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Author Topic: Terry Melcher  (Read 46131 times)
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« on: July 22, 2019, 07:15:24 PM »

I find Terry Melcher to be a fascinating and mostly unexamined part of Beach Boys lore. I also have to say some of his 80s and 90s co-writes with Mike Love are guilty pleasures of mine. It's fair to say that he got more out of Mike as a songwriter than anyone other than Brian. I might be in the minority, but I find Getcha Back, Kokomo, Somewhere Near Japan, Still Surfin, Strange Things Happen, Lahaina Aloha and Summer in Paradise to be quality songs. If there was an unofficial member of The Beach Boys, he'd certainly be in the running.

I wanted to try to make an exhaustive list of his actual Beach Boys collaborations.

He was credited as a background vocalist and on tambourines on Pet Sounds.
He co-wrote "Getcha Back" with Mike Love on The Beach Boys.
He co-wrote "Rock & Roll to the Rescue" with Mike Love. He also produced it.
He produced "California Dreamin'."
He co-wrote and produced "Kokomo."
He co-wrote "Still Crusin'," "Somewhere Near Japan," and "Make It Big." Did he also produce those songs?
He produced Summer in Paradise and co-wrote "Summer of Love," "Island Fever," "Still Surfin," "Strange Things Happen," "Lahaina Aloha" and "Summer in Paradise."
He wrote and produced "Problem Child."

He also worked with Bruce Johnston in the early 1960s with Bruce & Terry and The Rip-Chords.
He worked, if briefly, with Brian on California Music.

Outside of Manson, are there any other connections to The Beach Boys? What are your hidden Melcher gems outside of his work with The Beach Boys? Are there any unreleased Melcher/Love songs from the 80s and 90s that anyone is aware of? How did the Melcher/Love collab come to be? Why didn't Melcher do anything with The Beach Boys before 1985 outside of his BVs on Pet Sounds? Does anyone know if he was primarily a pianist or guitar player?
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« Reply #1 on: July 22, 2019, 07:56:42 PM »

Sigh. Please. Don’t ban me. I legitimately enjoy the instrumental Problem Child.
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« Reply #2 on: July 22, 2019, 08:12:51 PM »

Sigh. Please. Don’t ban me. I legitimately enjoy the instrumental Problem Child.

Nyah nyah nyah nyah nyah.
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« Reply #3 on: July 22, 2019, 08:42:27 PM »

Sigh. Please. Don’t ban me. I legitimately enjoy the instrumental Problem Child.

I forgot about Problem Child. Melcher wrote and produced.

I'll go you one further. I kind of like this song with vocals. Carl sounds great on it. The background vocals are fairly terrible, though.

This reminded me of Crocodile Rock, which it appears Melcher surprisingly didn't produce?
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« Reply #4 on: July 22, 2019, 10:46:17 PM »

You forgot to mention that he not only cowrote "Kokomo", but he also produced it - and yes, he did also produce those Still Cruisin' cuts you mentioned.

Terry also had a connection to Dennis Wilson - the two of them were part of a fairly well-known L.A. group called The Golden Penetrators - but alas, that was a competely non-musical group. Smiley

He also had an unfortunate connection to Manson, by way of his connection to Dennis...
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« Reply #5 on: July 22, 2019, 11:29:30 PM »

You forgot to mention that he not only cowrote "Kokomo", but he also produced it - and yes, he did also produce those Still Cruisin' cuts you mentioned.

Terry also had a connection to Dennis Wilson - the two of them were part of a fairly well-known L.A. group called The Golden Penetrators - but alas, that was a competely non-musical group. Smiley

He also had an unfortunate connection to Manson, by way of his connection to Dennis...


I wonder if one of the GP gang had made a custom embroidered Golden Penetrators biker jacket.

Not even kidding! If they went to the trouble of making a group name, and they were rich guys who had money to burn for getting custom embroidered clothes, it could've happened. Look at how many custom shirts Brian and Al were having made during the 1970s for themselves.

And with the amount of "tribute" bootleg T-shirts associated with this band that have made it to black market ("Keep it clean with Al Jardine", etc) I'm almost surprised that nobody has tried to make some sort of GP swag. 

