Mike Love dedicated his career to being a jerk

[Cabinessenceking]

tbh, I don't want to dislike ML. To some extent the Hall Of Fame speech of his was pretty hilarious, but he kinda pissed on the ppl for the wrong reasons and it was very hypocritical of him given that he at least as blown up and rediculous as anyone he criticised that night. I actually wanted to appreciate his effort for the 50th, and I still do. They put on an excellent show which I will remember forever. I will however always remember Myke for being one big fuckup of a human being. So will the rest of the world.

[hypehat]

Well, the writer's intelligence is just about on par with your everyday Brianista...he gets about 5% of it right and promptly spends 95% of the essay slinging mud.

That is a word -- "Brianista" I wish we could lose, permanently.  I find it "cultish" and trashes the fan's intelligence in finding Brian's works, extraordinary.  It conjures a blindness, IMHO.  From his throat, and out of his mouth.  

OTM. It should not be that the simple act  of calling Mike out for being a douche, if deservedly so, affords one such a label. Mostly, the label comes from The Real Beach Boy, but nevertheless. 

[Jason]

Dude...your hatred of the man is frightening, to be honest. Frightening in the "you belong in a padded room" sense.

[Shady]

And in the red corner weighing in at 210 pounds.....

[EthanJames]

Another great article from a Brian Wilson fan lol, I thought this would end after Brian's response, guess not

[hypehat]

Dude...your hatred of the man is frightening, to be honest. Frightening in the "you belong in a padded room" sense.

Me?! Sure, I rip on Country Love and his strange perception of how the band should carry themselves in this day and age, but I was never one to insult his wife or outright dismiss his work with the band as a whole like some people here.

[Magic Transistor Radio]

I will say that Mike dismissing the other Beach Boys has put him back on my bad side. But...

-Mike Love called Pet Sounds sh**?  Famously?  The only famous story I know is when he called Brian dog ears.

-Did Mike really give that reaction with the hand gun concerning the last 3 songs of TWGMTR? Or did Carl's evil twin just pull info out of his ass?

[Danimalist]

Dude...your hatred of the man is frightening, to be honest. Frightening in the "you belong in a padded room" sense.

This guy is a moderator? Seriously?

[Dunderhead]

Mike's had a hard life, I can really understand why he did a lot of the things he did, because he realized from early on that he was expendable. You can't blame Mike for looking out for himself, his best friend turned into one of the most successful songwriters of the 60s overnight and Mike sensed an opportunity. I can understand why Mike did the things that he did, but that doesn't mean I have to respect him, and really, I don't. Mike has been willing to do whatever it takes to keep getting paid, and fallout with the fans is just the price he has to pay for that. We're not obligated to like him, he's not just entitled to do whatever he wants and have the whole world drink it up. If he doesn't want the fans to be pissed off at him then he should just decide not to do the things that make the fans pissed off.

[Pinder's Gone To Kokomo And Back Again]

Brian turned Mike into one of the most successful songwriters of the 60sovernight and MIKE SENSED AN OPPORTUNITY???

Well, YEAH...... He contributed heavily to these songs that made him one of the most successful songwriters overnight. Wouldn't you see this as an opportunity???

As if Brian didn't sense an opportunity in having his brothers, cousin, friends around who played instruments, took his orders, sang with him BEAUTIFULLY and who wanted to be a band more than him and who were willing to keep doing so and to keep steaks on the table even when Brian wanted to be home? Oh, of course he didn't. Brian is a helpless innocent. It's an insult to Brian to insult Mike or the other guys. That's how I see it.

Somehow this is cool for every other guy in a band/rock star who's ever been successful, but in Mike's case, he's a scumbag taking an opportunity? Do you really think that a young guy in his early 20's who's itching to start a band and forms one as lead singer with his cousins and friends is really supposed to step back and go "whoa, my cousin Brian is THE GREAT BRIAN WILSON: I'd better just quit the band out of respect because if I'm to gain anything from this or am proud of my many contributions some nerd on a message board 50 years later will be ripping me a new asshole over how greedy and selfish I am???  ..... As a guy who's been in many bands myself, this is insanity of the highest order.

Bands are teams and The Beach Boys needed each other just like any other band.

And yeah, thanks for breaking it to me that Mike Love is the only guy who's ever liked getting paid from being in a band and wants to keep getting paid from being in a band..... Have you ever stood on a stage and had thousands of people rocking the place to the rafters over the music you're making with your friends/family? I have (well, maybe to tens of fans, but still) and it's one of the most addictive and common sense eradicating experiences you can ever have.....

