Just watched the newly-produced true crime series "The Ripper" on Netflix, and to my surprise I saw a BBs poster:



This is during a shot of stock footage of a man walking in what I presume to be the UK in the 1970s. Looks like this was a gig with with Santana, can anybody idea the show and its date?

I'm all for a free and open forum for debate and discussion, and giving everyone a chance to say their thing, but I'm going to lock this thread tomorrow. So say what you need to say, try to keep it civil and above board, and that will be it for this one after tomorrow.  

Probably just as well.  And for the record Century - again it's not my intention to pick on you too much nor do I even have any real problem with you.  Sometimes I just like getting into the spirit of the debate.  Definitely not personal.

It's cool, and thanks. I don't take it personally, I just wish peace and love to you and everybody on this board as well as the band. The dark side of the force needs to take a hike.

Conclusion: I think you are totally making a much bigger deal out of these things than necessary.  

You're free to think that, and perhaps to some degree I am. Maybe you are underestimating things as well. Maybe the truth falls somewhere in the middle. Hell if either of us can say for sure. I still contend that the concept of long term decay and death (or diminishment) by 1000 cuts can happen over time, silently, in any number of ways that are not necessarily immediately obvious, despite your desire to have instant gratification piles of massive evidence. I care because the music matters to me very much, that is all.

This is all ultimately a matter of how repulsive one feels about Trump and one's favorite band's repeated connection to him. I'm sure if Mike started flying swastikas at BBs shows, you might not think that people who take issue with that are making a bigger deal out of things than necessary. Right? That would cross a line with you, right?  I'm always curious where people's lines are. Everyone must have a line somewhere, no?

It ultimately all depends on how big or small a gap one sees between repeated Trump support involving the brand name (against the wishes of 2 members - and probably against the wishes of 4 members if 2 deceased ones were living) and a hypothetical scenario I've just described.  I don't mean to turn this into a political debate, but there's no way to divorce political views/opinions from a discussion of how big a deal (or not big a deal) one sees the connection as. And how one thinks history will view Trump and will view his ardent supporters, and how that could impact the band's legacy on future generations. Minimize these fears away, as I'm sure you will.  I simply prefer not to have stains of this magnitude on the legacy of my favorite band.

The Trump/BBs connection is either gonna deeply repulse someone to the core to the swastika level, or it's not. Or somewhere between. As I said earlier, your mileage may vary. You clearly think this is merely an insignificant blip and no big deal and I won't be able to change your mind so I'll stop trying to even meet you halfway. It's OK, no hard feelings. We just won't agree on this.

Nothing as polarizing as Trump should EVER have come within contact of the brand name, that's the only certainty in this whole mess.

Believe it or not folks but you can care about the band's legacy while simultaneously being confident that it remains strong and unwavering.

Again we'll have to agree to disagree. I personally know actual human beings (not hypothetical imaginary people) who have soured to the band/brand as a result of the endless barrage of Trump stuff. Those people who are turned off to the brand DO exist (it gives me zero pleasure to state that sad fact), so it's not possible to quantify the reputation as unwavering. I'm assuming those people are merely insignificant imbeciles in your book and couldn't possibly be indicative of a being a portion of other like-minded fans too,  because you'll say there haven't been mass boycotts or people marching in the street during a pandemic, etc to prove there has been any damage done.

I admit that everyone has their own social media bubble/echo chamber, and I am not above that myself (neither are you), but trust me when I tell you that there are people out there who feel this way. Trust me when I tell you that the concept of people who are not yet fans of an artist who will just dismiss that artist outright because of the artist's well-known disastrous political views/unhinged narcissism, exist. I will certainly agree these people absolutely aren't the majority of fans of this band. The band/brand has plenty of bedrock fans who don't care, and now will probably gain fans from the extreme right/Proud Boys crowd. So if you're OK with that, and with the idea of people being turned off to the brand in advance of becoming fans, if that doesn't bother you one bit and you want to just give your middle finger to those people, then the brand will be "OK" and there's nothing more to discuss.

