I think part of the problem is that it's been a long time since the entire BB group has done a big press tour and whatnot. I've followed, for instance, McCartney over the years, and even setting aside the same freaking Beatles questions he still gets asked ("Yesterday" was "Scrambled Eggs", John helping him with "Hey Jude", what it was like to land in America in 1964, etc.), it's the same round of questions and answers when it comes to whatever "new" project is going on. Often, the artist feeds the endless cycle by giving the same answers word-for-word every time. It's a cycle. Sometimes the artist is sick of the questions, but they can't control the questions, so they give the same answers. Hence, David Marks telling us a million times that "it's just like a family reunion", etc. A non-hardcore fan also doesn't follow the band to every interview, so the answers sound fresh to the masses.

But the interviewers (not our great fan-friendly, knowledgeable folks like Mr. Edelson) are a big part of the problem, and even when not prompted to ask anything or not ask anything, they all ask the same thing anyway. "What's it like to get back together?" Unless you can phrase that in a way that gets a different answer, what do you think the guys are going to say. "We hate it, but we signed on to finish the tour?"

The pattern for "new" songs being added to the setlist is that it usually seems to be a deeper cut that either Brian's or Mike's band has done within the last 5 or 7 years in their shows. How many songs have they done on this tour that neither band had ever done, aside from the two new album cuts? Even "California Saga" had been done by Brian's band during the handfull of shows Al did with him in 06/07.

So I would imagine likely candidates would be things like "Good Timin'" that both bands have done in the past. I've been hoping for "Goin' On" as my extreme long shot. It would be cool to hear that band do those ascending/descending harmonies. Heck, they even have Mertens there to do the 80's sax solo. The song was dropped like a bad habit before the end of the 1980 tour.

I'm still surprised they never did "Come Go With Me", not that I miss it terribly. If they added it the setlist without deleting a cool song or an Al song, I'd be for hearing it. But I'm surprised simply because it was in the setlist for so many years and was a relative hit in 1981.

Beyond songs either band has done in the past, I suppose we would look at songs the band members have mentioned. So yeah, things like "Graduation Day", "Vegetables", "Our Prayer", "Farmer's Daughter", and also maybe songs they've done in the past that we know some of the band members like. Mike has said he likes "Wonderful", so that's a slight possibility, as would be "Warmth of the Sun."

I'm still hoping someone convinces them to do the extended "Heroes and Villains" just to see if Mike will actually do the "Cantina" bit. If someone explained to him that he would probably at least temporarily win over a lot of the hipster/indie young fans by doing that bit, maybe he'd do it.  

Maybe AGD can refresh my memory about this. I recall that the multitracks hadn't been found for this track, only a rough mixdown. I would hope at least the fidelity of that mixdown in the vaults would be better than what "circulates", which sounds like a fifth-generation cassette dub.

As for 15BO, I actually think "That Same Song" and to a lesser extend "TM Song" are two of the better tracks on the album. They are more enjoyable to me than the limp oldies covers.

As long as Brian wasn't wearing the leather pants from the the Dick Clark "Night Time" performance from 1988...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGfwkkm-GQI

Yes, I am going to find as many ways as possible to reference that peformance.   

New U.S. tour date for the fall? October 6 at Nutty Jerry's in Winnie, TX.

From http://blogs.houstonpress.com/rocks/2012/06/the_beach_boys_coming_to_nutty.php

"As Rocks Off confirmed from Nutty Jerry's PR, this will in fact be the lineup that was at the Woodlands on June 8. There was some question to whether or not this would be Mike Love's version of the group that tours sans Brian Wilson."

Interesting! Hopefully they'll hit some markets they didn't hit on the first "leg", and also maybe do a second show in markets they only did one show in. I was wondering if something like this would happen; they may not want to do another 70-date tour in 2013, but maybe take a little break and cram in some more shows in 2012, just to wring as much as they can out of the "50th Anniversary" year. Maybe they booked "Nutty Jerry's" after they discovered they still had  a warehouse full of "50th Anniversary" tour merchandise to sell. 

