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, 10:11:35 AM
*
gfx*HomeHelpSearchCalendarLoginRegistergfx
gfxgfx
0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.       « previous next »
Pages: [1] Go Down Print
Author Topic: Remembering The Beach Boys' Dennis Wilson  (Read 5385 times)
Jon Stebbins
Honored Guest
******
Offline Offline

Gender: Male
Posts: 2635


View Profile
« on: December 04, 2009, 07:39:29 AM »

This ran this morning in Howie Edelson's nationally syndicated radio feed...

12/4/09
 
REMEMBERING THE BEACH BOYS' DENNIS WILSON
by Howie Edelson
__________________________________
 
Today (December 4th) marks what would have been Beach Boys' drummer and co-founder Dennis Wilson's 65th birthday. For most of his life, Dennis was overshadowed by his older brother Brian, who wrote most of the group's hits, and by his younger brother Carl, who sang lead on songs such as "God Only Knows" and "Good Vibrations." As a youngster, Dennis was considered the least musical of the Wilson brothers, but it was his idea for Brian and cousin Mike Love to first write about surfing which resulted in their 1961 debut single "Surfin'." It was the Wilson's mother Audree who urged the group to include Dennis, who was then forced to play drums because he couldn't play anything else.
 
Dennis' good looks and powerful live drumming provided the group with a much needed boost in the wake of the "British Invasion." Brian Wilson often used direct instances from Dennis' life as the foundation for Beach Boys songs, including "Fun, Fun, Fun," "Let Him Run Wild," and "Surfin' U.S.A." Dennis sang lead on the group's 1965 remake of Bobby Freeman's "Do You Wanna Dance." He began contributing songs to Beach Boys albums beginning with their 1968 album Friends, and everyone in the group was surprised at the spiritual quality of his work.
 
In the late 1960s, while older brother Brian Wilson slowly retreated from the group in a haze of mental illness and drug abuse, it was Dennis' songs on albums such as Friends, 20/20, Sunflower, Carl & The Passions - So Tough, and Holland that kept the band's artistic vision advancing. Songs such as "Little Bird," "Be Still," "Celebrate The News," "Forever," "Cuddle Up" "Only With You," and "Baby Blue," rank among the most revered of the band's catalogue.
 
His personal life was less successful, including five failed marriages and a year-long friendship with the infamous Charles Manson. Sadly the mainstream press has always gravitated toward his brief time knowing Manson and turbulent personal life than his 15 years as a songwriter.
 
In 1977, he became the first active Beach Boy to release a solo album, called Pacific Ocean Blue.
 
In recent years, it's come to light that Dennis' greatest success was in co-writing the Joe Cocker hit "You Are So Beautiful" with Billy Preston in 1974, for which he did not initially receive a credit. Friends who were there the night the song was written have gone on record claiming that Dennis contributed integral portions to the song, but that he refused to be credited, explaining that he was "just helping a friend out." Dennis went on to perform the song at nearly every Beach Boys show, starting in 1975, and told numerous people that he indeed did co-write the song.
 
On December 28th, 1983 Dennis drowned in Marina Del Rey, California just weeks after his 39th birthday.
 
Only days before, Wilson, who was homeless at the time, had checked himself out of a Los Angeles detox unit in an effort to kick his crippling drug and alcohol addictions. Wilson was visiting a friend whose boat was berthed next to where his own boat, the Harmony, had been docked for years. The Harmony had been repossessed in the summer of 1981 due to lack of mortgage payments, and at the time of his death, Wilson was diving into the 50 degree waters to retrieve various possessions he had thrown off the boat in the past.
 
Although burials at sea are normally reserved only for naval personnel, then-President Ronald Reagan gave the Wilson family special permission to allow a sea burial for Dennis. He was laid to rest in early 1984.
 
FRIENDS AND FAMILY REMEMBER DENNIS WILSON:
 
Brian Wilson revealed that it was none other than his brother Dennis who contributed the church-like organ during the slower portion of the group's 1966 Number One hit "Good Vibrations." Brian explained how Dennis ended up with such a high profile spot on his debut as the Beach Boys' keyboardist: "He was sitting at the organ, and I said, 'I wanna play the organ,' and he says, 'Well, let me play.' So I said, 'Alright,' and I taught him his part."
 
