gfxgfx
 
Welcome, Guest. Please login or register.

Login with username, password and session length
logo
 
gfx gfx
gfx
680601 Posts in 27601 Topics by 4068 Members - Latest Member: Dae Lims March 29, 2024, 09:59:18 AM
*
gfx*HomeHelpSearchCalendarLoginRegistergfx
gfxgfx
0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.       « previous next »
Pages: 1 [2] 3 Go Down Print
Author Topic: Carl Wilson - The Man - The Mystery  (Read 12686 times)
CenturyDeprived
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Offline Offline

Posts: 5749



View Profile
« Reply #25 on: June 22, 2016, 01:40:44 PM »

In terms of Carl, I think it totally depends on what tests and diagnoses were involved.

I don't disagree that pain can be psychosomatic, but when someone has *zero* pain, and is involved in one specific incident (car accident, etc.), and then gets *numerous* scans showing visible (to a laid person and to the naked eye) injury such as a herniation, bulging or ruptured disc, etc., and only after the injury starts to suffer from severe pain (not to mention other things that can occur due to herniations, including numbness, inability to walk, loss of bladder control, etc.), to suggest in *that* scenario that it's psychosomatic (and/or that maybe the doctors and technicians all read numerous tests/xrays/scans incorrectly?) is something I'd find to be offensive, dismissive, patronizing, and in some cases dangerous.

I've seen people who blow out a disc in their back due simply to sneezing, and who then couldn't even walk for weeks if not months. That's not psychosomatic.
 

True dat. My only aside is that it is possible for someone to have pain start from a legit, actual physical issue, but the pain - that could otherwise under ideal, stress-free circumstances, go away rather quickly - is unfortunately then amplified and significantly prolonged (sometimes indefinitely) due to a psychosomatic response, and basically made much worse by external, non-physical factors. At the very least, I have little doubt that the stress that Carl was under certainly didn't *help* his physical situation on many fronts.
« Last Edit: June 22, 2016, 01:41:25 PM by CenturyDeprived » Logged
Lonely Summer
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Online Online

Posts: 3932


View Profile
« Reply #26 on: June 22, 2016, 04:56:52 PM »

Carl definitely had his hands full. I still think the weight of these responsibilities eventually contributed to his early death. And I agree that Carl's personality was more like his mother's than his father's. Brian and Dennis seemed to take after their father more - minus the physical abuse. instead, they took the abuse out on themselves.
I've seen a lot written in recent years about Carl's later songs being less adventurous than the early 70's stuff. I think part of that was, that's just where mainstream rock and pop had gone by the late 70's. A friend of mine had the honor of Carl sitting in with him as guest dj in 1977 or 78. The stuff he picked was the Rolling Stones, Chicago,  Little Feat, Bee Gees, Emmylou Harris, very mainstream for FM rock stations in the late 70's. He wasn't asking to play punk and new wave stuff. The "Youngblood" album rocks pretty good, but in a Doobie Brothers way, not a Clash way, or a AC/DC way.
Perhaps too much to ask, but there was a path forwards for Carl and for the band in the late 70 s that didn't involve remaking themselves into a New Wave or avant garde act a la Rust Never Sleeps or Bowie's Berlin trilogy.

And that was the path Lindsey Buckingham took with TUSK. Mainstream rock, but with adventurous, inventive production and arrangements, an organic outgrowth from the seeds Brian had planted a dozen years previously.
I liked the direction they took with LA (Light Album), one they could not repeat with KTSA, because by then, Dennis was effectively out of the picture, and Mike's influence can be felt in his attempts with Brian to do more MIU-style material - grown men singing about being in school and chasing all the hot little babes down to the Frosty Freeze.
Logged
♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇
Pissing off drunks since 1978
Global Moderator
*****
Offline Offline

Posts: 11844


🍦🍦 Pet Demon for Sale - $5 or best offer ☮☮


View Profile WWW
« Reply #27 on: June 22, 2016, 11:34:43 PM »

Quote
Well, consider that fact that I believe Carl was 19 and Annie was 16 when they were married.  I would think very few couples would survive a marriage that early in life.  That doesn't mean people don't still care for each other, just that life happens, particularly when people are that young.
My wife and I recently celebrated our 15th year of marriage...we started dating right after graduation 19 years ago...but have been friends for almost 27 years (I was 11, she was 10 when we first met and fell in almost immediately). So yeah, I know how rare that is, and am always being told that when people ask how long we've been together. So with that in mind... us getting *married* in our teens? Yeah, I couldn't have seen that happening as we just weren't ready. Now, throw in being not only married young but being a music industry marriage (with all that entails)? The odds were stacked against them from day one.
Logged

Need your song mixed/mastered? Contact me at fear2stop@yahoo.com. Serious inquiries only, please!
Don Malcolm
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Online Online

Posts: 1108



View Profile
« Reply #28 on: June 23, 2016, 04:45:21 PM »

Carl's injury probably affected his outlook on the how the "drift" of the band was going and extended his dormant period as a songwriter. I think he always tried to do the best by the band and Brian, but found the polarizing forces that existed in the band during the 1976-80 time frame to be pretty overwhelming, leading him to eventually withdraw. Nowhere did I suggest that his frustrations led to a back injury...but once it was sustained, and became a lingering issue, it clearly had an impact on how he perceived things.

