The Smiley Smile Message Board

I believe this has been covered to a degree in the beach boys drug use thread. but in the nature of completism and obsession, and the effects smoking can have on a fellas voice. Im interested to know exactly which of the beach boys smoked and for how long. i seem to remmeber brian saying he smoked for 10 years and the same or so for carl. What about mike, bruce and al?

Well, given that all the band (Bruce excepted) have tried at least one hit of maryjane, I'm guessing they've all smoked at one stage or another.

I'm guessing Dennis smoked from, roughly, 1959 to 12/28/83. Brian, for more than 10 years (think he gave up in about 1983). Mike... I'm not so sure. I recall reading (jeez, does this make me look like a geek or what ?) that when he first fell for Suzanne in 1965, he bought her a carton of cigs, then later, whenh they were married, gave her a hard time for smoking. Alan, I've never seen any hard evidence one way or another. In fact, the only photo of any of the BB I've seen with cigs is Carl (koff, in my own book) circa 1965. Brian, of course, smoked like a chimney during the gigs of the early 80s.

Further contributions welcomed.

There are stories where Brian smoked in the early 90s. His voice clearly sounds like that on IJWMFTT. But I guess he didn't smoke during the Landy-years.

Mike said that Carl was a heavy smoker and you can see him having a cig on outtakes of the "Summer days..."-cover.

Don't know about Al, I always thought he was the only one who didn't do drugs at any time....

I remember reading somewhere that Carl was actually a heavier smoker than Brian or Dennis, and since Brian smoked 4 packs a day (probably due to the coke, which from my past experience tends to make one smoke more) Carl must've...yikes.

Brian quit smoking for good in 1994.

Carl's cigarette consumption sure didn't seem to trash his voice like some other singers.

Yeah, thats why I find it hard to believe he smoked more than Brian or Dennis.

I really think it was the blow that trashed Brian and Denny's voices. Booze and smokes didn't help, of course.

Carl reportedly started in grade school, behind the proverbial building.  That's mentioned in a couple of "the books".  He's seen puffing away while riding a bicycle in one of the American Band documentary scenes.  A few other pictures show up here and there.  Seems like Brian is reported to have sneaked a few when he could into the late 80's/early 90's.  Carl's voice started sounding a bit strained, if not exactly rough, in some of the documentary clips, like him with Brian and his mom at the piano.  But then so does mine at this late age and I've never smoked anything even once.  Age.  Darn.  Didn't he quit several years before he died?  Timothy White wrote about Dennis complaining about people smoking around Brian in the 1976 Crawdaddy interview. Ironic given his own onging cigarete habit, but also an indication of how much he cared for Brian. 

Looking at 60's pics and videos...also 70's, Carl & Dennis often had a ciggie between their fingers. I once read that Carl had the habit to smoke while eating.
But the questions is not how much you smoke - 2 packs, 5 packs... - it's more how you smoke. :smokin
The oldest man on earth, who died last week at age 115, stopped smoking when he was 90.
I've never seen a single pic of Brian with cigarette from the 60's. But listening to 'bedroom-years' interviews, he smoked like a pig. I don't think it was the nicotin in the first place that destroyed his voice. It was smoking the stuff that had an effect on many musicians voices - David, Dennis, Harry, Bobby ...

Carl started smoking in his early teens, along with David Marks, and quit smoking in the early '80s -- so it was 12-14 years between the time he quit and his passing.

Al may have tried "maryjane," but he was always pretty vocal about being a non-smoker, so we can safely rule out tobacco use for him. Mike smoked until the mid-60s. There are photos and film footage of him puffing on a large pipe during the Pet Sounds era.

Sloop John B Vid I belive.

FWIW, a BB friend of mine was driving through Holland on a holiday, when the town sign "Baambrugge" appeared on the side of the road, so he pulled into the nearest bar and asked if anyone recalled a pop group called The Beach Boys recording there in 1972. "Ah yes, Beach Boys - we remember them very well. Much drinking, many drugs." Apparently the local MJ dealers thought Christmas had come early.  :hat

I swear I saw a photo once of al with cig in his mouth in the studio circa mid 60's.....must've been a pen or something....

Sure it was a cig?