A compromise would be to allow Mike to keep the franchise and use the name calling his act "Mike Love's Beach Boys" so that people know the difference when Brian wants to record or tour.  Bruce and David wouldn't mind, as long as there is work for them.  Al has a bit more of an ego -- I don't think he'd be up for touring under that moniker.  But he doesn't want to tour 170 days a year, anyway, and the reunion has given him new visibility -- the Endless Summer Band would be a bigger draw, post-2012.

Interesting ideas, and I know that was something I wish Mike would have done with his band over a decade ago. But I don't see it happening. If they were into correctly labeling the band and doing a "truth in advertising" sort of thing, they would have done it long ago. The name with appended words doesn't work to anybody's liking. Mike, Bruce, and David toured in 1998 as "America's Band" and that didn't work. Al did the "Beach Boys Family and Friends" thing and nobody but Al liked that.

As I mentioned before, the only thing that I would think would give Mike pause to go back to his solo "Beach Boys" would be the public sort of re-evaluating his use of the band's name in light of all five having been part of it in 2012.

But the masses proved in 1998 (and numerous other times in other ways) that any band on stage using the name and I suppose with a few dudes in Hawaiian shirts is all it takes.

Both Brian and Al get checks from BRI whether they're touring or not, correct?  I can't see them objecting to Mike playing over 100 dates a year if he wants to and collecting a share of the pot.  I'm not sure Al is that interested in that much touring either. He's brought up going out as a full Beach Boys reunion every other year, not every year.  He can still gig around sometimes with his sons if he wants to play, but I can't see him wanting to leave his ranch to play a bunch of gigs in South America.  Unless he really wants to see South America.

Yes, all of the members of BRI get a cut of Mike's BB tours. But Brian and Al (and Carl's estate, and Mike for that matter) only split the licensing fee (which is, as the industry goes, usually something like a flat fee in addition to or against a percentage of the tour proceeds). In other words, Mike still makes much more money touring as the BB's than the cut that the other three parties get. Which in the most basic way makes sense, as he's the one of those four parties going out and actually performing.

Given Al making that appearance in early 2011 with Mike's "Beach Boys", I would guess that for better or worse, Al would probably re-joing Mike's band at this stage if they wanted him to.

This is why I continue to wonder whether Mike actually made more money touring without the other guys in 2011 for instance.

I think Al's discussion of doing his solo stuff in the reunion tour was a lot more like "yeah, that would be cool if we did that" rather than insisting it would happen. He was often asked specifically that question in interviews revolving around his solo album and the tour.

Al's picks are often random, and I love that.

I understand that under the loose "rules" we've seen for this tour's setlist, any new song does bump another one. But they haven't always bumped one raritiy for another song of the same raritiy. I love "Wendy" for instance, probably as a song more than "Farmer's Daughter", but just to hear something new, I wouldn't mind if the latter bumped the former.

I don't like being a naysayer. I truly do get all the touchy-feely reunion fuzziness feeling like everybody. I think it's amazing, and I hope it continues.

But I also don't for a second think Mike isn't capable and willing to scale back and go back to what he was doing. He did in 1998. They lost Carl, then Al quickly after, then Matt Jardine, and before the end of the year, the band was barely recognizeable compared to what it was less than 12 months earlier. By the middle of the following year, Marks was gone too.

It's all about the band's name, and the ability to lobby to get use of that name. The only thing that will stop Mike from continuing on with whatever version of the BB's he wants is if both Brian and Al don't allow it. If even just Brian goes back to what he has done up to this point, of agreeing to Mike having the license to do his own thing, then nothing would prevent the 2013 "Beach Boys" to be just like the 2011 "Beach Boys" and nothing like the 2012 "Beach Boys."