You don't have to respect Mike, but can't you just not respect him and not have to denigrate him for pursuing the things that every other musician/guy in a band spend their entire lives pursuing (in futility the great number of them)?

[Aegir]

Dude...your hatred of the man is frightening, to be honest. Frightening in the "you belong in a padded room" sense.

This guy is a moderator? Seriously?

what kinds of forums are you people going to where the moderators get selected by how nice they are?

[Dunderhead]

Brian turned Mike into one of the most successful songwriters of the 60sovernight and MIKE SENSED AN OPPORTUNITY???

Well, YEAH...... He contributed heavily to these songs that made him one of the most successful songwriters overnight. Wouldn't you see this as an opportunity???

Somehow this is cool for every other guy in a band/rock star who's ever been successful, but in Mike's case, he's a scumbag taking an opportunity? Do you really think that a young guy in his early 20's who's itching to start a band and forms one as lead singer with his cousins and friends is really supposed to step back and go "whoa, my cousin Brian is THE GREAT BRIAN WILSON: I'd better just quit the band out of respect because if I'm to gain anything from this or am proud of my many contributions some nerd on a message board 50 years later will be ripping me a new asshole over how greedy and selfish I am???  ..... As a guy who's been in many bands myself, this is insanity of the highest order.

Bands are teams and The Beach Boys needed each other just like any other band.

And yeah, thanks for breaking it to me that Mike Love is the only guy who's ever liked getting paid from being in a band and wants to keep getting paid from being in a band..... Have you ever stood on stage and had thousands or people rocking the place to the rafters over the music you're making with your friends/family? I have (well, maybe to tens of fans, but still) and it's one of the most addictive and common sense eradicating experiences you can ever have.....

So we have to like Mike or else you'll be pissed off at us and make whiny histrionic posts?

[Dunderhead]

Seriously, who cares if people don't like Mike Love. You make it out like "yeah like Mike cares about what a bunch of internet losers think", but at the same time you devote hours to yelling at those nerds on the internet for saying bad things about Mike. Get over it.

[Pinder's Gone To Kokomo And Back Again]

No you don't. But taking him to task of trying to make a character judgment based on the fact that he saw being IN THE BEACH BOYS as an opportunity() ..... I mean, how does that add up?

Sometimes hysterics are well deserved.

[Mikie]

He touched my hand once in 2004 on the Smile tour and suddenly... my leprosy was gone. Shout Hosanna!

I knew Brian walked on water!  I knew it!!

[Pinder's Gone To Kokomo And Back Again]

Seriously, who cares if people don't like Mike Love. You make it out like "yeah like Mike cares about what a bunch of internet losers think", but at the same time you devote hours to yelling at those nerds on the internet for saying bad things about Mike. Get over it.

I care because I love The Beach Boys

And yes, let's get over it. We can agree on that, right?

And I like your posts Klingsor. I consider it a compliment to you that I am moved to respond many times without sitting back and thinking it through (not in this case however). You are a good writer and challenge many of my long held views, and I like that.....

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

Me?! Sure, I rip on Country Love and his strange perception of how the band should carry themselves in this day and age, but I was never one to insult his wife or outright dismiss his work with the band as a whole like some people here.

I totally misread that as 'Courtney Love'.

Bands are teams and The Beach Boys needed each other just like any other band.

Exactly. They were all exceptionally talented...Brian and Dennis moreso, but that doesn't take away from the others.

[Dunderhead]

Seriously, who cares if people don't like Mike Love. You make it out like "yeah like Mike cares about what a bunch of internet losers think", but at the same time you devote hours to yelling at those nerds on the internet for saying bad things about Mike. Get over it.

I care because I love The Beach Boys

And yes, let's get over it. We can agree on that, right?

And I like your posts Klingsor. I consider it a compliment to you that I am moved to respond many times without sitting back and thinking it through (not in this case however). You are a good writer and challenge many of my long held views, and I like that.....

I appreciate that, I just think we should allow for a balanced perspective. Brian was a genius, but on the other side of that coin he was also a negligent husband and father. Mike Love was a wonderful singer, and wrote some memorable lyrics, but he's not exactly a paragon of virtuous behaviour. We should be able to acknowledge the respective strengths and weaknesses of ever band member.

The reason that some fans stress Mike's litigiousness is because of Brian's relative modesty. Does Brian sue Dennis' estate for a songwriting credit on Little Bird? I respect humility and good humor, and I see morality as not simply doing things because you can or because you want to. You're right that a band is team, that isn't being contested, The Beach Boys often collaborated with wonderful results on their vocal harmonies for example. When they were in the studio they all put aside their egos (on their best work that is...) and contributed whatever ideas they had in order to make the best song possible.

