|
Post by kds on Mar 6, 2020 14:48:04 GMT
There will be plenty of talk about how Melinda saved his life, and motivated him to get serious about his solo career. There was some interview or documentary with Brian after Carl died and Brian talked about having written new songs for the band and going out on tour with them the next year (1999). I wonder what changed his mind? I honestly think Melinda, or somebody close to Brian, wanted to create a Brian Wilson Brand, with the intention of differentiating him from the not so hip Beach Boys image of the late 80s / early 90s that was still very fresh in peoples' minds.
|
|
|
Post by Kapitan on Mar 6, 2020 14:56:41 GMT
That wasn't a terrible strategy at that point. The Beach Boys had become pretty embarrassing. Probably not at their worst, but certainly not as good as they became once the fantastic BW Band (and Al's band, for that matter) gave them a little kick in the ass. For a little stretch there, the Beach Boys were the worst of the three Beach Boys bands out there.
And their image was pretty rough at that point, too. Several consecutive bad albums and a bizarre country self-covers album? Not the easiest rehabilitation project, especially if you're staying in it. Think about it like this, if you're Brian "the genius."
"The Beach Boys, of which I have been an integral part, have been terrible. I'm going to try to raise the quality of the band."
"The Beach Boys have been undermining me and have been terrible. I've given them enough and I'm going to do my own thing."
When your reputation is "the genius of the group" and things have been going badly, the second option probably did make a lot more business sense.
|
|
|
Post by kds on Mar 6, 2020 15:01:47 GMT
That wasn't a terrible strategy at that point. The Beach Boys had become pretty embarrassing. Probably not at their worst, but certainly not as good as they became once the fantastic BW Band (and Al's band, for that matter) gave them a little kick in the ass. For a little stretch there, the Beach Boys were the worst of the three Beach Boys bands out there.
And their image was pretty rough at that point, too. Several consecutive bad albums and a bizarre country self-covers album? Not the easiest rehabilitation project, especially if you're staying in it. Think about it like this, if you're Brian "the genius."
"The Beach Boys, of which I have been an integral part, have been terrible. I'm going to try to raise the quality of the band."
"The Beach Boys have been undermining me and have been terrible. I've given them enough and I'm going to do my own thing."
When your reputation is "the genius of the group" and things have been going badly, the second option probably did make a lot more business sense.
I agree. At the time it did make sense. But, I think it just hit a bit of a wall a few years ago. The albums didn't do quite as well as they'd hoped. He was never really able to get that elusive big hit as a solo artist.
|
|
|
Post by Kapitan on Mar 6, 2020 15:22:46 GMT
Right. I think the big difference is "at the time" versus "in hindsight."
Remove the personal considerations between the guys for a minute: we don't REALLY know how those dynamics work, so let's toss those out and just think about the music and the business.
Brian's camp knew in the late '90s what everyone had known since the early '60s: he was the best songwriter, arranger, producer of the group by far. (He probably was also the best singer back then, but by the late 90s that wasn't true anymore.) So he--and by that I mean "his team"--figured their reputation was in the toilet and he was the guy who could deliver actual new music to an audience that would probably err on the side of critical acclaim (whereas, for example, new Mike-and-Bruce music would almost certainly be received to critical mockery) almost regardless of the music itself. Plus, he was going to be touring with a band that could actually perform it flawlessly--technically better than any Beach Boys band had ever performed it live.
Where it didn't work out was that first of all, the Beach Boys upped their game dramatically. Starting in the 00s, that band got really good and also began integrating more of their "artistic" music alongside the hits. Second of all, I think they overestimated how much of the load Brian could personally handle as a frontman, especially once the thrill of seeing him at all began to fade. And third, I think they made a mistake in thinking that all people cared about was the music: I think fans really, really like the idea of "the Beach Boys," even if they don't know who the Beach Boys individually are. Having Mike, Al, Brian, and Bruce (and David, for that matter) together, trading off leads, being able to do joint interviews, reminiscing about old times--that stuff matters to a lot of fans.
I think we could have had something like a smaller-scale C50 setup all along. We could have had better, more diverse albums all along. New material from THE BEACH BOYS, not just reissue projects, rarities projects, and uneven Brian Wilson albums. TLOS as a Beach Boys album? Forget it. Amazing thought.