A close examination of the big picture of Brian on the "Love You" inner sleeve reveals a blacked out pack of Marlboros between his hands.

Brian definitely started smoking again after freeing himself from Landy, but publicly announced he had quit smoking using the "patch" around '96.

Carl's voice never got as bad as Brian's or Dennis' but there is a significant change in tone from vocals recorded in the mid-60s to leads heard on the "Surf's Up" album and beyond.

Most definitely. The point where it became real obvious was from 15BO onwards. The late 70s vox had a tendancy of sounding flat, or in some cases, like the tape was severely slowed down. Of course,  that was the time period where he was on smack. His voice got better once he cleaned up, and IMHO, his vocals on BB85 (regardless of how you feel about the production) were some of his best ever. Sadly, he never got quite that good again. His vocals for the rest of his life sounded thinner, most likely due to age as this was first noticeable *before* he got sick. Listen his vocals on Still Cruisin' and notice the huge difference (esp on the title track).Same with SIP.

I read somewhere that Carl reckoned (near the end of his life) he had smoked a quarter of a million cigarettes in his lifetime.

That's approximately 20 a day for 35 years.

Huh, I guess Carl was the hardcore smoker of the group then. In the beatles, I believe ringo smoked more than everybody else. Speaking of those twol dig this theory. Ringo control's his beard, but Carl's beard controlled him. Forget that...

I realize that

This is one of the few photos I've seen with Brian even near cigarettes.  It's pretty clear he was a Marlboro man.

(http://img413.imageshack.us/img413/7057/bw7id0.jpg)

It's pretty odd that there aren't any pictures of the four guys lighting up at all.  I guess Capitol's PR department was strict about that.

Your math's off -- Carl quit smoking around (or by) 1984. Assuming he started when he was 12 (which is what I read somewhere), that would be closer to 25 years than 35.

In the common Brian and Roger Christain pic from 1964 Brian has cigs in his shirt pocket. Never saw him smoke one picture wise until 1976. Al talked about this once in an interview. He said Carl started before Dennis and that Brian and Al would get annoyed at him. David I have no idea except that he and Carl used to do it. Dennis probably from 1959-60 until he died. Mike probably a pipe at least through 1968. I heard he did pot until then so I guess when he gave up drugs he gave up cigs. Al probably never a smoker, Bruce either. Brian probably started in 62-3 got very bad around 75 quit in 83 started back in 1992 then quit again in 1996. Since 1996 his voice has improved a lot although where did that great vocal on the original Gettin In Over My Head come from?

The Fabs were big smokers too.  But Capitol minimized exposure of that fact.
Capitol air-brushed Paul's ciggie out of a photo used for a US 45 picture sleeve and promo photos of them smoking were pretty darn rare in the US....just like for the Wilson clan.

Of course, there is the photo of Murray deep in thougth with pipe in mouth on the back cover of "The Many Moods of..."

other than Brian being a Marlboro man, does anyone have any idea what brand(s) the others smoked?

Maybe over the long haul cigarette smoking trashes a voice--and Carl's voice in the late eighties and nineties, while still nice was NOT the same as it had been...But actually, as a former smoker and sometime singer, I found that quitting smoking actually made my voice sound rougher--while I gained in range pitchwise to the tune of a couple of whole tones at both the top and the bottm, my voice sounds rougher and raspier without the cigarettes. And my falsetto has almost disappeared, for some reason. And I know other singers who have told me the same.

Tom Waits is a case in point. He had a pretty even, tuneful voice when he smoked them by the hundreds. And he quit a long time ago. And listen to him now...

proven, 'sfar's I'm concerned.

Clearly the Beatles didn't care who saw them smoking. They'd puff away during press conferences all the time. I don't think it was any secret that they smoked.

Indeed, in all their films (Hard Days Night, Help, Magical Mystery Tour, Let It Be), the Beatles smoke like smokestacks.  Remember that smoking was still SOP in those days, even more so in Europe than the US.  For publicity shots they'd ditch the cancer sticks.  Lots of smoking in Dylan's Don't Look Back too.  When I showed some of these films to the young'un I always had some 'splainin' to do.

In some of the '67 Hawaii pictures there's a clearly visible pack of Marlboros on Brian's keyboard top. I think there may be a picture of him with one in his mouth too.