Al Jardine says that he's still amazed at the depth and beauty of Dennis' songs: "Oh, he was the most underrated member of the band in those terms. His compositions, I think, were stronger, and they got stronger and stronger as we went along -- as he went along -- until obviously he couldn't go any further. And I just think that given time, y'know, he would've been the... probably the best composer in the band, outside of Brian, of course. Yeah, he just had that natural, intuitive instinct about music and lyrics. He always... he was the kind of guy who could get to the point without beating around the bush and, y'know, could just nail it."
 
Beach Boys co-founder David Marks, who grew up across the street from the Wilsons in Hawthorne, California, recalled that even as a child Dennis was never predictable: "You know, he charmed the adults and some of the kids that he beat up on were afraid of him. And I was one of them, actually. But he mostly protected me because he regarded me as a brother. But if I was the only one around, then I would be the target. Not maliciously or in anger, but (he'd) hold you down and rub grapes in your face and punch you in the stomach, or slap you around (laughs), or whatever, But it was out of love."
 
Carnie Wilson, who is Brian Wilson's daughter and Dennis' niece, says that she thinks about her uncle regularly: "I had a crush on Dennis, he made my stomach feel funny. And my memories of Dennis was, like, him getting on the ground like he was proposing to me, kneeling down in front of me whenever he saw me and he would kiss my hand in like 20 places. That was his thing. And he was wild and sexy. Y'know, wild. Just out there."
 
Carl Wilson's son Justyn Wilson was asked what he remembered most about his Uncle Dennis: "Just fun stuff, you know sitting in his little, like lounge area behind his drum set. Like a little seating thing for people to hang out. He would have just like (laughs) a little spot to hang out (laughs) or like chill, maybe some pillows or you know... (laughs). He was just like a fun guy as much as I can remember. And I remember there was that other side where you're kind of not so sure, (and) it can maybe be a little scary or frightening, 'cause he was like on the edge, you know? But in just a very real way."
 
Glen Campbell toured briefly as the band's bassist in 1964 and 1965 played on dozens of Beach Boys studio tracks. He recalls Dennis' insatiable love of the outdoors: "Ah, he was incredible (laughs). First thing he wanted to do -- I think it was in Miami -- we'd go out and go fishin'! Or fish off the pier. I don't know why he liked to fish, 'cause I don't like really just sitting there holding a pole. If you're going out on a boat -- that's cool, at least it's a little recreation. But he just liked to do that."
 
By the time of Dennis' death his relationship with his cousin and Beach Boys frontman Mike Love was virtually non-existent. Having married Love's alleged illegitimate daughter Shawn Love, and fathering a son with her, Dennis had finally pushed his relationship with Love beyond repair. Photographer Ed Roach, Dennis' longtime confidante, was friendly with the entire band and shed some light on Dennis' relationship with Mike Love and Al Jardine: "The bad blood was really starting intensely between Dennis and Mike over women. Dennis was named in Mike's first divorce -- as, y'know, 'alienation of affection.' You needed a reason to divorce in those days, and he named Dennis as the 'despondent' (laughs), I think they called it, or something. So their bad blood started there and then it escalated when Mike got so wrapped up in TM and sobriety. But Al was never -- he wasn't disrespectful to Dennis back in those days. And Dennis still had a lot of clout in those days with them on the road, and stuff."
 
Jon Stebbins, who wrote the definitive biography on Dennis called The Real Beach Boy, explained one of the many reasons why Dennis abandoned his 1977 symphonic tour in support of Pacific Ocean Blue: "I think he wanted 23 pieces -- at least 18, he wanted. It was going to be all of his boys. I think he was going to play some piano and come up front and sing some. It was going to be a whole deal, y'know? They were rehearsing 'What's Wrong,' 'Rainbows,' 'Pacific Ocean Blue,' 'The End Of The Show' -- they were probably going to do that as the last song, and he'd do 'You Are So Beautiful' for the encore, I'm sure. But he wanted strings, he wanted bass flutes, y'know? (Laughs) He wanted all that stuff and they wouldn't give him the budget for it."
 
Dennis' primary songwriting partner and producer Gregg Jakobson says that Murry Wilson, the Wilson brothers' abusive father and original Beach Boys manager always weighed heavy on Dennis' psyche: "I think he probably channeled Murry into a lot of things. There was a lot of pathos there, there was a lot of conflict, and I think that was part of Dennis' make up -- how could it not be, since he was a little boy? And there was a lot of adversarial-ness there and a lot of conflict there. And this was a very spiritual cat -- I mean, there was a very, very spiritual side to Dennis. And a lot of that came from family -- (it) came from his dad and his mom, y'know? That's one of the things that made Dennis such a soulful person; It's real, and that's what people are pickin' up on."
 
