The decline in Brian's piano playing

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

None of it was necessary, but I can understand where ghost was coming from as regards to the original topic. That said...love & mercy guys.

[ghost]

It's not like I was spitting at the screen with rage just flowing with the recent profane style of posting and referencing in a joking manner the recent heat over in the Smile Sessions thread.

Anyway, oldsurferdude plays the role on this message board as old fan guy set in his ways never gonna learn a new thing from nobody specially not someone younger than his wise old self... oh, and the guy who makes it a point to always hate on Mike Love. Seriously, what kind of petty personality do you really have where you get your kicks out of insulting someone else so endlessly? At least my posts are often fun, wild, intelligent in a daring way, way outside the box. Yours are all one old game - hating on Mike Love, playing old grumpy guy. Love thy neighbor as thyself. The kingdom of god is within you. Om.

[ghost]

ironically although oldsurfersenior was perhaps around in the youth of the beach boys he has now become part of the 'old' faction against which brian et al were moving, the children know the way, their song is love, - children of god are in their 20s said brian wilson on television. i'm in my 20s. how old are you, dude? you sound just as locked in a box of a brain as murry did. brian would wonder what your problem is hating on mike love all the time. conversely, he'd probably find my ideas fascinating and appoint me his new songwriting partner immediately.

[The Madcap]

ironically although oldsurfersenior was perhaps around in the youth of the beach boys he has now become part of the 'old' faction against which brian et al were moving, the children know the way, their song is love, - children of god are in their 20s said brian wilson on television. i'm in my 20s. how old are you, dude? you sound just as locked in a box of a brain as murry did. brian would wonder what your problem is hating on mike love all the time. conversely, he'd probably find my ideas fascinating and appoint me his new songwriting partner immediately.

Even if he found your ideas fascinating, I doubt you could become his new songwriting partner. Melinda would never allow it.

[ghost]

ironically although oldsurfersenior was perhaps around in the youth of the beach boys he has now become part of the 'old' faction against which brian et al were moving, the children know the way, their song is love, - children of god are in their 20s said brian wilson on television. i'm in my 20s. how old are you, dude? you sound just as locked in a box of a brain as murry did. brian would wonder what your problem is hating on mike love all the time. conversely, he'd probably find my ideas fascinating and appoint me his new songwriting partner immediately.

Even if he found your ideas fascinating, I doubt you could become his new songwriting partner. Melinda would never allow it.

You're right. My first order of business as second in command would be: divorce thy wife. "And I can breakaway... from the shackles that hold me down..."

[puni puni]

Hey, put your ugly freakin' head between your two speakers, play Love You real loud

i've done this!

[The Shift]

Back to the topic -  I saw BW for around the 30th time on Tuesday night in Manchester and he played more keyboard than I've ever seen him do (except perhaps with the BBs in '80 at Knebworth, but he was playin somethign different to whatever the band was playing!   ).   Okay, he was no Bobby Crush on Tuesday night but everything was in tune, with the rhythm and audible.  More rhythm piano than lead keyboard, if you like. But there was a confidence, a regular-guy feel, that I hadn't seen before. He wasn't terribly communicative, as ever, but I enjoyed it!

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

That's good to hear (pardon the pun). Actually, I just saw a video of  a recent show on YouTube, where Brian is noticeably audible, and sounding pretty damn good. Color me impressed.

[The Shift]

I should add, Billy, that he was able to play and sing at the same time too! 

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

Touche.

[bachelorofbullets]

It could just be he already has 2 keyboard players in his band that know the chords better than he does.

[SMiLE Brian]

ironically although oldsurfersenior was perhaps around in the youth of the beach boys he has now become part of the 'old' faction against which brian et al were moving, the children know the way, their song is love, - children of god are in their 20s said brian wilson on television. i'm in my 20s. how old are you, dude? you sound just as locked in a box of a brain as murry did. brian would wonder what your problem is hating on mike love all the time. conversely, he'd probably find my ideas fascinating and appoint me his new songwriting partner immediately.

Talk about delusions of grandeur in thinking you could write with Brian. Lets see what lyrics you have for Brian to use.

[joe_blow]

I saw Brian play in 2007 at a casino in Richmond, B just south of Vancouver and he had no teleprompter. The show was very loose and Brian came off really relaxed, perhaps having less pressure he appeared better. Towards the end of the show he lifted his shirt (the blue and white polo one he wore many times) to show his bare chest.

Last June at a show I mentioned this and spoke with some friends about the teleprompters and shirt incident only to receive a tongue lashing from Melinda who was seated in front of us.

[SMiLE Brian]

I saw Brian play in 2007 at a casino in Richmond, B just south of Vancouver and he had no teleprompter. The show was very loose and Brian came off really relaxed, perhaps having less pressure he appeared better. Towards the end of the show he lifted his shirt (the blue and white polo one he wore many times) to show his bare chest.

Last June at a show I mentioned this and spoke with some friends about the teleprompters and shirt incident only to receive a tongue lashing from Melinda who was seated in front of us.

Sounds like you could have a beer with Mike Love, Joe Thomas, and Andy Paley about the wrath of Melinda.