I'm not trying to be a downer, but I don't want to live in the land of make-believe either. Do I think the brand will now shrivel up and die? No. Will hardcore and plenty of other casual fans stick around? Yep. But I think there's still harm that's been done. Maybe those folks who I know are in the minority of fans and simply "don't matter" in your view, but neither you nor I have any way of quantifying the number of people who this could effect.  All in all it's just another revenue stream of decay for the brand.

The only thing we can bicker about is the quantity of people this can effect, we cannot argue about the fact that the repeated Trump connection DOES and HAS affected some fans. I'm not making up the people of which I speak of, they're real.  I hate rehashing this, I'm only responding because I feel it's folly to just dismiss the truth. All we can dispute is the degree to which this hurts the brand, not if it hurts the brand.  

What exactly is the purpose of this thread? It was marked as a "General On Topic Discussion" thread yet last I checked Toby Keith has f***-all to do with The Beach Boys. Last I checked there is no written or verifiable record of Mike Love ever stating that he wanted an award from Donald Trump. And yes, I'm sure I could get an essay full of "what-ifs" and straw-man arguments that point toward Mike Love working his hardest at trying to get this award, but in the end it is all pure speculation.

And with that said, for someone so concerned about The Beach Boys being tarnished by being associated with Donald Trump, CD, you sure are trying hard to further escalate that association here.

I'm annoyed at Mike for the crap he's done throughout the years. I was greatly annoyed by Mike's playing the Trophy Hunter gig. I'm annoyed at Mike for associating this beautiful and spiritual music with the toilet water of politics. But I also don't understand the point of this thread - if one is worried about fans being turned off by Mike's association with Trump, why create a thread (on the most popular Beach Boys forum ever) that further discusses Mike's association with Trump?

If Mike actually got an award I would completely understand if a thread were made (much like I was a huge opponent of Mike's actions in the Trophy Hunter thread). But no award was given to Mike. Mike hasn't publicly stated animosity towards Toby Keith. If we're annoyed about Trump being associated with The Beach Boys perhaps it would be wise to not further create agitation by posting scenarios and speculation about Trump's association with The Beach Boys.

I'm not trying to escalate the association, though I understand how you might feel it came across that way. I'm more just horrified by the association is all. I'm not particularly fond of censoring my feelings on the matter, but yes I do understand and respect what you are saying. I'm just worried about what this all means for the future. Anyway, I certainly hope fans will look past that association, even though I fear that a sizeable amount won't.

And I'm going to just be brutally honest: just because Love supported an unpopular President and played a show for an unpopular group does not mean that he actually did anything objectively wrong, no matter how we may feel about it.  There are far worse things that Mike could be doing that could bring considerable damage to the brand name; these things are ultimately trivial.

If Trump flat out said "I could give a sh*t about Black/LGBTQ rights", "Hitler was vastly misunderstood and wasn't really such a bad guy", etc, - would Mike repeatedly supporting that person publicly be something you'd qualify as an objectively wrong action? All in all, it really depends on how one sees Trump, if they feel these are giant (or not-all-that-giant) leaps in logic from where Trump currently stands, and if they're not of the opinion that hateful rhetoric is a very serious thing with very serious potential consequences.  If one feels any of this stuff is even slightly in the ballpark of Trump, they may feel extraordinarily icky with this brand having repeated connections to it, and perhaps it can be better understood why the line got crossed for some people.

And like I said with my example earlier of people being turned off to an artist so much PRIOR to having given their music a chance, prior to being a fan, that they won't even bother... well that's an actual thing that happens. I can personally attest that it happens. It's not some super rare occurrence. One doesn't need to be a political extremist or zealout in order for this to happen, it's human nature sometimes.