Lindsey Buckingham became friendly with Dennis Wilson when Wilson began dating Fleetwood Mac's Christine McVie. Wilson was a frequent visitor to the band's recording sessions for Tusk, which coincided with the Wilson abandoning his own album Bambu: "He was kind of a lost guy. He was a very talented guy -- way more talented than he had the structure to be able to exhibit. You know, he had a lot going on without the tools to sort of get there -- that's my opinion anyway. He was a real sweetheart. He was also a rogue. Y'know, he was that rogue element."
 
Carl Wilson's brother-in-law and longtime Beach Boys sideman Billy Hinsche says that despite Dennis' long and public decline, his death was still a shock to him: "I never thought that Dennis would die that way, that young. He had done his Pacific Ocean Blue and it had done very well, and it was critically acclaimed, and it sold well. It had outsold the Beach Boys album at the time, so I'm told. Y'know, he never could sit still, he had to be doing something. So yeah, I was worried about him and I knew he wasn't healthy, but I didn't think it was gonna happen as soon as it did, or in the way that it did. I don't think anybody could've predicted the way it happened, y'know?"
 
Dennis' son, Carl B. Wilson, who's also a drummer, is hopeful that even more of his father's unreleased works will be issued sooner rather than later: "Anything that would be able to could come out and let people hear what work my dad has done... Y'know, I'd love to be able to go somewhere and buy one of his records. So whichever way any of his work can come out, just so long as it's through the right avenue and can really be done right, then yeah, all that stuff. Ultimately, what I'd really like is for people to be able to understand and appreciate what he did. Y'know, what it comes down to is, is it worth it for it to come out? And y'know, I've always thought that it was."
 
2008 proved to be the biggest year in Dennis Wilson's solo career, with the deluxe reissue of his solo album Pacific Ocean Blue and its unreleased 1978 follow-up, Bambu, which was released in June to unanimous critical acclaim -- and earning the nod for "Best Reissue" from Rolling Stone, Mojo and Uncut magazines.
 
One of the highlights on the set is "Holy Man" which is featured twice: once in Wilson's original 1975 instrumental version, and again with newly-written lyrics by Wilson's main collaborator, Gregg Jakobson. Jakobson enlisted the help of close family friend and Foo Fighters drummer Taylor Hawkins to sing the new words to Wilson's melody.
 
Yet another version of the track featuring Hawkins, with Brian May and Roger Taylor of Queen has been completed and is awaiting a release - possibly as part of a proposed single-disc reissue of Pacific Ocean Blue.
 
Dennis Wilson is survived by five sons and a daughter. In 2004, an illegitimate son of Dennis' was reunited with the Wilsons, thanks in part to the efforts of a Beach Boys fan website. In June, a woman posted on smileysmile.net, the high-end message board for Beach Boys connoisseurs, under the name "Dennyschild" and explained that she was born several months after Wilson's death in December 1983, making her 25-years-old. There has yet to be public clarification as to whether she is actually Dennis' daughter.
 
Early next year the BBC will air Dennis Wilson: The Real Beach Boy, the first major documentary ever produced on Dennis. Aside from previously unseen footage, the doc features exclusive interviews with Beach Boys' Brian Wilson, David Marks, Al Jardine, and Blondie Chaplin, Dennis' sons Michael and Carl B. Wilson, Jeff Foskett, engineers John Hanlon and Tom Murphy, Ed Roach, Gregg Jakobson, Jon Stebbins, Jo Ann Marks, Ron Swallow, and others.
Logged
DonnaK
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Offline Offline

Gender: Female
Posts: 292


View Profile
« Reply #1 on: December 04, 2009, 09:04:53 AM »

Thanks for posting this Jon.  Dennis is missed by so many......... Here's hoping the BBC doc will be shown soon and will be available to us here in the states.
Logged
Emdeeh
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Offline Offline

Posts: 2980



View Profile
« Reply #2 on: December 04, 2009, 10:41:48 AM »

Thanks for the posting, Jon. That's a well-written, nicely-realized article -- and I noticed this site gets some props in the process.