Brian has been used a lot during his career, he was always treated more like a commodity than a person, he was tossed around and pulled taught between the agendas of every friend and family member he ever had. There aren't any good reasons to fault Mike for the things he did in the early portion of the group's career, he was Brian's best friend, he worked hard, he and Brian were in agreement about the artistic content of the band's music, but he felt the sting of Brian's hyperactive, ever-evolving sensibility just as Murry did when Loren, Asher, and Parks began vying with him for Brian's attention. Undeniably I think Mike gave in to his baser instincts and allowed himself to be overcome by jealousy and resentment more and more until it finally became a wedge driven between him and the other band members.

I enjoy Mike's songs, I'm just as fond as you are of his singing voice, and I do think that there's a time and a place for his schtick, but as I said, we have to learn to accommodate a more balanced perspective. I'm so tired of this argument, "Mike's a jerk", "*oh* how dare he not bow down and kiss the mighty Brian Wilson's boots  ", blah blah blah, they're both complicated human beings with a more than fifty year relationship between them. They're both to blame for what's transpired, they both played a part in things, but this whole hyperbolic all-or-nothing, you're with us or against us attitude that gets flaunted here is so exhausting. I do think that Mike is a jerk, and I do think that Brian is far and away the most important member of the band, but I just can't understand why things have to be so mutually exclusive. Why can't we recognize Brian be the most creatively important member of the band at the same time we acknowledge Mike for all the excellent contributions he's made? Why can't we be honest not only about Brian's issues but about Mike's?

[Dave Modny]

-Did Mike really give that reaction with the hand gun concerning the last 3 songs of TWGMTR? Or did Carl's evil twin just pull info out of his ass?

The former. The scene was mentioned in the big Rolling Stone piece this summer.

[Cabinessenceking]

-Did Mike really give that reaction with the hand gun concerning the last 3 songs of TWGMTR? Or did Carl's evil twin just pull info out of his ass?

The former. The scene was mentioned in the big Rolling Stone piece this summer.

dat motherfucker Myke Luhv...

[runnersdialzero]

They're songs that deal heavily with mortaliity. The final song on what may be the final Beach Boys album is called "Summer's Gone", is basically Brian singing about how he doesn't have a great deal of time left on earth, and ends with the sound of a storm by a band who are known to the public for summer, sunshine, etc. etc. etc. I love the song, but yeesh, that's pretty f***in' grim.

I'd say there's nothing wrong with a bit of playful suicide-motions-with-hands upon listening to the final mix of such a song and I think there's not much else to it than, as I said, Mike just joking around a bit.

But because it's Mike Love, it's automatically read into as Mike not being able to appreciate it and, as always, slighting Brian's work. Nevermind the fact that Mike has a small lead vocal in the song (and appears in the lead and backing vocals on the entire suite) or Mike quoting the song recently in a positive light. Nop, he's just being a total asshole about it.

I'm looking forward to the day when, like half of Mike's other comments being twisted to barely resemble their original meaning over time, a bunch of kids online are talking about how Mike tried to kill Brian with a firearm upon Brian modestly playing him "Summer's Gone" for the first time.

[smilethebeachboysloveyou]

The reason that some fans stress Mike's litigiousness is because of Brian's relative modesty. Does Brian sue Dennis' estate for a songwriting credit on Little Bird? I respect humility and good humor, and I see morality as not simply doing things because you can or because you want to. You're right that a band is team, that isn't being contested, The Beach Boys often collaborated with wonderful results on their vocal harmonies for example. When they were in the studio they all put aside their egos (on their best work that is...) and contributed whatever ideas they had in order to make the best song possible.

Just on this point in particular--the reason that Brian never sued Dennis for credit on "Little Bird" is probably because his reputation as Beach Boys composer/genius was already secure, and adding a single songwriting credit (particularly one for a song that most people have never heard of) wouldn't really add anything.  On the other hand, Mike was involved in the writing of such songs as "California Girls" and "Good Vibrations," two of the bands best-known and most beloved songs, and had never been credited for them.  Certainly their gloriousness is more Brian's responsibility than Mike's, but Mike did play an important role and had a right to claim it.

Where it gets complicated, though, is the fact that Mike decided to claim credit for songs he wasn't involved with writing, such as "Wouldn't It Be Nice."  I don't know why he thought it was a good idea to try to get credit for songs he wasn't involved in writing (whether he thought it was an interest payment on all the years he wasn't credited for songs he had written), but that unfortunate decision is partly responsible for his litigious reputation.  The author of the original article takes the case out of context, though, and implies that all of the songwriting credits Mike claimed were phony when most of them were not.  Certainly Mike has helped to create a nasty reputation for himself at times, but there are some pretty egregious double standards at work.  Each of the surviving original members has sued at least one other original member, but somehow only Mike has the reputation for being litigious.