I can give you a list of artists who are famous, who I've never listened to their music before (who I'm well aware of their actions/views which deeply don't jive with mine, to put it lightly) who I would simply choose to never give the time of day to due to the eww factor. They don't have the advantage of me having gotten emotionally invested in their music beforehand. I've never sat down and listened to a Ted Nugent, Kanye West, Gary Glitter album. Maybe there's great music I'm leaving on the table, but you know what? I'm ok with that. There's soooo much music out there, why would I push myself to try to emotionally connect to something by someone who already has planted that seed of being a total POS? So your comment "were they really fans to begin with" holds no water, because I'm talking about people whose fandom was stopped before it ever even started.

I personally certainly don't need every musician or actor to have views that are the same as mine, it's silly to expect that, and there's a huge spectrum... I'm no political extremist either. YET there's nevertheless a line that can get crossed - EVERY or nearly every person/fan/potential fan has that line. Your mileage may vary. But you can't pretend that this is some minimal, insignificant concept. Yes the BBs brand is always going to have a bedrock of fans who won't go anywhere, but the fans who are perhaps the ones the FF set might get new fans into - those potential fans are probably the most at risk for shunning the brand, or at least having the amount of fandom lessened to some degree. And that sucks. All this does, ultimately, is further the "Brian rules, Mike sucks" narrative too, which is remarkable because that narrative seems to be Mike's kryptonite which he nevertheless keeps pathologically egging on.

I googled “biggest jerks in rock and roll” and one site actually has John Lennon at #1, stating his abuse of his first wife among other things.  I don’t think the Beatles legacy has been severely damaged, nevertheless.

Keep in mind, while not defending any of that, and while it's apples and oranges to compare the two men and their behaviors, you're referring to events of 55+ years in the past, as opposed to an ongoing series of obviously completely different reputation-damaging behavior that continues repeatedly over time, which unfortunately coincides with media amplification and scrutiny during the digital age time period in which those events are occurring. Meaning, if John had lived and what you mentioned was something newly happening in 2021, you could better believe the 21st century heat he and the brand would endure would be off the charts.  Once again, not looking to compare Mike to John or their behaviors, but the concept is that the damages that legacies endure can be impacted by many factors including time period and frequency, and apologies or lack thereof, etc. etc.

Realistically speaking, sadly, Dennis' name is rarely mentioned in big media articles without a reminder that he had a Manson connection. That unfortunate connection (which of course he deeply regretted) is forever linked, just as Mike's will be to Trump. It's low hanging fruit. Blame it on clickbait or whatever you want, but ultimately that will be forever a stain on the legacy. One Mike/Trump show/connection might have made that fade quicker, but by golly Mike's many repeated Trump connections ensured that he LOVED to be associated with Trump, and Mike wanted the public to know that even as late as NYE 2021 after Trump had been voted out of office, during the time period when Mike's buddy Trump was planting the seeds for what would 6 days later be an insurrection. Mike wanted the world to know that even at that late date, he was still A-OK with publicly supporting Trump at an indoor maskless show. With Vanilla Freaking Ice. Crapping on the legacy.

It's too soon to really quantify the damage, only time will tell. Mind you, this whole thing only makes me incredibly sad, and I hate to see my favorite band repeatedly associated with Trump and dragged through the mud.

This is SUCH a cool thread.

Side questions - did the band lug their gear at all during this time period? Or did they by this point have roadies who took care of all that?

And was the reverb tank the only effects unit the band used at the time? Would be interesting to know all the various guitar effects the band used during live shows throughout the years, especially the 60s.

At some point, which is another great question as to exactly when, they recruited their friend Ron Swallow to be a roadie (and erstwhile studio tambourinist).

Were Brian/Al/Carl ever using picks onstage at this point (and what brand)? Or just finger picking/strumming?

It sure would be fascinating to get a full-on detailed rundown of what things would have been like on the day of a show for these guys back then. No cell phones, no group text reminders, just hoping that everyone would show up on time, maybe they all met up at someone's house (Brian's?) and carpooled to shows? Or maybe for a local Hollywood Bowl show, they'd each go in their own cars. Every morsel of info regarding what this must've been like back then fascinates me to no end.

