in the Boys' band, why did he leave, and was he ever interviewed about his Beach Boys days? Thanks for any help

Rob Brown remains pretty elusive.  A little is known about his background, but to my knowledge he never did any major interviews.  Even his credits on records are a spottier than we'd like.

I'd love to know more if anyone finds anything. Ron's an interesting anomaly for the frequent studio work he did over about a month followed by... nothing at all. It feels noteworthy that he was playing on records at that early stage while Daryl Dragon seemingly wasn't for another year.

What do we know for sure about his involvement, session-wise? Darlin' and Time to Get Alone (via AFM), I Was Made to Love Her (via Bruce), probably Here Comes the Night going only by the sound of it, and I would assume Lonely Days for that reason too. Carl's bass playing on the basic track clearly isn't what survived to the master. Likewise Honey Get Home for the tone, and possibly that Been Way Too Long organ tag. Cool Water shares a date with HCTN but could just as easily be Carl.

Have Bruce or any of the others spoken about how/why he came to play on those tracks?

Wasn't he bass on the 1967 Thanksgiving tour ... as documented on the A Vocal Element boot?

Yeah, he was on the road with them for, what a year?  I've always hypothesized that he ended up playing on the stuff that he did in the studio simply because he was there already for combined recording/rehearsal time or something.  And then either he left the touring group and then sort of by default stopped recording for them, OR it just so happened that Brian felt like inviting his old pals back like Jimmy and Lyle around the time they start showing up on Friends.  Pretty difficult to pin down.

In his 2017 WH sessionography (from the ESQ that I’ve misplaced), c-man credited HCTN to Ron Brown. The others I don’t know obviously, other than c-man credits CCW to Carl. I’ve always had a hard time hearing a bass (that wasn’t a Moog) on CCW.

I think he's also at the UNICEF gala from December 1967:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zgIscI9NL_Y

Yes, with Joe Sample on piano.

I believe the way I worded the HCTN credits was: Basic track was piano (Brian), probably with overdubs of bass (Ron Brown), guitar (Carl), and drums (Dennis)
The "probably" is there because we can't be certain, but that's what it sounds like. :)

I have nothing to add except that his bass playing elevates the Wild Honey album from a 4 to a 4.5 for me. Here Comes the Night is a pretty basic song but the bass on that is just killer

Yes, same here. That sound of his is awesome.

Sorry to put words in your mouth, or post, c-man. I’m just too eager to spread your work around!! And I also couldn’t entirely remember because like I said, I misplaced that issue and can’t figure out where I put it.