Back to Reiley for one last go-round: what's being sidestepped is the role of enabler and how it might be more important in certain cases than others. The generalization that the Wilsons all had more musical talent than Jack is clearly on the money, but it ignores specific situations where Jack's ability to inspire the work was more pivotal for Carl than for Brian and Dennis. Carl's career as the songwriter who carried the vast majority of the musical creation (as opposed to the production, which he often contributed to for Brian and Dennis in the 69-73 period) is limited exclusively to songs in which he collaborated with Jack Rieley. I think that this point should be acknowledged for what it is, and not sidestepped in order to minimize Jack's effect on the band.

As for this Vietnam watershed, it's a little too pat. Musical "decadence" and edgier material that moved away from politics to sex/alternate lifestyle/ironic detachment/self-conscious "art rock" had begun in the turnaround between the 60s and 70s and reached its "heights" in the various drug-influenced manifestoes by the early 70s incarnations of Pink Floyd and the Grateful Dead. You have Steely Dan and Roxy Music slyly commenting on those landscapes...each of them with ironic perspectives on the burgeoning self-absorption that had become prominent in rock during this time frame--and with both eventually moving into the mainstream as they succumbed to their own rapprochement with  that self-absorption.

Nostalgia certainly came into play, but it overlapped the end of the war and the lingering tension that remained deep into 1973 due to conflicts between the White House and Congress (the latter actually passed bills that year which limited what the White House could do regarding any escalation of the war effort...Nixon would soon be engulfed in the Watergate scandal, forcing him to let go of many things, including any further overt chicanery regarding Vietnam). American Graffiti was a hit in the summer of '73, and it was the first link back to the BB's pre-PS work ("All Summer Long" anchoring the film's closing credits)...but "oldies" had already come into vogue the previous year, and a number of groups seized upon this "nostalgia" (including the Carpenters, who had a massive hit in that same '73 summer with "Yesterday Once More"--they found short-term record sales with oldies covers in subsequent years, just as the BBs did, rather late, in '76 with "Rock and Roll Music," but both groups would see their careers ultimately founder after becoming over-invested in that approach).

The BBs had not reestablished or reinvented themselves commercially in the Vietnam era, but they had made inroads, mostly during the Reiley era. The "nostalgia" era was a trap for the band, giving them a false sense of standing that was not sustainable when the next wave of musical changes hit in 1975-76. Their response was to push oldies, and while 15BO sold, it was a pyrrhic victory. By this time, Carl's energy had waned, his songwriting was in a five-year dry spell, and he was locked in ongoing odds with Mike and his desire to take the band back to 1964.

Of course I think it is fair to surmise that Jack Reiley could not necessarily have steered the band in a more coherent, consolidating  and commercially successful direction that didn't succumb to "nostalgia" had he remained with the BBs into the mid-70s. But I do think he would have had some definite ideas about what to do, ideas which seemed to be totally lacking (or, perhaps more accurately, simply unresolvable) in his absence.
« Last Edit: June 25, 2016, 09:46:18 AM by Don Malcolm » Logged
Lonely Summer
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Online Online

Posts: 3932


View Profile
« Reply #29 on: June 27, 2016, 09:26:11 PM »

If you are implying that nostalgia rock was out by 1975-76, I would have to disagree. The Beach Boys were on top of the world in those years. Their drop in status was mainly due to their inability to "keep the hits right on comin" after 15BO.
Logged
clack
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Offline Offline

Posts: 537


View Profile
« Reply #30 on: June 28, 2016, 12:52:19 PM »

What was New Wave but a (then) contemporary take on the pop rock of 1963-66? The Ramones, Dave Edmunds, and XTC, for instance, were deeply influenced by mid-sixties Beach Boys.

It was Carl and Dennis who were out of step with the times, not Mike. Mike had the right instinct -- that the way back to 1964 was the way forward to 1977-- he just didn't have the ability to pull it off.
Logged
CenturyDeprived
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Offline Offline

Posts: 5749



View Profile
« Reply #31 on: June 28, 2016, 01:13:39 PM »

What was New Wave but a (then) contemporary take on the pop rock of 1963-66? The Ramones, Dave Edmunds, and XTC, for instance, were deeply influenced by mid-sixties Beach Boys.

