The Smiley Smile Message Board

Just a minute ago on his facebook account:


We are heartbroken to announced that our beloved father Brian Wilson has passed away.
We are at a loss for words right now.
Please respect our privacy at this time as our family grieving.
We realize that we are sharing our grief with the world.
Love & Mercy



We love you, Brian! Thanks for everything!

Heartbreaking to read.

Brian may have left this world, but what he left us with will continue to inspire love, understanding, and creativity forever.

Thank you so, so much for everything.

No more pain, Brian.

Thank you for the gift of genius music you gave us.

There's a lot less love and mercy in the world tonight.

I had just sat at my home office desk to get some work done. Almost put "Pet Sounds" on but ended up choosing something else to start. I can't imagine if I had heard the news while that was playing, although now I feel have no choice but to put it on next in tribute. Regardless, I'm stopped in my tracks and suddenly not feeling too productive. Two of my favorites gone in two days, this is a rough week for music lovers.

No words. Thanks for the music sir.

Heartbreaking news. God bless Brian.

I’ve just found out and run here to be with my brothers. I may not be here much these days but Brian is still a massive reason that I am who I am. Love you Bri, thanks for everything ❤️

God bless you Brian on your continuing journey.

I may not also visit very much any more to post, but I wanted to come here to share that Brian and his work means so much to me.

"Well said" to you all. He gave us so, so much. The music will live on forever.

.

No other musician has taken me so often and in so many different ways - hit singles, unfinished works, live performances, backing tracks, deep cuts - to as many places of beauty, mystery and joy as Mr Wilson. Thank you, Brian. Be at peace.

Thank you Brian. We all love you and thank you for being our best friend through your music when we needed it.

You and your music will never be forgotten and will continue to inspire for generations to come.

Bless you and thank you.

This hurts beyond measure. My thoughts are with his family and friends.

I love you Brian…

Are there any words any of us can say to express our feelings?

Not really.

But ever since he was put under care I think we knew it was probably coming fairly soon.

Thank you Brian for everything you've done for us, and the world. I hope you, Dennis and Carl are jammin' away right now.

This song is very appropriate now:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=46IQu0yuJzU

Oh man. Like SMiLE-addict says, words can't express our feelings about this.

All prayers/love to Brian's family/friends, and love to all you fellow fans who are grieving right now. To not know the man personally, but gosh we kinda got to know him so personally through his music.

Living in a world where Brian can't make music anymore is a weird, weird feeling.

Peace and love to you all.

Thank you for everything Brian. You've changed my life to the better!

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Let's all "Thank God for the one-one-Wonderful" man whose passing is a terrible blow...but the simple and complex joy he has brought all of us in the music he created will never die.

We are all lucky to have lived in his lifetime, being connected to the truest and most unwavering artistic benevolence that can possibly be experienced. He conquered the chaos in his life and remained true to his calling--to bring love, healing and spirituality to the world via his music.

Let's be thankful that he cheated death so many times before, and survived to resurrect his most ambitious effort and gift it to eternity in such a triumphant manner. Even though he is no longer with us, we can take solace--and joy--in knowing that we will never be without him.

Love and mercy is definitely what all of us in this whole world need tonight, and every night--and the child-like genius of Brian Wilson is a lamplight that will never be extinguished.

I'm devastated. In many ways, direct and indirect, he shaped my life. I know he will shape my future as well.

Thank you, Brian, for everything.

This feels like one era of pop music and pop culture ending. Some of my best memories in life are when I found Pet Sounds and Smile nearly 25 years ago and my life was never the same after. Even though Brian’s greatest gifts to music were given nearly 60 years ago his presence nevertheless was a constant reminder that we live in the era of that masterful creativity through his presence. Now it has come an end. Brian’s passing is sad but of course not surprising considering his age.
 
Greetings to everyone and let’s keep the flame alive. 

The day we knew was coming but still emotional. Today will be a day of tribute in the only way I know…Beach Boys music! 🎸🥁🏄

Sail on Brian….

I am sad, yes, but overwhelmed with gratitude to have shared this timeline with Brian Wilson. As I grew older, I came to understand more about how one person's life can contain so many contradictions and complications, tragedies and triumphs. He was so very human. Brian and his bands (the Beach Boys, sure, but also the folks who toured with him for a quarter century beginning in 1999) created something special and lasting. Few others can say the same. Love to his friends and family, love to my fellow fans, love to us all. We sure need it.

RIP big guy.  What a life.  What a legacy.

Some of you are managing an impressive level of stoicism that I seem incapable of right now.

RIP.  Don't have enough words.  💔😭

Maybe it's because I'm preparing myself for my father's death (you do that when you have a parent with dementia), but I'm trying to be grateful that we had Brian on this Earth for so long. He gave us so much--he's leaving us with so much. I'm also grateful that I got to see him perform live and work with a truly great band that adored his music. I hope he had some moments of peace and happiness in his life and that his last years brought some artistic and personal fulfillment.

I don't know if I believe in any kind of afterlife, but at the risk of sounding corny, I hope he's at peace now, wherever he is.

I'm thinking of his children, who (the younger ones) lost their mom not that long ago. They'll be in a lot of pain. I hope they have a support system.

XM 60s channel host said “here’s Brian’s favorite song “ - Be My Baby playing now.
XM channel 79 is playing Beach Boys songs today

RIP Brian. A sad day. I am glad to have personally met you on a few occasions in the past, either at your concerts, when we were attending vip with the Ladykillers, or even when you last-minute signed my friend's surf green Rickenbacker guitar back in 2006 in London!

God.

Feeling hollow since getting this sad news. All I can envision is Brian's arms stretched out to Carl and Dennis with a heavenly hug. So many great comments here and all I can really muster up at this time is the world just seems a little colder now that he has passed. Things will never really seem the same without him here with us. It is a really soul killing event. Thank you so much, Brian, for everything!!  :bw

Thank you Brian for all the joy, happiness and comfort that your music has provided for myself and countless others.

I thought of all of you here as soon as I heard.
I know God or whatever is after heard him coming. What unbelievable music must be flowing through the heavens now. RIP.

I am sad.  I guess time waits for no man, not even one of your hero's.

THANK YOU

I hope his bandmates are doing okay today/tonight...Thinking of you all.

The outpouring of love here is so wonderful. So glad Brian was able to bring us all together.

It was in reference to the "Love & Mercy" movie back in 2015, but Howie Edelson's summation of that movie included something that has always stuck with me about Brian:

"It's about a guy who lives a personal internal Auschwitz nightmare yet still writes "This Whole World" for people he'll never meet."

I haven't posted on here in so long, needless to say it's beyond devastating to recieve this news.

Brian Wilson was one of the two most important musicians of my life. (McCartney being the other) One of my all time heroes. I always knew this day would come, but you can still never really prepare for it. Brian is on my mind a lot.

His music has always been there for me when I most needed it. I was terribly depressed and honestly had suicidal thoughts throughout my years at university. And the most therapeutic thing I could do for myself while walking home by myself was listening to Pet Sounds. Every day. That album was (and still is) my comfort blanket.

Brian felt like he was my friend. I never met him one on one, and in truth, I didn't want to, but he always inspired me creatively. I would never have started writing my own songs or expressing myself without Brian or the Beach Boys. He is my greatest inspiration.

When I was still in school, in the early days of the iPod, I Get Around was the first song I downloaded on my nano. (Funnily enough, I remembered first hearing the song from a vhs of the movie Look Who's Talking!)
But what got me properly into The Beach Boys was listening to Good Vibrations on some otherwise naff best of the sixties compilation when I was 15. I'd never heard anything that connected with me quite like that song. I must have played it at least 6-7 times in a row.

Cue a few years later, 2012. I was 18 years old. I'd already seen Brian perform the Reimagines Gershwin album, listened to all of the unsurpassed masters box sets, downloaded every SMiLE bootleg i could find, brought all their twofer albums on CD. and devoured everything to do with the 50th Anniversary tour and SMiLE box set. Then the news here on smileysmile.net was buzzing that The Beach Boys were going to play Wembley! I couldn't believe my luck when my Mum got tickets for us. I think it's still the greatest concert experience I've ever had. And that includes seeing Paul and Ringo at the o2 arena.

I remember looking out at the stage and on the screens, Brian was so happy up there and I'll always remember his big warm smile as he sang Please Let Me Wonder. It was such a happy memory of that time. And even if the reunion didn't last long it was the greatest closer I could have imagined to their live career. My first and last Beach Boys show, and it was the last show with Brian and Al Jardine. I'll always cherish that memory.

I saw Brian (And Al) a few more times up until 2017, and it was just such a thrill to be in the room with the man. His music has gotten me through some of the best and worst times of my life, and I'll always be thankful for that. The fact that he made it to 82 with all of his problems going back to the sixties has always been a huge inspiration to me, and above all, he's always made me want to be a better person.

Love you Brian, thank you for the music, thank you for everything. I hope you are at peace with Carl, Dennis, Audrey and Melinda.

Thank you Brian. Godspeed and God Bless.

My hero. So very sad. Rest in Peace, king!

Here is my version of a thank you note to Brian I'm sharing with other fans: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bcy6AQIcS-w

The thing about Brian besides his incredible talent, I doubt you can find anyone on this board hardly ever saying a negative word about him. Yes he had his issues, but he always seemed like such a sweet/kind man. Just watch long promise road where he drives around and talks about his life. Hard to see him as anything but a wonderful person with a treat heart.

He will be missed for a long time to come. We should be glad we had him as long as we did. Everyone thought he was gonna die in the 70s he ended up outliving his bothers, even Melinda. A tribute to his toughness.

It's a very sad day today. I found out about Brian's passing from my two siblings immediately texting me about it while I was at work. It hit me like few celebrity deaths ever have before, because Brian is absolutely more than that. More than ever, I feel the importance of communities like these, where Brian will live on far past his own lifetime. Love you guys, thanks for keeping the music and the love alive.

It really feels like a family member has died. I can't even picture him as gone, he was such a monumental figure.

This is a day we all knew was coming, and as much as I prepared myself, I still can't help but think of how strange it is to say "Brian was", not "Brian is". I was born after he had gotten away from Landy and beaten the worst of his demons, so I'll never know what it was like to be a fan in the 70s and 80s in constant fear that this bad news would happen so much earlier than it did, to say the least of the friends and family who were close to him.

Farewell, my friend, my beautiful friend.

Been dreading this day since news broke that Brian was being placed under conservatorship. I awoke to a beautiful summer day in the Washington DC area, but upon hearing the news, it suddenly became a cold gray January day. The outpouring of grief from all corners of the globe unites us in a communal feeling of loss. Ironically, I had planned to head to my place at the beach for a few weeks and so I will go and stare at the waves as they crash ashore with Brian’s music in my ears and sorrow in my soul.

Thank you Brian for all the great music you left for the rest of us to enjoy while we’re still here.

No...

I can't.

I mean... I knew this day would come, but I just am not ready. I don't think I really could ever be. Dammit.

Oh, this is not all about me. I'm sorry. I'll just say that... I'm glad to have lived during the last very nearly 46 years of his life. That probably doesn't make a whole lot of sense and I'm still making it about me. Like I said, I can't do this. Let me start over.

He is at peace now. For those that believe in that sort of thing, there is comfort in knowing that he is with Melinda and his brothers.

What he leaves behind in this world, his immeasurable legacy, his positive effect on so many people, including everyone here, is inextinguishable.

His effect on my life, through his beautiful music is... I can't even begin to express it now. Maybe I'll try again when I can stop crying. Maybe not even then. It's so all-encompassing.

It still doesn't feel completely real, or it hasn't fully hit me yet, or something. I don't know. Much like trying to put words to what his music means to us all, I don't know how to say just how much I'll miss him. I just know that the world feels... less. Hurts more. I think that'll pass because his music lives on and we'll carry it on and through it, the hurt will become a distant echo, far, far outlasted by light he chose to share with the world.

I love you Brian. And I thank you for being you. God only knows what we'd be without you.

Still in shock. Thank you for all the music, Brian.

Going between being totally numb and tearing up when I hear a certain song today and a few outright emotional collapses, I was thinking about the concept of spiritual energy and how collective thoughts and emotions can transmit feelings universally to whomever is receptive to them no matter where they are..."good vibrations" to borrow a phrase...

