Clay Patrick McBride/ KEYSTONE PRESS AGENCY
“True music . . . must reflect the thought and aspirations of the people and time. My people are Americans. My time is today.”
The quote is from George Gershwin, but those words might well have been spoken by the Beach Boys’ Brian Wilson. The two men’s bodies of work are characterized by a similar specificity of time and place—the fantasies and reality of Jazz Age and Depression-era audiences in Gershwin’s case, 1960s southern Californian adolescence in Wilson’s. Yet both have proven timeless and universal. Any indie band today worth its amplifier can talk breathlessly about the Beach Boys’ influence—the layered productions, unorthodox song structures, and, of course, those harmonies. And Gershwin’s musical legacy needs no introduction.
Wilson certainly felt a kinship to Gershwin. In fact, it was the composer’s symphonic jazz masterwork, Rhapsody in Blue, that awakened his own musical consciousness. “I was two years old when I first heard it,” he said, speaking to Maclean’s on the phone last week from his Beverly Hills home. “To me, Rhapsody in Blue is the song of my life.”
Pop experts hear Gershwin in the melodies and in Wilson’s piano playing on the early Beach Boys surf albums. Wilson even produced a version of Summertime for singer Sharon Marie in 1963. But it was in the early 1970s, when he was housebound and suffering from depression, that he set out to deconstruct Rhapsody. “I learned how to play the pretty part—you know, the violin part—when I was 28 years old,” he recalled. “I had a copy of Leonard Bernstein’s version. I went from the record to my piano—back and forth. I learned two bars at a time until I had that whole centrepiece down.”
So it seems apt to see the two giants of American music paired on Brian Wilson Reimagines Gershwin, released Aug. 17 by Walt Disney Records on its Pearl imprint. On it, Wilson tackles standards by Gershwin and his lyricist brother, Ira. “Isn’t it a nice album?” he enthused. “It’s very simple but direct, you know?”
It’s also apt Wilson is getting buzz for his new disc just as Paul McCartney—his friend, and the Beatle with whom he has most closely identified, since they are both bass players known for their melodic ballads—wraps up a tour that sold out arenas all over the U.K. and North America. The Beach Boys and the Beatles vied for pop supremacy in the ’60s. “I was envious as hell,” he recalled, “because they eclipsed everybody. I loved their music. Paul and John’s voices put me into a good thing, and their songs were so unique.” Each group’s albums would influence the other, but he insists it was not competition so much as mutual admiration. “I hoped they liked Pet Sounds as much as I liked Rubber Soul.”
These days, Wilson is enjoying a creative renaissance. Six years ago, he recorded a complete version of his aborted magnum opus Smile, which the Beach Boys started and then shelved in 1967 amid internal conflict. Its long-awaited release was met with big sales and euphoric reviews. His follow-ups have included 2008’s That Lucky Old Sun, a well-received suite of new songs, and live performances with the first-rate band he put together after his official departure from the Beach Boys, which followed the 1998 cancer death of his youngest brother, guitarist Carl. (The Beach Boys’ lineup in the group’s formative years also included middle brother Dennis, who died in 1983, the Wilsons’ cousin, Mike Love, neighbour David Marks, and high school friend Alan Jardine.) With the involvement of his wife of 15 years, Melinda, and his manager, Jean Sievers, Wilson has an active presence online, with a constantly updated website and regular posts on Facebook and Twitter. “Great dinner out with the family last night at Arnie Morton’s. LOVE that Cajun Ribeye!” read a recent tweet.
The productive new phase comes amid renewed interest in his old band. Dennis will reportedly be immortalized on the big screen in The Drummer, a dramatization of the fast-living Beach Boy’s final years, from the recording of his lauded 1977 solo album Pacific Ocean Blue to his drowning death six years later.
The film will go into production in January, and is just one event planned around the Beach Boys’ 50th anniversary next year. Capitol Records is also mulling over archival music releases.
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