I wouldn't call LY "great", but what I would say is that is the last of the band's major works. I mean, MIU is fine, but it's not essential. LY is essential.

Imagine the vituperation heaped upon Mike's head if he had written the lyrics for 'Lazy Lizzie', 'Hey Little Tomboy', 'Roller Skating Child', and 'I Wanna Pick You Up'. (What would Mike write if he had no filter? 'I Wanna Suck Your Toes'?)

That said, there is something innocent about Brian's perving after young girls. He has no idea he's being creepy.

Maybe we can have a pinned "I Hate Mike Love" thread, where the haters can go to talk at each other and leave the rest of the board to Beach Boys fans.

I'm starting to get ashamed of this board.

Just starting?

The chorus has a most unBrian-like structure.

We get the initial, Brian-signature transcendent surge of "Is somebody going to tell me...", but then that surge immediately crumbles into "why she has to hi-i-ide", or "why she has to lie-i-ie".

It's as if the song is continuously poised for emotional liftoff, only to be dragged back down. It's very effective, one of Brian's best.

Closest Brian ever came to Chagall. Filled with a child-like sense of wonder.

Again, the doc repeats the canard that the Capital execs was put off by PS because they wanted the band to put out surf and hot records. Even Brian says this at one point.

But surely record execs knew that surf and car songs had stopped selling by the summer of 1964. And look at the group's singles since that summer. When I Grow Up. Dance Dance Dance. Do You Want to Dance? Help Me Rhonda. California Girls. The Girl I Once Knew. Barbara Ann.

Not one surf or car song among them.

I think "surf and car songs" is just code for "something more closely associated with the Beach Boys." It's just for the sake of brevity it seems that folks tend to say "surf and car songs" rather than "less mature themes of pre-1966 Beach Boys hits."

PS sounded different, and lyrically/thematically/musically was different from both "Dance Dance Dance" and "Fun Fun Fun."

I don't think we can discount record label apprehension simply on a technicality because "Barbara Ann" wasn't literally about a car or surfing.

Ok, but -- it still doesn't make a lot of sense. Is 'Wouldn't It Be Nice' really all that different lyrically/thematically/musically from 'Help Me Rhonda', 'When I Grow Up', or (musically)  'California Girls'?

PS wasn't some radical departure. Brian had been working up to it for 2 years. Plus, "make more surf and car songs" is damn misleading code for "make more songs like 'Help Me Rhonda', please".

In 'Solar System' and 'Johnny Carson', I detect a similarity in sensibility between Brian and Jonathan  Richman : both writing about everyday subjects with a child-like openness and lack of irony.

'Johnny Carson' as a number continually flirts with tedium, but just when you think that " ok, this is getting boring", Brian throws in a change to keep it listenable.

Again, the doc repeats the canard that the Capital execs was put off by PS because they wanted the band to put out surf and hot records. Even Brian says this at one point.

But surely record execs knew that surf and car songs had stopped selling by the summer of 1964. And look at the group's singles since that summer. When I Grow Up. Dance Dance Dance. Do You Want to Dance? Help Me Rhonda. California Girls. The Girl I Once Knew. Barbara Ann.

Not one surf or car song among them.

Haven't seen The Who mentioned yet. And then there's The Rolling Stones : a heavy Beach Boys influence in such cuts as 'We Love You' and Dandelion'.

It's a radically repetitive and simple number.

There is a rich tradition in rock (VU, Eno) and classical (Glass, Riley) for such radically repetitive musical structures, though  Brian is not being self-consciously avant-garde here, he just hit upon a fun groove and decided to go with it.

It's not a composition for the ages, but neither is it mere filler. It has a pleasingly rough-hewed texture, and an over-all throw-back feel to it, like an early 60s Freddy Cannon or Gary U.S. Bonds record.

It is a minor delight.

Also, the chorus echoes 'Wendy' ("Guess I was wrong").

I'm trying to hear this similarity, but I don't hear it. Not in the slightest. Am I missing something?

'God please, let us go on this way" is markedly similar to "Oh Wendy, Wendy left me alone".