And it occurred to me that as long as he was alive, all of that positive and healing energy he sent into the world through his music would be reciprocated within that mysterious network and return to him. Again to borrow a phrase, "the smile you send out returns to you". And for all of those smiles this man inspired with his music, and all of the positive feelings he transmitted throughout his life through that music, it created a network of sorts that cycled all of this around and around in circular form, and whenever someone like me or you or anyone got that rush of positivity and joy that Brian's music uniquely created, it would radiate out and around and get back to him in some form.

And now that he has left us in the physical sense, it feels different, yet it might even make that circular transmission of positive energy and joy even stronger, every time we listen to one of those transcendent songs he created and those feelings reach someone else, that energy continues to grow.

And I guess my point is, share the music with anyone you can, and share the feelings with them that were personal to you and which made your own experience with his music special. It's up to us to pass on to others now and in the future just how special, uplifting, and healing this man's music was and is and can be. Then that cycle will continue for generations, and what Brian ultimately wanted to do for others through his music will continue. 

I didn't hear the sad news until about noon today, (Wednesday,) after a call from my closest Beach Boy friend.  Soon after I got a call from another friend relaying the news.  After that I tuned to Sirius XM's 60's channel and listened to it for the next 7 hours.  They didn't play a ton of Beach Boys/Brian Wilson songs, maybe 1 out of every 7 they played, but the DJ (Pat St. John?) was broken up with the news and dedicated the full time on air to talking about Brian and airing phone calls from fans.  I just needed someone to commiserate with, and that did the job.  (Finally, after 7+ hours, another DJ took over.  I gave him plenty of time, but he didn't play any Beach Boys songs and didn't even talk about it when he first came on the air, so I finally turned it off.)  Now I'm here at the SmileySmile board looking to find some solace with other Brian Wilson fans.  Thanks to everyone who has posted so far.  You've been much more eloquent than I can be.

It's eerie, but I had a premonition about Brian's death this past week.  I don't recall what I was reading, though it must have been Beach Boy related, but I remember all of a sudden a feeling came over me that Brian might die within the next few days.   I don't recall ever having that feeling about him before.  And, unfortunately, it came true.

Thank you, Brian, for all the love you've unleashed upon the world.  You were/are my musical hero, and as someone else expressed earlier, even though we never hung out with you, you became one of our best friends.

Love and mercy to all of Brian's close friends and all his family over the passing of this humble and gentle soul.


Love and merci,
Dan Lega

Sadness all across the world, hurting over here too mate.

That's an incredible quote. Wow.

I'm still at a loss for words myself. 

"Break Away" came on when I had my music on shuffle mode today at work, and after hearing the lyrics, things made a little more sense to me.

Break break shake away, break breakaway
Now I'm free to do what I want to do

Time will not wait for me, time is my destiny
Why change the part of me that has to be free
The love that passed me by, I found no reason why
But now each day is filled with the love, that very same love
That passed me by
and that is why
I can breakaway from that lonely life
And I can do what I want to do
And breakaway from that empty life and my world is new
When I laid down on my bed I heard voices in my head
Telling me now hey it's only a dream
The more I thought of it I had been out of it
And here's the answer I found instead
found out it was in my head
found out it was my head
found out it was in my head
And I can breakaway to the better life
Where the shackles never hold me down
I'm gonna make a way for each happy day
As my life turns around
Come on we're free to breakaway (oh boy you jump for joy)
Now won't you come on
You're free to breakaway
Come on you're free to breakaway
Now won't you come on
You're free to breakaway
Feel the vibrations in all the sensations, breakaway
Feel the vibrations in all the sensations, breakaway

Coming out of "retirement" briefly to say I was saddened by the news. Even though I understood it would come someday and that Brian was tough as nails to stick around through so much, I was really surprised too. Usually celebrity deaths dont hit me personally but this one is different--I even had some family members who knew I was an uberfan reach out to express condolences.

Thanks for all the music, Mr. Wilson. You inspired me to be a creative, to seek out meaning in a post-modern world and forge a new philosophy amidst the chaos of the Aquarian Age. You will remain a cherished icon by millions, and as I live and breath, your music (especially SMiLE) shall continue to serve as the psalms of psychedelic spirituality and American virtue forever.

To the community, though we've had our ups and downs, I appreciate now that we are the members of a chosen fellowship. We all heard the magic of these beautiful recordings in our own unique circumstances and were inspired by them. The work of these 5(6) young men brought us all together, fostered analysis and appreciation spanning decades, and remain popular at least three generations later. Im glad we could all share the honor of being a small part of Brian's legacy in that way.

As the man himself would put it, "Love and Mercy."
~The Illegitimate Sun of a Cerulean Sorceror

Our beloved Brian has passed.

He leaves behind a rich legacy to cherish for years to come.

He was a kind, humble and selfless man who loved to bring joy to people with his beautiful music.

He once said “I’m not a genius, just a hard working guy” he was both. He toured relentlessly in his later years and loved to make his fans happy. 

Thank you, Dear Brian. For everything.

Love And Mercy

Like others posting today, I haven't been here in a long time, but had to come back today.  To a place where people will not just understand the shock and sadness, but are experiencing it just as deeply.  I'm sorry for everyone here coming to terms with this news. 

I can't explain my feelings aside from saying that nothing about it feels real.  Brian was such a titan - in every way - that it seems impossible to imagine a world without him.   

I used to come here every day back in the 2000's. The Beach Boys, and Brian himself, mean't so much to me. I like other bands too but the Beach Boys and Brian Wilson's myth/legend really resonated with me.

The music always came first, which affected me on a profound level, but the genius of Brian who burned out, abandoning a masterpiece that could have changed everything, the rivalry with the Beatles, there is nothing else like it in popular music.

The rivalry between the Beach Boys and the Beatles was about who would change the course of music and the rivalry between the Rolling Stones and the Beatles always seemed more of a popularity contest.

I will always love Brian Wilson, what he represents, the tortured artist and innovator, and the music of the Beach Boys. Their music is so brilliant, original and unbeatable in a lot of ways.

Thank you so much for this Don. Exquisite words.

How long will be miss him? How long will we miss him? Until we die.....

Thank you Dan. Of course we've all known it could come but I had a moment yesterday. Someone had shared a photograph of Brian taken at Knotts Berry Farm sitting beside a model of a woman, with his arms about her shoulders. There was a signpost on which was written 'Ghost Town, Calif'. I took a screenshot and when I saved it as Brian Ghost Town it made me feel really uncomfortable.

But I think we all feel haunted today. God bless this sweet, talented man.

You made me cry...again!

.
That was truly beautiful - thank you.  I'm saving this one.

Guitarfool - may i add my compliments to Liz. I saved it too.

The Telegraph did a long article. I MUST quote this:

'Some of Brian’s solo work is equally glorious, especially his complex 1988 comeback (entitled Brian Wilson) and That Lucky Old Sun from 2008. I know a session singer who worked with Wilson during that period and would talk of how confounded he was by Wilson instructing him to sing seemingly random melodic lines that only made sense when all played back together in their full multi-track glory. Wilson carried the music in his mind, a jigsaw of sound that he was piecing together one part at a time, but that Wilson himself could always hear.

The figure we would see in rare public outings did not seem compatible with the visionary splendour of his music. His clinical diagnosis was schizoaffective disorder (he heard voices) and manic depression, conditions possibly rooted in his abusive childhood and magnified by copious drug use in younger days. He had some difficult personal times but held onto the music, as if it was able to keep him afloat. I had the opportunity to interview him for the Beach Boys reunion in 2012, but he was slack and vacant and barely seemed present. “I can’t really answer that,” was his de facto response to every question.

Yet I saw him perform many times and on stage his mood would visibly lift. However disconnected his presence, the aural splendour utterly overwhelmed the visual incongruity, somehow restoring the lost genius at its centre to his gilded youth. Wilson really was a man made of music. It is music that will survive him, and probably outlive us all.'

The news of Brian’s passing hit me harder than I expected, even though I knew it was coming sooner than later. I’m beyond sad—this already troubled world just felt a little better knowing he was still in it.

And yet… what a life. For everything he endured, all the pain and struggle, the odds said he shouldn’t have made it this far. He wasn’t supposed to have that extended coda—the later years where he was celebrated, cherished, and able to keep creating in some form. But he did. And I’m so thankful he had that.

His music has been a meaningful presence in my life, a kind of lighthouse through different storms. It’s hard to imagine the world without him, but I hope that somewhere, somehow, he’s finally at peace.

Thanks, Brian.

Here's Mike's tribute on his FB page.

Today, the world lost a genius, and I lost a cousin by blood and my partner in music.
Brian Wilson wasn’t just the heart of The Beach Boys—he was the soul of our sound. From the first time we sang together as kids in my living room, I knew there was something otherworldly in him. His musical gifts were unmatched. The melodies he dreamed up, the emotions he poured into every note—Brian changed the course of music forever.
Our journey together was filled with moments of brilliance, heartbreak, laughter, complexity and most of all, LOVE . Like all families, we had our ups and downs. But through it all, we never stopped loving each other, and I never stopped being in awe of what he could do when he sat at a piano or his spontaneity in the studio.
Brian’s unique artistry and our collaboration gave the world the American dream of optimism, joy, and a sense of freedom—music that made people feel good, made them believe in an endless summer and endless possibilities. It was one of the greatest blessings of my life to experience that creative space with him.
It was our privilege to make the world believe in sunshine, surfing, and teenage dreams. My life was forever changed by Pet Sounds, God Only Knows, In My Room, Good Vibrations, The Warmth of the Sun and a hundred other pieces of his soul wrapped in music. He allowed us to show the world what vulnerability and brilliance sound like in harmony. He was fragile, he was intense, he was funny—and he was one of a kind.
My wife, Jacquelyne, and I are heartbroken. She stood beside me through so many chapters of this story, and we both send our love and prayers to Brian’s family, his children, and all who were touched by his life and gifts.
Brian, you once asked, “Wouldn’t it be nice if we were older?” Now you are timeless. May you rest in the peace you so deeply deserve, surrounded by the heavenly music you helped create. May your spirit soar as high as your falsetto, may your wings spread in effortless flight.
Thank you for the harmonies, the memories, and the love.  Death leaves a heartache no one can heal, Love leaves a memory no one can steal.
I’ll miss you forever, my beloved cousin.
– Mike

Al's tribute :

Brian Wilson, my friend, my classmate, my football teammate, my Beach Boy bandmate and my brother in spirit, I will always feel blessed that you were in our lives for as long as you were. I think the most comforting thought right now is that you are reunited with Carl and Dennis, singing those beautiful harmonies again. You were a humble giant who always made me laugh and we will celebrate your music forever. Brian, I’ll really miss you…still I have the warmth of the sun within me tonight.

Blondie Chaplin said a few words too...

Sad, but beautiful memories of Buddy Boy,  a real good person. I will miss him dearly. My heart is shook up  and broken from all the times we’ve spoken of music and how important it is for the soul. Amen.

Mike's tribute got me choked up. More tributes below. Some were reprinted in Pitchfork, but I keep finding others.

 Sean Lennon: “Anyone who really knows me knows how heart broken I am about Brian Wilson passing,” wrote Sean Ono Lennon, whose late father, John Lennon, was a Wilson contemporary and known Beach Boys fan. “Not many people influenced me as much as he did. I feel very lucky that I was able to meet him and spend some time with him. He was always very kind and generous. He was our American Mozart. A one of a kind genius from another world."

Fred Vail: “Sixty-two years, that’s how long we were buddies. Some great memories, some great moments. They all fly back at me: meeting them at the old house in Hawthorne; sitting on the floor at Capitol, when he mastered Pet Sounds; at Columbia, when we recorded ‘Good Vibrations’; and then all the shows at the auditorium in Sacramento that I emceed.”

John Cusack: “The maestro has passed - Brian was a raw open heart with two legs - and an ear that heard the angels - quite literally. He was touched. To see him so happy with his wife Melinda - finally talking about and performing his unfinished masterpiece Smile , (after the release of the astounding Smile sessions) - to hear him be so open about the depth of his struggles so that the telling of his story might help others and take away the stigma of mental health - was to see a triumph of endurance and spirit , love and Mercy .”

