83 BIG ONES: LOVE & MERCY TO BRIAN WILSON83 BIG ONES: LOVE & MERCY TO BRIAN WILSON
Honoring a pop idol through the power of hyperfixation
I had saved the essential body of this piece in my Google Docs for almost a year. I was thinking about making it to 100 to drop a 100 Favorite Beach Boys songs list. I like lists and I like being the level of Beach Boys obsessive that this daunting task of ranking 100 favorite songs by them did not phase me. But on June 11, 2025, the day Brian Wilson was announced to have passed away. And so this list was altered to reflect a mix of sadness, reflection, and earnestness. In many ways, overwhelmed with moods that typified what made songs by The Beach Boys so brilliant and timeless.
It’s not so much that The Beach Boys were the greatest American band, they were one of the most ‘American bands’. Not because their greatness and heights into the sublime were always so consistent and stable. No. They could be seen as childish, reactionary, contradictory, and, for lack of a better word, schizoid as they matured and were pulled into different directions of inspirations and references. The whole point of what made The Beach Boys great was because their dogged pursuit of greatness often had them be so singular that they alienated fans, their peer group of artists, and commercially have so many ebbs and flows. It was ultimately the devil’s bargain of the song “Kokomo” that made all the living members of The Beach Boys set for life.
The Beach Boys are also one of the ‘most American’ bands because their union as a band of brothers, cousins, and neighborhood friends went from your boys next door of clean cut-looking Boy Scouts wearing candy striped shirts and Pendleton flannels to the hard shift of ‘60s and ‘70s strung out hedonism. Thanks to Boomerism it is easier to understand their trek through the decades as what became the canon of the midcentury American experience could be accessed through everything like Forrest Gump and to products featured in a $19.95 TimeLife commercial. And like many Americans who dabbled in the counterculture and drugs, The Beach Boys conformed back to squaredom. While dealing with the unexpected passing of drummer and songwriter Dennis Wilson in 1983, they shapeshifted to become dad rock in Reagan’s 80s where their biggest currency was as a nostalgia act. This period, not really featured on this list, is very difficult to discuss because Brian Wilson was also in a pre-Britney Spears conservatorship under the control of a dangerous, controlling quack. But darkness had always moved within the output of The Beach Boys whether it was the abusive patriarch Murry Wilson, how each Wilson brother responded to their abuse from their father (Brian and Dennis were clearly affected and it could be seen, Carl Wilson’s chain smoking since his teenage years as his outlet would ultimately lead to his 1998 death from lung cancer), the loose associations with Charles Manson and the Manson family, or the decades-long turmoil among the Wilson-Love family that frankly could give Dostoevsky a run for his money. Yet Brian Wilson’s legacy and the band’s legacy will be about their songs evoking the optimism of sun and summer, a travelogue for California, and serving as the soundtrack to so many people’s lives, including my own.
Trying to write more now feels too rushed to really do the life of Brian Wilson justice. His music and the work of The Beach Boys are better to get lost in the weeds over. The great irony is that there are multiple generations of introverted ‘indoor’ kids who look awkward in a bathing suit, let alone on a beach, that can also claim Brian Wilson as their music demigod. And they can do that because Brian was that awkward kid with an otherworldly gift. He did so despite being deaf in one ear like the character George Bailey in It’s a Wonderful Life. And like George Bailey, despite his misfortunes and slights he sustained over the course of his career, he stands as an admired hero and genius in the American pop landscape. His work, whether it was Pet Sounds or the SMiLE Sessions or the compromised 1970s output showed a genius who chased greatness of music that nobody else was making. Sometimes that yielded some really unfashionable songs and albums that were largely discarded upon release and yet, I dare you to listen to Smiley Smile and not think Animal Collective and, arguably, much of shoegaze and dream pop do not share the same DNA of that oft-maligned album.
