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Post by Kapitan on May 9, 2019 12:17:18 GMT
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Post by Sheriff John Stone on May 9, 2019 12:47:48 GMT
"tours with high-voiced guitarist Jeffrey Foskett"...
Are you going to the show?
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Post by Kapitan on May 9, 2019 12:50:42 GMT
That description cracked me up too. I ought to see what he said about Matt after the PS or Xmas show!
Hadn’t planned on attending (or even heard of until this morning) the shows.
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Post by The Cincinnati Kid on May 10, 2019 3:36:38 GMT
Apparently Mike is coming out with a new solo album later this year. Mike mentioned working on something, but when purchasing VIP BB tickets you will get a copy of Mike's upcoming album, so this appears to be the first concrete evidence of a new album. Maybe Mike really did have a big stockpile of songs to pick from!
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Post by Kapitan on May 10, 2019 11:11:42 GMT
Maybe Mike really did have a big stockpile of songs to pick from! Too bad they’re not very good. (So far.) I know of a guy he could work with who’s a pretty good co-writer. Melodies, harmonies, arrangements...
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Post by Sheriff John Stone on May 10, 2019 14:03:35 GMT
I'm convinced that Mike has been stockpiling songs for years and, the last couple of years has been thinking about his mortality (at least as a viable singer) AND MAYBE MORE RELEVANT, is sensing that his days of collaborating with Brian Wilson are over. I believe that Mike was holding out for decades, thinking that he and Brian would get back together and do it again. Mike watched one Brian Wilson solo album after another stiff and must've been thinking "it's just a matter of time". Maybe Mike can sit down and talk with Brian in a civil manner, and I guess we should be grateful for that, but as far as working together - at least on terms that would satisfy Mike - well, that doesn't look good.
Is that enough BB references/cliches thrown in there?
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Post by Kapitan on May 10, 2019 14:05:42 GMT
If he's been stockpiling songs, the ones he's released so far don't say much for what's in the pile. Or should I say it seems it's a pile of...
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Post by Sheriff John Stone on May 10, 2019 14:19:02 GMT
If he's been stockpiling songs, the ones he's released so far don't say much for what's in the pile. Or should I say it seems it's a pile of... But that's where your above post comes in. Mike knows a guy who can take the best of that pile of ... and make something out of it. And let's be honest, in any collaboration with Brian, while Mike would like his contributions to be taken seriously and used (this was a big stumbling block with TWGMTR) - I think another major goal would be the resurrection of the famous B. Wilson / M. Love credit. That's what Mike seems to talk about the most in his interviews, what he and Brian were able to achieve.
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Post by Kapitan on May 10, 2019 14:24:47 GMT
I'd be all for it on the condition that Mike goes in swearing off all Beach Boys puns, homages, winks, nods, and quotes. And preferably write lyrics that feel more appropriate for someone nearing 80 years old. I'm not saying he has to become late-era Bob Dylan (or early era Bob Dylan for that matter...ol' Zim was never much a beach-and-girls kind of writer!) singing about mortality, but I think a mature Mike could do some good work that doesn't feel absurd coming out of his mouth.
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Post by Kapitan on Dec 8, 2019 21:08:52 GMT
Here is a recent Roy Wood interview. A few minutes in, he talks a bit about being a Beach Boys fan growing up and working with them on 15 Big Ones. It's not Earth-shattering, but it's a couple minutes on the topic.
It's cued up here:
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Post by Sheriff John Stone on Dec 8, 2019 22:07:26 GMT
"It's OK" is one of my favorite BB songs, and I've played it a hundred times. But I'll be darned if I could ever pick out Roy Wood's saxophone or vocal part.
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Post by Kapitan on Dec 8, 2019 22:16:53 GMT
I don't know his voice, but the sax is usually pretty soft but audible in a descending pattern just after the verse lyrics end and before the "Gotta go to it" harmony voices, and then much more audible in Dennis's tag as descending lines in groups of three notes.