Bob Dylan: “Heard the sad news about Brian today and thought about all the years I’ve been listening to him and admiring his genius. Rest in peace dear Brian.”

Carole King: "“Brian Wilson was my friend and my brother in songwriting,” wrote Carole King. “We shared a similar sensibility, as evidenced by his 4 over 5 chord under ‘Aaaah!’ in ‘Good Vibrations; and mine under ‘I’m Into Something Good.’ We once discussed who used it first, and in the end we decided it didn’t matter. The world will miss Brian, but we are so lucky to have his music.”

Elton John:  “Brian Wilson was always so kind to me from the day I met him. He sang ‘Someone Saved My Life Tonight’ at a tribute concert in 2003, and it was an extraordinary moment for me. I played on his solo records, he sang on my album, The Union, and even performed for my AIDS Foundation. I grew to love him as a person, and for me, he was the biggest influence on my songwriting ever; he was a musical genius and revolutionary. He changed the goalposts when it came to writing songs and shaped music forever. A true giant.”

Paul McCartney: "Brian had that mysterious sense of musical genius that made his songs so achingly special. The notes he heard in his head and passed to us were simple and brilliant at the same time. I loved him, and was privileged to be around his bright shining light for a little while. How we will continue without Brian Wilson, ‘God Only Knows’." (Carnie's response on Insta: "Sir Paul thank you for your friendship. He absolutely adored you. You know that. 💔"

John Cale: "To me, Brian Wilson was not merely about surf music, rather a true musical genius toiling away at melding POP into startling sophistication.  He will he be missed mightily."

Randy Bachman: “I’ve known the Beach boys since the mid 60’s and have done lots of shows with them. They were the American answer to the Beatles. They wowed everyone with the songs, structures, vocals harmonies. The sunshine sound. I remember when Brian decided to not go on the road anymore but continued to write incredible music. They were like family.”

Questlove (there's more to this one on his Instagram): “If there was a human being who made art out of inexpressible sadness….damn it was Brian Wilson. I hate he went thru what he went thru to create this album (also: Smile Outakes in my North Star) but man——without him I dunno how so many that came after felt safe to express a feeling of sadness that most humans would be otherwise ridiculed/punished for.”

Mick Fleetwood: "Anyone with a musical bone in their body must be grateful for Brian Wilson’s genius magical touch !! And greatly saddened of this major worldly loss!! My thoughts go out to his family and friends"

John Fogerty: "So sad to see that Brian Wilson has passed away. Absolutely one of the greatest songwriters of all time. I love Brian’s music. He is and will always be a huge inspiration to me! His songs are sublime! Miss you Brian!"

 :bw When Brian and I were 24-years old, we met. He, an accomplished songwriter/producer with a well-established career, and me an audio engineer new to Hollywood. Our chance meeting became an entanglement going on 59 years … and the rest is history. Now, the Wilson brothers are reunited and I'm certain are making transcendental celestial harmonies, as life is eternal -- God Only Knows.

I remember Brian being a humble, yet complex person. Easy to be creative with, but harder to be with; a man of few spoken words, but of many written to song.

He was always respectful of my ideas, while I was in awe of his. Yet, he made me, and my contributions feel welcome, appreciated, important and maybe useful.

My love to all those whose lives were influenced by Brian's incredible and far-reaching touch. Close or far, direct or just-tangible the attitudes toward the good times of life and memories we all have experienced through Brian's music is unquestionably supreme.  

I know I will be thinking and reflecting on all those many times I spent much happiness in friendship with Brian and on the creative level with both of us having the best times ever. Until I too meet up again with the brother's Wilson . . .

Brian !    It’s the big Take Two !!   RIP my dear friend ~ Stephen W. Desper

The LA Times has some really touching expanded comments from Al.

https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/music/story/2025-06-12/al-jardine-interview-remembers-beach-boys-brian-wilson?fbclid=IwY2xjawK4EyNleHRuA2FlbQIxMQBicmlkETFhakRiM1ozQTY4S2dVYjJ4AR70h611GiacwdbuJbZU2AZbzATq8YgenJBNMMMoYtp7Boidl6g_695sfr_K1g_aem_ppLdDX1xfNBY-au-0YpFCA

--

The Beach Boys’ Al Jardine remembers Brian Wilson: ‘I’m still learning from him after all these years’

The death of Beach Boys founder Brian Wilson is an immeasurable loss for music and for California, both the place and the dream of it that Wilson conjured with his regal and tender compositions.

Wilson was the visionary of the defining American rock band, one who competed with the Beatles to move pop music into new realms of sophistication and invention, while writing songs capturing the longing of an ascendant youth culture.

His death leaves only two surviving members of the original lineup — Mike Love and Al Jardine, Wilson’s high school friend who sang lead on early hits like “Help Me Rhonda” and wrote songs for beloved later-period albums like “Surf’s Up” and “Sunflower.”

On the day the world learned of Wilson’s death, Jardine briefly spoke to The Times to remember his lifelong friend and bandmate. The guitarist, vocalist and songwriter — now on tour with his Pet Sounds Band playing Beach Boys hits with a focus on their 1970s output — looked back on six decades of writing and performing with one of the greatest minds of popular music.

Jardine’s conversation was edited for length and clarity.

--

I just lost my best friend and mentor. It’s not a good feeling, but I’m going to carry on and continue to play our music and perform with the Pet Sounds Band.

Brian was a great friend. We grew up together, we went to high school together. We were both dropouts, which is not a bad thing as long as you have a vision of the future. His and mine was to make music.

We were very good friends and very successful in part because of his great talent. He had an amazing ability to compose, very simple things and very complex things, all at the same time. He was a visionary.

We all grew up together musically, but he grew exponentially. He became a leader, and formed new ways of chord construction, things no one had heard before, and we rose to the challenge with him.

It’s been said that Brian invented the state of California, the state of mind. That’s a cute way of saying it, but he really invented a new form of music in the ’60s and ’70s. It was very sophisticated, but went way beyond that. He was a humble giant, a great American composer.

I don’t think anyone else could walk in his shoes, given all that he went through. I did write some songs he liked, and did help him get through treacherous times. It must be so frightening to be left in the wilderness by yourself and not know how to get home. He said one song I wrote helped him get through that, which is quite a compliment from the great Brian Wilson, who had his own demons to deal with.

Brian Wilson’s band was a reawakening of his professional life. He never enjoyed touring, so this band was a whole new life for him, to experience his own music and an adulation that he never had before.

His legacy is of course in the music, and any interpreter of that legacy has to be sharp and devoted to it. We have the most devoted people that could be there to do that, so many original members of his band. My son Matthew, he’s Brian’s voice, and the DNA is there. With his arranger, Darian, arranging all vocals, we have all the muscle and genius to pull it off.

When Carl Wilson and I were singing those parts back then, we’d abbreviate things — you can’t do everything you did in the studio with only five of us. Now we’ve got 10 people onstage and I just heard some background parts yesterday that sounded just like we used to — you can hear Carl and Dennis in there.

When we take the band out, I have a little white piano onstage, like the one he played in the past. It’s a symbolic moment, the empty piano.

While the Beach Boys tour was a hit-based performance, with this iteration, we’re more introspective, deeper cuts, performing much of the 1970s catalog. There’s quite a few numbers the public hasn’t heard, exploring the heart and soul of those albums. I was hoping Brian would have been able to join us.

But it’s wonderful, we’re hoping this music should last forever, and be felt at the deep levels that Brian experienced it.

It sure is a great responsibility to play it, but it just feels natural to me. I’ve been doing it for so long, It doesn’t feel weighty. I’m confident, especially with this band being so remarkable. I’m still learning from Brian after all these years.

Thanks for this uplifting and life enhancing message and for your work with Brian which we have all appreciated.  How long will we miss him? Until we die.....

Beautifully said Mr. Desper.

I haven't posted in sometime, but I've just come to read everyone's thoughts and memories. This has hit me quite hard, it's comforting to know others are feeling exactly the same.

A touching interview with Al Jardine about Brian on BBC4's Today show:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p0lht2ng

It runs about 5 minutes, and will only be up for a few days.

Part of what Al said about Brian:

Thank you so much Stephen for dropping by. Your thoughts are wonderful. The world has lost a bit of its soul.

Beautiful comments and memories here.

My wife said she expected me to be more "broken up" about it. The truth is, for all the pain this causes me, I can't help but think about how much love so many of us have for this guy. He's somehow brought so much love to the world, that even the end of his life can bring people together.

For that reason, I dont find myself breaking down emotionally... rather I am reminded of why this guy is my hero in the first place. Always led with love, gave the world more than he ever expected to gain, and was there for us when we needed him. Gave us a feeling of understanding that, perhaps, he wished he could have himself. A truly amazing man.

Had to come back and pay my respects.

I have posted on this thread before but took a break due to life circumstances.

I love Brian and all of his music.

He inspired me to create art and keep going when times were tough and sad.

I got to see him on his last Pet Sounds tour and I will forever be grateful with being in his prescence while he was alive.

He still continues to inspire me every day, and I am really going to miss his voice and spirit in this world.

R.I.P. Brian Wilson, my Greatest Of All Time artist, inspiration, and musical hero.

Mr. Desper, thanks so much for dropping by and saying a few words about Brian.  Out of all of us here, Brian's passing has to hit you the most as you were with Brian for so many years as a friend and collaborator.  Please allow us to express our sympathies to you as we are sorry for your loss. 


Love and merci,
Dan Lega

This was posted on Brian's MB.
''Rolling Stone
Brian Hiatt
June 12, 2025

Beach Boys co-founder Al Jardine had a final meeting last month with Brian Wilson, his friend and bandmate of six decades, he tells Rolling Stone. Wilson, who died at age 82, was sitting in the back of his house when Jardine arrived for a visit in May. "He looks at me and he says, ‘You started the group,'" Jardine says with a laugh. "It was his first statement to me. I didn't even have a chance to say hi." (Jardine's full interview, including a look back at the Beach Boys' earliest years, will air on an upcoming episode of our Rolling Stone Music Now podcast.)

"I'm going, ‘Yeah, you helped. You were part of it too!'" Jardine continues. "But he is not wrong, because we bumped into each other on campus and I said, ‘We've gotta start a band. We gotta start a group, Brian.' And he remembered that." For Jardine, Wilson's acknowledgment of his role in the Beach Boys' genesis provided some closure: " I go, wow. ‘Okay. Yeah, I did have something to do with it. So that's quite an honor."

Neither of the two men thought they were meeting for the last time, though Wilson was ailing. "I thought he was gonna get better, " Jardine says. "He had blood-oxygen-level problems, but his oxygen was coming back."

But ultimately, Jardine adds, Wilson "just wore out… He went peacefully, in sleep, and I'm grateful for that."

Jardine joined Wilson's solo band for a Pet Sounds tour in 2006, and started touring regularly with him in 2012. "My first show was at UCLA, and I got a standing ovation just walking out on stage," Jardine says. "And I'm going, ‘Holy cow. This feels like the old days, you know, the old Beach Boy days. And so we immediately kicked in where we left off."
Before Wilson's final show in 2022, Jardine recalls Wilson slowing down. "The last tour, he was quite reticent," Jardine says. "He didn't have the get up and go. He was just kind of slumped over the piano a little bit and not really engaging. So we noticed that, and finally we realized something's amiss here." Jardine believes Wilson changed after contracting Covid: "That was the end of it. He never came back after that."

Jardine is currently prepping for his own tour with members of Wilson's solo band - he had hoped to have Wilson himself join the band for at least one show. The tour will include both Beach Boys hits and deeper cuts from later albums, including 1977's quirky The Beach Boys Love You. "I was hoping he'd be there to approve," Jardine says.

Jardine says that his old friend was "beyond" a genius. "He invented the Beach Boys and he invented a style of music," he says. "A style of putting eight notes together in a different way. He could do anything, and each time it was a joy to hear his arrangement of something as simple as ‘Surfer Girl.' Writer, arranger, producer, singer - all five of those things. And he left us with the best repertoire for the rest of our lives to re-record, re-sing, replay."'