Of course as I said earlier, that's leaving out any personal issues. And obviously there are some, whatever they occasionally say ("oh, there's no bad blood...").
|
|
|
Post by kds on Mar 6, 2020 15:58:47 GMT
I also think that Brian's team outkicked their coverage a bit in assuming the name "Brian Wilson" has more cache than it does.
Also, it took a little while for them to get new music out there. Brian first went out as a solo act in 1999, then you had the honeymoon / Wow, it's Brian Wilson doing shows period, the cycles of Pet Sounds and Smile, then the first new music was..........GIOMH. Oops.
A smaller scale C50 would've been ideal, but I do think that Mike is a workaholic, and wants to be out there doing 100+ shows a year, and I'm not sure that would've been possible with Brian.
|
|
|
Post by Kapitan on Mar 6, 2020 16:22:57 GMT
Oh, I agree on all counts.
"Brian Wilson" had tremendous cache with insiders, hipsters ... Brian was a musician's musician at that point. But what are the sales revenues on "the man who brought you "Cabinessence" and "The Night Was So Young"? The reality is, Mike Love's long-standing discussion about the band's duality is right, if not so simple as Mike tells it. It's not just happy versus melancholy, but it absolutely is a strange combination of populist appeal, fun, nostalgia, and love with heartache, complexity, musical brilliance, and (frankly) the patron saint of anxiety and depression. Neither side REALLY works on its own for very long as a living organism. Both need the coexistence.
GIOMH as the first "real" Brian Wilson solo album (meaning one that appeared to be him running the show with his very good, very sympathetic band) was an absolute whiff. Just a turd. Not that it had nothing to offer, but for that time and place, it was TERRIBLE.
And the point about the reunited project, the small-scale C50, just yeah. That's the personalities, the business models. And that's where it just might not have been reconcilable. (For strong evidence, let's note how rarely in the grand scheme of their now nearly 60-year history they have actually worked as a true unit.) Whatever the possible commercial and artistic benefits, maybe they just saw themselves as wanting to work for different companies, so to speak. It's as different as working in the corporate office on one side and the internet startup or creative agency on the other. They apparently just don't see "going to work" in the same way.
|
|
|
Post by kds on Mar 6, 2020 17:12:23 GMT
Oh, I agree on all counts.
"Brian Wilson" had tremendous cache with insiders, hipsters ... Brian was a musician's musician at that point. But what are the sales revenues on "the man who brought you "Cabinessence" and "The Night Was So Young"? The reality is, Mike Love's long-standing discussion about the band's duality is right, if not so simple as Mike tells it. It's not just happy versus melancholy, but it absolutely is a strange combination of populist appeal, fun, nostalgia, and love with heartache, complexity, musical brilliance, and (frankly) the patron saint of anxiety and depression. Neither side REALLY works on its own for very long as a living organism. Both need the coexistence.
GIOMH as the first "real" Brian Wilson solo album (meaning one that appeared to be him running the show with his very good, very sympathetic band) was an absolute whiff. Just a turd. Not that it had nothing to offer, but for that time and place, it was TERRIBLE.
And the point about the reunited project, the small-scale C50, just yeah. That's the personalities, the business models. And that's where it just might not have been reconcilable. (For strong evidence, let's note how rarely in the grand scheme of their now nearly 60-year history they have actually worked as a true unit.) Whatever the possible commercial and artistic benefits, maybe they just saw themselves as wanting to work for different companies, so to speak. It's as different as working in the corporate office on one side and the internet startup or creative agency on the other. They apparently just don't see "going to work" in the same way.
When you think about it, it took Brian nearly a decade from his launch as a solo artist in 1999 to release an album of original material that was really worth a damn (TLOS), and it might have been too little too late. If he had been able to release a good album on the heels of touring Pet Sounds and reviving Smile, his status as a solo artist could've been very different.
|
|
|
Post by Kapitan on Mar 6, 2020 18:19:08 GMT
I wonder. I admit, I never felt that was the case--at least not then. For me, TLOS didn't feel like THAT long a wait. For me, yes, Imagination was heavily flawed. Then there were a few live albums, which felt like BW getting his sea legs back with a more or less permanent new band. Then the live BWPS-GIOMH-studio BWPS-Christmas flurry of activity was like a whirlwind, even if none of those were wholly original. They all felt at least partially (and I guess all were partially) original. And then not long after, TLOS.
It always felt to me more like he wasn't able to keep it going with new material, as opposed to disinterest in him as a solo artist from the fans. Instead it was another PS tour, two more covers albums, then the C50/NPP/endless PS tours.