I found it interesting that surely Al knew they were only gonna be playing a few "hits" today, but all he could think about was "Custom Machine" and "Graduation Day". He must constantly be pressing for his ideas, also supported by the Rolling Stone article regarding "Waves Of Love". The guys should show him a little more love, he's more respected by fans than they apparently know. He's truly thinking of us right now. What a solid thing to do. I'd love to hear some more Al in the sets, as well as the rarities he's proposing. Mike's the man, but c'mon dude! Imagine if Brian and Al ran the set lists?  

Btw, even though he only sang a few notes of Graduation Day, it sounded amazing. At 6 in the morning.

I would guess any songs Al was pushing to rehearse this morning were not intended to perform this morning. It sounds like they use their soundchecks as testing grounds for new setlist inclusions.

It is kind of astonishing that an actual BB has to start a political action committee and hire a lobbyist when they want to get a song in the setlist. 

Pure speculation, but something I've thought about concerning the reunion concerts....I think the powers that be are trying to involve Al as much as possible as far as lead vocals are concerned. But, let's face it, in regard to U.S. hit singles, Al sang lead on only one - "Help Me Rhonda". So, I think then Mike or Scott or whoever went down to the next tier - songs that were singles and had some chart success, maybe overseas, including "Then I Kissed Her", "Cottonfields", "California Saga", and "California Dreamin". There really weren't much more there. They might get away with "Come Go With Me" but that's about it. The days of "Lady Lynda", "Buzz Buzz Buzz", and "Runaway" are in the past. 

It could be that, if Al wasn't the lead singer on those above songs, they might not have even been included in the set. What I'm getting at is that maybe they feel that Al was already thrown a bone, and he should be grateful for that. Forget about trying to get even MORE input into the setlist.

Interesting points. It doesn't seem like all of Al's suggestions for the setlist even involve him as the lead singer, though. The songs he mentioned before the tour that we haven't heard are tracks like "Farmer's Daughter" and "Our Prayer", and now we see "Graduation Day", "Custom Machine", and so on. Al wouldn't be doing a solo lead vocal on any of those.

In other words, his picks don't seem to be ego-driven or driven by pandoring to the beach ball-bouncing fans at the shows. He seems to be into the obscure tracks not terribly unlike us fans. He apparently back in 2000, before a sheer lack of tour dates made it impossible, attempted to start doing "The Trader" at his shows, for instance. He mentioned to a fan once that he loved "Steamboat." This guy likes the music, he doesn't love that he sang these songs.

He mentioned in one appearance that he might bring up "Lookin' at Tomorrow" to Mike, but who knows if that even happened.

Then he could have been fired again like in the early 1990s. This tour and album is about Brian and Mike getting back together and they are essential to this. Brian is the leader in the studio and Mike is the leader on stage. Al is still an excellent singer but he doesn`t have the clout to start issuing ultimatums.

I would also say that much as I love him, Al is a fruitloop at times. He has made so many statements over the past 14 years about playing rare songs on stage that never happened or about reunions that were never on the cards. Allowing him to pick 5 songs for the setlist would be like giving the kids the key to the gun cabinet.

I think I'm probably going for too much of a theoretical point. Al legally does have the same clout as Mike and Brian. As a matter of practicality and functionality for the band on a day to day basis, this doesn't mean much in many cases,  and I think Al realizes this. His comments in the RS article seem to suggest he's resigned to Mike running the band and carrying the torch. He seems to be simply bemused about it at this point. The guys are old now, so stuff probably doesn't bother them as much, at least Al anyway. His comments seemed to suggest Mike insists on carrying the torch, and he seems to have the demeanor of "I'm too flippin' old and too much crap has happened and Mike isn't going to change anyway."

Al could have been stubborn about the reunion and made more demands, I'm guessing. And I know, this is a major guess. We can either say "it doesn't matter, he didn't have any clout to begin with, and he wanted the reunion more than Mike or Brian", or we can say "Al should be thanked a bit for not being another ego in the room that could have prevented the reunion from going as well as it has."

