Where was Dave's spot in the vocal stack on the first few albums?

Love all of the hard work Jon and you have put into continuing to research odds and ends like this. Maybe it's a pipe dream, but I'd love to see a revised and expanded version of your book someday.

The plot thickens. John Cowsill just posted a photo of him with his arm around his replacement.

Presumably, he bares no ill will toward the new guy, and doesn't want him to face any misguided rage from the fans.

But the level of implied involvement from Uncle Jesse certainly did raise my eyebrows...

Saw this on facebook and was shocked. So sad to see someone involved with the band as long as he has pass away, especially someone as comparatively young as Billy.

He was a great pinch hitter, and it was nice to see that he was still close enough to Brian where he was able to fill in for Darian a few years ago. (Unfortunately, I think he also got sick that same tour, the November 2015 show I saw was one of the first with Debbie Shair, I believe.)

And you know what? His rapping on Wipe Out, complete with his Uncle Sam MC getup? It's got a lot of cornball charm, looking back 30+ years later.

Good to see that Blondie seems to take it all in stride.

As much as we knock Kokomo, BW's band can play a damn good version of it, as the reunion tour showed.

I made this thread a few years ago, if it helps.

http://www.breakingnews247.net/5a0481339c08d/brian-wilson-pens-answer-song-to-weezer-s-beach-boys.html

Al's facebook page just shared this. Don't know anything else about it yet, but that line about Mike is VERY interesting.

It's easy to assume or wonder if Scott Bennett being on the session may have impacted the release/airing of the session, but I honestly don't know.

They certainly did some creative editing to make sure he's not easily seen in the Wouldn't It Be Nice video.

I asked Darian about this a year or so ago after a show. He didn't go into specifics but mentioned something about licensing issues and rights.

As for now, pretty much the only way to get them money from their recordings is to listen to their one song on Spotify over and over again. (It is a good one, though!)

Some upcoming shows are being billed and promoted as the "Surf & Soul Tour", a package concert with the Temptations. Subtitled "California surf meets Motor City soul". Video promos are already up and running, unless they're yet another ruse created by Noven Jaisi...  Not sure if "Surf & Soul" is only for the Temptations dates.

I think they used that same title for their tour with the Temptations last year.

55 years of Ten Little Indians!

Honey Don't.

The weak link of the album here is the pretty standard covers.

Last year at Goodwill I heard Brian's version of "We Wish You a Merry Christmas". I've never listened to his christmas album all the way through, so I didn't actually recognize it at first, all I could think was "wow, this is really awful".

On a better note, a CD One-Price Dry Cleaners was playing the BBs "Santa Claus is Coming to Town", which I stayed behind to listen to, even though I was halfway out the door when it started playing.

Was Blondie in there playing tambourine?

Looks like Scott Bennett, who they very carefully tried to edit around. He's not in focus even once here.

This must've been shot late last year, I'm surprised they waiting on this that long. I'd love to see a whole special filmed like this.

That's cool I guess. It would be nice if some of the BB's albums got this kind of treatment, but then again, not too many of them sold as well as Wilson-Phillip's first album.

Given that David was pretty much out of the picture from the mid-60s to the early-90s, I am almost certain there isn't. I don't think all nine have ever been in the same place at the same time.

Had David even met Blondie before the 2013 BAD tour?

You've Really Got a Hold on Me

Did he sign only books?

There were a few people who had stuff with them - (I know you're reading this  ), but we all just had our book signed out of courtesy to the people behind us.

But that didn't stop us from waiting in front of Mike's taxi so he could sign everything else. He seemed nice enough about it, though. Even the cabbie borrowed a sharpie because he wanted his book signed!

I went to one of Mike's book signings yesterday. There wasn't a talk or anything, it was just straight through the line, but you got to spend a good minute or two talking to him, and have a picture taken. I didn't feel rushed, but still deliberately paced. They had around two-hundred people to get through, so it's not like he could spend five minutes with everyone.

Mike looked pretty tired, but still chatted a bit with everyone. I'm pretty bad around celebrities, but I still told him I liked his comment about James Watt ("someone should drill his ass for brains") and he smiled and chuckled a little.

I haven't had a chance to dive very deep into the book, besides for what I read in line, but what I read was pretty good. He takes a few self-deprecating shots, and really plays up his connections to famous people (he has a great story about talking with Richard Pryor about the Chinese economy, which he admits is a very bizarre thing to have happened), but that's who Mike is. I can't imagine this book is going to redeem Mike from his haters, but at the very least, it's an extended glimpse into his psyche, and a pretty fun read.

I like the logo on the hat on the right, reminds me of Love You!

So, anyone remember when Brian sang "I Loves You, Porgy" without changing any of the words?

And, I'm not going to say anyone's a bigot or a homophobe for changing the words of a song around, but do we really have to be so paranoid about a few lyrics of a song?

Anybody know what Darian's schedule for the remaining part of the tour should be?

I don't know Darian's schedule, but it appears that his recent return was not planned and was a result of Billy Hinsche having to leave. They apparently went with no fill-in for a few shows, then Darian returned and my 100% total guess is that he only came back temporarily until they could find (and perhaps Darian could help "train") another keyboardist.

As mentioned awhile back, Billy Hinsche was originally only slated to fill-in for Darian through the June 19th show, but then when the tour resumed at the end of June, Billy was still there and remained until earlier this month. I don't know if Darian was originally scheduled to return at the end of June, or if they were planning on getting yet *another* replacement at that time. I would guess the original plan was for Darian to return, but he wasn't able to, and Billy was able to continue to fill in.

Considering the main "North American" leg of the tour ends in a couple of weeks, I would guess Darian probably won't be back in October. Who will reappear for the October/November/December gigs outside the US is anybody's guess at the moment.  

This is probably a pretty common thing for a band that is doing *extensive* touring (the schedule has to be at or near 100 shows at this point) in a given year when they are not normally on a round-the-clock contract/retainer all year long with Brian. Whereas, say, Mike Love's guys rarely are missing because they have a year-long, year-after-year schedule and thus don't need to take other engagements, the members of Brian's band on typical years are usually doing other things, and clearly at least in Darian's case he wasn't able to clear the entire year to tour because of other commitments. This year's near full-time schedule between March and October is a relatively rare thing for Brian.

Having Scott Bennett unavailable probably didn't help things. Usually their fill-in would be Gary Griffin, but it seems he's working with Brian pretty much full-time now.

I think having to constantly switch keyboard players in and out is part of the reason why the setlists haven't been too adventurous. The lineup of the band is changing almost week-by-week.

I'm sure it's only been delayed because Craig is trying to give us the best product possible... although it's been hard waiting this long for sure.

Maybe you could give us a sneak peek, C-man? 

Huh. You'd think he could've just asked Bruce, seeing as how they spend half the year together on the road.