Before listing my favorite 83 Beach Boys songs (83 in honor of Brian’s age had he lived through to his birthday on June 20th), I also want to note that the brilliance of The Beach Boys was an effort of not just Brian Wilson as the ‘singular’ great man but a collection of characters who were often underestimated. Some of my favorite songs are where Carl Wilson and Mike Love sang lead or were written by Dennis Wilson. Part of my Beach Boys obsession is knowing that their story does not end with the ‘failure’ of SMiLE but that their output from 1968-1977 was an output so many bands of that period wish they could claim as their own. Brian knew that. He regularly called 1977’s Love You album his favorite. Perhaps with people listening to The Beach Boys again in light of his passing, they find the appreciation in those works that Brian did. And maybe this very list will also push some people in that direction. There’s never a bad reason to listen to The Beach Boys.
Love and mercy, Brian. I hope you know how loved you were and I hope you have reconnected again with Dennis, Carl and Melinda in the next realm you passed into.
God, please, let us go on this way….
83. "That Same Song" live version featured in the 1976 American television special The Beach Boys: It’s OK!
-This song would make it to the 15 Big Ones album but the lo-fi production of just the piano pulls more focus on the gospel choir (supposedly the same choir that Dennis Wilson would enlist for his solo masterpiece album Pacific Ocean Blue) used to sing the chorus of the song are irresistible. The lyrics are the Love and Wilson collaboration pared down to their essence of earnest enthusiasm and love of finding community in song.
82. “Let’s Go Away for a While”
81. "Shortnin’ Bread" Adult/Child version
-Brian Wilson was a man of extremely intense hyperfixations for certain songs that he eventually covered or was inspired by. It’s the story of him listening to “Be My Baby” for the first time. On the other side of that, the most baffling and infamous of those songs Wilson obsessed over was “Shortnin’ Bread”. “Shortenin’ Bread”, popularized by The Andrews Sisters singing group and even sung by the great American actor-singer and activist Paul Robeson, the song's origins are complicated. It has been speculated to have been a plantation song sung among slaves but also speculated to have been a parody minstrel song. That questionable if outright lurid history is itself an indictment and commentary about American folklore and culture; making a song with such dark undercurrents a happy, peppy song of domestic life about making a meal. It is the type of song that a Randy Newman would satirize and riff on. But the difference between Newman and Wilson, who shared many fans and mutually appreciated each other’s work as artists, Wilson legitimately did think ‘Shortenin’ Bread’ as one of the great American songs. Wilson had an unpretentiousness and guilelessness that very few people in his time had, let alone get away with. However, the official version in the 1979 L.A. (Light Album) is a pale imitation of what often recirculated on bootleg tapes and now YouTube uploads of famously abandoned projects, like the Adult/Child album. I’ve listened to an 18 minute version and a 7 minute version uploaded on the internet that I think are far superior. I cannot say if these ever legitimately circulated because of the lore of this song is so bananas but I think the Adult/Child album uploads that get into the ways reworkings of the entire saga around what Wilson regularly called one of the greatest songs ever written shows the ripple effects this song and it’s farting synths that predated its official release. This song is like looking at the original Land O’ Lakes butter design and realizing it’s infinite.
80. "You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feeling"
-It’s punk as fuck.
79. "Vegetables"
-There was an incredible live version of them doing a rendition on a UK program hosted by David Frost in 1971. Alas, it appears scrubbed from YouTube.
78. "Cuddle Up"
-Some of the most revelatory things is realizing that the sincerity found in Brian’s songwriting are also quite evident in Dennis Wilson’s songwriting.
77. "Surfin’ Safari"
-Pretty sure my first instance of listening to this song was through Alvin and the Chipmunks on a VHS tape special. Just like how I listened to “Kokomo” through the Muppets first (I prefer their version).
76. "Disney Girls"
-And one for Bruce Johnston.
-One of the few saving graces on 15 Big Ones.
