Brain Dead Beach Boy

[hech54]

Can someone....anyone please tell me why the hell this brain dead talentless idiot is being "honored" so much recently? I don't get it.
The Beach Boys(with or without this putz) were THE worst live band in history and their studio stuff was mindless dribble.
Judging by their live performances...it probably took them a month to record each studio song because they were genuinely TERRIBLE singers with non-existant harmony.
Anyone?

[hoyboy]

Good...good...good good vibrations

[Kunta Kinte]

They weren't braggin' babe, so don't put em down...

[adam]

I never saw them live so I can't comment on that but are you SURE you actually saw the real Beach Boys? They split up and several of the members continued to tour as The Beach Boys and another member toured as The Beach Boys, Friends and Family. Both groups were still playing the same old Beach Boys songs and neither group sounded the same as the original act.

Anyway, Pet Sounds is one of the greatest albums ever recorded, and their earlier stuff is fantastic and really unlike any other music in existence. They were a classic band and very influencial. Now, Brian Wilson can't even talk but he's still riding the wave that they created years ago. I haven't followed their recent accolades. If the awards are for past recordings, well I say its about time. If its for Brian Wilson's current stuff, its obvious charity.

I saw a concert DVD of Brian Wilson's tour and quite frankly its just sad. He genuinely loves music and really gets into it, but its as if they added singing as a Special Olympics event.

[zzyzzx]

Presumably they were so popular in their day due to lack of competition of all the other venues we have today. Either that or all their fans were on drugs, or something.

[BobV]

That would be we were on somthin and it was a different time, but they were fun. Take icecream its very simple but at the same time great.

[BJ_M]

they used to have VERY good harmonies .. adam is right , they dont even sound 10% now what they used to sound like, so its a bad call to make ...

[hech54]

The Little River Band had great harmonies...live and studio....The Eagles had great harmonies....live and studio....the Beach Boys were terrible.
My call...sorry.

[BJ_M]

well - your wrong - sorry :P

some reviews to back this up

http://music.lycos.com/artist/bio.asp?QT=A&QW=The+Beach+Boys&AN=The+Beach+Boys&MID=1730&MH=
http://talk.livedaily.com/store/Beach_Boys-B00005ASHM.html

Pet Sounds though was the last good album really ..

[lordsmurf]

It can't be any worse than Britney Spears or the Simpson sisters.

[Rookie64]

If you think they're bad, try some {offsping} Wilson Phillips and you might reconsider worst live band ever


I can't say I ever really got into The Beach Boys, though I thought they did a pretty good cover of California Dreaming in '78 for the movie soundtrack of the same name.

They somewhat influenced Lindsey Buckingham/Fleetwood Mac...and the Mac did a cover of Farmer's Daughter around the time Christine McVie and the late Dennis Wilson were an item.

[BJ_M]

personally i never liked their music that much either ..

Wilson Phillips are not even CLOSE to the worse bands ... god there is some awful ones out there ..

[hech54]

Fleetwood Mac....another HUGELY OVER-RATED band. Stevie Nicks singing sounds like someone killing a sheep.
As far as reviews go...how many GLOWING reviews have been written for bands like the Rolling Stones? Those guys have 5 brain cells between them and those are only motor function brain cells, the last 10 records have sounded exactly the same and they still get great reviews by life-long fans who are now concert reviewers for local newspapers...same with the Beach Boys....and the Grateful Dead....and Springsteen.

[garman]

As I recall the Beachboys were Americas answer to the Beatles. You should look at thier discography. Lots of big hits, but not something I would listen to or the Beatles. Must be my generation of hairspray bands and men with make-up.

[hech54]

It happens in every genre of music I guess. The overwhelming urge to pay homage to people near the end of their runs on this earth. Just like the Country music people who feel the urge to try to immortalize old farts like Tammy Wynette, George Jones, Wayon Jennings, Johnny Cash...etc etc.
Some of the "country" music today is quite good compared to the old 60's and 70's "3 chord" junk...the stuff that is NOTHING like the music of these old farts mentioned above that is.

[hech54]

As I recall the Beachboys were Americas answer to the Beatles. You should look at thier discography. Lots of big hits, but not something I would listen to or the Beatles. Must be my generation of hairspray bands and men with make-up.

