Brian Wilson

For other people named Brian Wilson, see Brian Wilson (disambiguation).

Brian Douglas Wilson (born June 20, 1942 in Hawthorne, California) is an American musician best known as the lead songwriter, bassist, and singer of the American rock band The Beach Boys. Wilson was also the band's main producer, composer, and arranger. The lead vocal parts for The Beach Boys recordings were primarily sung by either Wilson or Mike Love.

Early influences included The Four Freshmen and Chuck Berry, among others. Wilson admired Phil Spector, considering him both a mentor and rival.

Wilson was a perfectionist in the studio, and often upset the other members of the Beach Boys with this incessant drive for perfection. Though one of the first users of an eight-channel multitrack tape recorder, he shunned stereophonic sound, preferring (as Spector did) to work in monaural — because he believed stereo gave an incomplete "sound picture" if the listener wasn't directly between the speakers although, this can also be partially attributed to Wilson being deaf in his right ear.

Biography

With The Beach Boys

Main article: The Beach Boys

Wilson formed The Beach Boys in the early 1960s with his brothers Carl and Dennis, his cousin Mike Love, and schoolfriend Al Jardine, who was briefly replaced by David Marks. They were originally named The Pendletones by Mike Love, the name being derived from Pendleton shirts which were fashionable at the time. Russ Regan, who was involved in promoting the group's first single, "Surfin'", is credited in Wilson's autobiography with renaming the group. The Beach Boys didn't find out about the change, however, until they saw the new name on the "Surfin'" single's label.

In 1965, Wilson felt he could not play live with the band as well as write new material; so Glen Campbell, a regular session musician, replaced Wilson for three months of tours before quitting to pursue a solo career. Bruce Johnston then joined the band. Wilson steered the group to huge success around the world and they scored a string of international hits between 1962 and 1967, including pop classics such as "Surfin' USA," "Fun, Fun, Fun"," "I Get Around," "Help Me Rhonda," "California Girls," "Wouldn't It Be Nice," "Good Vibrations," and "Heroes and Villains." He also produced records for other artists, including Glen Campbell and the Honeys, but with nowhere near the success he had with the Beach Boys. He also co-wrote many of the biggest hits for Jan and Dean during this period.

Until mid-1967, the international success and popularity of the Beach Boys put them among the world's biggest acts of the time, such as the Beatles, who later cited Wilson's work as a major influence. Wilson in turn considered the Beatles his other chief rivals, though he and fellow bassist-keyboardist Paul McCartney, born only two days earlier than himself, became friends. McCartney has frequently expressed his opinion that Wilson's "God Only Knows" is the greatest song ever written.

Wilson's creativity reached its apex during the mid-1960s with the Pet Sounds album (which, according to Paul McCartney, inspired the Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band). Various music polls have named Pet Sounds one of the greatest pop albums ever recorded, having reached 1st in Mojo's and New Musician Express all time albums-lists. Pet Sounds marked the first time Brian Wilson was featured as a solo artist when Capitol Records released the track "Caroline, No" not by The Beach Boys but as Brian Wilson.

This was immediately followed by their biggest chart success, the million-selling #1 hit single "Good Vibrations." Wilson then began work on a new album, originally called Dumb Angel but soon re-titled SMiLE, on which he collaborated with lyricist Van Dyke Parks, and on which "Good Vibrations" would have been included. However, the combination of resistance from within the group and Wilson's own growing personal problems led to the cancellation of the project in May of 1967.

File:Bwilson2.jpg

Brian Wilson, c. 1984.

Wilson also was the owner of a health food shop in Hollywood that lasted a year from its founding in the summer of 1969, the "Radiant Radish."

Mental illness

After production of SMiLE ceased in May 1967, Wilson prepared a single release of its central song, "Heroes and Villains". It stalled on the charts, briefly peaking at #12 in America. Psychologically overwhelmed by these failures and by the birth of his first child in 1968, Wilson began to take on a diminished creative role within the Beach Boys. Until about 1970 he remained the group's principal songwriter, but increasingly production reins were handed to younger brother Carl. Wilson mostly oversaw the albums Smiley Smile, Wild Honey and Friends, the first of which consisted mostly of recycled SMiLE material. All three were considered failures at the time. After that, he all but stopped writing songs and was frequently seen partying in the company of songwriter Tandyn Almer and Three Dog Night singer Danny Hutton. It was during this period that he was introduced to cocaine. Any hope of Wilson assuming his former level of dedication were crushed in 1969, when the single "Break Away" - produced by Brian and co-written by himself and his father Murry - reached a dismal #63 on the American charts. The contemporaneous Beach Boys album, 20/20, the group's last for Capitol, was made mostly without Wilson's participation.