Also - I find it hard to believe that Bruce never took a single hit from a joint. What about Al? Very hard to believe they didn't try it a single time.

Whether Mike, Al and Bruce smoked or not, they smoked,.....second hand that is.....

Al must've tried the ganj at least once during the Smiley Smile sessions.

Maybe. You don't have to be stoned to be goofy, though.

I'm surprised Al, wanting to be a dentist, wasn't a fan of nitrous. I heard the Beach Boys did lots of whippets - did Al partake? Nitrous is as much a drug high as marijuana.

Barely.

But, Al did smoke weed a few times. Bruce, unless I am mistaken, is the only one of them who never had his cherry popped, drug-wise.

Just a quick thought-in the Jules Siegel article, he states 'Now, at midnight, the Beach Boys had gone home and Brian was sitting in the back of his car, smoking moodily'.

Did Brian continue his smoking habit while running The Radiant Radish?  :lol

Also - has he ever spoken about that place? I don't know too much about it.

I was curious about that picture for years (having bought the album the day it came out); I used to think Brian was holding something more "illegal", but, then I thought, no.....

Also, for years, in Brian's case, I struggled with what I would eliminate the "most" - the mental illness or the drug intake. Well, this topic makes me wonder. Just think how differently the Beach Boys' career might've been if Brian, Dennis, AND CARL never smoked.

Well they defiantly smoked during the today sessions, In the extended bull sessions clip Dennis asks Carl for a smoke

Al told me the #1 reason his voice maintained quality is because he didn't smoke or do drugs.

The #1 reason Al remained the dorkiest Beach Boy is also because he didn't smoke or do drugs.  :smokin

Although... I always thought the California Saga was a really great thing.....

well dorky or not, he didn't suffer a slow, painful, premature death like Carl and Dennis

IMO, Brian's voice hit rock-bottom around the time he recorded the 'Orange Crate Art' album for VDP.  It's very unfortunate that he apparently resumed smoking during that immediate post-Landy period.

Your statement makes me want to say something like "yeah, unlike the late Dennis, Carl, and Brian Wilson", but that's not EXACTLY what I mean, so I'll leave it at that.

Dennis' death was premature, but no one knows if it was slow or painful.  Smoking undoubtedly damaged Dennis' voice, but it's impossible to make declarations about his health if he hadn't drowned.  For years, Brian was even unhealthier than Dennis, and Brian is alive and well today, so who knows?

Actually, he IS suffering a much slower death than the others...but Dennis? I mean, I know that smoking causes cancer, but can it actually cause a horrible death by drowning at sea? Thank God I quit.

It's horrible there and on Sweet Insanity.

I like Brian's zillion-tracked voice on Orange Crate Art. And I enjoy that album quite a lot too, when I'm in the right mood.

His vocals on Hold Back Time are among the worst he's ever done, IMHO.

Same here. On OCA his voice is way better than on, say, 15BO or LY. It is flat, and a bit thin (hence the multitracking) but he holds his tunes well and gets to the high notes. My thoughts: the material perhaps asks for a different singer, and I think everyone who heard VDP sing this material ('Live At The Ash Grove', and the couple of live shows I was happy to attend) knows that it's perfect for... VDP himself. My bet: VDP intended most of the songs for himself, but donated them to Brian out of a long friendship.

Really?  I thought his vocals on Orange Crate Art were excellent. 

To each his own, but I guess we have different standards of excellence.  To me, Brian's vocals on tracks like "Movies Is Magic" are among the worst he ever recorded.  I remember someone at the time saying that Brian was starting to sound like Buddy Hackett (i.e., raspy, slurred speech delivered out the side of his mouth).    And, sadly, it was true.   IMO, Brian's voice has improved substantially since those days.

Yes Juggler, our standards of excellence appear somewhat polarised.  IMO his vocals on Orange Crate Art strike the right balance between inspired, spirited, vulnerable and tuneful. With a sprinkling of the old BW falsetto on top. To be honest I can't hear a vast difference between his Orange Crate Art vocals and anything on 'Getting in Over My Head' or 'Lucky Old Sun'. All that changes is the quality of the material, which seems to dictate Brian's level of enthusiam, and therefore quality of vocal performance. He's clearly enjoying himself on Orange Crate Art, and IN GENERAL his vocals on 'Lucky Old Sun' are superior to GIOMH, but there's still inconsistency.  For example, I think he could have done a much better vocal take on Midnight's Another Day - which reveals that (oddly) he seems to be losing more of his lower register these days.