The earliest ad I can think of is this one, funnily enough from well after Carl had stopped playing the Jaguar, and well before he picked up his late 60s Tele...

Mike looks a bit sad, wondering when there's gonna be a tambourine ad which he can be at the forefront of 

Can you actually point to any objective evidence that anything Mike has said or done in the last few years including his association with Trump has had any direct negative impact on the Beach Boys name?  Has there been a significant drop in album sales and online streaming of their music?  Have there been any "ban Beach Boys" rallies where folks are burning their records?  And on this very message board have there been any regulars who have recently sworn off the band and left the forum over Mike's actions?  My guess of course is the answer is a firm no.  So perhaps we should drop the irrational "sky is falling" hysteria and be a little more level-headed about this.  

And Trump isn't even a Beach Boy.  Hell, he's not even a President anymore (...zing!!!).  

We'll never agree on this, so we'll just have to agree to disagree I suppose. I personally know people (actual people, not hypothetical ones) who are disgusted by the Mike/BBs/Trump connection, and won't support the band/brand anymore as a result. I haven't done a formal polling of fans to see how widespread this is, no. One need only look at *any* comments section from *any* publication (Rolling Stone, Variety, etc.) that mentions The Beach Boys, and it can be articles that are about BB subject matter that is not directly related to Mike/Trump, and you'll see plenty of reminders of that connection - and that omnipresent reminder (which Mike keeps inflaming like gasoline on the fire with his repeated connections, refusal to skip playing the trophy hunting gig, etc) can be regularly seen by fans who might just be budding BBs fans, but can get GROSSLY turned off by that connection.  

That connection won't go away. Maybe if we're lucky it will fade with time, but Mike is only helping to prevent that fading from happening by continually keeping up that connection. By playing maskless indoor shows at Mar-a-Lago. Because he's such a tough guy and can't relent or back down at all. Big tough guy Mike Love. And yeah, his silence on the insurrection much like his silence on Don Jr. sh*t-talking Brian speaks volumes.

There are plenty of artists who have questionable political views, and fans of course simply have to decide if those views are abhorrent enough to warrant disinterest in that artist. Usually, it's some views that may be shite, but can more easily be overlooked. But again, with Mike, it's the repeated over-and-over-and-over again ties to Trump that have really made that connection unshakable for a not insignificant amount of fans. I don't have numbers, nor does anyone, but common sense tells me this is not good for the brand.

If you think the Mike/Trump stuff won't be affecting the chances of a hypothetical 60th anniversary reunion, or won't at least taint it for plenty of people should such a reunion happen, I don't think you're seeing the big picture here. Just because the BBs train keeps on rolling along, there's plenty of modern day damage/rot/decay happening to the brand, which is ALL due to Mike, which has longterm effects, and it's extraordinarily unfortunate.  If ONE fan is lost due to this garbage, it's one fan too many.

And if you think this subject is somehow not on the minds of PR people associated with the band/brand/FF box/60th reunion, I'm certain you'd be wrong.

If you think that an artist's bad actions can't be a hindrance to fandom, you're 100% wrong. I have friends who are big, huge fans of Kanye West. I have not listened to his music, but after reading about his massive narcissism and abhorrent antics, I have no interest in giving his music a chance or listening to one note of it. I'm sure plenty of would-be BBs fans would fall into that same category. I'm grandfathered into BBs fandom, my emotional connection to the BBs music was forged deeply long ago, so it's rather impossible for me to simply give up on the music. But there's plenty of grey area of fans who are moderate to big fans (not superfan level) who will probably shun all things Mike Love now (which includes the brand), and again it doesn't take much energy for some would-be fan (who is yet to be emotionally invested in the band's music) to shun it more easily by being understandably grossly turned off by Mike. To think this is simply not happening is to be an ostrich. Of course it is. Like I said, I know actual people who fall into this category.  I'm sure the numbers are more than just a handful of folks.