So relieved to learn that Brian passed peacefully in his sleep. Goodnight sweet prince. May flights of angels sing thee to thy rest.

+1, beautifully said.

I love the guy to pieces without knowing him personally, save for a phone interview 20 years ago and a couple of brief encounters in 2001 and 2005. I also find it cosmically eerie that an interview I did with Mike Love about a June 21 concert the Beach Boys are doing in Montreal was published the day Brian died.
https://www.thesuburban.com/news/the-beach-boys-come-to-the-west-island/article_1e5a4189-9347-4d16-b16a-5cf8ee4e249d.html

Beach Boys' Al Jardine Opens Up About Brian Wilson's Final Days

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0S5IeiCESZA



Former Beach Boys manager remembers Brian Wilson, talks about unreleased 1970 album

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

(https://i.postimg.cc/zXwQppgH/Springsteen.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/tYTD43D9)

I saw the Beach Boys show at NYC's Town Hall last night. It was terrific!

I was really impressed when the second set started with a new and substantial video about Brian, using "Brian's Back" (Mike's late '70s song) as the soundtrack, and highlighting moments Brian, Mike and the band spent together over the decades. It segued into real-life Mike talking about Brian and dedicating The Warmth of the Sun to him. It was my first BBs show since 2017, if memory serves, and they've made a lot of changes which I think mostly work for the better. Aiming to write a full review when time allows.

"Devastated to hear of Brian Wilson‘s passing. He had such a profound effect on me. The Kinks played the Hollywood Bowl with The Beach Boys on our first us tour. Sad day .. years later Brian and I used to run into each other at the movies with our daughters and we’d catch up..I’m devastated. I loved his Singing.He was an innovator and his writing prowess was remarkable. I loved him." - Dave Davies

It’s been a long time, but I wanted to jump back on here to pay my respects.  I don’t have the words to describe the impact Brian Wilson’s work has had on my life.  I think he helped me be a happier person.  I know he helped me feel less alone.  God bless him.

Brian Wilson Performs "Sloop John B" | David Letterman


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=msBif2ZHqVw 

God Bless you Brian, universally loved by everyone! RIP

This was posted by one Lawrence Law Worrell on facebook. I always find these small insights into Brian's and the Beach Boys' influence interesting:


This one hits personally😢💔
When my legendary granddad Sam “Bluzman” Taylor
wanted to do more songwriting and production after touring with Etta James, The Coasters and more famously Joey Dee & The Starlighters,it was this genius that gave him and my uncle Benny Earl Taylor this chance by hiring them as staff songwriters for their record label Brother Records. Though the label was short lived, it was a opportunity and relationship that benefited my granddad in the long run even to the point of his relationship with Dennis Wilson and even more so the soon to be Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame Inductee Carol Kaye who played Brian’s written bass parts on most of the Beach Boys records. My granddad and Carol formed a Disco-Funk project called Spider Webb that released one album in the mid-70’s (Google It)
And lastly, me, my uncle Bobby, uncle Jacques and granddad would sometimes warm-up harmony wise for our shows singing The Beach Boys records ”In My Room” in which I always did Brian’s high note falsetto at the end that would drive the crowd crazy☺️
The Beach Boys RIDICULOUS SICK harmonies and Pop-Doo-Wop,R&B & Rock textures didn’t just define the summer, beaches and surfing. It set the mood for teenage understanding and longing for love in the most unusual settings so outside my granddad’s history with them, you better believe I studied EVERY Beach Boys album in the house
Though every member played a siginifcant role, it was this man right here who was defacto leader and the brains of the entire operation. Many music genres and movements like the California sound, art pop, psychedelia, chamber pop, progressive music, punk, outsider, and sunshine pop are all based on his influence from his high production values, complex harmonies and orchestrations, vocal layering, and introspective or ingenuous themes.
and besides…you know you a bad ass when you make The Beatles go in the studio to create their greatest album
Thank God For This Genius
Who Changed Music Forever😢
The Iconic BRIAN WILSON (RIP)

The Beach Boys Tribute to Brian Wilson - The Warmth of the Sun - Live New York City 6/13/25


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eC2HAhGMpTw

He is not only the Greatest of All Times in Music, he is also the true King of Roll and Rock. Just an example:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=N0DWT-VO5pQ

This makes me cry and smile at the same time. Who else?

His music is practically the soundtrack of my life... and I guess I am not the only one. He suffered so much pain in his life, and in exchange gave us so much happiness. A real HERO. Our hero, Brian.

This Bruce tribute is gold. He shows that he really knows and understands Brian, past the early hits and Pet Sounds. The great Summer's Gone, yeah, and also the "hidden" quote of the equally great "Nothing But Love" from Gershwin. Well done, Sir Bruce!

Here is the Brian's Back video that was played at the Beach Boys NYC concert Friday night in tribute to Brian. Well worth a few minutes of your time.
It's got a 2024 date and was created by Noven Jaisi... I believe that's a name that's come up on this board before. People in the comments say he is the official filmmaker of the current BBs.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pil-tAQQRjM

Everyone here of course knows the Mike/Brian relationship was more complex and fractured than what's presented here. But honestly, I found this incredibly moving. It feels like Brian's zany and warm personality really comes through in the choice of footage and the editing, and it had the crowd roaring. We've discussed before how eerie it was that Mike would very minimally mention Brian in BBs concerts in years past; this definitely humanizes Brian and puts him front and center at a key moment in the BBs show. Kudos to Mike for doing so.

Yes, really a moving tribute... thanks a lot ! :bw

Here’s my tribute. I hope you take a look and enjoy it.

https://kansasreflector.com/2025/06/16/how-beach-boys-mastermind-brian-wilson-changed-this-kansas-journalists-life/

This is great, Clay, thanks a million!
... and it seems we both love Do It Again performed by Brian and daughters! It's one of the most exhilarating performances of music ever recorded imho. Carnie and Wendy absolutely soar on the harmonies... as you would put it, they "levitate".  :bw

The King of Rock and Roll at it again:

https://youtu.be/08-A0-Lg7J8?feature=shared

I did! Thank you!

(https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5fd146e517d7a6173d68c882/1611795779700-WHSSJH062J4R0DM2F2EN/Brian+Wilson+Piano+Hawaii+1967+Nice.jpg)


I'm not a religious person but I am spiritual thanks in large part to Brian Wilson and his music. it's all the proof I need that God exists and I can't think of anyone more deserving of the divine love and mercy that awaits.

it's so satisfying to know the brothers are together again, the heavenly choir is a whole lot sweeter now.

people who've had near-death experiences describe (among other things) the incredible music they heard on the other side but Brian can actually compare notes.

bless you Bri, and THANK YOU. you gave this whole world a glimpse of heaven on earth and you're finally back home.

we will always LOVE YOU

Here's another memory (and picture) which was shared on facebook by Brian Mansfield:


In March 1996, I spent two days in the studio with the Beach Boys as they recorded their “Stars and Stripes Vol. 1,” an album of collaborations with country acts. I have four key memories from those days.

1) Sitting in the control room listening to Bruce Johnston and producer Joe Thomas reminisce about their days growing up in Southern California. After a while, I felt like I should add *something* to the conversation, but then I realized that anything I knew about growing up in Southern California in the 1950s and early ‘60s I’d learned from listening to Beach Boys and Bruce Johnston records.

2) Interviewing Carl Wilson and winding up talking about Dvorak and Shania Twain. For the life of me, I can't remember how he connected them, but he did.

3) Standing in a hallway, making small talk with Brian Wilson. And learning that Brian Wilson didn't do small talk.

4) Seeing Brian's jaw drop as Junior Brown laid down his guit-steel solo for “409." When Junior finished and came into the control room afterward, Brian jumped up from his chair and practically ran across the room to grab Junior’s hand. “That was even better than our version!” he exclaimed. (I interviewed Brian by phone a couple of years later and figured I’d use that anecdote as an icebreaker. He had no recollection of it. That conversation went about as well as the one in the hallway.)
Another time, I almost got to sing harmony with him at a small private performance where he needed some extra voices, but I chickened out. I’ve never been sure whether or not that was the right call on my part. Years later, I was in New York when Brian’s label hosted a party celebrating his album of Gershwin covers. My sons were with me that day, and we all got a picture. That one — and this one — are two of my favorites that I’ve ever had taken with an artist.

I have other memories of Brian and his music that I share with the rest of the world, but these are uniquely mine, and I’ll always think of them when I think of him.
Photo: John Lee Montgomery




(https://i.postimg.cc/MGhL99K6/beachboys.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/v1tXBLVk)

I’m struggling… no way to sugarcoat it. There was a time where I wrote more about Brian in a day than I did anything else in a month, at least . Those who have been around the BW online for the past 30 years know exactly what I mean. Yet I find myself at a loss for words right now . Been wanting to say exactly what Brian meant to me but it’s hard.  I’ve buried both parents and lost two babies and this ranks up there . But I gotta try.

It’s no hyperbole for me to say if it wasn’t for me discovering Brian’s music, I wouldn’t be here right now. That’s putting it mildly. But even more than his music, I was a fan of Brian Wilson as a person. The man was my hero, full stop, and a huge inspiration to me on a personal level. He was a fighter. As he loved to say, he was a Wilson… he had a lot of will. A pure force of nature to be reckoned with, for sure, but also one of kindest, gentle people the world has ever known. I’m so blessed to have lived in this timeline with him in it, and the world is a little darker now without him in it.

I love you Brian, and I will miss the hell out of you .

Nothing but respect for what you have gone through Billy C. Stay strong. 🙏

Not sure if this has come up, but Mike says he visited Brian just 3 weeks before he passed, sang for him a bit. If this is the case it’s good their last interaction was positive. (about 2:45 in)

https://youtu.be/9BwgYSJF0rs?si=KD3clCs-07OdcrN5

I notice that Mike’s take on seeing Brian is very similar to Al’s… I’m wondering if Brian knew on some level this was the last time he’d see them. I’m glad they were able to have one final good moment with him.

Hi Clay, thanks for writing this - very much captures the essence of what Brian was all about (although I have to admit I have a fondness for Kokomo ;D)


While the world may seem darker without him for sure, we are blessed to live in a time where Brian could put his music on tape, thus making his heart & soul nearly timeless. I have been listening to Beach Boys music nearly nonstop since last Wednesday, and the one song I keep coming back to is 'That's Why God Made The Radio' - and I can't help but think that God did have a hand in the Boys coming together to bring harmony to the music scene & the world.

The band and the fandom have had fractures, fights - the dark side of our human nature can easily be seen anywhere in that timeline. But what keeps us coming back to the table, what forces us to set aside those differences is this: I think few of us could deny that those voices, those harmonies are a link to the divine. Whatever your version of 'divine' is, there is something in that music that is just more than a kid finding some harmonies on a piano. There is something absolutely soul-stirring about those "wow" moments in his music.

I've been coming to this board since 2009. And one very common theme I've seen in the last nearly 2 decades is that a lot of us are wounded somehow (whether mentally, spiritually, etc), and yet we have all found healing in this music. I 100% believe this music kept me afloat during a very dark time in my life, it helped me tread the stormy water until God pulled me out one day and set me on some dry land.

I guess my point is, that while Brian has left this earthly realm, his music will continue to heal, it will always be there for us on this planet who need a shelter from the storm. Brian is kinda timeless - and his heart of gold, those harmonies, his striving for perfection, will outshine any darkness that this world throws at it. Yes, the world may seem darker without him being here, but he was able to leave us with a seemingly endless collection of harmony that will forever help people find refuge in the darkest of times.

Also want to add that I totally get what you're saying, Billy. I think I'm just trying to say that I believe Brian left a lot of light for us in the form of his music and his example of being a gold-hearted person, however it definitely does feel dark now that he has passed.

I just noticed a bittersweet entry on the board, under the "Upcoming Calendar", "Upcoming Birthdays" section just under the messages: The member "BrianWilson2015" and the number (83). With that birthday coming up, it's sad that Brian passed so close to his 83rd birthday, yet joyous in a way that he not only lived to the age of 82 when others since the 70's had counted him out and predicted he wouldn't make it to 40, but also how fortunate we all were as his fans to have been the recipients of so much great new music and live concert experiences when he saw his rebirth as both a regular recording artists and a live performer for all those years.