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« Reply #6 on: July 22, 2019, 11:32:18 PM »

Sigh. Please. Don’t ban me. I legitimately enjoy the instrumental Problem Child.

 Don't hang your head in shame. I kind of like it also.

And also, I think that the backing vocals that kick in during the lyric "first they'll be married, with kids after awhile" briefly sound like rad classic Beach Boys, and I briefly get the feels.

The song is certainly a mixed bag, but Carl "I could sing the phone book" Wilson and his magic voice, along with some isolated cool moments like this, make it a surprisingly listenable guilty pleasure…

And I will also add that I actually kinda like Terry's production on some of those late 1980s and even some SIP Beach Boys tracks. Even though in some cases he didn't have much to work with, I still feel like it's occasionally an interesting then-modern update on his jangly production style from the Byrds albums of the 1960s.
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« Reply #7 on: July 23, 2019, 12:01:42 AM »

And with the amount of "tribute" bootleg T-shirts associated with this band that have made it to black market ("Keep it clean with Al Jardine", etc) I'm almost surprised that nobody has tried to make some sort of GP swag.
It ain't catchy rhyme "Keep It Clean With Al Jardine", isn't hip as "Radiant Radish". Logic 101. police
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« Reply #8 on: July 23, 2019, 02:06:21 AM »

Terry also sang lead on "Why Do Fools Fall In Love" for California Music... I also read somewhere that the Golden Penetrators had an old VW Bug painted gold that they caroused in.
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« Reply #9 on: July 23, 2019, 08:02:54 AM »

Terry Melcher sang lead vocal on Bruce & Terry's (previously unreleased 45) recording of HELP ME, RHONDA.  The old story has it that Brian told Terry the Beach Boys were going to re-record it as a single (at that point only the album HMR version was done) and he'd prefer B&T scrap their plans to do the same then, which Terry complied.  You can hear this unreleased recording on a recent CD compilation for B&T, where Terry clearly sings the opening song line as "Well since she put me down I went out to relieve my head"

On SOMEWHERE NEAR JAPAN Terry sings a few lines too.  His voice is unmistakable, the same voice one hears singing along with Mark Lindsay on a number of Paul Revere & Raiders tunes which he of course produced
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« Reply #10 on: July 23, 2019, 08:24:18 AM »

There is a lot that we could discuss with Terry Melcher. He's one of the most under-written-about (is that a word? lol) contributors to the classic 60's LA music scene.

Just a few replies to previous points:

- He didn't only produce Paul Revere & The Raiders, he also shared the infamous Cielo Drive house with his buddy Raider Mark Lindsay for a few years...they leased the house and shared it as roommates. When Terry began dating Candace Bergen, Lindsay moved out, then soon after Terry moved to Malibu and sublet the place to Roman Polanski and Sharon Tate. The rest we all know.

But Mark Lindsay helped clarify a few points about that whole thing, and bust a myth too. The myth was that Manson was trying to spook Melcher at the Cielo Drive leased house, but Melcher wasn't there. However Lindsay says the Manson clan left a note at Terry's *new* place in Malibu as well, which would mean they knew that Terry had not only moved, but they knew where he moved. So there's that.

- Beach Boys connections? How about being one of the main channels between Brian Wilson and other LA-based rockers for a time? He got Brian and Van Dyke together at one of his parties which led to them collaborating on what was to be Smile. There were also other events not written about as much, like David Crosby being invited to a private listening party with Brian before Sloop John B came out, and Van Dyke was tagging along (if I recall...). Anyway, point being, the "network" among all these guys especially in 1965-66 was simply unreal in terms of being much tighter and much more close than a lot of us believed, and how the cross-pollination of talent and influence was simply off the charts.

Terry was a pretty big part of all that, and like Van Dyke getting together with Brian at one of Terry's parties then collaborating on Dumb Angel/Smile, a lot of things similar to that were happening regularly which led to some amazing art. A lot of it hasn't been written about because it was like everyday life for these people, like deciding to grab a sandwich for lunch last Thursday.