It doesn't take much effort to cut off would-be fans' fandom at the knees, and to at minimum dampen fandom for others who were more deeply into the music already. I'd sure like to tell friends of mine who are budding fans to give a listen to Sunshine Tomorrow to hear how Mike really was a solid lyricist moreso than he gets credit for. I'd sure like to say "give Mike a chance!", but yeah... plenty of people won't want to give Mike the time of day now. Call it "their loss" all you want, but it's a problem that's not going to go away with the brand. 

This is SUCH a cool thread.

Side questions - did the band lug their gear at all during this time period? Or did they by this point have roadies who took care of all that?

And was the reverb tank the only effects unit the band used at the time? Would be interesting to know all the various guitar effects the band used during live shows throughout the years, especially the 60s.

As I've debated with you before on this, while I would agree somewhat that Mike certainly has said and done things that haven't helped the Beach Boys' overall reputation, I don't think he's really tarnished it either.  At least not nearly as much as some folks would like to believe.  The band is still generally well-received and highly regarded as innovators by both fans and critics alike.  I really believe the only people that actually take too much notice of Love's theatrics are the die-hards like us who obsess endlessly over everything the band does.  I'm highly skeptical that the general public of today is paying too much attention to the antics of a near-80 year old of a 60-year-old band.  And I'd find it laughably silly if anyone stopped listening to the band as a whole over anything Love does today.  

The whole "cancel culture" thing has grown to be hopelessly stupid anyway.  Obviously most of us would understandably rather distance ourselves from people who are objectively hateful (nazi's, white supremacists, etc.), but none of the admittedly stupid things Love has said and done come anywhere close to that.   If folks are so thin-skinned that they must disassociate with anything outside their own echo chamber, that's their intolerance.  Mike's relationship with Trump may very well be a liability for him especially after what happened in D.C. a few weeks ago, but I don't see it at all as a "death sentence" for the Beach Boys as a whole.  Mike's been polarizing from the start; this is nothing new.  If the recently deceased Phil Spector has taught us anything, it's that sometimes you have to separate the artist from the art.  

The reason why I feel the Trump association is damaging (more so than you feel) is the sheer quantity of times the brand keeps REPEATEDLY being associated with Trump (during the time when Trump was a political figure), over and over and over again. Just look at the list I compiled at the start of this thread; there may be even more associations that I'm overlooking.  

It's not just a one-off or even a two-off. It's like Mike reminding the world HE HAS A GIANT HARD ON FOR TRUMP AND WANTS THE BRAND ASSOCIATED WITH TRUMP, MAKE NO MISTAKE.

That's the troubling part. I mean, I'd be troubled with one association, but there are MANY and this has gotten drilled into the heads of many people. I do have some issues with cancel culture, yet I also understand that people don't want to pad the pockets of someone who is/has directly supporting/supported Trump in a big way, nearly as big and high profile a way as *any* entertainer has done over the last 4 years. If Mike wanted to stake a claim to owning the role of someone who would keep being associated with Trump more than any other entertainer (or at least give dbags like Kid Rock and Ted Nugent a run for their money), he's certainly doing all he can to claim that title with a long list. And sadly, the brand too, by association.

No matter how one looks at it, it's deeply unfortunate that plenty of people won't want to touch the brand or at minimum support any future shows with Mike (such as a hypothetical 60th anniversary show) as a result of this. You can say "their loss" all you want, but it's Mike's fault that he unnecessarily brought this on himself. Feel free to minimize that quantity of fans or how much you think their thoughts matter (or don't matter) all you want - it still sucks, and it didn't have to happen. And yes, now the insurrection is associated with Trump. Mike didn't say a peep when Don Jr. sh*t-talked Brian, nor did Mike distance himself from Trump after that terrible fiasco, nor do I expect him to in the future. Don't Back Down.