After the failure of "Break Away", Wilson spent the majority of the following three years in his bedroom sleeping, taking drugs, and overeating. Some of his "new" contributions were remnants of SMiLE (e.g., "Surf's Up"); those that were genuinely new reflected his depression and growing detachment from the world ("Til I Die", the EP "Mount Vernon and Fairway"). Reportedly, Warner Brothers was so desperate for material from Wilson that the single "We Got Love" (co-written by Ricky Fataar, Blondie Chaplin, and Love) was scrapped in favor of "Sail On, Sailor", a song mostly written by committee (including Almer and Parks) that happened to draw its initial germ from a Wilson chord sequence. The Canadian band, The Barenaked Ladies' song Brian Wilson referes to this period of his life.

In 1975, Brian's wife and family enlisted the services of controversial therapist Eugene Landy in a bid to help Brian, and as a by-product, help revive the group's ailing profile. Brian did not stay under Landy's care for long, but during this short period, the doctor managed to help him into a more productive, social frame of mind. New albums were recorded, and for the first time since 1964, Brian started to regularly appear live on stage with the band. Brian was also deemed to be well enough to do a solo performance on Saturday Night Live in November 1976. The situation continued for a few years, but by 1982, his mental state had deteriorated even further; he was taking large amounts of cocaine, he weighed over 300 pounds, and he was in danger of losing his life.

Eugene Landy was once more called into action, and a more radical program was undertaken to try to restore Brian to health. This involved firing him from the Beach Boys, isolating him from his family on Hawaii, and being put onto a rigorous diet and health regimen. This, coupled with long, extreme counselling sessions, brought Brian back to reality. He was certainly healthier and more conversant than previously, but he was also under a strict level of control by Landy. Brian's recovery continued as he joined the band on stage in Live Aid in 1985, and recorded a new eponymous album with the Beach Boys.

It was variously reported that Wilson had either schizophrenia or bipolar affective disorder. Dr. Landy's treatment regimen was not a recognized treatment for either of these mental illnesses. Some years later, during his second marriage, he was diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder, bipolar type which supposedly caused him to hear voices in his head. According to the new Peter Ames Carlin biography of Wilson, Catch A Wave, Wilson's drug regimen has been reduced to a mild combination of antidepressants, which keep him functioning at a more socially acceptable level than he has been at in decades, enabling him to record and tour.

Solo career

File:Bwilson3.jpg

Brian Wilson, after making a significant recovery, in 1988

Wilson launched a career as a solo artist in 1988 with limited success. It is possible that his efforts in this regard were both encouraged and hampered by Landy's influence. Partly due to the control that Landy exercised on his life, Wilson stopped working with the Beach Boys on a regular basis after the release of The Beach Boys in 1985.

Wilson released a solo album, Brian Wilson, in 1988 and a memoir, Wouldn't It Be Nice - My Own Story, in which he spoke for the first time about his troubled relationship with his abusive father Murry and his "lost years" of mental illness. It is widely understood that although it was written following interviews with Brian and others, Landy was largely responsible for the book, in conjunction with People magazine writer Todd Gold. The book describes Landy in terms that could be called messianic. In a later lawsuit over the book, Wilson testified in court that he hadn't even read the final manuscript. As a result, the book was taken out of press some years later. It should also be noted that the book used parts of other Beach Boys books written by Gaines and Leaf without crediting the sources . They also altered these "borrowings" to put other people's words into Brian's mouth.

Landy's illegal use of psychotropic drugs on Wilson and his influence over Wilson's financial affairs was legally ended by Wilson's brother Carl. In 1995, Wilson married Melinda Ledbetter after a longstanding relationship with Stephanie Marks and subsequently the couple adopted two girls, Daria and Delanie, and, in 2004, a son, Dylan. He has two daughters from his first marriage to Marilyn Rovell, Carnie Wilson and Wendy Wilson, who would go on to musical success of their own in the early 1990s as two-thirds of Wilson Phillips.

Also in 1995 he released two albums, albeit neither containing any new original material, almost simultaneously. The first, the soundtrack to Don Was's documentary I Just Wasn't Made for These Times, consists of re-recorded versions of songs from his Beach Boys and solo catalogue produced by Was, along with a 1976-vintage demo recording. The second, Orange Crate Art, saw Wilson as lead vocalist on an album of songs produced, arranged and (mostly) written by Van Dyke Parks, and was released as a duo album under both men's names.

His final release as part of the group was on the 1996 album Stars and Stripes Vol. 1, a group collaboration with select country music artists singing the lead vocals. After considerable mental recovery, he mended his relationship with his daughters Carnie and Wendy and the three of them released an album in 1997 titled "The Wilsons."

Wilson released a second solo album of (mostly) new material, Imagination, in 1998. Following this, he learned to cope with his stage fright and started to play live for the first time in decades, going on to play the whole Pet Sounds album live on his tours of the United States, United Kingdom, and Europe. In 2004 Brian astounded the pop world by performing SMiLE (his legendary unreleased Beach Boys album abandoned in 1967) live, debuting at London's Royal Festival Hall, February 20th.

A new studio album, Gettin' in Over My Head, was released on 22 June, 2004. It featured collaborations with Elton John, Paul McCartney, Eric Clapton, and Wilson's deceased brother Carl. Eric Clapton played on the track "City Blues." The album was almost entirely composed of re-recordings of unreleased material, and received mixed reviews.