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Post by Sheriff John Stone on Dec 27, 2019 13:03:08 GMT
Mike Love appeared on the PBS NewsHour feature, My Brief But Spectacular Take, on 12/28/19:
Well, Mike's consistent, that's for sure. But, with only three minutes to fill - and so many spectacular (positive?) things to mention - did he really have to venture into the songwriting credit lawsuit territory? At least he didn't mention drugs and Manson...
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Post by jk on Mar 23, 2020 11:53:30 GMT
This isn't new--but where else do I post it? It's a review that was first published in Dutch in NRC Handelsblad on Tuesday, 5 June 2012. My translation includes all factual errors without comment.
Buoyant Beach Boys still feel nineteen
A contradiction resides at the heart of The Beach Boys' music. On the one hand, the songs can be regarded as mini-symphonies to the greater honour and glory of life and love in America. On the other, many people discern in the wondrous, bizarre and unusually orchestrated songs an inkling of unease. And they take this to their hearts, for life has more to offer than just splashing about in the waves off California.
The bitter pill was scrupulously sugared by front man Brian Wilson, but there was always a hint of discomfort to be heard between the lines, even in classics such as "Good Vibrations" and "Wouldn't It Be Nice".
Now that The Beach Boys have made a new album some twenty years after they last worked together, there is the question of which side of Wilson and his friend--sweet or bitter--this album presents. First off there is the title, which straightaway reflects Wilson's view of things; this is, after all, the man who enriched pop music with such lines as "I guess I just wasn't made for these times" and "God only knows what I'd be without you". The new CD is called That's Why God Made The Radio, a tribute as much to the transistor radio as to the band itself. And rightly so.
The wonderfully airy title song with its languid organ and lazy drums shows why The Beach Boys, armed with Wilson's orchestrations and the vocal harmonies, are still unbeatable fifty years on. Once again, Wilson has combined many instruments into sumptuous symphonies without degenerating into bombast, and the five vocalists may be older but are scarcely less flexible technically. Their voices by turns take the lead, sing backing, melt, warble and dance like sunbeams.
The mood is buoyant: "Isn't It Time" is measured but lilting, "Beaches In Mind" is upbeat and in "Spring Vacation" the band members clearly still feel nineteen: "Spring vacation / good vibration / some say it wouldn't last / all we can say / still having a blast."
But the other side--snakes in the grass, disaster around the corner--is there in equal measure. Why else would the singer offer the one he loves a safe haven from the storm in "Shelter"? And there is no misunderstanding the triptych that closes the album, concluding with the exquisite "Summer's Gone", where the voices, supported by mysterious harp, trumpet and lonesome percussion, convey a feeling of emptiness. They sing it with majesty and sadness, and with resignation.
That's Why God Made The Radio was recorded in Los Angeles, with the same strategy as that used by The Beach Boys in the past, where Wilson is the composer and director who works out all the parts. His brothers are dead (playboy/drummer Dennis Wilson in 1983, guitarist Carl Wilson in 1998), but the current members--cousin Mike Love, guitarist Bruce Johnson, Al Jardine and David Marks--have all been Beach Boys.
Soon they will embark on an American tour. Jovial Mike Love is taking on the role of front man, much to Wilson's relief, no doubt. Wilson, who has risen above a long history of psychological problems, can withdraw behind his instruments and devote himself to crafting the distinctive Beach Boy sound: peaceful, but at a price.
HESTER CARVALHO
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Post by Kapitan on Mar 23, 2020 13:23:24 GMT
Thanks for posting that.
As is often the case, it seems like a reviewer taking things a little too much at face value: Wilson is writing and doling out all the parts; the voices are "scarcely less flexible technically" than they used to be (when the album is a Foskett feature than anything).
And as you hinted, there are the simple factual errors, like "guitarist Bruce Johnston."
Still always good to have more documentation out there for reference.
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