Beach Boys - All Summer Long / Little Deuce Coupe

Someone named "B. Haley" sold his or her records to a new record store near my place of work. Two of these records were early Beach Boys albums, "All Summer Long" and "Little Deuce Coupe."

I'm not an expert on these things, but I think it's hard to figure out which albums had which songs for some of these bands because the music industry at nearly every level revolved around the single instead of the album. Maybe albums were released to just "put stuff out" and get it on the shelves. There was no cohesive narrative or theme on these albums, especially in the mainstream unless you were talkin' soundtracks. I know "I Get Around" was released earlier, before it appeared here on "All Summer Long," but maybe I'm wrong.

I love the Beach Boys but had NONE of their albums. I had a best of that was released in the late 70's, after the band had burned out their fan base by releasing weirder and weirder albums while just performing the hits live. (They looked like a bunch of hippies on the cover.) Critics rave about "Pet Sounds" and whatever "Smile" is supposed to be. Artist Pete Bagge wrote a great essay "In Defense Of Mike Love," ragging on these self-indulgent albums produced by a drugged and burned out Brian Wilson while the rest of the band is begging him to not "f*** with the formula." Good for Brian for experimenting and expressing himself, good for Mike Love for trying to keep the band going.

Anyway, one of the tracks on "All Summer Long" is "Our Favorite Recording Sessions," which is the band messing up in the studio and having a laugh before someone behind the board tells them to shut up. That man has to be the late Murry Wilson, Brian's dad and Mike's uncle. I think the Beach Boys are fascinating on a level beyond Brian's brilliant vocal arrangement over simple (but well written) rock music: like a lot of bands in the 60's that you can claim to be manufactured, the Beach Boys were managed by good ol' Murry, and he did so with an iron fist and occasionally a 2x4 that deafened Brian in his right ear. Out of context, it's a group of kids having a laugh. We know now that Murry was just a split second from terrorizing and physically abusing anyone in this band, caught on tape. That's kind of bizarre.

Yes, I'm impressed by filler tracks on records from over 40 years ago.

Anyway, the Beach Boys. What a great band.