Unfortunately the same sharing, communal, networking type of scene also found its unfortunate end when that guy Manson got into the network. More on that?
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« Reply #11 on: July 23, 2019, 08:46:13 AM »

the very last things Terry produced for PR & Raiders were their Christmas album (Past & Present, on which you can hear him sing a lot) and then finally the 45 version of PEACE OF MIND

Then the Mark & Terry relationship was severed (Mark produced himself the next 45's CINDERELLA SUNSHINE & TOO MUCH TALK, with the Goin' To Memphis album being handled by Chips Moman), and the following void for Terry somehow got filled with increased association w/ Dennis, plus interest in Charles Manson both songs and as a possible recording artist (1968)
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« Reply #12 on: July 23, 2019, 09:50:50 AM »


On SOMEWHERE NEAR JAPAN Terry sings a few lines too.  His voice is unmistakable, the same voice one hears singing along with Mark Lindsay on a number of Paul Revere & Raiders tunes which he of course produced

I had no idea about this. Can you point out any specific examples/timecodes of Terry's voice in SNJ?

Side note: I've always found it interesting to try and pick out Terry's voice on the alternate God Only Knows (With A Capella Tag) version. It usually tends to be pretty obvious - at least in the '60s/'70s eras, when a non Beach Boy voice sneaks into the harmony mix.  Pretty sure he's singing the "bop" parts with other BB members near the end of the song, during the A Capella Tag itself.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sCq3npjR9Mg
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« Reply #13 on: July 23, 2019, 10:42:16 AM »

I love Bruce's story from 1997:

"Terry Melcher played tambourine on 'Here Today'. I was playing him the instrumental track from the new box set and he was very rude about the shoddy playing of the tambourine on the track. He asked me 'Who is that?' I said 'It was you!'"

[From Back to the Beach, p. 288]
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« Reply #14 on: July 23, 2019, 12:35:52 PM »

There is a lot to like on Terry's two solo albums IMO.
Is it true he didn't like performing live?
Always wanted to see a B&T set list from the shows in Hawaii with The Beach Boys
And one other thing, I swear I once saw a Dean Torrence designed album cover for a Terry Melcher album titled 'Damn Everything But The Circus' -any Intel?
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« Reply #15 on: July 23, 2019, 06:28:34 PM »

I pretty much love all of Terry Melcher's production work, especially the way he produced guitars and in particular 12-strings. Don't ban me but I love Still Cruisin' for the instrumental breaks, first a pretty solo followed by an ML vocal break followed by a second solo cranked up to 11.

He also produced the first two Byrds albums and IMHO they were the best produced of their career, with the best 12-string sound McGuinn would ever get (although Alan Stanton got close on Fifth Dimension). He did a great job with everything else and the Byrds sound is just glued together better than it would ever be again. Yes Younger Than Yesterday had great songs but Usher's production always seemed a little weak to me. Just my opinion.

And of course Melcher and McGuinn reunited for the BBs California Dreamin' and again the 12-string sound was a thing of beauty.

If I had my way there would be a Beach Boys "Melcher Productions" compilation, although SIP would need some careful song selection.
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« Reply #16 on: July 24, 2019, 04:41:05 AM »

Sigh. Please. Don’t ban me. I legitimately enjoy the instrumental Problem Child.

Nyah nyah nyah nyah nyah.

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« Reply #17 on: July 24, 2019, 04:43:38 AM »

You forgot to mention that he not only cowrote "Kokomo", but he also produced it - and yes, he did also produce those Still Cruisin' cuts you mentioned.

Terry also had a connection to Dennis Wilson - the two of them were part of a fairly well-known L.A. group called The Golden Penetrators - but alas, that was a competely non-musical group. Smiley

He also had an unfortunate connection to Manson, by way of his connection to Dennis...


He actually brought Manson into prominence and also wrote Problem Child? Tell me, did the devil himself father this man?
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« Reply #18 on: July 24, 2019, 05:08:20 AM »

Bruce and Terry also did work for Bobby Darin (Trinity Music / TMI).