It was Carl and Dennis who were out of step with the times, not Mike. Mike had the right instinct -- that the way back to 1964 was the way forward to 1977-- he just didn't have the ability to pull it off.

Speaking of Mike's new wave instincts (or lack thereof)... What's the deal with the choruses of the song "Looking Back With Love" sounding just like the soon-to-be very popular "Somebody's Baby" by Jackson Browne? Mike apparently didn't write LBWL, but for whatever it's worth, the title track on his solo album - despite the song having some truly terrible and embarrassing detours into name checking Jan & Dean tunes - had a very, very similar sound to something popular, modern, and successful.

Does anyone think those two songs were possibly written without either song's writers having heard the other song? The choruses are so similar, it seems doubtful to me that it's pure coincidence... I also doubt that Mike is/was unaware of the similarities. If Mike ever saw the film Fast Times at Ridgemont High, he'd surely have heard the similarities.
« Last Edit: June 28, 2016, 01:17:23 PM by CenturyDeprived » Logged
♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇
Pissing off drunks since 1978
Global Moderator
*****
Offline Offline

Posts: 11844


🍦🍦 Pet Demon for Sale - $5 or best offer ☮☮


View Profile WWW
« Reply #32 on: June 28, 2016, 01:23:39 PM »

What was New Wave but a (then) contemporary take on the pop rock of 1963-66? The Ramones, Dave Edmunds, and XTC, for instance, were deeply influenced by mid-sixties Beach Boys.

It was Carl and Dennis who were out of step with the times, not Mike. Mike had the right instinct -- that the way back to 1964 was the way forward to 1977-- he just didn't have the ability to pull it off.

Speaking of Mike's new wave instincts (or lack thereof)... What's the deal with the choruses of the song "Looking Back With Love" sounding just like the soon-to-be very popular "Somebody's Baby" by Jackson Browne? Mike apparently didn't write LBWL, but for whatever it's worth, the title track on his solo album - despite the song having some truly terrible and embarrassing detours into name checking Jan & Dean tunes - had a very, very similar sound to something popular, modern, and successful.

Does anyone think those two songs were possibly written without either song's writers having heard the other song? The choruses are so similar, it seems doubtful to me that it's pure coincidence... I also doubt that Mike is/was unaware of the similarities. If Mike ever saw the film Fast Times at Ridgemont High, he'd surely have heard the similarities.

Yes! I knew I wasn't crazy!

Now HERE is a good example of a song being a bit too damn close to another one ...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pav2f4b-1ZE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ApjaP1mfS5M
Logged

Need your song mixed/mastered? Contact me at fear2stop@yahoo.com. Serious inquiries only, please!
Don Malcolm
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Online Online

Posts: 1108



View Profile
« Reply #33 on: June 28, 2016, 08:43:59 PM »

BBs had one hit in this time frame. "Rock and Roll Music." The next single "It's OK," despite two years of insanely great press and massive hype, got to #29, then sank--and, after a late-summer run-up into the Top 10, 15BO sank right with it. It was a hollow comeback that started to come apart at the seams even as it was happening, and it's unimaginable that any of the other oldies could have done better than "It's OK." You really see "Still Of The Night" or "Palisades Park" leaping up the charts?

Dave Edmunds was not "new wave." He was part of the pub-rock scene that began in 1972-74 with British "back to the roots" bands such as Brinsley Schwarz, Man, Ducks Deluxe. And he didn't do BBs-inspired stuff, he covered Spector tunes. The rest of the US "new wave" omitted in that oversimplified statement--Patti Smith, Television, Blondie, etc.--had absolutely zero to do with mid-60s music. The analogue for that is "power pop", which recycled the Beatles and Elvis (Dwight Twilley) and the Byrds (early Tom Petty) rather than the BBs. On the Brit side, XTC broke on the scene doing music that bore little resemblance to the BBs...that was a later manifestation of the band when Andy Partridige became the dominant force. The vast majority of the English new wave was punky and arty, but not in ways that quoted pre-PS BBs.

As noted before, the band needed a hit that didn't lock them into the oldies trap that only looked like a return to success. They didn't do that. The wave of nostalgia lasted long enough for them to capitalize on it, but no one sustained oldies success in 1977-80 (aka the "age of disco").
Logged
joe_blow
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Offline Offline

Gender: Male
Posts: 532



View Profile
« Reply #34 on: June 28, 2016, 10:11:27 PM »

BBs had one hit in this time frame. "Rock and Roll Music." The next single "It's OK," despite two years of insanely great press and massive hype, got to #29, then sank--and, after a late-summer run-up into the Top 10, 15BO sank right with it. It was a hollow comeback that started to come apart at the seams even as it was happening, and it's unimaginable that any of the other oldies could have done better than "It's OK." You really see "Still Of The Night" or "Palisades Park" leaping up the charts?