Arrangement has a nice, chunky texture. Classic Brian arrangements are translucent -- we can hear each instrument -- but here Brian has gone the Spector route : though not a Wall of Sound so much as maybe a Block of Sound.

The structure is interesting -- the verse drives forward, but the chorus stops the song in its tracks. Gives a transcendent, floating feel to the number that's very Brian.

Also, the chorus echoes 'Wendy' ("Guess I was wrong").

I'd bring along the sheet music to all my favorite hit songs from 1970 on, and thus become the most successful songwriter ever.

By 1977, I had moved on from the Beach Boys and was listening mainly to punk/New Wave. My sister, however, bought a copy of 'Love You' and I loved it from the first listen  -- in fact, it sounded quite punk/New Wave to me.

Loved it then, love it still.

wow I've never heard that! cool to know.

I'm a huge deadhead, saw over a hundred shows and play in a GD tribute act these days. I even read this blog recently documenting Jerry's known musical influences: http://deadessays.blogspot.com/2013/08/garcias-record-collection.html

no mention of the Beach Boys, unsurprisingly.
we've been working on some of the Blues for Allah material recently. hard to hear the Smiley influence although it is the Dead's weirdest album, which is saying something.


I'm not familiar with the book... looks fairly recent. do you recommend it?

Book published in 2015. It's highly readable, though not being a Deadhead I can't vouch for its accuracy.

The Smiley Smile reference is on page 223.

...Smiley Smile. Not just favorite Beach Boys album, but favorite album, period (at least in the 1970's.)

According to David Browne's So Many Roads: the Life and Times of the Grateful Dead, this was the album that Garcia played to the rest of the band when they were preparing Blues for Allah.

I didn't care whether or not they played at the inauguration  -- until I read this thread. Now I want them to play.

The lyrics of California Girls are an inventive variation on Chuck Berry's Sweet Little Sixteen. It's a travel guide song, like Dancin' in the Streets, or indeed Surfin' USA. Songs that use a single focal point (dancing, surfing, or appreciating attractive girls) as a hook to give the listener a quick spin through various locations.

Some of Mike's best lyrics were Berry-inspired (Fun Fun Fun, I Get Around).

Granted, the sentiment behind them hasn't aged well, but they were, at the time, great pop lyrics, part of Mike's brilliant run 64-65 of Fun, Fun, Fun, I Get Around, and When I Grow Up. All with lyrics that were catchy, specifically detailed, memorable, original, and immediately graspable. (Contrast the more generic lyrics of Wendy, for instance.)

In addition, the lyrics did their part in accomplishing the tricky transition that The Beach Boys were undergoing at the time : expanding their subject matter from surfing and cars to the more universal ones of sex, romance, and hanging out with your buddies.

Exhibit A for the defense: Brian didn't seem to mind having himself officially credited as the lyricist of 'California Girls' for 30 years.

Bruce and Mike did collaborate -- along with Terry and John Phillips -- on Somewhere Near Japan.

The Zombies are the last of the uninducted major British Invasion bands. Long overdue.

Steppenwolf had their moment of near-greatness (1968), but fizzled out too quickly to deserve induction, imo.

Journey? They've got to be kidding. Who next, Air Supply?

Pearl Jam in before the Replacements? Really?

The Cars : successful, had good songs, not quite HOF material.

Yes: yes.

ELO : important 70's band, great sound, some great songs. Marginal, but yes.

I've read the available pages. The following comments apply only to the excerpts, ( maybe 1/5 of the book?) and not to the book as a whole.

The good : Brian's personality really comes through, and an attractive personality it is -- generous and  open-hearted. Not a petty bone in his body. Likely to disappoint some is his praise of Mike Love.

The bad :  it's all sweeping, big-picture stuff. Want to get a detailed, inside story of the reconciliation of Brian and Joe Thomas, which in turn led to TWGMTR? "Joe Thomas came back" is all we get.

We may ridicule it, but this is the kind of thesis ( acclaim for Pet Sounds as a rockist construct of white privilege) that can stick in today's political climate. If PS ever again tops a Best Albums of All Time list, I bet accusations of racism will be leveled.