Bruce's first single came out in 1959, on Arwin, the label that Terry's mom and dad owned. Interestingly, Kim Fowley worked for Arwin and brought his high school buddy, Bruce, to the attention of Doris.
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« Reply #19 on: July 24, 2019, 06:55:31 AM »

"I had no idea about this. Can you point out any specific examples/timecodes of Terry's voice in SNJ? "

the two lines in SOMEWHERE NEAR JAPAN that Terry Melcher sings himself are "My engine's all burnt out, my crew has all...."

his voice has this kind of a tenor howling quality to it, not exactly nasal, for lack of a better way to describe.  once you realize it you'll notice it all over PR & Raiders records background vocals, and IMO it worked terrifically together w/ Mark Lindsay

the very first time I played Still Cruisin' when CD came out I said to myself "What is Terry Melcher doing singing verse on a Beach Boys recording?", his voice always jumps out at me.  Then I looked and realized he produced SNJ

In the new movie "CHARLIE SAYS"  Terry Melcher (and Dennis) are portrayed.  They are both there (somewhat briefly) not because they add anything substantial to the story the movie wants to tell (which is the girls of mansons family imprisoned in solitary confinement are still spouting his insane apocalyptic blather even years afterwards, prefaced by "Charlie says.....", and their treatment), but because the association with the famous was a turning point for Manson and can't be written out.  BTW the film is excellent IMO and even contains a surprise ending, something that'd be impossible for anyone who reads up on the horrible Manson story
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« Reply #20 on: July 24, 2019, 06:57:21 AM »

Melcher's 60s connections with the group and various members are interesting, but I've also always found his 80s/90s work with the band (and mainly a close collaborative relationship with Mike) intriguing.

The question of why they continued to keep Melcher in their orb in the 80s was posed some time back, and a pertinent point raised during that discussion was that Melcher was good at scoring the band placement in movie soundtracks. Getting your song in a movie (specifically *in* a movie, perhaps more so than on any subsequent soundtrack) was and is quite lucrative. Even when the movie is a bomb, if it's a relatively big production (meaning even a mid-budget flick from a relatively major studio; certainly one that can afford the Beach Boys), it can be a nice little financial infusion. If the movie does well, all the better. If a soundtrack release materializes featuring the song, even better. If the soundtrack does well, even better yet. If the band scores any sort of hit with the song (which really only mainly occurred once, with "Kokomo"), that's the ultimate best cast scenario.

But you can see they kept taking on co-written songs and production duties from Melcher who, by mid 80s, was not exactly an A-lister in the pop music industry. But he was getting them placement in film soundtracks, and usually some sort of single and/or soundtrack album came about. Most of these songs were quickly forgotten by the public, and many fans and the band themselves, but made them a nice little extra chunk of change. Stuff like "Happy Endings", "Make It Big", "Problem Child", "Still Cruisin'", and of course "Kokomo." They also worked with Melcher on non-soundtrack material, with him co-writing "Getcha Back" and then "Rock and Roll to the Rescue", producing R&R to the Rescue and the rejiggered version of "California Dreamin'", working with the band producing the tracks for the '86 anniversary TV special, and then more substantial work on some of the "Still Cruisin'" tracks and then eventually "Summer in Paradise."

The Brian Wilson/Gary Usher book covering 1986/87 also ends up touching on Melcher's position within the band, and how Usher and Melcher were to some degree jockeying for position to produce "the next Beach Boys album", which obviously never ended up happening in that iteration.

Melcher obviously had a "creative" relationship with Mike that both pre and post-dated his getting the band soundtrack placements, so Terry and Mike certainly had something beyond that motivating their creative collaboration. I think they seemed to just have relatively similar (or at least compatible) personalities, and I can only imagine Melcher back around that time wasn't exactly an A-list, super in-demand producer. It was mutually beneficial. Melcher scored some songwriting royalties and producer "points" on some BB projects, and Mike got a guy to craft usually at least superficially catchy/melodic material for which Mike could add lyrics.

I recall Howie Edelson mentioning that he once asked David Crosby about the Melcher/Love partnership and what the deal was with that, and Crosby (who I gather wasn't/isn't a huge fan of either guy) seemed to feel it made total sense for those two to be working together.

I've found the main hallmarks of Melcher's work, especially his 80s/90s work with the band, to be characterized by Melcher having a good ear for catchy chord changes and melodies in some cases. I don't think he brought much to the table production-wise. He did a serviceable, fine job on most stuff, though "Summer in Paradise" his quite problematic with its shrill, digital, thin sound. "Somewhere Near Japan" and "California Dreamin'" is about as good as it got production-wise. And while some of the stuff he wrote was textbook bland (read: most of SIP), even the stuff he wrote that was catchy musically ("Lahaina Aloha", "Strange Things Happen", etc.) often ended up being marred by rather predictable, rote lyrics from Mike.