[ghost]

ironically although oldsurfersenior was perhaps around in the youth of the beach boys he has now become part of the 'old' faction against which brian et al were moving, the children know the way, their song is love, - children of god are in their 20s said brian wilson on television. i'm in my 20s. how old are you, dude? you sound just as locked in a box of a brain as murry did. brian would wonder what your problem is hating on mike love all the time. conversely, he'd probably find my ideas fascinating and appoint me his new songwriting partner immediately.

Talk about delusions of grandeur in thinking you could write with Brian. Lets see what lyrics you have for Brian to use.

well you're well you're welcome
well you're well you're welcome
well you're well you're welcome
well you're welcome to f*** off

[37!ws]

BTW, I KNOW I read a post years ago from someone who was there in the audience that Brian was the one playing the keyboard on "Love and Mercy" on Live at the Roxy Theater. Don't know if I believe that, though.

[Justin]

I see Brian's unwillingness to play the piano to be a combination of a couple hings: his current mental state in conjunction with physical limitations brought on by old age.  The guy is 69 and while he seems relatively physically healthy, it's obvious that his mental and psychological difficulties have taken the best of him today.  Paul can still rock out for 3 hours because he keeps himself in very good shape, musically.  He hasn't had episodes of slowing down or any hardships that have taken a physical toll on him...in the same scale as Brian.  The psychological aspects of the human mind creep into the physical very easily. 

As we've all seen in person or via clips, Brian does sit there with his hands to the side and hardly plays the piano...I tend to attribute this by his stage fright.  He seems quite frozen with what looks like fear---if not uneasiness.  It seems the semi-constant touring he's done since the late 90's still hasn't cured his stage fright.  That's how i see it, anyway. 

[PhilSpectre]

  It seems the semi-constant touring he's done since the late 90's still hasn't cured his stage fright.  That's how i see it, anyway. 

I tend to agree, he's never been a natural live performer. Although I suspect that being on tour may give his mind a sense of purpose (along with new recording projects from time to time). As is well known, an idle mind can play nasty tricks on the person, especially on an intelligent person with mental health issues, like BW.

Personally, imo he's given us so much down the years, if he retired from music altogether right now, he wouldn't owe us a thing. Though one last Beach Boys album of at least the standard of Holland or Lucky Old Sun including the best of the rest of the unreleased Paley sessions and any other good/ great unrecorded/ unreleased songs, including any unfinished Carl/ Dennis gems/ lead vocals (lightly worked on to meet release standard by the remaining members) would be a nice 'That's All Folks' for this selfish fan  .

[Sam_BFC]

Brian played some piano at tonight's RFH gig for Mary Had a Little Lamb and afterwords Jeff said something along the lines of 'And some people say he can't play piano any more' hehe.

Good show thought Brian sang really well on the Gershwin stuff especially.

[ghost]

Brian played some piano at tonight's RFH gig for Mary Had a Little Lamb and afterwords Jeff said something along the lines of 'And some people say he can't play piano any more' hehe.

Good show thought Brian sang really well on the Gershwin stuff especially.

Nice to know Jeff has been reading my posts. Jeff, give Love You another shot. Sniff some cocaine first.

[Myk Luhv]

"Brian played some piano at tonight's RFH gig for 'Mary Had a Little Lamb'"

Is this what we're reduced to saying in defence of Brian's seeming uninterest, for whatever reason, in playing piano?

[ghost]

"Brian played some piano at tonight's RFH gig for 'Mary Had a Little Lamb'"

Is this what we're reduced to saying in defence of Brian's seeming uninterest, for whatever reason, in playing piano?

seems like Brian is mocking his fans. he sits behind a keyboard and the only time he plays it is to play a song i played when i was 7 years old to a nursing home audience. mary had a little lamb. how about you put on your cool guy sunglasses, get on a baldwin organ, and rock out to some Here Comes The Night for us, Brian? make all the mistakes you want, it's all right man.

[runnersdialzero]

Last June at a show I mentioned this and spoke with some friends about the teleprompters and shirt incident only to receive a tongue lashing from Melinda who was seated in front of us.

I love the seemingly "How DARE you find that amusing. Don't you know the man isn't well?" attitude when Brian was TRYING to be funny. He's not retarded, for Chrissakes.

[Sam_BFC]

"Brian played some piano at tonight's RFH gig for 'Mary Had a Little Lamb'"

Is this what we're reduced to saying in defence of Brian's seeming uninterest, for whatever reason, in playing piano?

I guess I should have made it clear that he did have his hands on the piano a few times, but I singled out 'Mary...' because this was one of the (few) times he was playing solo piano.

I wasn't really trying to defend him anyway per se just mentioning it because people had been talking about it and I thought Jeff's comment was therefore a little funny.

[Justin]

I've seen him a couple times recently and he did the same thing....only playing during "Row Your Boat"

To me it was proof that Brian really doesn't have the appetite to really play the piano on stage anymore.  "Row Your Boat" consisted of 3 chords...played so very simply..enough to just accompany the acapella bit he was doing with the audience.  And he didn't play any piano for the rest of the show.  Seems to me that he's not interested in playing piano on the more complicated stuff.  He doesn't want to think about suspended 11's and major 7 chords everywhere.  It must take a great amount of concentration to do that...these are after all, very complicated songs they're playing.  With that in mind, Brian doesn't seem to be able to sing and play these songs at the same time anymore.