Duran Duran were the new Beatles too according to my recollection of the 80's... "Hits and Radio Play" do not relate in any way to genuine talent or musicianship in my book I'm afraid.

[Rookie64]

Fleetwood Mac....another HUGELY OVER-RATED band. Stevie Nicks singing sounds like someone killing a sheep.

Hech, I might agree with you to a degree if I'd only heard the commercially released stuff from the Mac...but there's so much great unrealeased material along with older material that has only been released commercially very recently...and IMO the Mac are hugely underrated.

They sell themselves short when they get the recording sessions edited and toned way down for the final release.

Lindsey has always kept Stevie toned down and extremely oppressed, which causes a lot of conflict within the band...a lot of it simply came from lover's quarrels, as the two split up romantically just as their career was soaring.


The end result doesn't compare with what got cut, and you're only getting a small part of the whole picture.
Stevie's songs won't even make much sense unless you've heard the unedited versions (they were always too long for the albums and had to go from 9 minutes to 6..or even less)

Some of those even run like 20 minutes...not to mention all the songs that never made it to the album - many that were superior to the songs that did make the album.

That in the McVie, Buckingham and Nicks lineup, the 3 had to squeeze their songs with each other's...and there just wasn't enough room for all of 'em.

Also that they would even bother covering other people's songs, 'cause they had tons of their own.
I usually don't agree with their song selections.

As for live...from 1975 to '77 were their best years.

They made a strong comeback for their recent tour (depending on specific shows) but anything in the years between didn't live up to the previous years...and they got into a bad habit of performing the same songs.


Stevie only has the sheepish voice on solo albums - and that would be due to Lindsey not being there to make her do over and over 'til she got it right

Again, the recording sessions were much better than final product.

Only Mac album she sounds awful on is Tango In The Night...which IMO is their weakest album.
By that time she had damaged her vocal chords from all the hard drinking, smoking and intense exorcisms she had performed on stage.

Then you have the other lineups and fans of the orginal Mac do not like to associate those years with the Buckingham/Nicks years - they are completely different bands and very different styles.

Not to mention later years with personnel change...much like Santana.



Much thanks go to fans who get the unreleased stuff out there in circulation.
I probably wouldn't have been much of a Mac fan had I not heard all that great stuff!
I can't even listen to the commercially released stuff anymore - just doesn't compare.

[hech54]

All of the Fleetwood Mac songs I like are McVie songs. You are right. Fleetwood Mac as a whole can't be judged solely on Nicks nasty voice.
Just like I would love to find an instrumental only Prince release(although I think I found one here in Germany)....some of his "music" is really cool...it's the words and the voice that ruin most of his stuff for me.
The Beach Boys on the other hand are a different story for me...YUK.

[freak_in_cage_10k]

what are you on about! beach boys were awesome!!!! im 21, listen to most forms of modern rock and can easily appreciate older artists, espercially if they are as good as the beach boys.

if you dont like them your a minority, they were very sucessful hence the award!

[Roundabout]

Fleetwood Mac....another HUGELY OVER-RATED band. Stevie Nicks singing sounds like someone killing a sheep.

Baaa. Baaa. If only I had a nickel for every time I've heard that comparison

As some already know, I have been/was a big FM and SN fan for years, going back to 1975/6 and the era of the "White Album" (actually titled "Fleetwood Mac", but called the "White Album" by fans). I was constantly being told Stevie sounds like a sheep/goat (your pick) and FM sucks.

All I can say is, to each his own. Every band can receive allocades that people think they don't deserve. I could say the same about many bands. Many are over/under rated IMO but I'm not the one that decides if they should be considered the best or not. I just listen to what I like and don't worry about it.

Compared to the totally commercial pap being broadcast on the radio today, almost any band from 20 years or more ago could be considered brilliant. It all depends on when you were born, or where you grew up, or subjective factors similar to these.

Just my opinion.

And I do agree with Rookie's assessment of FM and Stevie's music. The unreleased material is far superior to what the public has heard, in general. Once it became chopped and over-produced, the life had gone out of many songs, with some exceptions: "Silver Springs" for example.

Stevie recorded hundreds of songs that have never been released, or released in forms where you would never recognize them. Many were much better than anything she has released commercially, IMO.