To me, most of his vocals on 15 Big Ones and Love You were distressingly bad, especially when set in contrast to how he still sounded just a few years prior to that.  Perhaps I'm TOO grateful that he was able to come back from that, and produce some sublime vocals, such as on (the bizarrely underrated) BW88 and (yes) Orange Crate Art.

OCA is interesting in that Brian's voice sounds old, cracky and forced, and YET quite athletic! He's singing these intricate tunes and harmonies, hitting the highest notes he's sung since then. He sounds pretty confident also.

Regarding "Hold back time", that's Brian + Danny Hutton. And reportedly, a rough take was used for the album instead of the correct one.

Or, as someone once put it, he was just using Brian's name in order to help increase record sales.

...which I don't believe. If there's one person whose generosity and kindness is beyond doubt for me, it is VDP (based on personal contact and e-mails).

I believe that. And after all, VDP does have some reasons to be grateful to BW.

According to the Carlin book, all of you are correct.  It was an act of friendship for VDP to offer the vocal chores to Brian, and also a smart marketing move, making it look like the "Smile" team was up to a new work even though the songs were all Van Dyke's.  And Brian, even with all the damage done, had much better vocal chops than Van Dyke, whose voice is reedy and weak (see "Song Cycle").   Van Dyke would never have been able to produce harmony vocals with the facility which Brian could do in his sleep.  Recall Van Dyke's answer to Brian when Brian asked why he was even in the studio to begin with:  "Because I can't stand the sound of my own voice!"

on the subject of cigarettes...

i've never been a smoker of tobacco but tonight i had an American Spirit cigarette,
it was pretty good compared to other brands i've tried...nice tasting tobacco,
great mellow buzz, and 'smooth' smoke on the throat, but it has absolutely stunk up my room!

what a pervasive, ugly stench it leaves! yucky!

my body is so sensitive these days, i feel everything so strongly, so i can feel so much noise in this organism from just one cigarette.

i really don't enjoy having anything in my system that causes a significant change these days...
the most daring i get is TEA which i take with ritualistic seriousness

my new, beautiful yixing clay mug has become my 'piece' with just as much emotional attachment
and tea is sobering

this this this, a thousand times THIS

if only the Beach Boys preferred tea...

Back in my Cigarette days I think I tried one of those. It was pretty good but now I can't stand smoke. I quit more or less in 2001 and the last time I bummed one in 2004 it made me really sick. Tea would have been much better for the boys I agree lol! So does Al Jardine I'm sure.

I dunno about that, MBE - tea stains the teeth!  :-D

I will tell you a story - Back in the tale end of 1980 i answered an advert in BB Stomp by Eddy Fieiken (cant remember how to spell his name) who had shot some Home Movie Vid of the BB's in Den Haag in the Netherlands (transpires to been their last gig there) and he was requesting that a number of us clubbed together to get the footage transferred to video tape (and each contributor getting a copy) which in those days was quite a technical and expensive process.
I still remember with great glee getting the said copy on Betamax (remember thoses??) tape , but was somewhat suprised to see Mike seeming to hold a cigarette after H & V in his mouth for a few seconds.
I have just found the footage on You Tube , and YES though not conclusive it certainly looks like it OR just maybe Mike had visited one of those famous Amsterdam Cafe's in the afternoon.

Are you sure tea would've been that great for the boys...after all, it was tea that caused the Rutles to lose their minds! :lol

... ah, you mean Eddy Feiken. The former chief of the Dutch Beach Boys Information Center (late 80ies). Bought quite some tapes from him a long time ago, and this footage was on one of them (and now guess who's the guy showing that Den Haag-footage on YouTube   ;D ). Never knew he made that footage himself. So thanks for sharing that info with us. And I never noticed a cig at all. Going to check that out...

Rob Dean,
My name was almost written correctly. It is Eddy Feiken.

Hello Eddy. Welcome om this board!

