The beginning of the Beach Boys, an absolute reference in 60s pop, could not be understood without Brian Wilson, who passed away at the age of 82 on Wednesday. However, the name of the band was not even his idea. A very young boy born in Inglewood, California, who had become deaf in one ear due to a blow from his father, later suffered from drug abuse and mental health problems, decided to name the group he was forming with his brothers Carl and Dennis, his cousin Mike Love, and his friend Al Jardine as the Pendletones.
They presented themselves with the Candix Records label in 1961, with which they released their first single, "Surfin'." It was the record label itself, without the members' permission, that baptized them as The Beach Boys. From there, they went straight to legend under the guidance of Brian Wilson, who passed away after years of living with a neurocognitive disorder. "Our hearts are broken to announce the passing of our dear father, Brian Wilson. We are at a loss for words. Please respect our privacy during this time of family mourning," the family announced on their social media.
Brian Wilson is the beginning and the end of a group that has one of the most iconic albums of that 60s pop era, undeniably linked to surf culture, the sun, California beaches, and convertibles. Pet Sounds is an absolute milestone in music history, and God Only Knows is the anthem that has been danced to, with its cheerful and catchy rhythm, on dance floors around the world. Only the Beatles, with their omnipresent Paul McCartney, compete in the history of a genre in which both converged and rivaled. Almost simultaneously with Pet Sounds resonating from California, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band did so from Liverpool.
However, that pure happiness contrasts with a life of hardships, to the point of being immortalized in the 2014 film 'Love & mercy', about the founder and soul of the group. His childhood was marked by a violent father who left him deaf in one ear. As an absurd irony, that boy ended up not only as the great pop genius as a vocalist but also as a fantastic producer. In the early 60s, The Beach Boys released Surfin' Safari (1962), Little Deuce Coupe (1963), and, of course, Surfin' USA (1965). The single that gives its name to this last album was the group's first number 1 hit in the United States. This was followed by I Get Around, Help Me, Rhonda, and Good Vibrations.
Meanwhile, Brian Wilson was already experiencing his first nervous breakdowns, which led him to step away from the stage in 1964, and his drug addiction problems began. As he himself recounted in 1965, he tried LSD for the first time, experiencing a transformative yet terrifying situation. This was followed by amphetamines to stay awake during marathon creative sessions, barbiturates, alcohol, as well as episodes of paranoia, hallucinations, and pervasive emotional instability. Amidst this turmoil, he created his masterpiece, Pet Sounds, and distanced himself from the other band members. He single-handedly created the album that would eventually become a pinnacle of pop history, despite its poor commercial and critical reception. In 2004, it was included in the National Recording Registry of the Library of Congress of the United States for its cultural and historical significance.
Wilson also began working on Smile, intended to be his magnum opus, once again separated from his band and amidst a conflict with his label, Capitol Records. His emotional state was so precarious, and his substance abuse so rampant, that the project remained unfinished until 2004. During the recording sessions, Brian Wilson wanted the album to be recorded on the beach. He had tons of sand brought into his home studio to play barefoot there. The studio was unusable for days. The great pop genius was trapped in a spiral of self-destruction that only deepened.
The number of bizarre situations from those years is countless. During the recording of Smile, he threw a harp and bass drum into the deep end of his pool to hear how they sounded submerged. He believed that Phil Spector wanted to kill him and that the FBI was after him for subverting his music. The recording of I Just Wasn't Made for These Times with a piano that his dog had urinated inside. The burning embers in the studio, the orchestra wearing firefighter helmets to record Fire...
At that point, already taking a back seat within the band, Brian Wilson's role as a producer emerged. He shaped the sound of some works by The Honeys, Spring, or Jan and Dean, all related to the surf rock of the 60s. Years later, he also produced tribute albums for Elton John, Eric Clapton, and even collaborated with Paul McCartney, with whom he shared a close friendship. In 2002, during a charity event in Los Angeles, they both performed God Only Knows by the Beach Boys and Let It Be by the Beatles.
By the 1970s, Brian Wilson's life would experience an even deeper decline. Addicted to cocaine, struggling with obesity, in 1975, his wife, Marilyn, decided to hire psychologist Eugene Landy to treat him. Landy became a dominant figure in the musician's life. He lived with him, overmedicated him, took control of his artistic and financial decisions - allegedly stealing up to 430,000 euros per year from him -, signed his songs as a co-author... He was fired, but in 1983, he returned with even more power. It wasn't until 1991 that the family managed to obtain a restraining order against him through the courts, and the California Medical Board revoked his license to practice. This episode is primarily explored in the film Love and Mercy.
During the 1990s, despite ongoing legal issues among the Beach Boys members, Mike Love and Brian Wilson resumed composing together. This led to the album Summer in Paradise, followed by Stars and Stripes Vol. 1, a compilation of their greatest hits from the 60s. With the new millennium, Wilson's recognition as a global pop icon continued to grow. The incorporation of Pet Sounds into the cultural legacy of the United States, inclusion in all lists of music geniuses of the 20th century by specialized magazines... And so on until his death.