Dave Edmunds was not "new wave." He was part of the pub-rock scene that began in 1972-74 with British "back to the roots" bands such as Brinsley Schwarz, Man, Ducks Deluxe. And he didn't do BBs-inspired stuff, he covered Spector tunes. The rest of the US "new wave" omitted in that oversimplified statement--Patti Smith, Television, Blondie, etc.--had absolutely zero to do with mid-60s music. The analogue for that is "power pop", which recycled the Beatles and Elvis (Dwight Twilley) and the Byrds (early Tom Petty) rather than the BBs. On the Brit side, XTC broke on the scene doing music that bore little resemblance to the BBs...that was a later manifestation of the band when Andy Partridige became the dominant force. The vast majority of the English new wave was punky and arty, but not in ways that quoted pre-PS BBs.

As noted before, the band needed a hit that didn't lock them into the oldies trap that only looked like a return to success. They didn't do that. The wave of nostalgia lasted long enough for them to capitalize on it, but no one sustained oldies success in 1977-80 (aka the "age of disco").
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nzYKMdXxlW0
Logged
tpesky
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Offline Offline

Posts: 1031


View Profile
« Reply #35 on: June 28, 2016, 10:29:49 PM »

It's Ok should have been the first single off 15 BO for sure.
Logged
Lonely Summer
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Online Online

Posts: 3932


View Profile
« Reply #36 on: June 28, 2016, 11:03:25 PM »

Even if the Beach Boys had come out with a top notch contemporary sounding album in 1976-77, it probably would not have connected with the fans of Endless Summer and Spirit of America. That's all that fan base wanted out of the group - surf, cars, girls, fun. Warners comp "Good Vibrations - Best of the Beach Boys" had as many legit hits as SOA, yet only sold half as much. The cult audience they had built up with Surf's Up/Holland was not large enough to get them a top 10 hit. I do think, though, that if the retro sounding tracks the guys came up with in 1976-78 were of the same quality of those 63-65 hits, they could have topped the charts again. But even the best of the retro tracks - It's OK being one - were not as good as the old stuff. It would have been better if they had forgotten about trying to appeal to that crowd, and just turned out quality works like LA - and even that was marred by the attempt to win the disco crowd.
Logged
clack
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Offline Offline

Posts: 537


View Profile
« Reply #37 on: June 29, 2016, 04:35:58 AM »

BBs had one hit in this time frame. "Rock and Roll Music." The next single "It's OK," despite two years of insanely great press and massive hype, got to #29, then sank--and, after a late-summer run-up into the Top 10, 15BO sank right with it. It was a hollow comeback that started to come apart at the seams even as it was happening, and it's unimaginable that any of the other oldies could have done better than "It's OK." You really see "Still Of The Night" or "Palisades Park" leaping up the charts?

Dave Edmunds was not "new wave." He was part of the pub-rock scene that began in 1972-74 with British "back to the roots" bands such as Brinsley Schwarz, Man, Ducks Deluxe. And he didn't do BBs-inspired stuff, he covered Spector tunes. The rest of the US "new wave" omitted in that oversimplified statement--Patti Smith, Television, Blondie, etc.--had absolutely zero to do with mid-60s music. The analogue for that is "power pop", which recycled the Beatles and Elvis (Dwight Twilley) and the Byrds (early Tom Petty) rather than the BBs. On the Brit side, XTC broke on the scene doing music that bore little resemblance to the BBs...that was a later manifestation of the band when Andy Partridige became the dominant force. The vast majority of the English new wave was punky and arty, but not in ways that quoted pre-PS BBs.

As noted before, the band needed a hit that didn't lock them into the oldies trap that only looked like a return to success. They didn't do that. The wave of nostalgia lasted long enough for them to capitalize on it, but no one sustained oldies success in 1977-80 (aka the "age of disco").
Though Dave Edmunds had roots in pub rock (as did Joe Strummer, btw), Rockpile was definitely New Wave. And how can you say he didn't do BB- inspired stuff? He made a record with Gary Usher, Terry Melcher, Curt Boecher, and Bruce Johnston!

Equally bizarre is your contention that Blondie had nothing to do with mid-sixties music. They were hugely influenced by the Brill Building girl groups. Television, Patti Smith? Inspired by mid-sixties garage rock. Lenny Kaye, Patti's guitarist, compiled Nuggets, for Christ sake. She covered Them!