Eddy, my man ! Long time no see - remember when John Porteous & I emptied your fridge that Easter weekend in 1980 ?  ;D

Eddy... did you used to subscribe to my horrible newsletters?

I subscribed to Eddy's horrible newsletters  :smokin and he once offered me to take over the editorship (and the fanbase...). I declined, being a very shy young student. (even if Eddy doesn't recall any of this... it's true!)

Marty, back then we all did. Mainly because it was better than nothing. Just.

Seriously, late 70s/early 80s I subscribed to Marty's Friends of The Beach Boys, Eddy's Dutch BBFC, Don Cunningham's Add Some Music, David Leaf's Pet Sounds and the legendary Susumu Ogata's Japanese BBFC. And if you're wondering why I didn't subscribe to the UK's Beach Boys Stomp... well, hell, I wrote most of the damn thing.  ;D

I like oca on occasion but Brian actually DOES sound like Mickey Mouse with a cold on the title cut.  I like his non falsetto voice on that album.

man, i remember him. when i bought larry froebe's collection, larry had letters from him plus all these recordings on vinyl that he did. they were a hoot to listen to!  ;D

I don't think VDP had Brian sing on OCA as a favor to Brian. There was a TV interview about OCA, and Brian said that VDP brought him in to sing one song, and then after that, asked Brian to sing on all of the songs. Brian summarized his reaction as being something like this: "What?!?! I thought this was supposed to be your album!" I think VDP was just enjoying his time back with Brian, and, of course, he was always very insecure about his own voice. It was just fun to record with Brian, and I'm guessing Brian enjoyed the experience as well.

As I recall, Brian sat down to sing, then asked VDP why he was singing. "Because I can't stand the sound of my own voice". Brian pondered for a moment, then said "makes sense, let's go".  ;D

Those newsletters of mine in the old days were a lot of fun, through them I got to know a lot of very nice people... and Andrew, too!

I have a copy of "Marty Taber" (reworded Johnny Carson") b/w "Celebrate The Newsletter" - if you thought Marty's literary skills were somewhat lacking...  ::)

 :police: is that legal? If not, I'll have to confiscate it, Sir.

Andrew - I would respond, but I'm currently in litigation with Mike Love over writing credits...

Ah, trying to get credit for Country Love again, I see.  ;D

Oddly, it is - MT cut it during a visit from Susumu Ogata back in, oh... late 70s ?

Yeah, Susumu and I did those songs (I use the term loosely) in 1979 or '80, maybe even '81... Carol Kaye could give more detailed information...

Forgive me for quoting a near 3 year old post, but...


Andrew...dude...there's a picture of Brian in the late 70s (when he got skinny for a bit and had his hair cut short) in your own book and he's got a smoke in his hand! :lol

I also just realized this thread is older than my daughter...

Hey Eddy ,
Sorry about the tippo on your name (close as it was) , BUT hey good to see you on-board !!

Now that we're at it: what were the favourite brands? I recall Denny preferring unfiltered Larks (according to Gaines) and Brian smoking Marlboros endlessly. Am I right?

i've wondered this as well

Somwhere in this thread, somebody wondered about Brian smoking in the early 1980's during the second Landy "treatment". If you watch the footage of Barbra Ann from the July 4th 1983 show, Brian has a cigarette in the neck of his bass.

  anyone know what Carl smoked. I think i see a Pall Mall pack in the photos of the 1967 Hawaii rehearsal. i could be totally wrong though

I think I remember an interview with Al that said Brian started smoking the last out of the brothers.

Even clutching a cig on the actual cover  :o

I was wondering, did Carl ever smoke onstage? I know there is footage of him in the studio recording while smoking. I was just wondering if during any concerts, Carl put a cigarette in the neck of his guitar.

Not sure about Carl but Mike certainly did during their unedited performance of Heroes and Villains at the Wollman Rink, Central Park, New York NY, July 2nd. He can be spotted with a cig just before the start of the second verse.  :hat

thats a little shocking to me

Cannot believe how well Carl's voice held up given how much he smoked over time. His voice changed over time, sure, but he still sounded damn good up until his passing. Pretty incredible.