I don't see how Al's picks for a few setlist inclusions would hurt anything. To your point, he has at least spoken about "rarities" in setlists more than the other guys. He often hasn't been able to do them, but that gets us back into the 2000's debate about Al's inability to regularly tour and build up a setlist due to the lawsuits and all of that business.

I doubt whether Al, Bruce or David have much say in the setlist whatsoever.

Definitely. That always kind of seemed to be the case, and it's becoming more and more apparent as we hear little bits of setlist discussion. My point is that I'm surprised it is this way, to this degree at least. Al's different than David or Bruce. Al is an equal shareholder in the group with Mike and Brian. I'd be curious to know to what detail the agreements were drawn up for this tour. Al just seems to be too kind of easy going and passive to have his lawyer draw up a "Jardine gets five setlist picks" clause. Seems like he could have done this, or could yield a tiny bit more power on this tour, and he seems to be choosing not to.

I'm hearing that the Mike & Bruce band are booking South American dates for once the reunion tour wraps.
No confirmation on that, just info passed on from a reliable source.

It seems kind of sad but inevitable. The only thing that made me think maybe Mike and Bruce wouldn't just go right back out again was that their tour would just situationally seem to lose some credibility. It was one thing for Mike and Bruce in recent years to go out only having to acknowledge that once, many many years ago, a fuller BB band with Brian had toured. But if they go back out, it'll be more like "dude, like a few months ago you were five, and now you're two again?"

I still wonder if Mike makes more money on his own "BB" tours compared to the overhead cost and having to presumably split more of the money on this tour. Yes, they are probably selling more tickets and have a higher ticket price on this tour, but I wonder if that offsets the increased costs and profit sharing.

Seems the whole organization currently has been purposely silent about what happens after this tour. I think only Bruce directly referenced this before the tour even started, implying this was a one-time thing that wouldn't happen after August.

Mike wasn't actually on stage to respond. Totten said he brought it up to Mike in the past, but he doesn't want to do it.

Ahhh, okay. I can't imagine why "Don't Back Down" is a favorite of his apparently, but not "Custom Machine?" Reading that "Rolling Stone" article and the discussions about setlists among the guys, I'm still even more amazed that we're hearing them do something like "Marcella."

I do reiterate my original point, which is that Al should have enough swing in this thing to pick a few songs he wants, regardless of what the figs those songs are. "Looking at Tomorrow", or "Hey Little Tomboy", or "Skatetown USA", or whatever. If he wants to bring his horse out on stage for a song, whatever. He should get a little spot to do whatever he wants. It sounds like even the songs he sings in the show were picked by others, with the exception of presumably "California Saga."

I think one of the main things is that all of the surviving members are involved (discounting Blondie and Ricky). I remember back a decade or so ago in the midst of Mike and Al's bands (and Brian's of course) touring seperately, that a lot of conversations were going on among fans about whether we all really felt the BB's died with Carl, or if some sort of reunion would still be appealing. I remember my opinion being that I wasn't sure a Carl-less BB's would work, but I could definitely say that a reunion would have to have all of the surviving members involved. I think that's a key. Once a band can't even get the guys that are still alive to participate, then it quickly loses credibility exponentially.

David being there really does help the reunion hit that sort of "sweet spot." It does just visually look more appealing to have five guys in those reunion photos and up on stage, and he does lend some early-era authenticity that nobody else possibly could.

Wow, I guess not watching a lot of TV lately and having a DVR, I don't have to sit through this stuff normally. What utter crap these shows are. I think the issue of "Entertainment Weekly" I thumbed through last week was more interesting and intellectually stimulating than this show. I'm quite glad I have a DVR, as I didn't have to sit through anything I didn't want to.

The band sounded good. Too bad they got about 2 1/3 songs on TV, and the camera work was horrendous (yeah, we get it, there are people in the audience).