New Wave flourished into the 80's, and in the 80's XTC did take on a notable Beach Boys influence.
Logged
Magic Transistor Radio
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Offline Offline

Gender: Male
Posts: 2974


Bill Cooper Mystery Babylon


View Profile
« Reply #38 on: June 29, 2016, 10:59:49 AM »

Back to the original post, I was hoping to get more about Carl from the book that came out recently. I think it did a good job concerning Carl's influence on the music, but didn't go as deep into his life as John Stebbon's books on Dennis and Dave. In fact Dave's book probably revealed as much about Carl's life as Long Promised Road did!
Logged

"Over the years, I've been accused of not supporting our new music from this era (67-73) and just wanting to play our hits. That's complete b.s......I was also, as the front man, the one promoting these songs onstage and have the scars to show for it."
Mike Love autobiography (pg 242-243)
Don Malcolm
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Online Online

Posts: 1108



View Profile
« Reply #39 on: June 29, 2016, 02:15:07 PM »

You're conflating so many styles together that it's meaningless to state "mid-60s" when these are separate influences. If anything, LOVE YOU moves in a direction that would become popular later--synth-based pop. But would I try to say that BW's "farting synts" were the "inspiration" for all that 80s music? No. I would be making the same overly generalized, meaningless comparisons that you are. Patti Smith's hit ("Gloria") is Them, sure, but just how is Them part of the garage rock in America? Answer: it ain't. And Welshman art-rocker John Cale produced Patti's first LP, Lenny was just the guitarist.

Dave Edmunds' name-checking of the BBs in that song is great...except that the song was written in 1994. Rockpile was an extension of what he'd been doing for several years after debuting as a flashy instrumentalist. Sure, Edmunds and Nick Lowe (an original member of Brinsley Shwarz, the first pub-rock band, first LP in 1971...) glommed onto "new wave"--who didn't in 1977-79? Even Bill Nelson broke up Be-Bop Deluxe and went "new wave" for an LP.

"Garage-rock" ain't the BBs, and "new wave" didn't even dominate the airwaves in the USA in the time frame. Face it, the BBs tried nostalgia, milked it for a hit, but the LP was mostly a steaming pile and that cost them a great deal with the record-buying public. A lot of buyer's remorse with that record--and yes, I was there and I was one of them! Something that bridged the gap, songs that broke new ground while still keeping a significant flavor of the vocal blend, was what they needed in the long in-between from Holland to 15BO. They didn't deliver it, they became slaves to their past, and the factions in the band became permanent and insurmountable--except when there's big enough bucks in it (50th anniversary) for them to get back together and "do it again."

According to your logic, the BBs should have released "Sea Cruise" in early 1977. I would love to go back in time and wager some big bucks with you on whether that track would have gone even Top 40 if they'd done so. It certainly was a better overall record than any of the oldies they put out on 15BO. "R&R Music" made it because the pump had been primed for any BB product in the summer of '76 and the clever strategy of covering Chuck Berry got them a lot of airplay--until people eventually came to their senses and realized what an clunky track it was. The backlash was pronounced that even through the most of the critics praised LOVE YOU, fans were confused, leery and weren't ready to embrace "teenage Brian Wilson."
Logged
Lonely Summer
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Online Online

Posts: 3932


View Profile
« Reply #40 on: June 29, 2016, 04:34:17 PM »

You're conflating so many styles together that it's meaningless to state "mid-60s" when these are separate influences. If anything, LOVE YOU moves in a direction that would become popular later--synth-based pop. But would I try to say that BW's "farting synts" were the "inspiration" for all that 80s music? No. I would be making the same overly generalized, meaningless comparisons that you are. Patti Smith's hit ("Gloria") is Them, sure, but just how is Them part of the garage rock in America? Answer: it ain't. And Welshman art-rocker John Cale produced Patti's first LP, Lenny was just the guitarist.

Dave Edmunds' name-checking of the BBs in that song is great...except that the song was written in 1994. Rockpile was an extension of what he'd been doing for several years after debuting as a flashy instrumentalist. Sure, Edmunds and Nick Lowe (an original member of Brinsley Shwarz, the first pub-rock band, first LP in 1971...) glommed onto "new wave"--who didn't in 1977-79? Even Bill Nelson broke up Be-Bop Deluxe and went "new wave" for an LP.

"Garage-rock" ain't the BBs, and "new wave" didn't even dominate the airwaves in the USA in the time frame. Face it, the BBs tried nostalgia, milked it for a hit, but the LP was mostly a steaming pile and that cost them a great deal with the record-buying public. A lot of buyer's remorse with that record--and yes, I was there and I was one of them! Something that bridged the gap, songs that broke new ground while still keeping a significant flavor of the vocal blend, was what they needed in the long in-between from Holland to 15BO. They didn't deliver it, they became slaves to their past, and the factions in the band became permanent and insurmountable--except when there's big enough bucks in it (50th anniversary) for them to get back together and "do it again."

