“Sgt. Pepper” turns 50 on June 1, and the world will celebrate the Beatles’ 1967 landmark album. Just don’t forget to invite the Beach Boys to the party.
Three brand new “packages” of “Sgt. Pepper” will be available. They include a “super deluxe six-disc box set,” which comes with unreleased tracks and a 144-page hardcover book, according to Rolling Stone
But without Brian Wilson and the Beach Boys – who play two sold out shows Friday at The Sharon — you might say God only knows if “Sgt. Pepper” would have come to pass.
It was Wilson’s Beach Boys’ 1966 masterpiece LP, “Pet Sounds,” that set the stage for “Sgt. Pepper.”
George Martin, the late producer of the Beatles’ albums, once wrote: “Without ‘Pet Sounds,’ ‘Sgt. Pepper never would have happened. ‘Pepper’ was an attempt to equal ‘Pet Sounds.’”
Brian Wilson, the Beach Boys’ resident genius and composer was in a creative contest with John Lennon and Paul McCartney.
“We ended up kind of like a rivalry,” McCartney told Ron Wood of the Rolling Stones in a video interview. “We’d put a song out and then Brian would have at it and then do one. It was kind of like me and John (Lennon). You had to try and top each other all the time.”
During the mid ‘60s, it looked like the Beatles were getting the best of Wilson and his bandmates: singer Mike Love, guitarist Al Jardine and Brian’s two brothers, Carl Wilson, guitar and Dennis Wilson on drums.
Love and longtime Beach Boy Bruce Johnston will appear in The Villages. Brian Wilson stopped touring years ago. Carl and Dennis Wilson are deceased and Jardine no longer tours with the band.
The Beach Boys hit the national charts in 1962 with the single “Surfin’ Safari” (“409”was on the flip side). Brian Wilson wrote most of the music for such records as “Surfin’ USA,” “Little Deuce Coupe,” “Little Surfer Girl” and “Fun, Fun Fun.”
By 1964, the Beach Boys were the kings of surf music, singing about surf boards, girls and cars.
Also, in 1964, the Beatles played on the “Ed Sullivan Show” and took America by storm.
The Fabs also had a sweet, youthful sound, singing about girls (“She Loves You,”), romance (“I Want to Hold Your Hand”) and teen life (“A Hard Day’s Night”).
The mood and the music changed drastically in December, 1965 with the Beatles’ release of “Rubber Soul.” The album had a folk/rock flavor, showing the influence of Bob Dylan. It seemed personal and introspective with songs like: “It’s Only Love,” “I’m Looking Through You” and a remarkably mature and melancholy “In My Life.”
“Rubber Soul” had a profound effect on Brian Wilson, who had suffered mental problems, drug abuse and a nervous breakdown.
The Beatles were searching for the meaning of life and death, and Wilson wanted to dig deeper into his own life and creative soul.
Mike Love understood.
“Anything and everything the Beatles did, you had to pay notice to,” he said in a recent Showtime documentary. “Brian was very introspective and melancholy but afraid to express himself that way,” original Beach Boy David Marks told Showtime. “The ‘Rubber Soul’ album “opened Brian up.”
“’Rubber Soul’ blew my mind,” Brian Wilson once said. “I said I’m going to make an album that’s really good. I mean I’m really going to challenge myself.”
“I experimented on ‘Pet Sounds,’” Wilson told Showtime. “I tried to write something better than surf songs or car songs.”
“Pet Sounds,” unlike “Sgt. Pepper,” was a major commercial disappointment when released in 1966. Capitol Records, the Beach Boys label, was lukewarm about the band breaking the hit-making formula.
“I couldn’t understand why they didn’t like it,” Wilson told Showtime. “They said it was good music but not commercial.”
Soon after “Pet Sounds” came out, Capitol released a “Best of the Beach Boys” hits compilation. It became a best-seller and “Pet Sounds” floundered.
“We were competing with our history,” Love told Showtime.
But in England and Europe, “Pet Sounds’ became the stuff of legend and inspired bands like the Beatles and the Who, to try something different and push musical and creative boundaries.
Bruce Johnston took a couple of advance copies of “Pet Sounds” to England before it was released in that country. Keith Moon, drummer for the Who, loved it.
Moon, along with Beatles’ publicist Derek Taylor, arranged for Johnston to play the album for John Lennon and McCartney in a London hotel room.
“They asked to hear it two times,” Johnston said. “They were delighted.” McCartney quickly became enamored with Wilson’s masterpiece track, “God Only Knows.”
“Paul said, he thought that was the greatest song,” Mike Love told Showtime. Rock journalist David Wild added that ‘God Only Knows’ is “where rock and roll becomes a religious experience.”
Here is a video of “God Only Knows”:
And now, here we are 50 years later.
“Sgt. Pepper” may be the greatest album of all time, but “Pet Sounds” isn’t far behind. The two albums and bands will forever be intertwined.
The 1960s, was a strange, emotional and mysterious decade. There were no easy answers or explanations.
But the Beatles and the Beach Boys helped a generation come of age and cope with love, war, loss, youth, rebellion, justice, aging and death.
That Baby Boom generation is still dealing with those issues today. So, if you’re at The Sharon on Friday and hear the Beach Boys sing “God Only Knows,” “Wouldn’t It Be Nice,” or “Sloop John B” you might remember those bygone days. (They probably won’t sing “I Just Wasn’t Made for These Times”) but you already know that feeling.
And you might go home and play some “Sgt. Pepper” songs on your iPhone like: “When I’m 64,” “Getting Better,” “Within Without You” “With A Little Help From My Friends” and “A Day in the Life.”
Those albums may make you think of what was, what is and what might have been. Such is the magic in the music of the Beatles and the Beach Boys.