I sense Melcher was good as a wrangler/organizational guy when producing BB stuff, and was the band was probably more amenable to having someone like Melcher run a session than having some big shot come in and start barking orders around. For many reasons, they were not working with the big producers of the era, the Hugh Padgham-types.
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« Reply #21 on: July 24, 2019, 07:02:42 AM »

"I had no idea about this. Can you point out any specific examples/timecodes of Terry's voice in SNJ? "

the two lines in SOMEWHERE NEAR JAPAN that Terry Melcher sings himself are "My engine's all burnt out, my crew has all...."

his voice has this kind of a tenor howling quality to it, not exactly nasal, for lack of a better way to describe.  once you realize it you'll notice it all over PR & Raiders records background vocals, and IMO it worked terrifically together w/ Mark Lindsay

the very first time I played Still Cruisin' when CD came out I said to myself "What is Terry Melcher doing singing verse on a Beach Boys recording?", his voice always jumps out at me.  Then I looked and realized he produced SNJ


I realize I'm just reverting to the most obvious thought that I'm guessing most BB fans have had, but are we absolutely sure those lines aren't predominantly Carl? Believe me, I'm well aware how crazy BB vocal credits can get and how minds can be blown when we discover who is or isn't actually singing on something. I'm not very familiar with Melcher's 80s voice (I've heard his vocal work on the 60s stuff, and I find it pretty bland and workmanlike, and I certainly don't hear anything on the 80s/90s tracks that sound like *that*), and it seems a no-brainer that he would be singing on some of that stuff, especially in cases where he did some amount of pre-production work prior to the "main" BB vocals sessions. But gosh, without going back to listen right at this moment (something I'll do soon), it seems like Carl is in there on those lines.
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« Reply #22 on: July 24, 2019, 07:26:27 AM »

<<I realize I'm just reverting to the most obvious thought that I'm guessing most BB fans have had, but are we absolutely sure those lines aren't predominantly Carl? Believe me, I'm well aware how crazy BB vocal credits can get and how minds can be blown when we discover who is or isn't actually singing on something. I'm not very familiar with Melcher's 80s voice (I've heard his vocal work on the 60s stuff, and I find it pretty bland and workmanlike, and I certainly don't hear anything on the 80s/90s tracks that sound like *that*), and it seems a no-brainer that he would be singing on some of that stuff, especially in cases where he did some amount of pre-production work prior to the "main" BB vocals sessions. But gosh, without going back to listen right at this moment (something I'll do soon), it seems like Carl is in there on those lines. >>

Melcher had a very distinctive voice.  He's lead vocalist on HEY LITTLE COBRA.  For reference, if you want to do a comparison between his and Carl's voice... listen to the symphonic version of KOKOMO on Bruce's 1998 Symphonic Sounds of the Beach Boys.  Terry is singing Carl's part on the chorus ("Ooh, I wanna take you down to Kokomo...").
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« Reply #23 on: July 24, 2019, 07:31:37 AM »

on SNJ there's obvious difference between Carl singing "This call is probably mine" and the lines Terry sings.  I really like the way Al comes in later with "And now she's trippin' on some Chinese junk"
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« Reply #24 on: July 24, 2019, 08:25:15 AM »

I think Melcher has a distinctive enough voice on a number of his tracks. As I've said, I'm not familiar with the changes his voice may have displayed by the 80s. Those lines in "Somewhere Near Japan" don't sound much at all like Melcher's (in my opinion rather dull and monotone) lead vocals from his 60s tracks.

But am I really the only person who thinks it sounds like Carl singing "my engine's all burned out..., etc." on "Somewhere Near Japan"?

Yes, the timbre of those lines is somewhat different from Carl's other lines. But those other lines are higher notes. The "my engine's.." lines are in a lower register, much more in the mid-range.

I'm open to those lines being Melcher, but if they are, it's Melcher doing a pretty good Carl impression. In the 30 years since that song came out, I don't think I've ever heard much of anyone suggest it's Melcher singing those lines. He very well could be, but I'm guessing most fans have assumed all these years it's Carl, which suggests to me that many agree it sounds enough like Carl to allow many to assume it *is* Carl.
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