Carl Wilson - The Man - The Mystery

[bb4ever]

Agree 110%    Carl is the least known of the Wilson Bros.   Just trying to gather some information about him.  I got very excited when Long Promised Road came out; however, it fell short of being a biography of Carl. It did give me a greater appreciation of him as a musician, but still interested in the man himself.

[The 4th Wilson Bro.]

Agree 110%    Carl is the least known of the Wilson Bros.   Just trying to gather some information about him.  I got very excited when Long Promised Road came out; however, it fell short of being a biography of Carl. It did give me a greater appreciation of him as a musician, but still interested in the man himself.

Carl has been gone for more than 18 years, and those of us who still love and admire the man continue to feel like his story has not yet been told.  Long-time Beach Boys fans (53 years, in my case) are still hopeful that we'll live long enough to read the definitive account of Carl's life.

[Ian]

As I stated in another thread, Carl has a saintly image and his many friends and colleagues are not going to talk out of turn about him.  For a public figure he lived a very private life and you will not get anyone to break that wall of privacy too much. So I don't think a biography of Carl can present much more than that. The billy hinsche DVD is probably as intimate as it gets about him

[Lonely Summer]

A biography doesn't have to dig out the dirt to be detailed and factual. LPR did a good job at exploring Carl's contributions to the band in the 60's, and to some degree, the early 70's. There really should have been more about the later years. Most of the book just read like another BB's bio. His problems with drugs in 77-78 has already been talked about; no need to sensationalize it. He got clean and never relapsed. He made the gutsy move of not only releasing a solo album that sounded nothing like the Beach Boys, he toured behind it playing almost exclusively his own material. When the group didn't show any interest in recording, he went ahead with a second solo album. How did the rest of the band feel when Carl went solo? Did they support him, or did they think he was being foolish? How did Carl feel about records like Summer In Paradise? Did he sing on them just to keep the peace with band members, or did he fully support Mike's ideas? Was he depressed when the 1985 album failed to be a big seller? That album, more than any other, seemed to be Carl's baby. I wonder if he felt like "I'm not wasting my songs on these guys anymore"? Did he bitch slap Mike after that speech at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1988?

[Don Malcolm]

Agree 110%    Carl is the least known of the Wilson Bros.   Just trying to gather some information about him.  I got very excited when Long Promised Road came out; however, it fell short of being a biography of Carl. It did give me a greater appreciation of him as a musician, but still interested in the man himself.

Carl has been gone for more than 18 years, and those of us who still love and admire the man continue to feel like his story has not yet been told.  Long-time Beach Boys fans (53 years, in my case) are still hopeful that we'll live long enough to read the definitive account of Carl's life.

Hey, no argument from me. But that is why it's important to know what went down in the time frame when the BBs were suddenly a big deal again--but without a way to tie it to their 69-73 work (the period, BTW, when Carl took over a lot of the production reins from Brian).

The quote about Brian-Dennis-Carl is well-known, probably published several dozen times. And I'm sure that Carl did do a lot of what is intimated in that quote (compensatory compromise). But when you listen to the SOT sessions for Beach Boys Party you hear a not-quite-19-year old guy who was very sharp and was already all business in the studio. Stephen Desper's testimony makes it clear that Carl showed a great deal of affinity for production and took on a more encompassing role in the process. And, yes, we know a good bit about that as well.

The mystery, at least as I see it, is why that seemed to come to a stop in 1974. People say Carl and Dennis couldn't take the band in a new direction. Sorry, but they had already done that. Of course there was still a desire to keep Brian in the mix--after all, no one else had a hit or wrote anything like GV so the band needed his aura if nothing else. But Carl was the prime mover behind many changes in 1970-72 (Reiley, bringing in Blondie and Ricky, etc.) and he was acknowledged as the leader in this time frame. What happened to all that? This is a good part of what we need to know in order to "solve the mystery."

[The 4th Wilson Bro.]

A biography doesn't have to dig out the dirt to be detailed and factual. LPR did a good job at exploring Carl's contributions to the band in the 60's, and to some degree, the early 70's. There really should have been more about the later years. Most of the book just read like another BB's bio. His problems with drugs in 77-78 has already been talked about; no need to sensationalize it. He got clean and never relapsed. He made the gutsy move of not only releasing a solo album that sounded nothing like the Beach Boys, he toured behind it playing almost exclusively his own material. When the group didn't show any interest in recording, he went ahead with a second solo album. How did the rest of the band feel when Carl went solo? Did they support him, or did they think he was being foolish? How did Carl feel about records like Summer In Paradise? Did he sing on them just to keep the peace with band members, or did he fully support Mike's ideas? Was he depressed when the 1985 album failed to be a big seller? That album, more than any other, seemed to be Carl's baby. I wonder if he felt like "I'm not wasting my songs on these guys anymore"? Did he bitch slap Mike after that speech at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1988?

Thanks, Lonely Summer.  Those – and others – are exactly the types of things all Carl Wilson fans yearn to learn more about.  I can't imagine why anyone would want to dig up dirt on Carl, though I suppose there is a market for that sort of thing.  But surely his sons, one of the two women who shared parts of their lives with him, or his one surviving sibling could and should be willing to share some of their experiences and memories of the man they loved.

I know that Carl's private life was important to him and I understand the family's need to honor that aspect of his life.  But I also have to believe that perhaps they may not fully comprehend the depth of admiration and respect that true Carl Wilson fans had and will continue to have for him.  Surely those closest to Carl have fond memories of their husband, father, brother or bandmate that would honor his life and legacy if they would share them with the rest of us who loved him too.

[bb4ever]

I, too, am not interested in a smidgen (because that's all you could even find) of dirt on Carl.  I just want to know about him.  What made him tick?  What did he think of his band family?   What kind of parent was he?  What motivated him?  etc., etc.  I'm quite certain that Jerry Schilling, Billy Hinsche, Ron Swallow, or Marilyn Wilson could write an honest and respectful book about Carl.  Why does a person have to suffer from mental instability or drug addiction to warrant a book?

[Lonely Summer]

I, too, am not interested in a smidgen (because that's all you could even find) of dirt on Carl.  I just want to know about him.  What made him tick?  What did he think of his band family?   What kind of parent was he?  What motivated him?  etc., etc.  I'm quite certain that Jerry Schilling, Billy Hinsche, Ron Swallow, or Marilyn Wilson could write an honest and respectful book about Carl.  Why does a person have to suffer from mental instability or drug addiction to warrant a book?

That's a good question. I guess it may be down to publishers; they always want some dirt to sell the book on. If there's not enough there, they they make stuff up. There could be plenty of drama, though, if they need it: his years long battle against the draft board, the drug addiction in the mid 70's, and in the end, the cancer that killed him. It's not as if his life was dull.