[AlecWest]

It all depends on when you were born, or where you grew up, or subjective factors similar to these.

True. I liked some but not all Beach Boys music, some but not all Fleetwood Mac music, some but not all Yes music, and so on. Everyone has their own thing.

Once, my kid and his cousin Benny (both teens at the time) were in my kid's bedroom listening to some pretty vulgar hip-hop music. The door was open and I came up to the door, winced, and shook my head. Benny turned to my son and said, "Don't mind your dad. He's just a head-banger." I replied, "To a point. But, we're all unique. Some of us are head-bangers and some of us are murfers." Benny asked, "What's a murfer?" I replied, "Someone who only likes music if every other word in the song is murfer, murfer, murfer." Then Benny got righteous (grin) and said, "You're making fun of a truly original black art form.?" I winced and replied, "Speaking words to a synchronous or asynchronous beat is original to blacks? When's the last time you listened to Beatnik music?"

Oh, well. You just can't please some people.

[garman]

Well, I have always had this thought about music genres during time periods. Take all the great songs from the 60's, 70's' 80's. And some how present them as a new song. Do you think it would be a great song or would it flop? One example would be..... Hotel California by the Eagles. I'm sure there other monster songs that i could use. -garman

[AlecWest]

Well, I have always had this thought about music genres during time periods. Take all the great songs from the 60's, 70's' 80's. And some how present them as a new song. Do you think it would be a great song or would it flop? One example would be..... Hotel California by the Eagles. I'm sure there other monster songs that i could use. -garman

That's very common in hip-hop ... to take a song someone else has made famous and do it in the new artist's own style. But even that isn't "original." Back in the 40s and 50s, it was quite common for a famous songwriter to write a song and have a whole handful of different artists record it, adding their own artistic flare to the composition.

P.S. Sometimes, artists go WAY BACK to steal a song (grin). Back in 1965, a black all-girl group called The Toys released a chart-topping song titled, "A Lover's Concerto." One of them wrote the lyrics ... but the background music was a complete ripoff of Johann Sebastian Bach's piano finger exercise piece, "Notebook For Anna Magdalena" from his "Minuet In G." Kids didn't seem to notice. But some of their parents (and all of their music teachers) did, hehe.

[garman]

Well, I have always had this thought about music genres during time periods. Take all the great songs from the 60's, 70's' 80's. And some how present them as a new song. Do you think it would be a great song or would it flop? One example would be..... Hotel California by the Eagles. I'm sure there other monster songs that i could use. -garman

That's very common in hip-hop ... to take a song someone else has made famous and do it in the new artist's own style. But even that isn't "original." Back in the 40s and 50s, it was quite common for a famous songwriter to write a song and have a whole handful of different artists record it, adding their own artistic flare to the composition.

P.S. Sometimes, artists go WAY BACK to steal a song (grin). Back in 1965, a black all-girl group called The Toys released a chart-topping song titled, "A Lover's Concerto." One of them wrote the lyrics ... but the background music was a complete ripoff of Johann Sebastian Bach's piano finger exercise piece, "Notebook For Anna Magdalena" from his "Minuet In G." Kids didn't seem to notice. But some of their parents (and all of their music teachers) did, hehe.
[/img]

I understand the "sampling" spin. My question is.....If that song "Hotel California" for example did not exist in the 70's would it still be a great hit it were played in the year 2005 just the way I heard it. Sounds like the other OT thread about time dialation. Anymore detail my head will implode! -garman

[yoda313]

Hello,

Anymore detail my head will implode!

CLEANUP ON AISLE 5 PLEASE!

Kevin

[AlecWest]

Hehehe. Well, my guess is that it would be popular. How popular is anybody's guess. But, there are a lot of Beatles fans out there who weren't even born when the Beatles broke up ... or Elvis fans who weren't even alive before his death.

[hech54]

:P

[Soopafresh]

I still love "The Chain". It's always refereshing to hear bands with several lead singers. That's what gave the Beatles some of their uniqueness, same with the Eagles (although they haven't made a great album since 1977 either).

[HatchetMan]

Oldies rock! Beach Boys too. I can't believe this thread is still going. My fav was probably Sam Cooke. And I grew up listening to rap & metal since the mid 80's (born in '76), so go figure