Beach Boys Lyrics Class, Session #2

[The Heartical Don]

OK folks, last time we discussed the rather familial and funny line 'No Calls From Korthof, Parks Or Grillo'.

Now, I'd rather like to see you comment some more unsettling material. It goes:

'People Have You Heard Of The World Plan / To Know The Inner Nature Of Every Man?'

This frightens me more with each passing year. Did Mike have secret powers to look into my brain when I listened to CATP? Did he have capacities in 1971 already that most governments and internet providers only did by 2000 or so? Did he tap our phone lines?

Did he add and average all our deepest musical dreams, fantasies, and secret wishes, and were Looking Back With Love, and Summer In Paradise the statistical outcomes?

I want to know. Desperately so.

[filledeplage]

OK folks, last time we discussed the rather familial and funny line 'No Calls From Korthof, Parks Or Grillo'.

Now, I'd rather like to see you comment some more unsettling material. It goes:

'People Have You Heard Of The World Plan / To Know The Inner Nature Of Every Man?'

This frightens me more with each passing year. Did Mike have secret powers to look into my brain when I listened to CATP? Did he have capacities in 1971 already that most governments and internet providers only did by 2000 or so? Did he tap our phone lines?

Did he add and average all our deepest musical dreams, fantasies, and secret wishes, and were Looking Back With Love, and Summer In Paradise the statistical outcomes?

I want to know. Desperately so.

You Mr. Don as an "academic," are likely looking at world affairs from an "academic perch," and likely have access to news materials that the common folk do not have.  I do feel that "global travel" educates one in a way that books cannot, and experiences on tour such as the "Prague Spring" provide hands-on insight to any lyricist, and a tremendous reservoir from which a songwriter can draw.  I have always felt, even during my college years that the music was sort of "ahead of its time" - Don't Go Near the Water and Student Demonstration Time are two that come to mind, having been a 1970's college undergrad.  Summer in Paradise is more recent but no less didactic. 

That said, I don't think Mike is the second coming of Nostradamus. I do think he is one of those people who looks around and "takes it all in" and "pays attention."  Not "paying attention" is one reason that as global citizens, we are in deep trouble.

That continuous travel, weaving in and out of the path of countries which may or may not have "security alerts" provides a "living textbook" for world affairs, and an insight into some serious issues, and might engender a "heightened concern" for issues concerning mankind, in particular environmental issues. 

It takes the listener a while to "get the message" but for me, looking back, a lot of what Mike has become involved in, such as TM, 40+ years ago has become "mainstream" and you well know that what people ridicule in one time-space, as odd, off the wall, or too cutting edge in one decade, becomes mainstream and embraced decades later.  I recently read where meditation practice has become, or is becoming part of curriculum design, for high risk and violent urban school populations, to teach kids to get self awareness and more importantly self control.  I taught many years in a troubled urban setting.  I think it is exactly what they need. To make it pass "Constitutional muster" in terms of separation of church and state in the States" it needs to be religiously neutral, but taught from a multicultural and historical perspective.   

Docs are using meditation and yoga practice as a means of lowering blood pressure and assisting in the tailoring a lifestyle where one can  be taught as a skill-set, as in the school setting,  to deal with stress in a positive fashion.  I don't have the solo Mike album, but do think that a lot of Mike's lyrics are a place where there is a lesson to be learned.  I don't think he has a crystal ball, but he is someone who is inspired by "paying attention."     

[The Heartical Don]

 

You, ma fille, wrote a most enlightening essay, which deserves an A+.

So Mike is more a Platonian, waving the adage: 'Gnoti Se Auton'. That makes eminent sense. I am unfortunately running out of time right now, but will no doubt return to your delightful little piece of prose.

[Fun Is In]

OK folks, last time we discussed the rather familial and funny line 'No Calls From Korthof, Parks Or Grillo'.

Now, I'd rather like to see you comment some more unsettling material. It goes:

'People Have You Heard Of The World Plan / To Know The Inner Nature Of Every Man?'

This frightens me more with each passing year. Did Mike have secret powers to look into my brain when I listened to CATP? Did he have capacities in 1971 already that most governments and internet providers only did by 2000 or so? Did he tap our phone lines?

Did he add and average all our deepest musical dreams, fantasies, and secret wishes, and were Looking Back With Love, and Summer In Paradise the statistical outcomes?

I want to know. Desperately so.

Yes, yes, he did but unfortunately it relied on the quantity of anagen phase hairs on his head. Needless to say, those powers have weakened considerably.  Alternatively, it's just a bunch of, er, information he heard from the Maha and "yes, I believe him"ed it.

[Jay]

I would like to know how Brian tapped into the time space continuum that allowed him to temporarily posses his rough 1976 voice on He Come Down, a song recorded way back in 1973.

[The Heartical Don]

I would like to know how Brian tapped into the time space continuum that allowed him to temporarily posses his rough 1976 voice on He Come Down, a song recorded way back in 1973.

Perhaps he did not so much tap into a time/space continuum as more into a 6 packs Gauloises a day continuum for a coupla months?

[filledeplage]

You, ma fille, wrote a most enlightening essay, which deserves an A+.

So Mike is more a Platonian, waving the adage: 'Gnoti Se Auton'. That makes eminent sense. I am unfortunately running out of time right now, but will no doubt return to your delightful little piece of prose.

Thanks professor, for the grade, but was/am a student of the "Socratic Method" ~ and had to work really hard to get a B!

But was told, that the "A" students "become professors," and the "B" Students "work for" the "C" students!