Instead of starting a new topic, I might as well post it here since runners already touched upon the subject:

Did Carl ever comment on how his voice changed through the years? Not like there's anything that strange about it, especially since he was so young for the earliest lead vocals, but you can't help but notice how big a difference there is between, say, "Pom Pom Play Girl", "God Only Knows", "Darlin'", "Our Sweet Love" and "Keepin' the Summer Alive" to name just a few. And I don't mean different vocal approaches here; of course that's one part of it, but these five songs almost sound like they're sung by five different (all highly talented) singers. Carl's thoughts? Your thoughts?

Carl told my spouse in 1985 (not long after he quit smoking) that he wished he'd taken better care of his voice over the years.

I really hear a change in Carl's voice on the Surf's Up album. Then after 1981-82 it again got huskier. He still sounded like Carl to me though.

Hey, if he sounded that good without taking care of his voice, imaging how it would've sounded if he had...

So Mike actually smoked, that is shocking.

Can he be sued? For having been a corrupting influence on minors, or something? Just a thought...

I have a theory that Carl's voice changed during his drug and alchohol phase. Listen to his voice on "Holland", then listen to it on "Keepin' The Summer Alive". Carl's voice is quite a bit better than it was on the "15 Big Ones" through "LA Light Album" albums, but the tone has changed. It's like those two or three years of abuse lowered his voice by an octive or two. If you listen to live recordings from around 1979 and on, he could never again get his voice quite as high on "God Only Knows", for example.

i'm a Lucky Strike smoker. it would be cool to find out one of the Beach Boys smoked luckies...not that smoking is cool...

Yeah, his voice matured, but in a positive way that happens with age. I know he gave up on cigs quite early on...and its a shame it caught up with him in the worst way it could have. Atleast he kept his voice until the end.


He was known to tell people "Smoke em if ya got em."

.

This must be the most often revived after year-long gaps thread of all time! :)


If "blow" means cocaine in this context (had to look that up as English isn't my first language), why does cocaine ruin one's voice? You don't eat it, do you?



Personally I'd say the "maturing" of Carl's voice is evident on Holland first, but only slightly. It's really strange that between Holland and 15BO Brian's and Dennis' voices got raspy and hoarse, Carl's got significantly darker sounding while at the same time Mike's got significantly more nasal than before. Only Al sounds like before, and still does.

Ah, what do you know. A Beach Boys question I can professionally answer (I'm a speech therapist). Cocaine can have a negative effect on the voice in several ways. If it's snorted, it can produce a "drip" that goes down the back of the pharynx and into the vocal cords.  The vocal cords swell and the voice becomes hoarse. Singing on the swollen vocal cords can cause permanent damage.  Smoking it results in the same kind of damage that occurs with cigarettes.

Depending on how you take it - sure, cocaine can severely damage your voice. "Dripping" cocaine injures the vocal chords, because - basically - the stuff goes down your throat.


(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/dc/Side_effects_of_chronic_use_of_Cocaine.png)

BTW, going back on the comments about Carl stopping smoking in the '80s...a guy on a Rickenbacker forum who says he toured with the Beach Boys says that Carl didn't actually give up smoking until not long before his death.

Ah, what do you know. A Beach Boys question I can professionally answer (I'm a speech therapist). Cocaine can have a negative effect on the voice in several ways. If it's snorted, it can produce a "drip" that goes down the back of the pharynx and into the vocal cords.  The vocal cords swell and the voice becomes hoarse. Singing on the swollen vocal cords can cause permanent damage.  Smoking it results in the same kind of damage that occurs with cigarettes.
[/quote]

I read somewhere that Paul McCartney tried cocaine a few times in the late 60s but gave it up because it made his throat feel funny and he was afraid it would affect his voice.

Thank you very much for this, Cyncie! :)

seems 'unlikely' he would develop throat cancer if he stopped smoking a decade earlier as claimed.

I don't believe that he died of throat cancer, more like lung cancer. My uncle died of lung cancer a few years back and he quit smoking back in 1967. Smoking can take its toll many, many years after the fact, along with all the other sh*t that pollutes the air that we breathe.

It's already well established that it started in his lungs and spread to his brain.