-Many will say the Love You album is like listening to your strung out uncles try to be crooners and I would say that is precisely the reason why it is brilliant. Patti Smith wrote it best:
'love you is siphoned from the meandering mind of a madman. like the hero-dream of slaughter house five we have yet another case where existence is elsewhere. for the hero it lies in the future. but for brian Wilson the dream is trapped within the wholesome abstraction of a jello ad. his desire is to escape into the real world.'
'My mother told me
Jesus loved the world
And if that’s true then
Why hasn’t he helped me to find my girl
And find my world
‘Til then I’m just a dreamer’
71. "In My Room"
70. "Only With You"
-I do prefer the version that Dennis Wilson put out in Pacific Ocean Blue, but Carl Wilson’s velvet voice still makes this song go.
-The Blondie Chaplin/Ricky Fataar era of the band had them essentially become a roots band and which perfectly melded with their Americana predilections as the United States was entering its bicentennial period.
-Only thing eerier about the notion of flight than this deep cut is maybe… I don’t know, Laurie Anderson’s “O Superman”.
66. "Shut Down"
-For those who thought I was going to side-step the songs about cars and surfing entirely.
65. "Airplane"
63. "Good Time"
-Meant for 1970’s Sunflower album, it sounds completely out of place in 1977’ws Love You because Brian Wilson’s drug abuse lowered his voice by a few registers. But still a good tune.
62. "Don’t Talk (Put Your Head On My Shoulder)"
61. "A Day in the Life of a Tree"
-Featuring vocals by Van Dyke Parks but the lead vocals are done by Jack Rieley, who was primarily a music producer. It’s like Shel Silverstein’s The Giving Tree told in song. Quite possibly the most feel bad song in their most feel bad album, until….
60. "Til I Die (Alternate Mix)"
-A haunting.
59. "Wake the World"
-The Friends album being released in 1968 practically feels transmitted from another realm of the time space continuum. How in the height of assassinations and political turmoil can a song with the lyrics about ‘...another fine morning’ possibly resonate. It flopped, although not without its gems and this song, despite the period stacked against it, is one of those gems. The album is beautiful in its optimism, even if it feels stubborn due to the album having such a solipsistic, escapist outlook than a collective engagement (ultimately, very tied to Mike Love’s interest in transcendental meditation).
58. "Diamond Head"
-A gorgeous instrumental.
57. "Kiss Me Baby"
55. "Feel Flows"
54. "Lonely Sea"
53. "Wild Honey"
-People are often struck by how they made a lo-fi album that seemed built on the fact that Carl Wilson really loved to sing r&b. The Blondie Chaplin live version that goes full throttle is also incredible.
52. "Wind Chimes" (SMiLE Sessions version)
-The ‘Wind Chimes’ that made Smiley Smile is ultimately what I would consider completely lackluster and uninteresting compared to what was ultimately awaiting in the sessions version in 2011.
50. "There’s No Other (Like My Baby)"
-A wonderful cover of the song by The Crystals on the Party! “Live album”.
-Shoutout Lisa Simpson.
47. "San Miguel"
-Best Beach Boys song with castanets.
46. "Here Today"
45. "Little Bird"
-Kind of a stealth Beatles inspired song.
44. "Big Sur"
-Low-key one of Mike Love’s best vocals.
43. "Here She Comes"
-The closest they ever came to sounding like Steely Dan.
41. "Whistle In"
-A brisk evening walk of a song.
-Knausgaard meets Les Baxter lounge music.
-Crosby Stills & Nash found dead in a ditch. That both it and the song “Break Away”, that it was a B-side for, are often cast as ‘deep cuts’ is frustrating as these are songs that would be charting singles for almost any other band.
37. "Steamboat"
-Very The Lovin’ Spoonful.
34. "Cotton Fields (The Cotton Song)"
-So much better than what made it onto the 20/20 album. This Lead Belly cover becomes a fun country & western song and Al Jardine vocal.
-Insanely chosen to be a single while ‘Forever’ was a B-side, but still such a chill vibe.