According to your logic, the BBs should have released "Sea Cruise" in early 1977. I would love to go back in time and wager some big bucks with you on whether that track would have gone even Top 40 if they'd done so. It certainly was a better overall record than any of the oldies they put out on 15BO. "R&R Music" made it because the pump had been primed for any BB product in the summer of '76 and the clever strategy of covering Chuck Berry got them a lot of airplay--until people eventually came to their senses and realized what an clunky track it was. The backlash was pronounced that even through the most of the critics praised LOVE YOU, fans were confused, leery and weren't ready to embrace "teenage Brian Wilson."
If their attempts at being retro had contained the same magic as the original 60's hits, they would have been HUGE hits. Nostalgia was still big in 76-80, but there was not a large audience for lame remakes like School Days and Peggy Sue.
Logged
Don Malcolm
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Online Online

Posts: 1108



View Profile
« Reply #41 on: June 30, 2016, 02:03:17 AM »

If their attempts at being retro had contained the same magic as the original 60's hits, they would have been HUGE hits. Nostalgia was still big in 76-80, but there was not a large audience for lame remakes like School Days and Peggy Sue.

And there's the rub. The point is that they wrote their own material back in the day. Essentially they followed the Carpenters, who went "oldies" in '73 ("Yesterday Once More" and an entire side of oldies on "Now and Then")  and had a #1 hit with "Please Mr. Postman" in late '74, then followed up "There's A Kind of Hush" (Herman's Hermits) in '76, which went to #12. But, as I keep saying, things changed rapidly in '77 and nostalgia from established bands fell off a cliff. The Carpenters had no production or performance issues in this time frame the way that the BBs did, and they could not buy another hit with an oldie in this time frame--and it wasn't for a lack of trying. Nostalgia ebbed in the '77 but got a new lease on life when disco collapsed at the end of '80, and the BBs had a bit of chart success with Al's "Come Go With Me," which really is the only one of these tracks that's any good and if it had been available for release in '77 would have had a shot...but it wasn't, so it didn't.
Logged
thorgil
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Offline Offline

Posts: 416


GREAT post, Rab!


View Profile
« Reply #42 on: June 30, 2016, 06:39:46 AM »

You're conflating so many styles together that it's meaningless to state "mid-60s" when these are separate influences. If anything, LOVE YOU moves in a direction that would become popular later--synth-based pop. But would I try to say that BW's "farting synts" were the "inspiration" for all that 80s music? No. I would be making the same overly generalized, meaningless comparisons that you are. Patti Smith's hit ("Gloria") is Them, sure, but just how is Them part of the garage rock in America? Answer: it ain't. And Welshman art-rocker John Cale produced Patti's first LP, Lenny was just the guitarist.

Dave Edmunds' name-checking of the BBs in that song is great...except that the song was written in 1994. Rockpile was an extension of what he'd been doing for several years after debuting as a flashy instrumentalist. Sure, Edmunds and Nick Lowe (an original member of Brinsley Shwarz, the first pub-rock band, first LP in 1971...) glommed onto "new wave"--who didn't in 1977-79? Even Bill Nelson broke up Be-Bop Deluxe and went "new wave" for an LP.

"Garage-rock" ain't the BBs, and "new wave" didn't even dominate the airwaves in the USA in the time frame. Face it, the BBs tried nostalgia, milked it for a hit, but the LP was mostly a steaming pile and that cost them a great deal with the record-buying public. A lot of buyer's remorse with that record--and yes, I was there and I was one of them! Something that bridged the gap, songs that broke new ground while still keeping a significant flavor of the vocal blend, was what they needed in the long in-between from Holland to 15BO. They didn't deliver it, they became slaves to their past, and the factions in the band became permanent and insurmountable--except when there's big enough bucks in it (50th anniversary) for them to get back together and "do it again."

According to your logic, the BBs should have released "Sea Cruise" in early 1977. I would love to go back in time and wager some big bucks with you on whether that track would have gone even Top 40 if they'd done so. It certainly was a better overall record than any of the oldies they put out on 15BO. "R&R Music" made it because the pump had been primed for any BB product in the summer of '76 and the clever strategy of covering Chuck Berry got them a lot of airplay--until people eventually came to their senses and realized what an clunky track it was. The backlash was pronounced that even through the most of the critics praised LOVE YOU, fans were confused, leery and weren't ready to embrace "teenage Brian Wilson."
If their attempts at being retro had contained the same magic as the original 60's hits, they would have been HUGE hits. Nostalgia was still big in 76-80, but there was not a large audience for lame remakes like School Days and Peggy Sue.