I'm sure Feel Flows will get stellar reviews once it comes out, but I'll bet you that IF any major publication *omits* mentioning the awful, repeated Trump connection in any at-length writeup, it will be because some behind-the-scenes PR person begged/pleaded/bartered for this to not be mentioned. In other words, I don't think the stink of the Trump connection is leaving the brand anytime soon, and we'll be *lucky* if some smart, proactive PR people can get that connection omitted from FF (or reunion) writeups once the brand gets in the news again for this box set or any hypothetical reunion. Even if gets omitted in some places (it surely won't be omitted from all publications across the board), you can bet your bottom dollar many, many fans won't forget.

At the very moment Trump was getting impeached for the record-setting 2nd time, Trump turned a blind eye to pesky talk of insurrection, and held a very, very important closed door event... to award BBs collaborator Toby Keith with this prestigious honor.

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2021/jan/13/trump-awards-medals-singers-toby-keith-and-ricky-s/

I can't imagine a scenario where Mike isn't annoyed that it wasn't *him* receiving this award over Toby - after all of the Trump brownnosing that Mike has done with this transactional, twice-impeached president.

But there's still another week though, so maybe Mike is next in line. I think Mike is legit going to feel pretty cheated if his buddy leaves him hanging. Does anyone disagree? I am totally serious in thinking this.
I mean Mike's been in the music business twice as long as Keith, and has brownnosed at least 2.5 times as hard.

- 2017 inauguration-adjacent show
- 2018 White House press conference with Kid Rock, etc.
- 2020 Trump Jr.-related trophy hunting gig
- 2020 Trump fundraiser show in the middle of a pandemic
- 2021 NYE Mar-a-Lago show in the middle of a pandemic
+ probably more stuff I'm overlooking.

That unwavering loyalty has got to count for *something*.

And it makes Mike's unthinkably bad choice to proceed with even the indefensible trophy hunting gig make all the more sense in hindsight. There is *no way* Mike hasn't been purposefully angling for an award like this, gaining "own the libs" points with multiple generations of Trump family members.  Of course Mike has all along known that Trump is transactional, and of course an award has been on his radar.

If Trump somehow leaves Mike hanging, Mike is most *definitely* going to have to speak to the manager.

You really have an unhealthy fixation on these two guys (Love & Trump), Century.  There's more to life than obsessing endlessly in fury over two people you don't even know personally.  

While my post was undoubtedly drenched in sarcasm, I will say that I was legitimately, truthfully expecting Mike to get an honor from Trump, and I am quite surprised it didn't happen. I'm completely serious. And I'd be surprised if Mike wasn't pissed about it. Find me another musician, let alone one from an extraordinarily legendary band, who did as many public Trump shows/fundraiser/etc. over the last few years other than Mike. Let alone somebody who is 80 years old.

Point taken, but my fascinatinon with Mike's unrelenting associations with Trump is informed by how it disturbs me, which is because the music that Mike helped create means a heck of a lot to me. Too much, probably. I legitimately hope Mike's association with Trump hasn't tarnished the brand name beyond repair. It's certain that such tarnishment has in fact already occurred with plenty of fans. There will be plenty of people who will never listen to the band or take them seriously because of that connection. It's very unfortunate. You can say "well that's their loss", or any such derivative, but that damage has been done and can't be undone. And it really pisses me off to see my favorite band being dragged through the mud because of this garbage.

Only 36 hours to go, Mike is surely prepping his phone call to the manager about what may soon be a grave injustice

Thank you Stephen! And Happy New Year to you.

Thread title speaks for itself.

Anyone have a clue?

I'm guessing it's more complex a situation with rights, due to different movie soundtracks being involved? Plus probably a general lack of interest for it being out there. Parts of the album are definitely a guilty pleasure for me.

