The Smiley Smile Message Board

Between 12/23/61 and 12/31/92, The Beach Boys played 3,005 shows that we know of: 333 overseas, 111 in Canada, 3 in Mexico and 2,558 in the States (all 50 of them at least once).

Excluding 1961, peak year was 1966 - 154 - while the low was 48 in, amazingly, 1976.  Oddest year - 1970, when they played 18 in the US, 1 in Canada and 77 overseas.

These stats are surprising especially.

I assumed they must have played at least 200 gigs some years. What were they doing in the years after Holland?  Spending their money? :o

And only 48 in '76? Whew... they were riding a big wave that year. I bet that's a when a good few folk on this board first got into the band. I know it was my year. What were the band members doing? Spending their money?

Nope... that 154 in 1966 was far and away the peak year: the top ten touring years were...

1966 - 154
1964 - 133
1987 - 129
1988 - 129
1963 - 123
1968 - 119*
1983 - 116
1982 - 115
1965 - 114
1991 - 113

* - if 23 dates of the 'Maharishi' tour hadn't been canceled (plus two on the earlier SW tour), the band would have played 144 shows in 1968.

Things on Bellagio I am proud of-
1) we list almost every date on the two 1963 tours-thanks to the Marks family keeping records and looking thru papers-the Keith Badman book only listed about 6 of these shows
2) I list every date on the Summer Safari tour of summer 1964-many were previously missing
3) We uncovered three extra shows in Australia from 1964
4) Uncovered every show on the July 1965 tour
5) Uncovered about 12 Salt Lake City shows not mentioned before
6) uncovered the correct dates for the August 1966 tour
7) Discovered that there was a Hong Kong leg of the Japan 1966 tour-though still missing venues and exact dates
8) Uncovered the truth about the April 1968 tour (not the disaster long believed at all)
9) Found the correct dates of the Dec 1968 Europe tour
10) Found most of the shows for the various 1971 tours-many previously missing
11) Uncovered an entire April 1972 tour not included in the Definitive Diary,,,,,etc (but there is more to do!)
Help always appreciated

Why was the April 68 tour thought to be a disaster?

There's more... from 1964-1992, The Beach Boys played 333 shows in overseas territories (plus 3 in Mexico and 111 in Canada), namely...

England - 113
Wales - 6
Scotland - 11
N. Ireland - 2
[UK - 132]
Ireland - 4
France - 10
Sweden - 8
Germany - 29
Austria - 4
Denmark - 4
Finland - 3
Netherlands - 11
Belgium - 9
Czechoslovakia - 8
Luxemburg - 1
Norway - 1
Switzerland - 2
Spain - 3
Monaco - 1
Australia - 52
New Zealand - 23
Japan - 21
Hong Kong - 1
Jamaica - 1
South Africa - 3*

* - possibly: we don't know the exact number. Could well be more.

I need to get out more...

According to then-manager Nick Grillo, in the wake of the MLK assassination the tour was in ruins with dates cancelled left, right & center. Grillo was actually misremembering the chaos of the later 'Maharishi' tour, which was a total financial disaster, but on the earlier tour only two dates were actually cancelled. A few were rearranged but in essence the tour went ahead as scheduled.

If you see the Definitive Diary book-he lists about twelve canceled shows from that tour...but I slowly realized it wasn't so.  For example-a guy wrote on a website that he attended a BB show in Sarasota with the Buffalo Springfield-so I wrote to the library and sure enough I found a concert review from the local paper...Then I found a review of the Tampa show...Then I met a fan who's all time favorite memory was seeing the BB and Buffalo Springfield in Apr 1968 in South Carolina- I soon realized that every canceled listing had to be checked for accuracy...just goes to show-you can't believe everything you read. By the way Buffalo at that time featured Jim Messina in place of Bruce Palmer

Errr... slight boo-boo - I managed to overlook 12 Canadian gigs in 1987 and 1988, thus those two years now have 141 shows each.

I guess the Maharishi tour was when they were playing to as little as 200 people, must of been rough.

And you should be! I hope everyone realize what a treasure the Bellagio site is! :woot

Any thought on whether it was intentional to play the exact same amount of shows two years in a row?

In fact that was the Thanksgiving tour that year - 200 punters at The Corn Palace, Mitchell SD.  Mind, I don't think the few shows they did play with Maharishi did too well - the Singer Bowl show was cancelled at very short notice when only 800 showed up. It holds 16,000.

Something else that I thought was interesting:

In the NINE years after their first show, there was just one single month (January 1968) where the group didn't have a single gig or recording session!

I wonder how many bands can say the same thing...

Bob Dylan?

Is Bob Dylan a band?  ;)

Remember these numbers are so far-there are missing shows on the list from every year-so if you have any info....

Um... he plays guitar and mouth harmonica simultaneously, and sings in between. That qualifies as a one-man band for me...  :-[

Maybe the Stones-they worked pretty hard in the 60s-though like the BBs they slowed down a bit in 67

"The Beach Boys have continued to do, about, we did about 180 performances last year. I'd like to see the Mop-Tops match that! I'd like to see Mick Jagger get out on this stage and do I Get Around versus Jumpin' Jack Flash, any day now. (Mike Love 1988)


Hmm...So the total for 1987 was really 129? ;)

No, 141 - I missed 12 Canadian gigs.

Still some short of 180, though.  :)