My two cents: there is no way the Boys could have recaptured the "magic of the '60 hits", not even if Brian had still been 100% functional. Life simply doesn't work that way. The pristine magic of being young artists just starting to know the world can't be recaptured, only imitated and often badly. Magic has to be reinvented and rebuilt, every time, and that requires growing (really growing, not just getting older) and not living in the past.
In any case, there is no way they could have returned to "hit machine" status, but if they, as a band, had accepted to grow instead of becoming a pure nostalgia act, they would have avoided the post-1977 artistic suicide. And who knows, Dennis and Carl might even be alive now.
« Last Edit: June 30, 2016, 06:42:34 AM by thorgil » Logged

DIT, DIT, DIT, HEROES AND VILLAINS...
HeyJude
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Offline Offline

Posts: 10030



View Profile WWW
« Reply #43 on: June 30, 2016, 06:48:47 AM »

I think it's hard to figure out why the public rejected or embraced what the BBs did. Sometimes it makes sense ("Peggy Sue" is a pretty limp cover), other times not so much. In 1981, they pulled a three-year-old recording of "Come Go With Me" and turned it into a relative hit single (Top 20). Certainly, that recording was a bit more sharp and slick than something like "Peggy Sue" or even "School Days", but the track record prior to that 1981 single didn't suggest releasing *another* 50s oldie cover version, and certainly one from a then three-year-old bomb of an album, would be successful.
Logged

THE BEACH BOYS OPINION PAGE IS ON FACEBOOK!!! http://www.facebook.com/beachboysopinion - Check out the original "BEACH BOYS OPINION PAGE" Blog - http://beachboysopinion.blogspot.com/
clack
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Offline Offline

Posts: 537


View Profile
« Reply #44 on: June 30, 2016, 01:53:44 PM »

You're conflating so many styles together that it's meaningless to state "mid-60s" when these are separate influences. If anything, LOVE YOU moves in a direction that would become popular later--synth-based pop. But would I try to say that BW's "farting synts" were the "inspiration" for all that 80s music? No. I would be making the same overly generalized, meaningless comparisons that you are. Patti Smith's hit ("Gloria") is Them, sure, but just how is Them part of the garage rock in America? Answer: it ain't. And Welshman art-rocker John Cale produced Patti's first LP, Lenny was just the guitarist.

Dave Edmunds' name-checking of the BBs in that song is great...except that the song was written in 1994. Rockpile was an extension of what he'd been doing for several years after debuting as a flashy instrumentalist. Sure, Edmunds and Nick Lowe (an original member of Brinsley Shwarz, the first pub-rock band, first LP in 1971...) glommed onto "new wave"--who didn't in 1977-79? Even Bill Nelson broke up Be-Bop Deluxe and went "new wave" for an LP.

"Garage-rock" ain't the BBs, and "new wave" didn't even dominate the airwaves in the USA in the time frame. Face it, the BBs tried nostalgia, milked it for a hit, but the LP was mostly a steaming pile and that cost them a great deal with the record-buying public. A lot of buyer's remorse with that record--and yes, I was there and I was one of them! Something that bridged the gap, songs that broke new ground while still keeping a significant flavor of the vocal blend, was what they needed in the long in-between from Holland to 15BO. They didn't deliver it, they became slaves to their past, and the factions in the band became permanent and insurmountable--except when there's big enough bucks in it (50th anniversary) for them to get back together and "do it again."

According to your logic, the BBs should have released "Sea Cruise" in early 1977. I would love to go back in time and wager some big bucks with you on whether that track would have gone even Top 40 if they'd done so. It certainly was a better overall record than any of the oldies they put out on 15BO. "R&R Music" made it because the pump had been primed for any BB product in the summer of '76 and the clever strategy of covering Chuck Berry got them a lot of airplay--until people eventually came to their senses and realized what an clunky track it was. The backlash was pronounced that even through the most of the critics praised LOVE YOU, fans were confused, leery and weren't ready to embrace "teenage Brian Wilson."
We're talking at cross purposes.

In 1977, the future of rock lay not in the white boy funk, blues, and r&b of Little Feat or Bambu, but in the New Wave reprise (with a contemporary edge) of the catchy, bright, melodic pop of the mid-sixties. Nothing to do with a 50's song like 'Sea Cruise'.

Now, that was a road down which the Beach Boys would never pull off (though I'd argue that LOVE YOU was an accidental, Modern Lovers-type New Wave record). I'm not saying that the band should have pursued making New Wave records, no more than Paul McCartney, say,  should have. It would have been forced and embarrassing.

What I am saying is that commercial/critical salvation would have not laid in giving Carl and Dennis carte blanche to follow their "progressive" muses. Progressive rock, or whatever you want to call it, was dead in the water by the end of the 70's.
Logged
Don Malcolm
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Online Online

Posts: 1108



View Profile
« Reply #45 on: June 30, 2016, 03:10:52 PM »

You are right. Cross-purposes. Because the claim I'm making is that a transition to a new type of popularity where two factions of BB fans could have co-existed was something that could have occurred in 1974-75, well before this weird mashup of "New Wave" you are describing was a gleam in anyone's eye.