That's why I say it's more that we just learned while he was and is undoubtedly the best Beach Boy in terms of bringing new material, he just isn't able to do enough anymore. Making matters worse, he did pigeon-hole himself into doing the "genius" work, so he's either criticized for mining that same territory, or he's criticized for reverting to the Beach Boys formula he left behind.
|
|
|
Post by kds on Mar 6, 2020 18:33:28 GMT
I wonder. I admit, I never felt that was the case--at least not then. For me, TLOS didn't feel like THAT long a wait. For me, yes, Imagination was heavily flawed. Then there were a few live albums, which felt like BW getting his sea legs back with a more or less permanent new band. Then the live BWPS-GIOMH-studio BWPS-Christmas flurry of activity was like a whirlwind, even if none of those were wholly original. They all felt at least partially (and I guess all were partially) original. And then not long after, TLOS.
It always felt to me more like he wasn't able to keep it going with new material, as opposed to disinterest in him as a solo artist from the fans. Instead it was another PS tour, two more covers albums, then the C50/NPP/endless PS tours.
That's why I say it's more that we just learned while he was and is undoubtedly the best Beach Boy in terms of bringing new material, he just isn't able to do enough anymore. Making matters worse, he did pigeon-hole himself into doing the "genius" work, so he's either criticized for mining that same territory, or he's criticized for reverting to the Beach Boys formula he left behind.
I don't even necessarily think it's a bad thing that he doesn't release new stuff often. There's plenty of legacy artists who are less prolific than Brian now. I just think the timing was poor.
|
|
|
Post by Sheriff John Stone on Mar 7, 2020 14:58:45 GMT
Brian's "decision" to pursue a solo career and basically no longer be a Beach Boy is, in my opinion, one of the most important and relatively least-discussed occurrences in the group's history. At the time (the mid-1990's), there were signs that Brian might be leaning in that direction with the Paley sessions, the I Just Wasn't Made For These Times documentary, and his participation with Van Dyke Parks on Orange Crate Art. He was definitely becoming more active, more active by himself. Surely when the time came to release an album of his own new material, he would redirect all of his attention back to The Beach Boys. But that never happened. To be exact, it only happened one more time in the ensuing 25 years, and that was for the group's 50th Anniversary. But why? Why did Brian Wilson become a full-time (permanent?) solo artist, and a...former Beach Boy? Let's go back to the mid-1990's...
Touring: It didn't work since 1964 and it wasn't going to work now. Brian showing up sporadically for concerts like he did from 1976-1982 wasn't an option. Well, it was, but things had changed with the touring band, something called stability. Mike Love was still insistent on playing 150+ dates a year. That wasn't going to change either, and there was no way Brian could physically and emotionally handle that situation. The only logical solution, one which many fans would've preferred, would've been to include Brian on the tours but reduce the dates significantly. I personally would've recommended an annual "Summer Tour" from Memorial Day to Labor Day, and then a "Holiday Tour" starting November 1 and finishing with a special New Year's Eve concert. That would leave a good six-seven months each year to rest and/or pursue other interests. But, obviously that wasn't an option either. So, what did that leave Brian, who, as we now know, was ready to return to touring in some fashion? Form his own band and tour just the way HE wants to. And that's exactly what they did.
The Music: I do think Melinda had some grasp on Brian's musical abilities - and shortcomings - when she became his wifeandmanager. I'm sure she approved of and maybe even helped in recruiting Jeff Foskett, Darian Sahanaja, Nicky Wonder, Mike D'Amico, Probyn Gregory and the rest to form Brian's new band. I also wouldn't be surprised if Melinda was advocating for outside collaborators and producers. She had to make this solo career work and was going to do whatever it took to make it a success. In my opinion, she had to "sell" this alternative career, a non-Beach Boys' career, to Brian. She had to cover all the bases and make Brian comfortable enough to go along with it. She did and he did. Where I think most involved in this decision were short-sighted was the most important factor of all. Did Brian Wilson still have the music in him to make this solo career venture a success? What would the quality be like? Would he have enough new material? Could he sing well enough to carry an entire album? Could he still produce and arrange to the old Brian Wilson standards? Did he still have the magic? I'll leave the answers to those questions for others to answer. But I'll ask one more question, and a long one. Would've it been better - for Brian AND The Beach Boys - to just take the BEST OF Brian's new music and record it with The Beach Boys' voices, maybe taking five or six of Brian's best songs and adding one each from Mike, Al, Bruce, David, and Carl (when he was still alive), along with a cover or two, and releasing THAT as a new Beach Boys' album? I would've taken my chances with that as opposed to a Brian Wilson solo album. Of course that was my personal preference, but many times over the last twenty-five years I also wondered if that would've been Brian's preference, too. Yes, there were stumbling blocks. Big ones. Mike Love's desire to write with Brian was always going to be there and would've had to be addressed. But I've always thought that Brian never entirely shut the door on being a Beach Boy. Musically, didn't he continue to think and compose as a Beach Boy? He continued to arrange vocals by imagining the guy's voices in his head. On every solo album that Brian recorded, he did not significantly "step away" from his past Beach Boys' music. So, then, what was the point of going solo if you continued to return to Beach Boys musically? I think the answer lies with the next category.