So if you click on that "BrianWilson2015" member name, you can access his post history here, and read his answers to the Q&A he participated in here back in 2015, which is still one of the all-time highlights. And for the naysayers...if they're still lingering out there...that was 100% Brian answering those questions that day on this board. We'll never forget it. Thank you Brian.

Brian liked very much the word "spiritual", he used it as the greatest praise. I think that's because it was not just a word to him, and the same can be said of other common words like "love" and "mercy". He knew and meant them, not just lip service.
I think the unique light radiating from his music, felt by everybody, stems mainly from that.

Beach Boys co-founder remembers the late Brian Wilson | Today Show Australia


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uE7CaEgq398

Hang in there Billy, all good things must pass, including all good humans must pass. The world is a better place because of Brian, and that's all that's ultimately important.

I'm right there with you, brother. I've found it extremely hard to really express in mere words what Brian means to me. I've been in a vacant, depressed haze in days since he passed and I'm just getting out of it now. Just... a departure from reality, especially since reality, the world, is so bleak, insane and terrifying lately.  I said to myself today, "snap out of it!" Such foolishness. If anything, thinking on Brian, listening to his music is what can keep me going, actually living, and not trudging around like a zombie. I suppose I've been searching for the words to say how much Brian means to me when it's there only in the feelings that his music summons in me. I've been hesitant to listen because of how much I think it'll hurt to do so, but I wasn't thinking of the healing that only his music provides. How silly of me. I suppose part of me will always mourn him in some capacity, but more than anything, I wish to always celebrate his life and especially his immortal legacy - his beautiful music.

VAN DYKE PARKS on Brian's passing...

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2025/jun/17/his-music-documented-an-america-that-no-longer-exists-brian-wilsons-brilliance-by-key-collaborator-van-dyke-parks



‘His music documented an America that no longer exists’: Brian Wilson’s brilliance, by key collaborator Van Dyke Parks
Wilson bought Parks a Volvo when he’d barely met him – and together they brought sublime poetry to pop. He remembers the making of Smile, Surf’s Up and more

Dave Simpson
As told to Dave Simpson
Tue 17 Jun 2025 09.49 EDT



It was the Beatles’ publicist Derek Taylor – who I met backstage at their first concert at the Hollywood Bowl – who first declared “Brian Wilson is a genius” as part of a [1966] publicity campaign. I knew that word would come back to haunt Brian and it did: from then on he was competing in a world of heightened expectations, but he did that very bravely all his life. He was basically forever competing against a previous version of himself, but as the great American beat poet Lewis MacAdams said: “If it’s not impossible, I’m not interested.” As for lyrics, you can’t beat “I’m a cork on the ocean” [in Til I Die] for a redux of thought from a Beach Boy. I will call that genius and I think the word does apply to Brian.

The things he could do with a piano, bass and a couple of guitars were like him entering a dark room and breathing light and life into it
He had so many gifts. One of them was mutual empowerment. He brought out the best in everyone around him. In the studio, under great tensile strength, the things he could do with a piano, bass, and maybe a couple of guitars were like him entering a dark room and breathing light and life into it. He was a celebratory spirit with a dark coda on his life: the burden of some psychosis. I don’t believe that was caused by drugs. I think it was in his genes, but he had the ability to dig deep. He had a disciplined spiritual force and had sat on church pews and had learned musical lingos, had loved and absorbed everything from barbershop quartets to calypso to composers to Gershwin, was growing up when they coined the expression “Americana” and configured all this into a new kind of pop.


Equally, he was a positive social force while Rome was burning and certainly Vietnam was. People were being hosed down in Selma [Alabama, on civil rights marches] and there was panic and apprehension and assassinations, but against that backdrop we got the tonic of Brian Wilson’s music. I’m glad he didn’t see a state senator shot down to the ground this weekend.

In mid-1960s Laurel Canyon, I was very active and had played on stuff like the Byrds’ Fifth Dimension. David Crosby encouraged me to become a Byrd but I wasn’t strong enough to be that, but they were wonderful people and Roger McGuinn was a great lyricist. I did everything in my power to surround myself with superior talents and really found one in Brian. I can’t remember whether it was David or [Byrds’ producer] Terry Melcher or [talent agent] Loren Schwartz who introduced us, but I went over when they were working on Good Vibrations. I suggested the cello parts with triplets played arco [with a bow] that became part of the song’s signature, like the ruby slippers in The Wizard of Oz. I thought I might get taken on as an arranger or rather a musician trying to become an arranger, but that wasn’t the job Brian had for me at all. Suddenly I was a lyricist.



At that time, I knew nothing about Brian Wilson – I was a Beatles fan – and lyrics weren’t really my background. It’s possible that he’d heard my song High Coin [first recorded in 1965 by Rick Jarrard], which [psychedelic band] the Charlatans had done in San Francisco to very minor impact.

When I rode up to Brian’s poolside mansion in Beverly Hills on a motorcycle I was pulled over by a cop who asked me what I was doing in such a neighborhood. He didn’t believe me so accompanied me to Brian’s front door. When Brian answered it turned out that the cop’s sister went out with Dennis [Wilson]. It was all smoothed over, but Brian asked me what I needed that would draw less attention. At the time, a Volvo was the safest car built. The next day I got a cheque with no conditions for $5,000, to buy myself a Volvo. I hardly knew this man, but sometimes good things happen on trust.

We wrote songs right there in his living room. The first was Heroes and Villains. Brian was the leader and came up with the melody and with it the required number of syllables. I started “I’ve been in this town so long that back in the city / I’ve been taken for lost and gone and unknown for a long long time / Fell in love years ago with an innocent girl from the Spanish and Indian home / home of the heroes and villains …” and never changed a syllable. I envisaged a country and western ballad – a story, kind of. It was a beautiful experience, one of the “eureka” moments of my relationship with Brian Wilson.

We came up with Surf’s Up in one night. We talked about how classical music had died and was being replaced by something else, and there were things to be discovered. I sat there with Brian as we were reinventing the song form. One of the things he did then was record in modular fragments – sections which would then be put together – as opposed to whole songs, a bit like the way people like Robert Altman were making movies.


I don’t know how much Brian consciously was trying to top Pet Sounds [1966] but he wanted out of the box. Placing his piano in a sand-box in his living room wasn’t an example of his craziness. It was both a pop art statement and his fantastic sense of humour. He’d wanted to drop the surfboard and progress so I mischievously suggested the title Surf’s Up. It was naughty … but how could his cousin Mike Love [Beach Boys singer/co-lyricist, who famously wasn’t always receptive to Wilson and Parks’s experimentation] argue with a title like Surf’s Up? I wanted to help Brian have a moment he deserved.


The lyrics were inspired by an artist called Frank Holmes, whose pictures interested me so I tried to adhere to them. “Columnated ruins domino, canvas the town and brush the backdrop / Are you sleeping?” The lyrics are inadvertently about a man who attends a concert and has an epiphany. We did a whole bunch of songs and Frank [who subsequently did the cover art] can testify that I suggested the title Smile for the album.

During the recording sessions Brian dominated the piano. Musicians would come and go, but Carol Kaye [bass] was very important. Elegant and swell, the only female on that set and she played on so much stuff. Dennis [Wilson] was nice to me and Carl [Wilson] knew what Brian was up against so was inclined to promote his brother’s search for freedom, but Brian had to fight to make an album at his own expense and the group felt threatened or diminished, maybe. I walked away. [Wilson pulled Smile, which – although some tracks emerged – became a “legendary lost album”. He withdrew further into drug use.]


A few years later I was in a Warner Brothers meeting about the Beach Boys’ Holland album [1973], which they said was unreleasable without Brian. Mo Ostin [chief executive] said to me: “Can you get Brian?” I went over to his place with my cassette recorder and came up with a few notes, the words “Sail on, sail on sailor” and the title Sail On Sailor. It got him outta bed. We sent the tape to the Beach Boys [who recorded it for Holland]. I take no further credit for the song, which was sweet, desperate and elevating, but it put me in the position of being an effective agitator.


We reunited again for [Parks’s 1995 solo album] Orange Crate Art, which reignited Brian’s recording career. It was my last record for Warners and I was infatuated with the word “orange”, because of its associations with Florida and California. He was sitting in a beach home, looking at a television that wasn’t on, but I so wanted him to sing the word “orange”. He came to the studio and when I got him in front of a microphone he suddenly asked me: “Why aren’t you singing this song?” I said: “Quite frankly Brian, I just don’t like the sound of my own voice,” and quick as a flash he said: “I don’t blame you.” That was Brian: dry as bones. When he became lead vocalist it was different to the 1960s because of whatever had happened to him and he was singing parts that I dictated. It sank without a trace, but it was a step forward – he realised he could get out of the tomb.

Working together again on Brian Wilson Presents Smile [2004, the album as it was originally intended] was more of a long-distance love. I didn’t have the chance to socialise with him at that time, but did some audio intervals, played some parts and so on. I went to the triumphant Royal Festival Hall show [2004] where he performed the Smile songs and my only regret is that my parents weren’t alive to see the joy those songs generated.

Brian and I stayed in touch. My wife Sally and I were close to Brian and both of his wives. Our friendship spanned decades and his various associations and casts of characters. Losing him is so tough and leaves a vacuum, but Brian bloomed where he was planted and his music documented an America that no longer exists. He moved mountains. He changed the language. He treated me kindly when he didn’t need to and when people say his music is astonishing, I agree.

Sorry, if already posted, this is pure gold by Darian.

https://variety.com/2025/music/news/brian-wilson-darian-sahanaja-salute-solo-band-beach-boys-1236432399/

Thank you guys, these tributes are just beautiful. Keep 'em coming!

Darlene Loves Instagram:
Today I lost a dear friend and the world lost a true musical genius — Brian Wilson. I’ve known Brian since the very beginning of my career through Lou Adler, and over the years, we shared unforgettable memories, both on stage and in the studio.

From singing backup on Beach Boys tracks to sharing moments of laughter and harmony during his solo projects, Brian was more than a collaborator — he was family. His creativity knew no limits, and his heart was just as big as his talent.

One of his favorite Christmas songs was Christmas (Baby Please Come Home), and I was always so touched by how much that meant to him. We shared a deep respect for each other’s gifts, and I always said, “The world always needs to see and hear Brian Wilson.” That’s never been more true than it is today.

Rest easy, Brian. Your music, your spirit, and your soul will live on forever. 🕊️💙🎶

For those who might not be able to access Darian Sahanaja's lovely tribute to Brian in Variety...here's the text. I think all of us will recognize and resonate with Darian's closing sentence:

"How ironic is it that Brian, the eldest of the three Wilson brothers… the “troubled one” with all the physical and mental health challenges… would end up being the last man standing? I mean, the guy lived twice as long as his brother Dennis, who was the physical ideal of an all-American surfer boy. Then again, he was always defying the odds. From the very first concert I played with him in March of 1999 — when it was predicted that he may not even make it through a song, let alone an entire show — through to him overcoming some serious demons to find closure to the unfinished post-“Pet Sounds” album “SMiLE,” the man could somehow reach deep down and find the will power to get through most any challenge.

The process, however, might not have been a smooth one. In fact, nearly all my favorite Brian stories are a product of him having to “work through the moment.”

His awkward attempts to get past an uncomfortable situation could result in pure comedy gold, or might even be perceived as “genius.” If he wasn’t in the mood to meet visitors backstage before a show, they might say “Hi Brian, it’s an honor to meet you,” and his typical five-word response would be “Thank you … enjoy the catering!” Always sincere and never meant to be hurtful. Like the time I was standing with him post-show when Eric Clapton walked over, immediately gushing about the music. Brian looked at the both of us and said, “Well… rock ‘n’ roll is here to stay. (Pause.) It will never die” — then turned around, walked 10 feet to his dressing room and slammed the door behind him. Eric and I turned to each other with palms up and just had to laugh. Genius? Perhaps. Honest? Absolutely.