For those who heard the exchange about "Custom Machine", can you describe it more? Did Mike really just shut Al down (no pun intended, seriously) and literally say "No", or was it just a sort of "meh", disinterested reaction? As I alluded to in another thread, I sense Al is puposely being passive in this reunion to make it run as smoothly as it can. It just seems odd that Al 50 years later can't get a song he wants in the setlist. He's an original f-ing member and he owns the band's name and corporation with Brian and Mike. I can only guess he chooses not to push these issues. I guess he thought better of negotiating a tour agreement that said "once in a while, being an original freaking Beach Boy and all, I get to pick a song or two for the setlist."  

The entire group: "Does this mean we all have to appear on a late night talk show peforming in tight leather pants and dancing without instruments, like Brian did in 1988?" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGfwkkm-GQI

Bruce: "Is "Friday's" still on the air? We did that show in 1980!"

Brian: "I remember when we did the Ed Sullivan show back in 1964. How is Ed doing these days?"

Al: "Okay, but on the next album *I* get to fly in a song from an unreleased solo album!"

Matt Jardine: "Hey, wasn't I *kind of* in the band in the 90's?"

Mike: "Okay, so who gets the backing band in our group divorce settlement?"

I know we've already had enough of the political/O'Reilly/Johnston debates. I just wish they'd book a better place to do an interview. It's one thing if there's on a show that's a talk show which happens to have a host with some known political views or whatnot. But other than the clueless Larry King, there has never been much non-political crap on these cable stations.

I've seen the other O'Reilly bits that Love has done, and O'Reilly strikes me as someone who feels he's an expert on the band because he can name the members and knows some of the personnel changes from over the years. He didn't seem particularly respectful of anyone in the band other than those who are in front of him at the moment. He totally didn't challenge anything when Love came on a few years go during the "Smile" related lawsuits. He just let Mike say what he wanted to say. It was kind of odd.

I can't believe Brian's handlers are letting him on this show. I say this objectively, whether I like the show or not, this show doesn't have the format, style, or politics that would be ideal for Brian. I guess he'll just let Mike do most of the talking.

John Stamos: "I wish "Full House" was still on the air so the band could promote it on the show."

Al Jardine: "For the new music video, I wanted to remake that scene where the goat tries to attack me in the 1976 "It's OK" TV special."

Tom Petty: "Brian clearly *didn't* stick his head between two pieces of buttered bread for this album!"

David Marks: "We picked up right where we left off, just like the old days when I lived across the street from the Wilsons. Er, well, the "we" that included me left off in 1963, unless we're talking about the 1999 version of "we", which didn't sound anything like this new album. Phil Bardowell was a cool guy, though."

Brian Wilson: "This album came out of my throat and into the audience."

Mike Love: "We finally settled on the album title after my suggestion of "Unleash the Beach Boys" was inexplicably turned down."

Bruce Johnston: "No, seriously, Democrats are free to buy the album too!"

Ricky Fataar: "Wait, it's already the Rutles' 50th Anniversary?"

Adrian Baker: "I'm on the album too!"

I would imagine a lot of things factored into what Carl supported or attempted to advocate for when it came to the band and the setlist. In Carl's defense, it seems like the culture of the audiences and the media coverage of the band was such that there was less celebration and "coolness" in the nerdy aspects of BB fandom, like "Smile" and championing Dennis' solo work, and all of that sort of stuff. There have always been die-hard fans. But I think there wasn't the same apparent openness to more varied setlists from the fans in Carl and the band's view in, say, 1991 or whatever.

Part of the reason the 2012 setlist has featured a nice selection of "rarities" is that the band is now aware of the popularity of their less-obvious hits. Carl or Al or whoever probably couldn't have convinced Mike to sing "Marcella" in 1990.