Personal Issues: I think this was the main reason that Brian left The Beach Boys and never returned. Warning: This is pure speculation on my part. I think Brian and Melinda did a lot of talking about Brian's family and The Beach Boys as a musical group and as a business. And, I think Brian associated names like Murry, Dennis, Carl, Capitol Records, doctors, other family/friends, Mike Love, and yes, even Al Jardine with many bad memories, personal turmoil, and continued stress. This was baggage, emotional baggage that Brian spent about a quarter century trying to reconcile. It might've been difficult for Brian to reconcile his past because, as much unhappiness that those people brought him, they were also directly and indirectly responsible for many of his greatest musical triumphs. So, why should Brian go back to them, to it? Why would he even want to? Other than creating more music with them, and who knows what that held, was it worth all of the grief that would inevitably accompany it? I think they chose "no". Brian didn't want to return to that. Brian had just be freed from Eugene Landy. He just got married. He was making new friends, family, and contacts. Why go back when you can go forward, wherever forward may lead you. I think Melinda took a page out of the Dr. Landy playbook and was very influential in keeping Brian away from The Beach Boys' craziness. I mean, even us BB/BW diehards know about that. We write about it all the time. We're constantly pointing out huge mistakes, things that didn't make sense, decisions that derailed them personally and professionally. Yes, I think Brian and Melinda looked at that and decided, no, not THAT again. Was the move out of California and to Illinois a direct attempt to leave certain things behind and try a new beginning...elsewhere?
Would've there been a way for The Beach Boys and Brian Wilson to work things out, to co-exist musically and personally? I don't KNOW, but I thought there had to be a way. Much of the craziness - drugs, certain doctors, certain family members, certain record companies, hangers on, etc. - were gone. Maybe they did grow up, maybe they would've learned from their past mistakes. Of course it would've worked this time. Nah, who am I kidding...
|
|
|
Post by Kapitan on Mar 8, 2020 0:23:47 GMT
But I'll ask one more question, and a long one. Would've it been better - for Brian AND The Beach Boys - to just take the BEST OF Brian's new music and record it with The Beach Boys' voices, maybe taking five or six of Brian's best songs and adding one each from Mike, Al, Bruce, David, and Carl (when he was still alive), along with a cover or two, and releasing THAT as a new Beach Boys' album? That's easy: yes. It would've been better. We talked earlier about how Brian's output was infrequent and uneven. Al's was even more so. "The Beach Boys" didn't release anything new at all until TWGMTR. Mike, until recently, had occasionally recorded but rarely released.
There's just no question that even had Brian taken the exact same material he DID record and release, but do it with the Beach Boys and some combination of their bands, those albums would have been better. But if you supplement them with 25-50% other guys' best material, too? The band could have--COULD HAVE, with the best choices for material and production, something generally age appropriate and not chasing every little fad (e.g. not caving to the worst of Mike Love's latter-day instincts)--had a resurgent late-stage career. There's no reason there couldn't have been several TWGMTR-caliber albums. I rate TLOS as roughly that caliber already, and obviously it could have been improved. Ditto GIOMH, Imagination, etc.: they could have been pretty darn good with some song replacements, better vocals, solid production.
|
|
|
Post by kds on Mar 8, 2020 1:17:29 GMT
Like most things Beach Boys, its another "if only" blown opportunity. I think it was on this board that I took the best (IMO) songs from NPP and UTL and combined this for a circa 2015 "Beach Boys album." It was quite a solid playlist.
|
|
|
Post by Sheriff John Stone on Mar 8, 2020 2:39:14 GMT
But I'll ask one more question, and a long one. Would've it been better - for Brian AND The Beach Boys - to just take the BEST OF Brian's new music and record it with The Beach Boys' voices, maybe taking five or six of Brian's best songs and adding one each from Mike, Al, Bruce, David, and Carl (when he was still alive), along with a cover or two, and releasing THAT as a new Beach Boys' album? That's easy: yes. It would've been better. We talked earlier about how Brian's output was infrequent and uneven. Al's was even more so. "The Beach Boys" didn't release anything new at all until TWGMTR. Mike, until recently, had occasionally recorded but rarely released.