I write all of this as we in the Brian Wilson Band are preparing to join Al Jardine for some shows that will highlight songs off of the 1977 album “The Beach Boys Love You.” The album is one of my favorites in the catalog because I find it to be Brian’s most personal effort after “Pet Sounds.” Even though 11 years had gone by, with his voice no longer angelic, the songs were as beautiful and heartbreaking as ever. And unlike the collaborative approach of the 1966 album, this time around he authored the lyrics to 11 out of the 14 tracks on his own. Are the topics complex, the words deeply thought-provoking? With songs like “Johnny Carson,” “Airplane” and “Solar System,” one would be led to believe they are not. But you can’t deny the sincerity, the heartfelt beauty of the chords and melodies.

The other thing about that album is that Brian produced and played nearly everything on it. If there’s anything I know about Brian Wilson’s creative process, it’s that he was always going for immediate gratification. You can even hear throughout the “Pet Sounds” session tapes him getting impatient between takes to get everyone back to playing together again. Not because he was a control freak, but because he was so anxious to hear the parts come together. Even with us in his band, he would quickly feed each of us a part to sing or play and just couldn’t wait to hear it all come together.

By the time of “The Beach Boys Love You” in 1977, he had several keyboard instruments at his disposal that could now mimic a string section, and others that could sound like a fuzz bass or brass. Most all of them were of the newfangled analog synthesizer variety, and so instead of having to get string or brass players, or even having to strap a bass on, he’d simply grab a Minimoog or ARP synth keyboard and lay his ideas down in a quick and raw fashion, getting the immediate gratification he so wanted. Then, just as he did with “Pet Sounds,” he’d have the guys come in and lay down their vocal parts. What we got in the end was a thoroughly unique collection of songs and an album that sounds like no other Beach Boys record. Some folks even cite it as being the first synth-pop record. At times awkward, but mostly gorgeous, catchy and sincere. Genius? Perhaps. Honest? Absolutely.

In this past year, a few of us would visit him on a regular basis, just to sit and sing with him — just wanting to keep his musical gears spinning. Sometimes he’d join in, but mostly he just sat and listened, choosing to immerse himself in the sound of live vocal harmonies and instruments. For me, it was the least I could do. To be able to give back even a fraction of the joy he’d given me. But also for helping to make me the person I am today.

As a pre-teen, I was ridiculed and even physically abused by my so-called friends for favoring Beach Boys music over the heavier FM rock acts of the mid-’70s they deemed as “cool.” Yet even that amount of peer pressure wasn’t enough to sway my opinion — a testament of how good that music was to me. By the time I got to junior high, I was much better equipped to manage criticism and was able to develop a solid understanding of what I did and didn’t like.

I wanted to thank him for that. I wanted to show him how grateful I was for all the opportunities he gave me. To live out the dreams of every musician. To play Carnegie Hall, the Hollywood Bowl, Sydney Opera House, Royal Albert Hall, Madison Square Garden… to share the stage and mingle with the likes of Paul McCartney, Neil Young, Bruce Springsteen, Elton John, Pete Townshend and even the Queen of England after performing for her at Buckingham Palace.

I mean, how does one possibly show gratitude for all of that? By singing a song by the Ronettes and making him smile.

Brian Wilson passed away in his sleep, at home, in his room. Just as he would have wanted it. The news did not upset me. I was saddened, yes, but mainly I felt relief. I was relieved to know that a man who had suffered nearly every day of his life in a struggle to find a little bit of peace and love was suffering no more.

And without getting overly New Testament here, I’ve always felt that it was through his struggle, his yearning, his reaching to find a better place, that we were given such beautiful music. How lucky are we to have been alive while he walked this earth?"

This is beautiful

https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/articles/brian-wilson-last-playlist-173135772.html

A couple more:

https://www.billboard.com/music/pop/don-was-remembers-brian-wilson-mystical-genius-1236000315/?fbclid=IwY2xjawLAy_1leHRuA2FlbQIxMQBicmlkETBWM1U4Q1BsblRUM0xhbENnAR7lb64ZrAoiTt7EXUHNGTkKLsykG0nKlfaJirCMv-8ww0lBP18NrEVjP67slQ_aem_p448GtYr5Y8wXxZOp7hdpg

https://pitchfork.com/features/afterword/brian-wilson-obituary/?fbclid=IwY2xjawLAy99leHRuA2FlbQIxMQBicmlkETBWM1U4Q1BsblRUM0xhbENnAR7K0sNCenbEnBXfyKG1g95k_NzvltkIbqeOYTscGDyOd6TAXQa8AicZ2ife4g_aem_8NmvY3-JvropW1MLkXXbLA

Oh my, aren't all these tributes gorgeous. Brian is getting the best out of everybody, some of the best prose I have read in these years.
Thanks a million for posting them here.  :bw

This and Darian's tribute are incredible. It's so nice to hear about Brian still being a bit active in his last years/months.

It's more great work from Jason Fine, and that playlist is fascinating enough that it deserves scrutiny from all--and some annotation as well.

Jason does a little of that, but he knew not to go too deep into it in the context of what was called for at this time.

When we are a little further from Brian's passing (can it really be only eight days since it happened?) we might want to create a thread for it, where folks can examine it--either as whole, or in segments--or even individually. I think it's filled with both confirmation of things we know about Brian, but it also contains a number of surprises in terms of what's included (and what's not).

(Of course, it isn't a playlist built via painstaking reflection: it was more spontaneous in nature. But that's also interesting (and pertinent).

To that end, I post the playlist here for ease of access.
The Ronettes, "Be My Baby"
George Harrison, “My Sweet Lord”
The Rolling Stones, “My Obsession”
Bee Gees, “Too Much Heaven”
The Ronettes, “Baby, I Love You”
The Beach Boys, “The Night Was So Young”
Elton John, “Someone Saved My Life Tonight”
The Beatles, “Strawberry Fields Forever”
The Beach Boys, “Please Let Me Wonder”
Chuck Berry, “Johnny B. Goode”
The Beach Boys, “Mt. Vernon & Fairway”
Creedence Clearwater Revival, “Proud Mary”
Bob Dylan, “Mr. Tambourine Man”
Dennis Wilson, “Pacific Ocean Blues”
Buddy Holly, “Rave On”
The Crystals, “Then He Kissed Me”
The Beach Boys, “It’s OK”

I made a duplicate of that playlist in Apple Music!

For what it’s worth I recently found out Brian had actually covered “Someone Saved My Life Tonight “ live which blew my mind. It’s not the best performance of it (it was one of those times where Jeff was doubling Brian and they both were a bit off pitch ) but he sang it with a lot of feeling

This reminds me that Brian and band played Please Let Me Wonder when I saw them in 2015, and it was *spectacular.* It's one of my favorite deeper cuts from that mid-60s era, and it was perfect for Brian's later/mature voice. Every word rung with emotion. I'm sure there are similar clips on YouTube if you dig for them.

I agree, that song always resonated with me and has been a favorite going back to when my dad got an 8-track cartridge of "Best Of Vol. 2" and I used to play it all the time as a kid. And it resonated with Brian too, I think he was very proud of what he accomplished with that song in particular and how it turned out and enjoyed playing it for the fans.

And that's why I think this clip at the link I'm posting is so damn special, and one of my favorite Brian moments of all time. I was not at this show, but someone thankfully captured it aiming their camera at the video screen to get the close-ups of Brian singing it, and the texture that the lo-fi video creates visually makes it even more of an experience. Besides the band simply nailing it that night, watch as Brian "conducts" the band during that glorious instrumental break, and you can tell how much he's digging hearing them play it and hearing that arrangement come together. And...(for those who get the reference here)...that instrumental break is PERFECT as-is, one of the best things he ever wrote and arranged, and it absolutely DID NOT need lyrics added to it decades later to make it 25% better.

But the most sublime moment in that performance is at the very end, please watch this until the last note! Brian for whatever reason that night - maybe he was just inspired in that moment, maybe with the 50th tour coming to a close he wanted to do something extra - well, he rears back at the end and lets go with a high falsetto note that sounds like 1964 Brian hitting that note. It's amazing for fans who thought that particular voice of Brian's, one of the best and most identifiable sounds in the last 75 years of popular music, would not be heard again. But there it is. And the whole thing came full circle for me with this short clip when it appeared.

Please Let Me Wonder, live from the 50th anniversary tour, September 27, 2012 at Royal Albert Hall. Enjoy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rsB3s9xDzRI (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rsB3s9xDzRI)

My favorite moment during that tour was at the show I went to at the Woodlands; during I Just Wasn’t Made For These Times, Jeff pretty much sat it out and let Brian absolutely nail the sh*t out of the lead, and when it ended, he held out “times” and had it end on a pretty good falsetto.

Other great live memories…

2004 - during the cigarette lighter joke , my bandmate/friend  Raymond and I yelled out “but we just quit smoking!” … Brian actually heard us and responded back “G*ddamit good for you ! (Slightly quieter voice) Killed my joke but out fucking standing”

During Marcella he left before the end of the song and the mic picked up him saying “I got to peeeeee” as he sprinted off stage faster than I’d ever see him move

When he strapped on the bass during the encore he acted like it was a rifle and “shot” Jeff and Scott, which was so hilariously random that I’m making it a point to do that myself if I ever do a live show again

2015- before “One Kind Of Love” - “This next song was in a movie . Can you believe it? A movie l! (Pause) AND it was about me”

The 2000 show I saw in Saratoga, CA (one of the few non-symphonic full "Pet Sounds" shows, which I always thought sounded better than the orchestral shows) was the most "on" I've ever seen Brian during his solo years, either in person or just in general. And an excellent recording of it actually exists.

He was talking a bunch between songs. If this had been the 70s, I'd swear he had snorted a line or two. He was *that* energetic.

At one point he came in late at the beginning of "That's Not Me", and told the band to stop so he could do "Take 2."

He told everybody at one point to "get off your fat asses" for one song, and during his "how loud can you yell?" bit he took it to the point of blurting out "I said how loud can you fu*kin' yell?"

It was also the first gig ever where he did "Let It Shine", which I and like 9 other people in the audience seemed to be excited about.

I think it was around 2005 when Brian started doing the "walking down the path of life" song towards the end of his sets. He was really on top form then IMO. Saw him in Dublin and then Cork a day later. Great times!

There was also a Q&A, I think on the night before the Dublin gig. Brian trying hopelessly to decipher what Irish accents were saying was quite funny  ;D

I have heard "Southern California" twice since Brian's passing and darnit if I am not getting teary eyes with each listen.

Looks like Bennett has posted a couple of things on his facebook page (voice messages from Brian, unused mixes):


https://www.facebook.com/scott.montgomery.16503

Indeed and he also posted a beautiful very Brianesque piece for which he requested lyrics. I replied that it worked well as an instrumental (there are some vocal adornments too)  and suggested the title Lost for Words which is an apt title for our reaction to Brian's passing.

Scott also was on a radio show and played an unreleased piece. This was a rock and roll interpretation of I Just Got My Pay - not just that track but it was in there. Wonderful! Brian really rocked  and in good voice! It was his birthday but we got a present as I keep writing!

Scott made some really sensible comments about Brian - how Brian was too sensitive to handle drugs, how Brian's fellow BBs couldn't handle his talent (the problems of being family - IMO a bit like getting a relative to teach you to drive!), how Sloop John B didn't fit on Pet Sounds - he thought Let Him Run Wild would have been better. A friend of mine suggested Guess I'm Dumb which I think would have been better still and fits into the deveoping narrative of the album.

Thanks so much for this. Awesome!

It jogged my memory of a similar "going for it" moment from 2013 -- Brian does his falsetto on I'm Waiting for the Day (Pet Sounds Live), just before the 2-minute mark. This clip is from an LA show, but he did the same song a few days earlier at the NYC show I attended and this is just how I remember it. Brian conducting the whole song with his hands and super into it!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yCyH3nZkw_U&list=RDyCyH3nZkw_U&start_radio=1

I’m getting extremely angry about the AI generated click bait content we’re getting on YouTube … I just had a really tacky one show up in my feed showing “Brian” in a coffin (and the AI was modeled on a photo from about 2011 on top of that ). Fucking sick.


On a brighter note, my daughter reminded me of the show she went to in 2015 with us when she was going on 8 and we talked with the band after the show (we still have the setlist Paul gave her) . It occurred to us that both Brian and Rodriguez (who opened for him on that tour) are no longer with us , along with Nicky Wonder as well.

