Wilson, Brian (1942- )

Subterms

    Latest story

    88 Shares25 Views

    The Musical Mysteries Brian Wilson Left Behind

    by

    The Beach Boys mastermind has been the subject of pop scholarship and major boxed sets, but some corners of his oeuvre remain unreleased.Though Brian Wilson was one of pop’s most studied artists, he largely remained an enigma. The Beach Boys leader, whose death at 82 was announced this week, made music for the masses with an artisan’s eye for detail. While his biography was well known, questions about what drove him to the top of the charts — and ultimately deep into darkness — could never definitively be answered.Since the start of the CD era, Wilson’s legacy has been burnished by a series of deep-dive archival efforts, including the 1993 “Good Vibrations” boxed set, the revelatory “Pet Sounds Sessions” collection from 1996, a series of early 2000s reissues focused on the band’s Brother label years, and ultimately the holy grail: the release of his abandoned mid-60s masterwork, “Smile,” in 2011.“Everything Brian created is worth hearing and it all has a kind of historical value in terms of understanding his life,” said David Leaf, the Beach Boys historian who published “Smile: The Rise, Fall & Resurrection of Brian Wilson” this spring.In more recent years, that effort has continued with sets focused on the Beach Boys’ overlooked and often deceptively strange 1970s work. “These projects continue to come out with all this new and unheard material,” said the author Peter Ames Carlin, who wrote a 2006 biography of Wilson, “Catch a Wave.” “It’s a testament to just how creative and prolific Brian was — despite the many ups and downs of his life.”Even with the consistent release of music from the vaults, there are fascinating corners of Wilson’s oeuvre that have yet to see the light of day. Here’s a rundown.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    More stories

    • 138 Shares34 Views

      in Elections

      Paul McCartney, Carole King and Others Pay Tribute to Brian Wilson

      by

      Wilson, whose death was announced on Wednesday, leaves behind an immense musical legacy that spans several decades. King and others share how his music shaped them.Brian Wilson, the leader of the Beach Boys who death at 82 was announced on Wednesday, provided a joyous soundtrack for beach vacations and summer road trips for generations of people.Among pop and rock musicians he will also be remembered as a talented songwriter and studio pioneer whose music has had an immense influence for decades on those who followed him.The Beach Boys had 13 singles in the Billboard Top 10, with three of them reaching No. 1. Their influence on the surf rock genre and on popular music generally was recognized by the variety of people who paid respects on social media to Wilson on Wednesday.Here’s what some of Wilson’s friends had to say about his death and legacy.Paul McCartney, a Wilson contemporary, noted that there was a chorus of tributes from other musicians, saying Wilson had a “mysterious sense of musical genius” that made his songs special. “The notes he heard in his head and passed to us were simple and brilliant at the same time,” McCartney said. “I loved him, and was privileged to be around his bright shining light for a little while. How we will continue without Brian Wilson, ‘God Only Knows.’”Carole King, also a contemporary, wrote on Facebook that Wilson was her friend and brother in songwriting. “We shared a similar sensibility, as evidenced by his 4 over 5 chord under ‘Aaaah!’ in ‘Good Vibrations’ and mine under ‘I’m Into Something Good,’” she said. “We once discussed who used it first, and in the end we decided it didn’t matter.”In 2015, “Love & Mercy,” a biopic about Wilson’s life starring John Cusack was released. On Wednesday, Cusack said that the “maestro” had died, adding that the hitmaker was an open heart with two legs “with an ear that heard the angels.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 100 Shares18 Views

      in Elections

      How “Pet Sounds” Became the Beach Boys Masterpiece

      by

      Brian Wilson’s 1966 masterpiece is now considered a crowning achievement of music. The album’s reputation grew over time.Making a list of the best rock albums ever is easy: Something old (the Beatles), something new (or newer; perhaps Radiohead), something borrowed (the Rolling Stones’ blues or disco pastiches) and Joni Mitchell’s “Blue.”And, of course, bursting into the top 10 — and often higher — of any respectable list: “Pet Sounds.”The overwhelming brainchild of Brian Wilson, the Beach Boys’ chief songwriter whose death at 82 was announced on Wednesday, “Pet Sounds” is beautiful — with gorgeous vocal harmonies, haunting timbres and wistful lyrics of adolescent longing and estrangement. It was a landmark in studio experimentation that changed the idea of how albums could be made. But one thing that stands out about the Beach Boys’ masterpiece is how gradually it came to be widely celebrated, compared with many of its peers.“When it was released in the United States,” said Jan Butler, a senior lecturer in popular music at Oxford Brookes University in the United Kingdom, “it did pretty well, but for the Beach Boys, it was considered a flop.”Released in the spring of 1966, “Pet Sounds” represented a break from the catchy tunes about surfing, cars and girls that the group had consistently rode to the top of the charts. The opening track is called “Wouldn’t It Be Nice,” but previous Beach Boys songs had described how nice it was.The album peaked at No. 10 — low for one of the most popular acts at the time — and was the first Beach Boys album in three years not to reach gold status, Butler wrote in a chapter of an academic book. The Beach Boys’ record company, Capitol, rushed out a greatest-hits that outsold the album of original music.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More