There's just no question that even had Brian taken the exact same material he DID record and release, but do it with the Beach Boys and some combination of their bands, those albums would have been better. But if you supplement them with 25-50% other guys' best material, too? The band could have--COULD HAVE, with the best choices for material and production, something generally age appropriate and not chasing every little fad (e.g. not caving to the worst of Mike Love's latter-day instincts)--had a resurgent late-stage career. There's no reason there couldn't have been several TWGMTR-caliber albums. I rate TLOS as roughly that caliber already, and obviously it could have been improved. Ditto GIOMH, Imagination, etc.: they could have been pretty darn good with some song replacements, better vocals, solid production.
The discussion always leads me to this point - the group needed a manager, a competent manager. And, maybe not even a manager by definition, but somebody who the group would listen to and have confidence in. An "adviser" would actually be a better term, somebody who had some common sense and would have a better grasp of "the best way to go". I realize there were five or six very different personalities, so the task would've been daunting to get them all on the same page. But at the same time, post-1976, I'm not so sure the guys couldn't have been led. It's not that they didn't care (well, not all the time); they all had a lot of personal, financial, and professional problems. The only one who was really "leading" was Mike, and we know that his ideas, while ambitious at times, were not taking the group where they needed to go. It was just one misstep after another, and people like Steve Love were not the answer. It's still a mystery to me why James Guercio was not more effective, but it seemed like he never really wanted to take charge in the way he did with Chicago.
|
|
|
Post by Kapitan on Mar 8, 2020 12:04:27 GMT
And here is where you and I always seem to part ways. You tend to end up with the "better/different manager" solution, which I fully agree makes sense objectively.
But I always end up with "but they obviously didn't want to." I think commercially and artistically it was a slam dunk, yet despite numerous tepid attempts at coming together, they never did and it was always acrimonious. The personal problems come into play, and they matter a lot. It always comes back to that for me: they clearly didn't want to be in a band together (or at least didn't want to be in the kind of band that one another might want to be in). So they weren't. The best manager in the world can't make them want to do what they don't want to do.
|
|
|
Post by Sheriff John Stone on Mar 8, 2020 12:54:18 GMT
I always wonder not HOW MUCH the guys tried to work out their differences, but HOW they tried to solve their problems. I'm assuming they had periodic meetings as BRI, but how productive were they? I have to think they weren't well attended other than by the attorneys and accountants. I mean, how exactly did the guys communicate and express their needs and wants? Was it through attorneys, was it through mutual friends, or did the manager at the time go around and speak to each Beach Boy individually and then summarize what he/she found out in some kind of report. Or, maybe it was just one Beach Boy (probably Mike post-1977) who was even inspired enough to have an idea and/or motivated enough to pursue it, and the other guys just went along with it in varying degrees of enthusiasm (or not - thinking of Dennis).
I often think about the September 1977 meltdown and the ensuing M.I.U. project. OK, the band has a major argument, a major disagreement, and a subsequent fallout. How was that handled? Apparently not satisfactorily. You might think there was NO WAY the group was ever going to agree on Mike's M.I.U. idea. If they - Carl and Dennis - wanted to keep their distance at that time, there was no way and no one who was going to change their minds. Really? Did they try? Who tried? Did they meet? Did they try to make M.I.U. an album that would work for everybody? And if that wasn't possible, did they have an alternate plan?
I don't know all the particulars about the M.I.U. excursion, but from what I read it was Mike's idea and that was that. Either you're coming along - or you're not. And Carl and Dennis didn't. Wonderful...Where was management? Where was an intermediary? Where was a friend of the group? Where was anybody? I have a feeling it was left to the five Beach Boys and that was that. Mike probably went to a meeting (or maybe just his attorney went), made a proposal, got it passed somehow, and that was that. How many other Beach Boys were even represented?
The Beach Boys have no one to blame for their failures but themselves. I guess we can all agree on that.
|
|