Someone on FB posted  'The carillon of the highest church tower in the Netherlands de Dom in Utrecht played God Only Knows today.'

For a long time I've said "Please Let Me Wonder" was my favorite Beach Boys/Brian Wilson song!  At one point in that video Brian smiles with the most genuine smile I may have ever seen him give!  Priceless!


(And this is hilarious, while I was writing "smile" above, spell check changed it to "SMiLE!"  When did spell check learn to do that!?)

sh*t, that song has filled my eyes with tears since this one day in 2011 when it just really hit me that the song worked so beautifully as an ideal finale to Brian’s musical life. I said then on these forums that it felt like the scene at the end of the movie where the guy walks into the sunset. I haven't listened to 'Southern California' since Brian’s passing and I know I'm going to cry like a goshdarn relentless rainstorm when I do. But that song has almost always brought on the waterworks in me.

Smile autocorrected to SMiLE... that is fantastic Dan! You have the best spell checker ever!

Totally agree about Southern California. The end of the movie where our hero walks into the sunset... and the sublime end of a sublime album.

I know that some folks think "Sloop John B." doesn't fit the theme, but two thoughts: 1) it is such a gorgeous production that not to have it on an LP would be criminal; 2) if we take the title "Let's Go Away For Awhile" literally, one could argue that Sloop functions in just that way--a side trip (or the memory of same) that ends in an analogous state of disillusion.

I too think it's a bit of a stretch, but I think it works as a "gestalt" better than either "Let Him Run Wild" or "Guess I'm Dumb," neither of which would really fit the arc of the theme. "Let Him Run Wild" is a variant of "I'm Waiting For The Day" (the love triangle) and would really be redundant in the sequence. "Guess I'm Dumb" has the couple broken up and the guy unable to shake his desire to be with the girl. But if "Waiting for the Day" is more backstory in the way that "You Still Believe In Me" adds depth/context to the relationship established in "Wouldn't It Be Nice", "Waiting" suggesting that the romantic evening in "Don't Talk" was not quite the clincher for the girl--who's maybe still gun-shy because of what's revealed in "You Still Believe In Me" (the guy's waywardness and immaturity)--then "Guess I'm Dumb" takes us too far for the arc to work. We're better off with a certain hopeful ambiguity in their status, as is present in "I'm Waiting For The Day," which echoes the yearning hope of "Wouldn't It Be Nice." With "Let's Go Away for Awhile," we have the sinuous soundtrack of a romantic getaway that ends with orchestral sounds that conjure up images of seagulls on a misty beach...which leads to a remembrance of a different, much less romantic seaside adventure in "Sloop John B."

Side 2 also moves around a lot, shifting from romantic consummation "God Only Knows" to interpersonal alienation ("I Know There's An Answer") to romantic uncertainty and resignation ("Here Today") which shifts into a striking autobiographical depiction of feeling entrapped and stifled by others ("I Just Wasn't Made for These Times," which eschews romance in favor of a more encompassing frustration and sadness). Then "Pet Sounds" shows us what our protagonist is capable of when he pushes all that aside and focuses on his talent to one-up everyone who'd been making Tiki Lounge-style tracks. :3d (We really need a respite after the three preceding songs!!) But finally, he can't escape the shattering disillusionment that envelops him when he sees that love--even one that he tried hard to rescue and nurture--can turn sour and die ("Caroline, No").

The thing is that the logic of the music itself is more "consistent" and "linear" than the actual themes--but because the music keeps evolving, getting more muscular and elaborate as the situations occurring in the lyrics do a kind of figure-eight, the "gestalt" in the sequence works. And it's this musical evolution, particularly on Side 2 (as we used to call it!) that cements it all together.

That musical evolution is also what makes the two proposed songs problematic for inclusion on Pet Sounds: as good as they both are, they're clearly a notch or two below the level Brian achieved in his post SD&SN phase; "California Girls" is the pinnacle of mid-'65, but Brian (arguably) goes past it with "The Little Girl I Once Knew" and "Sloop John B."--the former upping the ante on the up-tempo orchestration, the latter pushing us closer and closer to that "teen-age symphony." The progression is palpable--and either "Guess I'm Dumb" or "Let Him Run Wild" clearly pre-date it. Lots of folks have thought that "Guess I'm Dumb" would fit on the Today! LP, and i think it could work well on Side 2--and it would be an interesting thread to see how people decided to arrange the track order with it in the mix (with the motivating result of allowing us to jettison "Bull Session with the Big Daddy"!!). Of course, there's also the question of who's going to sing lead on it...

In short, the anomalies and peregrinations in Pet Sounds are what make it a whole greater than the sum of its parts. I remember making tapes of Beach Boys songs for a friend a number of years ago, and putting tracks from Pet Sounds on in what we'd now call a "shuffle" mode. Though grateful for the gesture, my friend was offput by not hearing the songs in the order they appear on the LP. As time has gone on, I've come to fully appreciate that point of view...

Not confirmed but looks genuine. Brian to join Carl and Audree at Westwood.

About 18:40 mark. Plot being prepared.

https://youtu.be/_jeae3bIcJI?si=OgZJ6n73aW4z4LJc

All good points. I've taken Sloop John B as a sort of interlude. As for the suggested alternatives, maybe Guess I'm Dumb could fit after That's Not Me but it's too late to change it. We're used to Pet Sounds as it is. Even in real life, the narrative is not necessarily consistent after all! The one thing I would change is having Caroline No at the original speed. Having it in mono? I just wish Brian could have heard in true stereo but it's hard to imagine how he could have improved on most of what he did.

Re: Don Malcom's excellent and insightful thoughts - Here we have the conundrum of what many describe as an album that is perfect as-is and speculation about what could have made it even better. The album has existed since 1966 with a sequence that all devoted fans know by heart, and which has a great flow from side to side both musically and lyrically, yet those same devoted fans know about Sloop and how it was a single that the label wanted on the album perhaps against Brian's own wishes and plans. But I don't think suggesting another track would have been a better fit serves much of a purpose other than for expressing opinions any more than someone suggesting the Sistine Chapel art would have been better if a 2-foot square panel on that work had been changed to include something other than what has been there for centuries.

I think - and Brian has said something similar to this as well - that the focus was on the sounds, via the production, arrangement, and overall texture of these songs as the point of cohesion of this album project. The lyrics do follow a definite arc and storyline if you follow the lyrical narrative through the track sequencing, but ultimately was that planned in advance or did it just happen to fall into place as these songs were being developed?

I think the real glue that holds it together is in fact the production and arranging, and the overall "aura" that the production techniques created. The fact the lyrics of these songs somehow congealed and fell into place in order to create a sequential narrative could be one of the greatest happy accidents in modern pop music, not the least point of which is that they were able to sequence that storyline and develop the narrative while also having two of the album's singles appearing as Side 1 track 1 and side 2 track 1...standard practice of the day for labels sequencing albums.

And as a further point to consider, take a look at "I'm Waiting For The Day". Here's a song that was written by Brian in early 1964, when the Beatles were the hottest thing in music and ruling the charts, and Beach Boys album covers still showed images of cars and the beach. Yet, does that track sound like it was written in early 1964 as it appears on Pet Sounds? Absolutely not, and as much as the lyrical content fits well into the story arc and sequence of the album, it's the production and arranging Brian used on the song that makes it fit, and erases any thoughts about what a song Brian wrote in early 1964 would sound like versus something he wrote specifically for Pet Sounds. That's where the music, and the musical headspace Brian was in during this time in late 65-early 66, makes these songs "fit" into the bigger picture of a cohesive album. I think more than the lyrics, both Guess I'm Dumb and Let Him Run Wild as the two cited examples just don't carry that same sonic texture and weight, and therefore no matter what the lyrics say or suggest, they existed as separate productions designed for other projects when Brian was in a different headspace in terms of creating an overall "sound" for a project.

Having said that...where's the love for "Trombone Dixie"? Since that first Pet Sounds reissue that included Trombone Dixie as a bonus track, it's hard not to want to hear that as part of the album experience, at least for me. I just listened to it this morning, and it's a terrific track. Whether it was a throwaway track or Brian just playing around with the musicians or something more that never developed, it works so well as an instrumental, yet I think perhaps it could have been intended for lyrics at some point because it does follow something of a pop song form, whereas the "released" PS instrumentals really do not. Would Trombone Dixie as it exists in the state we all know have fit on Pet Sounds? I'd say yes, again more due to the overall sound and production than anything else. But again, I'm not going to say that little swatch of the Sistine Chapel would have been better serving the overall work if there was something other than what has existed and celebrated as the finished work.

Great posts guys. Agree 100% that the production and arrangements on Pet Sounds are really Brian's unique signature from that time period.

It's been fascinating to experience Pet Sounds performed live... by Brian and his band, but it's even true of the three PS numbers that Mike's Beach Boys always deliver. In either case you see a dozen musicians on stage pushing themselves to their limits. Wonderful textures and instruments and cascading vocals.

That's wild that I'm Waiting For the Day was written in 1964, I never would have guessed that. The arrangement on that one absolutely cooks live (and again, last decade I was lucky to have seen both camps perform it).

https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/articles/brian-wilson-cause-death-revealed-175854173.html

🥺

Ironically, it's TMZ that has put the situation more succinctly:

"Basically, Brian was an older individual who wasn't in great health ... and, he died of natural causes."

https://www.tmz.com/2025/06/26/brian-wilson-cause-of-death/

Wow, he was in really bad shape! :-(

Yeah that was very hard to read. Seems like a fair bit of it stemmed from his kidneys , and that he’d been sick for longer than we knew.

Just occurred to me we still don’t know what happened to Melinda.

My heart goes out to their kids…I lost both my parents about the same length apart

If I had ever met Brian, I would thank him for all the music, but especially for the two shows my brother and I took our mother to. She was in her 70s and loved both shows.

I think I'm like a lot of folks here: Ask me on 20 days what my favorite Brian/BB song and you might get 20 different answers.

I think we all know that when Brian heard "Rubber Soul" he wanted to make an album of all good songs. Brian "album filler" was better than most people's best. Think of "We'll Run Away." It never is talked about, it doesn't appear on compilations and most probably probably don't know it, but it's absolutely amazing.

Yes!! My first couple introductions to Beach Boys music were Greatest Hits compilations. And I think that's what made my musical journey so special with them: I went into listening to their albums thinking that I'd already heard the best of their music (from the Greatest Hits), and I was quickly jolted from that mindset upon finding songs like 'We'll Run Away', 'The Lonely Sea', 'Spirit of America', 'Cherry Cherry Coupe', the list really goes on and on. To this day we're still finding little unknown gems that make us fall in love with the music all over again.

funny you should ask.. I’ve been listening to a lot of Brian’s music the past couple weeks and really flipped for Trombone Dixie this past weekend. the 12-string guitar in particular on the intro is so magical.

years ago I uploaded a mash-up of TD and Had To Phone Ya from 15 Big Ones but they’re in such wildly different keys it just didn’t work. thought I’d try again with the Spring version which is much closer in key and I was surprised just how well they fit together

https://youtu.be/oXTh-PJDhLM

I think Melinda’s passing has been surprisingly undiscussed. There are a lot of mysteries.

— Why wasn’t she seen in public after 2015?
— What role did or didn’t she have in BW’s career after that point?
— What actually happened with BW’s bad back surgery in 2018/19?
— Did BW face challenges a lot earlier than anyone suspected?

I suspect a lot of things went on over these final years that we may learn in times to come. And some will likely be really challenging to take.

I noticed that Melinda disappearing from the public eye , so to speak, coincided with Brian’s decline in live performance. After 2015 (which was an AMAZING tour), things seemed different.

The other thing, and I thought about this when it was announced Brian had dementia and I just thought about it again today… I’m wondering if that time when Brian had to stop a tour because he was having mental issues…I’m seriously wondering if that was when he was first diagnosed. I think that might explain why in Long Promised Road he didn’t remember Jack Rieley passing away, or having listened to Pacific Ocean Blue before.

It’s not uncommon for older folks to receive dementia diagnoses after back surgery.

Anyway, I think a lot of unhappy stuff started to snowball after 2015, and accelerated after the back surgery. And I strongly suspect Melinda was dealing with her own challenges in one way or another.