I think Carl also didn't get a chance to see the type of huge fan appreciation that Brian got for his solo tours. Carl has been quoted in interviews lamenting how the band could do a short, stinker of a show and fans still loved it. He also dealt with the fans who screamed "Barbara Ann" and went on a beer break while they performed "Angel Come Home" or "Livin' with a Heartache" or, in 1988 when they tried to add "This Whole World", etc.

I can only guess, but I would doubt Carl ever didn't want to do more varied setlists. I think he believed, rightly or wrongly, that such setlists wouldn't go over well. Also, it seems in later years he did abdicate some of the leadership role to Mike in terms of organization and whatnot. This eventually created a bit of a rift apparently between he and Al as described in Jon Stebbins' and David Marks' book.

Brian may not be able to pull off an amazing "Darlin'", but I think he could do as well on it as some of the other songs he's doing on this tour and has done on recent solo tours. I thought he sounded rather weak on "This Whole World" all the way back in 1999, and he's still singing that one 13 years later. I think "Darlin'", with the key lowered as heard on the Roxy live album, would sound okay with Brian singing.

I'd like to imagine that if Carl were alive, he would have joined Brian on the Pet Sounds tour and ultimately the BWPS tour.  He did not seem as though he would have wanted to do the non-stop fairground tour circuit with the Mike and Bruce band, and it would seem that the opportunity to perform the best music from Brian's best days would pull him in like a magnet.   It would be the Wilson Brothers on tour!

But at the same time, maybe it was Carl's death which smacked BW in the face and made him think, "gee, I'm sort of running out of time.  Maybe I ought to resurrect my career and deal with my demons because if I don't, I'm going to be remembered as nothing more than a 60's surf music genius who had an acid meltdown and spent his life in bed."

Whatever the reason is, it's very clear that BW has found his mojo again.  It's almost if the solo period was preparation for the day he would have to take command of his old band again and right the ship.

I know the "what if" thing is pretty pointless, but I'm not sure Carl would have just one day decided to leave the touring BB's and join Brian. Even prior to his illness, in the 90's Carl seemed to become more and more resigned to Mike's vision for the band and he continued to participate in that band. Carl and Dennis seemed to be major proponents in the 70's especially of being more progressive in the studio and live. Carl seemed to feel this way into the 80's, one of his conditions on rejoining the live band in 1982 being to institute a more varied setlist. But it's ironic that a Carl-less BB's in 2012 are performing a more interesting and varied setlist than anything the BB's with Carl did in the 90's and probably the 80's (apart from the late '93 "box set" tour).

I think Carl may well have worked with Brian on Brian's solo stuff. It's more likely in my view that Carl would have maybe fostered a Brian-inclusive BB reunion sooner as opposed to leaving the BB's and touring with Brian. But of course, the what-if scenarios mean nothing.

It's too bad Carl was never interviewed indepth on these and other topics. It certainly seems that at a certain point, he sort of stopped putting up a fight to things like "Summer in Paradise" or "Stars and Stripes" or the jukebox touring, etc.

His reported distaste for the couple of Paley tracks the BB's worked on has always been really vague. One report I remember reading suggested he simply didn't like the Don Was-produced backing track to "Soul Searchin'." He sang the song to that backing track, but later on his vocal was dubbed back onto the older Paley-Brian-produced backing track, which is the version we've heard for all these years. The Was backing track has never surfaced, and while they did the cut-and-paste job on Carl's vocal before he died, he may have never heard that version.

But the BB's are sometimes the kings of irony and contradictions. "Smile" is too weird, but they put out "Smiley Smile." Somebody doesn't like the Paley tracks, but soon after signs on for an album where Toby Keith sings "Be True to Your School."

I don't think there is any actual blame to be had for the album's peformance. #3 is great.

However, I don't think it's an uninteresting point that many people (not anybody here on this board) probably did pay over $100 for a ticket to the BB reunion show yet didn't buy the new album. I think that's an interesting thing to ponder. This is true of most acts. When I saw McCartney in 2002, I'm sure many if not most of the 15,000 in the arena had no intention of ever buying "Driving Rain."