31. "Do It Again"
-Such a lean, compact song and like in the ways other Beach Boys songs can become so repetitive, you kind of think it could go on way longer. The extended outro version of this song also teases this.
30. "The Trader"
-A revisionist piece of American history and a shocker from a band that once covered “Ten Little Indians”.
26. "Pet Sounds"
25. "Caroline, No"
-Very much the forerunner to “The Trader” in the perils of manifest destiny.
23. "The Elements (Mrs. O’Leary’s Cow)"
-Trippy. Should be a baseball pitcher’s entrance music.
22. "Heroes and Villains" SMiLE Session version
-A whole book could be written on this song’s tortured history but it’s clear from the Smiley Smile version that there was something missing.
-Sunflower as an album has Dennis Wilson’s fingerprints all over it. Unfortunately it didn't really chart as a single.
20. "Forever"
-I am deeply frustrated that people my age may associate this with Full House and John Stamos but, ‘Que Sera, Sera’. I am partial to live in Central Park version from 1970.
19. "All I Wanna Do"
-I think it’s getting obvious that I’m a total champion for the Sunflower album.
18. "Break Away"
When I laid down on my bed
I heard voices in my head
Telling me now "Hey, it's only a dream"
17. "Fun, Fun, Fun"
16. "Surfin’ U.S.A."
-Their performance on the T.A.M.I. Show underscored the ‘battle of the bands’ level showmanship from every participating act (although James Brown took everyone to town on that broadcast as the clear winner).
15. "I Just Wasn't Made For These Times"
14. "Solar System"
-‘If Mars had life on it I might find my wife on it
Venus the goddess of love can thank all the stars above
Mercury's close to the sun
You'll see it when day is done.’
I actually get way too emotional thinking about Brian’s love of planets.
13. "Help Me Rhonda"
12. "Sloop John B"
-I love The Ronettes and Ronnie Spector but I actually do think this is the superior song. Again, Carl Wilson’s velvet vocals fit this like a glove.
-Who ran the iron horse?
-Listen, the Today album is saddled with being the album before Pet Sounds, but this is a masterpiece of a song. It goes back to the Patti Smith review of Love You in the 1970s remarking how ‘please’ is a catchword for them. Smith recalls their catalogue involving ‘please’, ‘...songs of the immoral love mechanism- telepathy, songs of innocence and foreplay, they are pleading w/ the same urgency as the boy in the back seat to the girl in 1963. please it won't hurt. please. come to me/give to me/tell me/ listen to me..' The simple yet loaded consideration is swimming in yearning or wish fulfilment for something better.
‘I built all my goals around you
That some day my love would surround you’
-Glen Campbell on the guitar (and apparently banjo)!
-I’ve made an effort to steer clear in giving an autobiography but this became the soundtrack to my first heartbreak.
4. "Surf's Up"
-Leonard Bernstein saw in Brian Wilson that the world wasn’t able to see for years and that fact lives rent-free in my head.
-I’ve been pretty good at leaving some of my misgivings for how Brian and the group are often talked about at the door for this piece, but I do want to say, I really hope any discussions between The Beach Boys versus The Beatles is less stressed. In the year of the lord 2025, it just simply feels like a lazy default than any productive discussion. I would much rather discuss the fact that “Be My Baby” became Brian’s North Star song and clearly put Ronnie Spector on a pedestal for it. He was correct to do so and it inspired him to create one of the greatest American pop songs ever.
-In the same way that Orson Welles was 26 when Citizen Kane was released and Chantal Akerman made Jeanne Dielman at 25, I think about the fact that Carl Wilson was 19 when he sang this song and Brian Wilson was 24 when he recorded this song.
-Speaking of hyperfixations, when I first heard this song in my Dad’s car when I was young, I immediately wanted him to play it again. I think it was the theremin that sparked my curiosity. I think in total I cajoled my Dad to play “Good Vibrations” about seven consecutive times before we made it home. I’m going to take that with me.
This was lovely Caden.