At the very moment Trump was getting impeached for the record-setting 2nd time, Trump turned a blind eye to pesky talk of insurrection, and held a very, very important closed door event... to award BBs collaborator Toby Keith with this prestigious honor.

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2021/jan/13/trump-awards-medals-singers-toby-keith-and-ricky-s/

I can't imagine a scenario where Mike isn't annoyed that it wasn't *him* receiving this award over Toby - after all of the Trump brownnosing that Mike has done with this transactional, twice-impeached president.

But there's still another week though, so maybe Mike is next in line. I think Mike is legit going to feel pretty cheated if his buddy leaves him hanging. Does anyone disagree? I am totally serious in thinking this.
I mean Mike's been in the music business twice as long as Keith, and has brownnosed at least 2.5 times as hard.

- 2017 inauguration-adjacent show
- 2018 White House press conference with Kid Rock, etc.
- 2020 Trump Jr.-related trophy hunting gig
- 2020 Trump fundraiser show in the middle of a pandemic
- 2021 NYE Mar-a-Lago show in the middle of a pandemic
+ probably more stuff I'm overlooking.

That unwavering loyalty has got to count for *something*.

And it makes Mike's unthinkably bad choice to proceed with even the indefensible trophy hunting gig make all the more sense in hindsight. There is *no way* Mike hasn't been purposefully angling for an award like this, gaining "own the libs" points with multiple generations of Trump family members.  Of course Mike has all along known that Trump is transactional, and of course an award has been on his radar.

If Trump somehow leaves Mike hanging, Mike is most *definitely* going to have to speak to the manager.

I must say I was pleasantly surprised to discover this today, Stone Temple Pilots covered Brian’s Today Classic “She Knows Me Too Well” and they do a fine job. Scott Weiland sounds a lot like Dennis here. Enjoy!

 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0lKLMacU5OM

Fantastic version.

The old-school hack for recording off the radio with a timer was using a VCR and basic AV receiver setup, better if it were hi-fi stereo for FM. You'd tune in your tuner to the station, rout that signal to the VCR (through a receiver or otherwise) as if it were a cassette deck, set your timer on the VCR, keep everything powered on, and you could record between 2-8 hours off the radio. Then transfer it to cassettes later. Real old-school but it solved the issue of timing a radio recording without having a special deck. Ahh the good ol' days.

Interestingly, it is my understanding that this was how the Beach Boys vaults were raided for the Sea of Tunes boots. A VCR was the only available recording device!

That's amazing. I'd still love to hear a full detailed breakdown of how the SOT heist went down. There must be a fascinating story.

Whether or not somebody loves Mike, loves Donald Trump, thinks Covid is a hoax, and thinks maskless concerts are fantastic, objectively speaking this Mike song is really really terrible, with laughably bad lyrics. The only morsel of credit I will give Mike is that the song isn't drenched in terrible autotune, like the robo Help Me Rhonda from UTL. At least there's that.

Other than that, it's utter garbage I'm sorry to say.

And I will call out modern-ish songs by Mike such as cool head, warm heart for being surprisingly decent. When Mike decides to not be awful, he'll get compliments.

But his new Covid song is terrible and laughable. Mike was robbed of the #1 spot on this list. Maybe someone needs to start a petition to get Variety to revise the list so that Mike can rightfully claim his throne. We all know how much he likes to be #1.

Good ol' Jack Rieley. I'm assuming we have him to thank for getting articles like that into the consciousness of readers.

Nice to see Mike keeping his name in the news...

"The worst songs of the year included Van Morrison and Eric Clapton's anti-lockdown songs, plus numbers by Tory Lanez, Mike Love and Lil Pump"

https://variety.com/lists/worst-songs-2020-year-review-van-morrison-eric-clapton/?fbclid=IwAR1TsYvn6DcIjbg-U1Ko2BW1kcHkQAdqt5yWhIUoegFOKF9FtvSSRxSffj0

Random question: does anyone else have a hard time listening to thoughts of you because there’s a short piano part that sounds just like the MASH theme song?