Logged
Jon Stebbins
Honored Guest
******
Offline Offline

Gender: Male
Posts: 2635


View Profile
« Reply #3 on: December 04, 2009, 04:03:35 PM »

Thanks for the posting, Jon. That's a well-written, nicely-realized article -- and I noticed this site gets some props in the process.








Always great to hear from you Emdeeh. i hope your holidays are fun! Yeah...Howie did a great job, and he has a lot of love for this board.
Logged
Wirestone
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Offline Offline

Posts: 6043



View Profile
« Reply #4 on: December 04, 2009, 05:19:53 PM »

Beautiful work. Dennis's best songs have a depth and romanticism and rawness and sheer sexiness to them that make them unique in the BB output. He was so deeply into his music.
Logged
rogerlancelot
Guest
« Reply #5 on: December 04, 2009, 05:57:38 PM »

That was an excellent article. The Carnie Wilson bit was a bit of a shock for me but the BB story never gets boring ever.

Totally looking forward to the doc next year. Finally got a copy of Wouldn't It Be Nice (BBC) and watched it 3 times in a row the first night I had it.

Thank you, Jon. Now if I can ever find a copy of your book about Dennis...Amazon's prices are around the $100 mark last I checked and I missed it the first time around.
Logged
Clare
Smiley Smile Newbie

Offline Offline

Posts: 8


View Profile
« Reply #6 on: December 05, 2009, 05:23:34 AM »

This is a little out there but yesterday I broke my sliding glass door.  The glass is still in the frame but all night it made the sound of rain with all the little shatters rippling throughout the glass.  It actually looks like a piece of art right now.  I thought about the time Dennis put his hand through the glass and severed tendons in it (I am happy I didn't copy that part) and how much pain that comes from.   The heart of the beach boys is the humanity they so eloquently translate in their music.  DW made his mark and he is missed.
Logged
8o8o
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Offline Offline

Gender: Male
Posts: 176



View Profile
« Reply #7 on: December 05, 2009, 07:39:00 AM »

One of the highlights on the set is "Holy Man".......
 
Yet another version of the track featuring Hawkins, with Brian May and Roger Taylor of Queen has been completed and is awaiting a release - possibly as part of a proposed single-disc reissue of Pacific Ocean Blue.
I had been wondering what had happened to this version, I also didn't know yet that a single-disc reissue of "POB" is on the way (or being considered). If so, is there a chance it will include any other material that didn't make it onto the 2-CD/3-LP set?

Logged
PongHit
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Offline Offline

Gender: Male
Posts: 1085


AVOID MISSING BALL FOR HIGH SCORE • JeffWinner.com


View Profile WWW
« Reply #8 on: December 06, 2009, 07:45:34 AM »

Wow, we are "connoisseurs" on a "high-end" message board. Aren't we special?  LOL
Logged

''Only more damage can arise from this temporary, fleeting image of success known as The Beach Boys.''
—MURRY WILSON

''People are thinking Mike Love is crazy.''
—MIKE LOVE

''Mike Love? He's Crazy.''
—BRIAN WILSON
Dove Nested Towers
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Offline Offline

Posts: 877

Goodnight, Mrs. Calabash, wherever you are!


View Profile
« Reply #9 on: December 07, 2009, 07:45:36 PM »

Wow, we are "connoisseurs" on a "high-end" message board. Aren't we special?  LOL

I'm not a connoisseur, I'm just a hard-workin' guy. Smiley
Logged

"The police aren't there to create disorder,
they're there to preserve disorder!" -Mayor
Daly, Chicago 1968
Jason
Guest
« Reply #10 on: December 07, 2009, 07:51:00 PM »

 LOL

A great article, indeed. Some good insights, plus a dusting of the old cobwebs of Beach Boys trivia. I wonder if Howie would ever consider writing a book of his own on the band.
« Last Edit: December 07, 2009, 07:52:04 PM by The Real Beach Boy » Logged
Howie Edelson
Smiley Smile Associate
*
Offline Offline

Posts: 672


View Profile
« Reply #11 on: December 08, 2009, 01:01:28 PM »

Thanks RBB --  to answer your question: Yes. I'm planning something pretty big for the 50th.

More news as it comes.
Logged
gfx
Pages: [1] Go Up Print 
gfx
Jump to:  
gfx
Powered by SMF 1.1.21 | SMF © 2015, Simple Machines Page created in 0.943 seconds with 22 queries.
Helios Multi design by Bloc
gfx
Powered by MySQL Powered by PHP Valid XHTML 1.0! Valid CSS!