[Gertie J.]

They're songs that deal heavily with mortaliity. The final song on what may be the final Beach Boys album is called "Summer's Gone", is basically Brian singing about how he doesn't have a great deal of time left on earth, and ends with the sound of a storm by a band who are known to the public for summer, sunshine, etc. etc. etc. I love the song, but yeesh, that's pretty f***in' grim.

I'd say there's nothing wrong with a bit of playful suicide-motions-with-hands upon listening to the final mix of such a song and I think there's not much else to it than, as I said, Mike just joking around a bit.

But because it's Mike Love, it's automatically read into as Mike not being able to appreciate it and, as always, slighting Brian's work. Nevermind the fact that Mike has a small lead vocal in the song (and appears in the lead and backing vocals on the entire suite) or Mike quoting the song recently in a positive light. Nop, he's just being a total asshole about it.

I'm looking forward to the day when, like half of Mike's other comments being twisted to barely resemble their original meaning over time, a bunch of kids online are talking about how Mike tried to kill Brian with a firearm upon Brian modestly playing him "Summer's Gone" for the first time.

runners, i take my hat off to you. nice post.

[runnersdialzero]

Where it gets complicated, though, is the fact that Mike decided to claim credit for songs he wasn't involved with writing, such as "Wouldn't It Be Nice."  I don't know why he thought it was a good idea to try to get credit for songs he wasn't involved in writing (whether he thought it was an interest payment on all the years he wasn't credited for songs he had written), but that unfortunate decision is partly responsible for his litigious reputation.  The author of the original article takes the case out of context, though, and implies that all of the songwriting credits Mike claimed were phony when most of them were not.  Certainly Mike has helped to create a nasty reputation for himself at times, but there are some pretty egregious double standards at work.  Each of the surviving original members has sued at least one other original member, but somehow only Mike has the reputation for being litigious.

What songs other than "Wouldn't It Be Nice?" were there? I've only seen that one mentioned when it comes to songs he claimed he helped with and didn't. Maybe I missed something, but isn't "WIBN?" still uncertain? I wouldn't have demanded a credit for something as simple as "Good night, baby, sleep tight, baby" but then like you said, maybe wanting credit for something so minor was a way to get an "interest payment" of sorts. Or maybe he wrote the melody along with the words for those couple lines too, or maybe he really did feel that those couple lines warranted a credit. It is, after all, proof in Mike's favor against the whole "Mike hated Pet Sounds and wanted nothing to do with it" thing.

[Dave Modny]

They're songs that deal heavily with mortaliity. The final song on what may be the final Beach Boys album is called "Summer's Gone", is basically Brian singing about how he doesn't have a great deal of time left on earth, and ends with the sound of a storm by a band who are known to the public for summer, sunshine, etc. etc. etc. I love the song, but yeesh, that's pretty f***in' grim.

I'd say there's nothing wrong with a bit of playful suicide-motions-with-hands upon listening to the final mix of such a song and I think there's not much else to it than, as I said, Mike just joking around a bit.

But because it's Mike Love, it's automatically read into as Mike not being able to appreciate it and, as always, slighting Brian's work. Nevermind the fact that Mike has a small lead vocal in the song (and appears in the lead and backing vocals on the entire suite) or Mike quoting the song recently in a positive light. Nop, he's just being a total asshole about it.

I'm looking forward to the day when, like half of Mike's other comments being twisted to barely resemble their original meaning over time, a bunch of kids online are talking about how Mike tried to kill Brian with a firearm upon Brian modestly playing him "Summer's Gone" for the first time.

I don't think anything need be twisted, as Mike himself went on to succinctly explain his reasoning. That is, there was more to the story than just the printed line above. Paraphrasing, he went on to say that he thought the suite was "beautiful." Just that, as a writer, it wasn't something that he, himself, was wired to write. I believe he also threw in some sort of cosmic analogy as well.

NOW...people can make of *that* what they want if they so choose. But, personally, I don't think it's anything revelatory on his part...or much of a surprise. We already know where Mike's stylistic preferences lie as both a writer and performer. Probably his overall vision for the band, too.

As Jeff Foskett also said in the RS piece:

Brian Wilson is an artist. Mike Love is an entertainer. And (paraphrasing again) sometimes it isn't easy to make those two worlds co-exist.