Doesn't bother me, but I always notice it.

Same here. I guess when I first heard the song it jumped out more and it was a bit distracting because I immediately thought about the TV show, but over time I don't really think about it anymore when I listen to the song these days.

Was Dennis a viewer of M*A*S*H*? The show was so popular for over an entire decade, I would think it would've been next to impossible for him to have never seen the show or to have been totally unaware of the theme song, but who knows.

I doubt he was going for an intentional "homage" or direct reference, but I do wonder if he realized the similarity, but decided he liked the part anyway and just kept it in, or if there's any more to the story than that. It's also possible he didn't realize it at all, but it seems unlikely to me that nobody would've pointed it out to him at some point. The show was so popular for over an entire decade, I would think it would've been next to impossible for him to have never seen the show or to have been totally unaware of the theme song, but who knows.

Very cool, thanks for taping that back in the day. I certainly remember the days of taping radio shows off the air on Cassette  although I never I knew how to do that with a timer.

I was fortunate enough to have a console with a built-in timer.

Only recently did I learn who Steve Dahl was/is, after reading more about the disco demolition event after watching the Bee Gees documentary. He seems like a real jerk having spearheaded that event, IMHO it probably puts Dahl up there amongst one of the biggest jerks who were songwriting collaborators with BW/BBs.

I don't think anybody faults him for that; it was meant to be harmless fun. I live in Chicago, and that event is frickin' legendary, but what has me concerned is some of the "disco" albums that were submitted for demolition.

Not to derail this thread into a completely different topic, but my understanding Is that the disco demolition event descended into  a lot of homophobic subtext, though I'm not saying that every person involved with it had that on their mind - but it seems like that was a silent underpinning of some of that movement. The recent Bee Gees documentary goes deeper into it. Not going to profess to be an expert on Dahl, but a cursory reading about some of his antics rubbed me the wrong way, that's all.

If you're saying there was an anti-gay element of that event, it's not something I was aware of - I always felt the anti-disco movement had more of a racist underpinning to it. That seemed to be around the time that album oriented FM stations changed from a wide ranging list of performers to a narrow one excluding all black artists. Before that time, artists like Stevie Wonder, Earth Wind & Fire and Tower of Power got a lot of play on the album oriented stations. When the disco backlash occured, suddenly those artists were no longer welcome on AOR stations. That format continues today as Classic Rock, and unless your name is Jimi Hendrix, black artists don't get played on those stations.
That was the format MTV was emulating in their early years, and they got called on it when the biggest album in the land was a little record called Thriller - and MTV wouldn't touch those videos.

There were both racist and homophobic underpinnings to it, I should have mentioned both were factors. Again, not saying that was everyone's motive, but I can't think that Dahl was blissfully unaware completely that an event like this empowered racist and homophobic folks. It's pretty mind boggling to think of an entire stadium filled with people specifically to hate on something as general as a genre of music. And with a wide brush, all sorts of disco adjacent music got lumped in and destroyed too at this event.

So yeah, Dahl creeps me out as a result of his connection to that. Was Dahl buddies with Joe Thomas and that's how he wound up writing with Brian?

Why is nobody piling on Dean Torrence? Why does he get a free pass?

Dean was in the Vosse Posse airport photos.  He has lifetime street cred around these parts.   

Seriously, though, my advice to some of you is from the famous serenity prayer: "Grant me the serenity to accept what I cannot change."   Mike Love is nearly 80. Mike is gonna do what he's gonna do.  No amount of criticism, complaints or teeth-gnashing by fans is going to change him.

Actually, I think he keeps doing what he's doing because a sizable amount of both low information fans as well as general right wing hardcore fans line up to show their support of Mike and continue patronizing him. If enough fans actually no longer supported him, and his fanbase dwindled to about 15 people, you can bet he would change his tune.

But yes we know that's not going to happen and I understand what you're saying of course.