SMiLE resurrected

Main article: Smile (Brian Wilson album)

On 28 September 2004, a newly recorded version of Wilson's previously shelved SMiLE album was released. The album had reached mythic proportions within Beach Boys fandom, and the 1966/1967 sessions had been heavily bootlegged. The 2004 recording features his backup/touring band, which consists of former Beach Boys guitarist Jeff Foskett and members of the Wondermints and others, including backup singer Taylor Mills. In this version, the song "Good Vibrations" notably features Tony Asher's original, temporary lyrics instead of the more familiar ones penned by Beach Boy Mike Love from the 1966 single version of the song.

Ironically, Wilson, long known for using the human voice as an instrument (both his own, and also those of The Beach Boys), won his first Grammy award not for Best Vocal Performance, but for best rock instrumental, the SMiLE track "Mrs. O'Leary's Cow (Fire)." He released the award-winning two-DVD "Smile" set, consisting of a documentary and a live presentation of the work. He toured the USA for the second half of 2005, also releasing a Christmas album for Arista Records, called What I Really Want for Christmas. The release hit #200 on the Billboard chart, a rarity for a holiday offering, though its sales were modest. Wilson's remake of the classic "Deck The Halls" became a surprise Top 10 Adult Contemporary hit.

Though no longer a part of The Beach Boys touring band, Brian Wilson remains a member of the Beach Boys corporation, Brother Records Incorporated.

Recent events

Recently, Brian Wilson cameoed in Duck Dodgers in the 24½th Century as Daffy Duck's spiritual surfing advisor. He also made a musical appearance on the 2005 holiday episode of Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, performing "Deck the Halls" for a group of children with xeroderma pigmentosum (hypersensitivity to sunlight) at Walt Disney World, which specially opened at night for these children.

He is back on the road again performing both newer material from his solo career, as well as his classic albums 'Smile' and 'Pet Sounds' with his latter-day band.

On July 2, 2005 Wilson performed for the Live 8 concert in Berlin, Germany.

In September 2005, fans from Brian's message board took part in a charity drive to aid the victims of Hurricane Katrina. Brian and Melinda arranged a system whereby any and all fans who donated at least $100 or more for the cause would receive a personal phone call from Brian himself. [1] - According to the website, over $250K was raised.

In 2005, former bandmate Mike Love sued Wilson over "shamelessly misappropriating... Love's songs, likeness, and the Beach Boys trademark, as well as the 'Smile' album itself" in the promotion of SMiLE and an exclusive CD collection issued through a British newspaper to promote the release. ([2]) Wilson's representatives have responded on the official message board that the lawsuit is "meritless" and that Brian "will vigorously defend himself" in court. ([3]) The lawsuit was thrown out of court on May 16, 2007 on the grounds that it was meritless. ([4])

On November 1, 2006, Wilson kicked off a small but highly anticipated tour [5][6] celebrating the 40th anniversary of Pet Sounds. The concert, at UCLA's Royce Hall in Los Angeles, was attended by a sell-out crowd, who accorded Wilson multiple standing ovations. Wilson was backed by a 12-member band, which included one-time Beach Boy Al Jardine (who himself received a standing ovation) and long-time bandmate and musical director Jeff Foskett ([7]). After a long set of oldies, most of which were written by Wilson, the band performed Pet Sounds in its entirety.

On November 14, 2006, Wilson was inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame by legendary Pink Floyd guitarist David Gilmour, performing "God Only Knows" and "Good Vibrations" at the ceremony.

In September 2007, Wilson debuted a new song cycle entitled That Lucky Old Sun (A Narrative) at Royal Festival Hall in London, England. The new piece consists of four 'rounds', with interspersed spoken words.[8]

Wilson will headline the Sydney Festival in January 2008, performing a free concert as well as two paid appearances featuring performances of Pet Sounds and That Lucky Old Sun.

Awards and recognitions

On December 2, 2007, the prestigious Kennedy Center Honors committee recognized Brian for a lifetime of contributions to American culture through the performing arts in music.

Discography

Brian Wilson Discography

See also

• The Beach Boys
• List of Beach Boys songs by singer - Brian Wilson
• List of songs by Brian Wilson
• Beach Boys Historic Landmark

External links

• Official site
• 2004 Larry King Transcript where they speak about Wilson's mental illness
• Un-official fan site: "Cabinessence: web page for Brian Wilson"
• Extensive discography & timeline
• Dumb Angel Magazine: Brian Wilson, Beach Boys* Salon review of The Pet Sounds Sessions (12 November 1997)
• "After the wipe out" by Ginny Dougary in The Guardian (1 June 2002)
• "Four Decades Later, Wilson's 'Smile' Hits London" Audio review at NPR (25 February 2004)
• SMiLE Timeline
• New York Review of Books review of Smile (22 September 2005)
• Brian Wilson Pictures from 2007 Consumer Electronics Show performance
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