There was smart speculation earlier in the thread that a final Brian album might have been in the works, with Joe Thomas helming it until his death put it on hold.
Check this out:

Todd Sucherman: An unfinished Brian Wilson song: In October 2023 I was hired by producer Joe Thomas to record a couple songs for Brian Wilson. Joe told me the plan was for this to be his final record, and this song “Never Land” was to be the final song ending the record. Shortly after this Melinda Wilson passed away, then Joe passed away, and then Brian. I can’t share the music but I can share my ten parts I recorded for the end section into a “long goodbye” fade out. I imagined Brian soaring over the ocean and disappearing into “Neverland” which is what I tried to convey with my parts. I hope you can feel it, and my heart was so deep into this. I wish this could have been finished, but alas…

https://www.facebook.com/todd.sucherman/videos/717158034056559

Now almost everybody "admits" Brian was a genius. And he was, one of the greatest in music. But he was a hero, too. He knew mostly fear, pain and sorrow, and distilled all that into happiness for us.

This is wonderful! I can hear the waves, and Brian soaring over them, at an mysterious yet upbeat rhythm. As unfinished as it is, it's perfect for me!  Thanks a million. What an unexpected gift!  :drumroll

Regarding Brian, Al said Brian declined a lot after a case of Covid and there were issues with oxygen. Covid can damage pretty much every organ, and Brian probably already had existing issues (given his age). My own father declined mentally after getting Covid and has now been diagnosed with dementia.

Regarding Melinda, no idea, but I remember thinking she seemed a little frail during the Love and Mercy promotion, and we didn't really see her after that. However, she lived many more years, and no one seems to have made arrangements for Brian and/or the kids in case of her death (hence the family's rush to make arrangements/a conservatorship to protect the kids after she died). I keep thinking about those kids, many of whom are still so young.

 

RIP Brian Wilson | UNSEEN Interview on His Love for Music, R&R Hall of Fame & Personal Struggles


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dhthfctO3_o





I Photographed The Beach Boys' Brian Wilson (And Had To Keep A Secret...)


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gAe4BL0fa5E

I reckon the Chronic Kidney Disease could account for at least part of his back troubles too.

The one thing I can be glad about is that he is no longer in pain, no longer struggling. Still so sad.

I was wondering, has there been any reaction from Mike about Brian's death? I just hopped on his Twitter page and there's nothing about it.

.

Yes, it's on his Instagram. https://www.instagram.com/p/DKxscKEB10n/

"Today, the world lost a genius, and I lost a cousin by blood and my partner in music.

Brian Wilson wasn’t just the heart of The Beach Boys—he was the soul of our sound. From the first time we sang together as kids in my living room, I knew there was something otherworldly in him. His musical gifts were unmatched. The melodies he dreamed up, the emotions he poured into every note—Brian changed the course of music forever.

Our journey together was filled with moments of brilliance, heartbreak, laughter, complexity and most of all, LOVE . Like all families, we had our ups and downs. But through it all, we never stopped loving each other, and I never stopped being in awe of what he could do when he sat at a piano or his spontaneity in the studio.

Brian’s unique artistry and our collaboration gave the world the American dream of optimism, joy, and a sense of freedom—music that made people feel good, made them believe in an endless summer and endless possibilities. It was one of the greatest blessings of my life to experience that creative space with him.

It was our privilege to make the world believe in sunshine, surfing, and teenage dreams. My life was forever changed by Pet Sounds, God Only Knows, In My Room, Good Vibrations, The Warmth of the Sun and a hundred other pieces of his soul wrapped in music. He allowed us to show the world what vulnerability and brilliance sound like in harmony. He was fragile, he was intense, he was funny—and he was one of a kind.

My wife, Jacquelyne, and I are heartbroken. She stood beside me through so many chapters of this story, and we both send our love and prayers to Brian’s family, his children, and all who were touched by his life and gifts.

Brian, you once asked, “Wouldn’t it be nice if we were older?” Now you are timeless. May you rest in the peace you so deeply deserve, surrounded by the heavenly music you helped create. May your spirit soar as high as your falsetto, may your wings spread in effortless flight.

Thank you for the harmonies, the memories, and the love. Death leaves a heartache no one can heal, Love leaves a memory no one can steal.

I’ll miss you forever, my beloved cousin.
– Mike"

I have read this wonderful tribute by Mike several times. Never gets old.

He’s also talked about him being interviewed by Entertainment Tonight.

My heart goes out to him… losing Brian and Stan in close proximity like that.

Just saw this

https://variety.com/2025/music/news/brian-wilson-darian-sahanaja-salute-solo-band-beach-boys-1236432399/?fbclid=IwQ0xDSwLSRI1leHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHjLRoGAN-aA88hGrZgm0CWy-l8oLJFPTEa8P6_c8hHRT-eOS4ZWMxynoCCJZ_aem_KdGnnURK0c8-9289xWwfyQ

This is a fantastic tribute by one of the greatest guys in the music business, Darian Sahanaja. That the real saviour of SMiLE would come from Indonesia is nothing short of a miracle.

Yes, Darian is definitely a hero and a key player in Brian's saga. I've been reading David Leaf's Smile book and there are fascinating passages where Darian and Brian collaborate on the Smile arrangements.

It makes me think too, they must have gone through a similar (though obviously shorter) collaborative process to work up arrangements for the 2019 tour of Friends and 20/20 material. We think of that material as a pretty big departure from Smile, but hearing some of those songs played freshly in concert, and played by much of the actual BWPS band, I was struck how some tracks really sounded like they could have come directly from Smile.

Beach Boys Salute in L.A. Brings Three Generations of the Wilson Family Together With Friends for First Tribute Concert Since Brian’s Death

https://variety.com/2025/music/news/beach-boys-tribute-carnie-wilson-family-brian-concert-1236447640/

Interesting. Wasn’t there some speculation Carrie Marks was out of the picture?

Marks said it felt slightly strange taking part in a Beach Boys salute: “I told my wife, it’s kinda weird that I’m here paying tribute to myself! But I didn’t want to miss it.”

Instagram post from Carnie yesterday. Funeral for Brian was held yesterday, August 7.

https://www.billboard.com/music/rock/carnie-wilson-tribute-dad-brian-wilson-beach-boys-funeral-1236039420/ (https://www.billboard.com/music/rock/carnie-wilson-tribute-dad-brian-wilson-beach-boys-funeral-1236039420/)
https://www.instagram.com/p/DNCcTw9x9l1/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link (https://www.instagram.com/p/DNCcTw9x9l1/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link)

Today we laid my Daddy to rest. It was incredibly difficult to see that happen, but at the same time it gave more closure and more of a feeling of restful peace. The last eight weeks have been extremely challenging and like nothing I've ever experienced. I love and miss him so much and I wish he could come back. There's so many signs that he gives me every day and I know that he's around ...he can hear me and he can see me. He makes that apparent. I'm so grateful for this. Today we had a couple of monarch butterflies that just would not leave the site. It was comforting and beautiful.  I'm trying to deal with my emotions -they're so up and down. I know that he would want everybody to feel happy and not sad. He didn't like it when I cried. I was talking with my dear friend Gunnar Nelson today who lost his Pop Ricky Nelson years ago and he reminded me that the world will have his music to sing to and remember him every single solitary day until we are all gone. This is a really special and a real  heavy duty thought. It's much bigger than I can wrap my head around. For this I am grateful for though because I know it's the truth. So I just wanna say thank you... thank you Daddy for your beautiful contribution to so much happiness and real raw emotions that you have brought to people. Thank you to all the beautiful loving and supportive fans out there for honoring him. We share this together.  God knows what we'd be without him. Love, Carnie ❤️🎼❤️

Just when I clicked on your post I had Skeeter Davis' "The End of the World" playing. Well, I guess Brian would've liked that one.
You did well, Brian. Thanks for everything!


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-IVmKH_yYU

Beautiful post. I had to check the date to see if it was right... it took 8 weeks to get him laid to rest?

:'( ahhh man amazing tune. Kind of in a similar vein, I had the Armstrong's 'What A Wonderful World' stuck in my head a lot in the week following Brian's passing.
_____

Yeah I'm not sure why it took so long for the burial - I wonder if it was quite an ordeal to prepare for his service (ensuring everyone was able to be there on a specific date which may explain the wait).

(https://preview.redd.it/the-program-from-brians-memorial-service-shared-by-david-v0-cpzcg5qs34cf1.jpeg?width=1080&crop=smart&auto=webp&s=b6841809fe125e7797dd6bcb1d76fd566e3e6f06)

[sorry for the double post, but the size of the above image made the formatting of the following text weird]

David Leaf shared this image above of the program from Brian's service on Facebook. Below is his tearjerking writeup about the service. What an incredible selection of music on that program.

“Yesterday, July 9, was one of the most remarkable—and heartbreaking—days of my life.

It was a deeply moving celebration of Brian Wilson’s life, held just steps from home at the United Methodist Church in Westwood. The service—filled with music, memories, and love—was planned with extraordinary care by Elizabeth, Jean, Carnie, the kids, and Darian.

Everything in the church was perfect, including an organist who, before the formal service began, included “Rhapsody in Blue” amongst the hymns

I had the honor of offering the eulogy.

Hearing “Our Prayer,” “God Only Knows,” and “Love and Mercy” in that sacred space—where Carl Wilson’s service was also held—was almost too much to bear.

The pastors spoke with grace. Dakota and Delanie read from Scripture. Dash bravely spoke about his father. Jason Fine shared a beautifully crafted, heartfelt remembrance.

The church was filled with old friends—too many to do more than hug and say hello. Vicki digitally captured the warm moments as they passed by.

Later, at the Beverly Hills Hotel luncheon, Brent Wilson and his team shared a stunning short film about Brian’s life and music. Each guest received a beautifully crafted 24-page commemorative book, adapted from Brian’s final tour program—bravo, Mark London. I had the privilege of contributing the essay inside.

Carnie emceed with warmth and grace. And the stories that followed—from Carnie, Wendy, Daria, Delanie, Danny Hutton, and especially Jerry Weiss—were loving, funny, and true. Jerry’s (often hilarious) reflections from his 16 years on the road with Brian were a special and unique window into the man behind the music.

And in nearly every tribute, one name stood alongside Brian’s: Gloria Ramos—his devoted caregiver of 40 years.

At our table: Danny and Laurie Hutton, Tony and Sheryl Asher, and Van Dyke and Sally Parks. Van Dyke even marked the day with a photo alongside Mike Love.

I had the chance to reconnect with so many dear friends as well as members of the original Beach Boys family—Marilyn Wilson-Rutherford, David Marks, Alan Jardine, the ever-elegant Annie Hinsche Wilson Karges, and Justyn Wilson among them.

The SMiLE theme was everywhere—on the napkins, the cupcakes, and in the music. Brian’s band performed a 45-minute set of classics, joined by Marilyn and Ginger from the Honeys, a reunion of Wilson Phillips, Carnie’s daughter Lola, and Wendy’s son Leo. Ginger’s voice was as powerful as ever—what a moment.

Everything, from the program at the church to the cookies with one Brian bite taken out of each of them (take a bow, Debbie) to the music was just so perfectly planned and executed by Elizabeth and Jean and Carnie and all “the kids” and Darian. Throughout the afternoon, a slide show of Brian’s life played on big screens..

A deeply touching detail: in the ballroom, a small piano placed in a sandbox was displayed with a pair of white sneakers beside it—an homage to Brian’s early days composing barefoot in the sand, a symbol of innocence, genius, and the place where SMiLE began.

A personal highlight: Blondie Chaplin’s performance of “Sail On, Sailor.” When he softly sang “Buddy Boy,” his nickname for Brian, it struck a deep chord.

Watching it all with us were five members of the Stockholm Strings ‘n’ Horns who flew in from the other side of the ocean. They brought such youthful joy and energy (as well as their amazing musicianship) to both the Brian Wilson Presents SMiLE tour and album. It was so great to see them after all these years.

No one wanted the day to end. It felt—though I hesitate to say it—like the closing of an era. But it isn’t. Brian’s music lives on. It always will.”

I mean, they did file for divorce. Papers easy to find online.