The main problem with your analysis is that the bands/artists you namecheck, with only a scant number of exceptions, were never more than cult presences in the commercial mainstream. You are now getting a little closer to actually suggesting what the BBs should have released in '77, but remember that the band had chosen (in some cases via some kicking and screaming) to toss in with "Brian is back" and the hoary reality of the tracks that emerged from all that. LOVE YOU was a cult record all the way, with some great songs that might have had a chance to do decently as 45s if they'd been recorded 4-5 years earlier with more traditional BB production. The marketplace needed to be further primed for a change in direction from the BBs, which is why they should have tried to pave the way in 74-75, particularly as the crest of their revivified popularity was underway.

If they'd achieved that, there might well have been better balance in the band's subsequent output and a basis for mixing together a more accessible set of "Beach Boy genres" that could have spoken to all of the fandom. Instead, we got creaky oldies, a few interesting leftovers, and "teenage Brian the synth master." This came across to the general public as finger food that had been left out in the sun too long. Brianistas (even though they didn't exist until they were coined at this here board...) loved LOVE YOU, but not even they heard a single in the midst of that strange wonderment.

This is all relevant to this thread because we (or at least I) want to know what Carl was facing (and what he was trying to do about it) during this time as his ideas for what the band should do simply just evaporated over that time frame.
Logged
Lonely Summer
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Online Online

Posts: 3932


View Profile
« Reply #46 on: June 30, 2016, 04:42:29 PM »

Well, this is a stretch, but what if the Beach Boys had recorded some of the material Carl did on his solo albums? "Heaven" might have been a bigger hit with the group name attached to it. As it was, it made the top 20 on Billboard's Adult Contemporary chart, but only bubbled under the Hot 100. A couple years later, "What You Do to Me" (not written by Carl) fared similarly. Both of those songs were played by the group in their shows 1983-onward. I can't quite imagine the group doing some of the harder rockers off those albums, though. "What More Can I Say", "She's Mine", "Too Early to Tell", "The Right Lane"...there was a time when the band could do an occasional heavier rocker, but those days seemed to be gone by the 80's.
Logged
bb4ever
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Offline Offline

Posts: 62


View Profile
« Reply #47 on: July 01, 2016, 06:39:13 AM »

Here is my (possibly oversimplified) take on things.  The three brothers had some insecurities due to their father's emotional/verbal/physical abuse.  When faced with pressure or conflict, all three reacted in very different ways.  Brian retreated into himself, Dennis fought back, and Carl tried to be a people pleaser and avoid conflict.  How on earth could Carl and Dennis drag the rest of the band kicking and screaming in a different direction musically?  Brian did it and was met with great skepticism.   That was not Carl's way of doing things.  He was a compromiser.  In fact, I feel like he compromised a LOT in his life for the sake of others and in order to avoid conflict.   Could it be that Carl just put 'family' above music?  His Beach Boys family and his Wilson family?
Logged
Emdeeh
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Offline Offline

Posts: 2980



View Profile
« Reply #48 on: July 01, 2016, 09:21:25 AM »

Could it be that Carl just put 'family' above music?  His Beach Boys family and his Wilson family?

Absolutely.
Logged
The 4th Wilson Bro.
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Offline Offline

Posts: 227


View Profile
« Reply #49 on: July 01, 2016, 10:56:18 AM »

Here is my (possibly oversimplified) take on things.  The three brothers had some insecurities due to their father's emotional/verbal/physical abuse.  When faced with pressure or conflict, all three reacted in very different ways.  Brian retreated into himself, Dennis fought back, and Carl tried to be a people pleaser and avoid conflict.  How on earth could Carl and Dennis drag the rest of the band kicking and screaming in a different direction musically?  Brian did it and was met with great skepticism.   That was not Carl's way of doing things.  He was a compromiser.  In fact, I feel like he compromised a LOT in his life for the sake of others and in order to avoid conflict.   Could it be that Carl just put 'family' above music?  His Beach Boys family and his Wilson family?

Thanks, bb4ever, for trying to get this thread back on track.  A thread entitled "Re: Carl Wilson - The Man - The Mystery" could and should offer the opportunity for a meaningful discussion on what, exactly, Carl Wilson was about; his likes and dislikes, his relationships with bandmates and family, what motivated him musically and personally, etc.  But as is almost always the case, a potentially great thread quickly devolves into a wee-weeing contest between a handful of posters who are determined to prove they know more than anyone else about some obscure fact or trend that has little or nothing to do with the topic at hand.

Sorry; rant over.
Logged
gfx
Pages: 1 [2] 3 Go Up Print 
gfx
Jump to:  
gfx
Powered by SMF 1.1.21 | SMF © 2015, Simple Machines Page created in 0.557 seconds with 21 queries.
Helios Multi design by Bloc
gfx
Powered by MySQL Powered by PHP Valid XHTML 1.0! Valid CSS!