NOT that it really matters WHAT it is/was called, but most sites I googled refer to Carl's as Lung cancer
That being said (  I don't know if this has been previously addressed) My sense is cancer is generally attributed to the root organ/cause, no matter where it may later spread

Not to be too nit-picky but I thought I'd point out that while his tone changed, it certainly wasn't lowered by an octave or two. For perspective of what that means, the entire melody of "God Only Knows" covers only slightly more than one octave. (An octave plus a minor third, to be specific, from an F# to an A an octave above it.) For someone's voice to lower by more than an octave, it wouldn't just be some minor struggle to hit a few of the higher notes. Also, tone isn't the same as pitch, so when you say the tone has changed, that would be a separate thing from a voice lowering in pitch (be it by an octave or two, or however much).

In the Good Vibrations from Central Park concert, Mike is either smoking a cigarette or a joint during Heroes and Villains.

I used to think that, but having seen the footage numerous times, I'm beginning to think that it may have been something as innocuous as a stick of incense.

Funny, since the anti-drug song follows immediately after Heroes and Villains. You might be correct  :smokin

 Wow, stop the presses. Mike Love smoked pot now and then in the 60's and 70's. Mike has never claimed to have been 100% drug free his entire life, but unlike so many others, he seemed to give it all up during a time when the awful white powder made its way through the entire entertainment industry. I'm glad he did.

  Does anyone remember a brief news blurb from circa 1994 when Mike's gardener was busted for growing plants on Mike's property? I'm sure I didn't dream this.

  Is it possible Bruce never tried pot?

  

  I thought Carl's singing was superb on L.A. The only albums where his vocals suffered (a bit) were 15 BIG ONES and LOVE YOU.

It's not like I'm trying to nail the guy with anything - it'd be interesting to see him smoking pot onstage, considering he was one of the 'clean' members. I think he was into it as part of his image at the time though, since he does mention getting high with Buffalo Springfield to the entire audience at that Grateful Dead show.

I could see Bruce never once touching drugs, but it must have been hard, what with being in a world famous rock n roll band touring around the world all year.

Hi all,

People smoked wo were in the music business.  Some might have not.  Yet most did.  If one reads the statistics people smoked a lot, even those not in the entertainment world from after the two world wars until a certain time.  Some could agrue that if you were abused smoking was self mediction or self abuse.  Most people in the world have done drugs more than we think. 

I have never smoked or done drugs.  One could say that eating candy cigarettes leads to smoking real ones.  That is a myth.  I eat candy cigarettes and I have NEVER smoked real ones.   

He came pretty close to that claim during the 30th anniversary program:

"Cousin Mike sort of felt that the returns weren't all in yet on the indiscriminate usage of non-prescribed hallucinogenic drugs, therefore cousin Mike didn't take those [laughter] drugs."

^
Ah, but notice he just said hallucinagenic drugs. Which, of course, leaves quite a bit of other kinds of drugs.

So did any of them smoke Camel Straights? Or was it just Mike's special "Camel Incense"

I agree with that. His voice sounded won-won-wonderful throughout the 80's and 90's.

I`m not sure that is really conclusive proof.

I have traveled in a car yet have never been involved in a fatal road accident. I wouldn`t say that they are a myth though.  ;)

Bruce in the entertainment industry from the time he was a kid and never even experimented?  Hanging out with Terry Melcher, Byrds producer?   I'd say everyone in the band did a bit of something over the years.  The holier than thou attitude of some band members only says that they didn't become dependent and sink into the abyss like others.

It's not good on MIU either. I agree that he sings well again from L.A. on, but of course it didn't have that youthful sound of his teenage years.

Not a one of them sounded as youthful as their teenage years by 1979, Carl was no exception.

Why would we want him to sound like a teenager the rest of his life? Maturity is not a bad thing, even in singing voices.

Pop music is a young person's game. A youthful image is essential... proof is on the back cover of the Imagination CD...

Then I guess Brian and the "boys" should have packed it in decades ago, leave the pop music making to One Direction.

Ha - a then friend of mine had bought Imagination on its day of release and showed it to me at dinner. Immediately and on instinct I remarked about the front cover picture: 'Nice, that must be the son of Brian Wilson then.'

He had a big LOL moment and I took that as a real compliment.

Of course not! :)



Because I like the sound ;D. But naturally that's irrealistic, unless you want to go into castrato territory. :o