I Am Brian Wilson

by Brian Wilson

  “Great,” he said. “Ready to go?”

  “I want to try one more thing,” I said. By now the entire warehouse staff and all the customers in the place were gathered around. I tried a version of “Surfer Girl” that was different from the original 1961 version. It was more like a version we did in 1967 in Hawaii. It was a slower and smoother version. When I played it at SIR, that was the version, and when I was done, everyone applauded. It was like a concert.

  Ray and I took the organ and carried it down the street to the Mercedes, where we jammed it into the backseat. We went home, Ray split, and I worked more on “Midnight’s Another Day.” All the people who were around for that song—Melinda, Scott, and even Ray—couldn’t believe it, all that effort just to get a few notes of a specific sound on a track. Ultimately Scott and I didn’t use that little organ on the basic track. It didn’t get the vibe I thought it would. But I had to try, you know?

  For another song on that record, “Going Home,” I had it in my mind that I needed Tommy Morgan, who had played with the Wrecking Crew and was one of the best harmonica players I had ever heard. I knew I wanted his sound. I hadn’t worked with Tommy for years; I knew him back in the ’60s and he had come to do some tracks with me and Andy Paley in the ’90s. I didn’t know how to reach him. I called up the musician’s union and got Tommy’s information and then called Tommy directly. “This is Brian Wilson,” I said when he answered. “I have a job for you. Bring all your stuff.”

  Tommy and all his stuff showed up on time, and he played a great part. Then he was done. But a few minutes later when I turned around, he was still there. “Hey,” he said. “When are you going to cut the vocals?”

  “As soon as you leave,” I said.

  “Well,” he said, “actually, I’d like to stay because I’ve never seen the vocals cut. I always just did my parts and left. I want to see how you do it.” Tommy stayed on the side and watched me sing.

  The song itself was about my own life, about the ways I had let things unravel over the years and the ways I was picking up the threads.

  At twenty-five I turned out the light

  ’Cause I couldn’t handle the glare in my tired eyes

  But now I’m back, drawing shades of kind blue skies

  It’s good to travel

  But not for too long

  So now I’m home where I belong

  And that’s the key

  To every song

  I’m going home

  I loved the concert tour we did after that record. Taking the new songs out was so exciting. It was material I believed in—more than that, it was material that seemed like it was tapping into the same kind of vibe that had made the old songs special. In those shows, we closed the first half with “I Get Around” and in the intermission I went to hang out with the band. They were the same guys who had been playing with me for almost ten years at that point: Darian Sahanaja and Scott Bennett on keyboards; Jeff Foskett and Nicky Wonder on guitars; Mikey D’Amico on drums; Nelson Bragg on percussion; Probyn Gregory on guitar, horns, and theremin; Brett Simons on bass (he had actually just joined up when Bob Lizik split for a few years); Taylor Mills on vocals; and Paul Von Mertens on saxophone and harmonica. I got comfortable back there with them. Some of them were studying like professors and some of them were acting like clowns. I knew that if I looked I would see a half-full beer bottle next to Mikey, or that Paul would be sitting a little apart, going through the second half of the show in his head, or that Scott would be bouncing around trying to keep the room’s energy high. Just like every house isn’t a home, every band isn’t a family. But I had been in a band that was an actual family, and the band that played with me around 2006—most of them are still with me now—is the closest I’ve come since.

  The new songs worked so well that I started to see old songs in new ways. We started those shows with some older Beach Boys stuff: “Do It Again,” “The Little Girl I Once Knew,” “Dance, Dance, Dance.” We were also adding in “Salt Lake City,” a song from Summer Days (And Summer Nights!!) that we had never played live before. In sound check, Paul was playing the sax break and all of a sudden I thought of something. “Stop,” I said. “Stop everything.” Everyone was confused. “Paul,” I said, “when you get to the second four bars of the break, I want you to double up.” We had our friends the Stockholm Strings and Horns with us on that tour, so we had a second sax on the stage. No one understood why I wanted it to go that way until they heard it, and then they understood completely. Dynamics! I don’t know for sure that I wouldn’t have heard those things a few years before, but I know that I was hearing them more clearly when we went out on the road after Lucky Old Sun. It was WCW more often than not.

  CHAPTER 8

  America

  Hurry, hurry, hurry, hurry, folks

  Step right up to the Beach Boy circus

  The best little show in town

  Hurry, hurry, hurry, it’s only a dime, folks

  One thin dime, just one tenth of a dollar

  —“Amusement Parks U.S.A.”

  Rock and roll was made in England and America, and you could say that the Beach Boys were made on both sides of the ocean, too. We learned from British bands, and we always played well in the UK and in Australia. Audiences there are more sensitive to artists. They have more love for American music than American audiences do. But we were only ever making American music, which is one of the reasons the end of 2007 was so exciting and rewarding.

  One afternoon I came home from a walk in the park (my second walk of the day—I was feeling healthy and clear-headed) and I was watching the news when all of a sudden I heard Melinda scream. It wasn’t a worried scream. It was a happy scream. She came into the room. “Brian,” she said, “you just won the Kennedy Center award.”

  “What the hell?” I said. “What for?”

  She told me that it was for my contribution to American music and my lifetime achievement in the field. We were invited to Washington to meet with President and Mrs. Bush. I couldn’t believe it. I had watched the Kennedy Center Honors on TV before. I saw when Smokey Robinson was honored. He was such a great songwriter and singer, one of the people in the music world I respected the most. I couldn’t believe that I was in Smokey’s company. Melinda told me the other honorees, and they were incredible company, too: Diana Ross, Steve Martin, Martin Scorsese, and Leon Fleisher.

  A few minutes later I remembered that it wasn’t my first trip to the White House. Back in the early ’80s, Reagan’s interior secretary, James Watt, banned the Beach Boys from playing in the White House’s official Independence Day celebration. He said that rock bands attracted the wrong element. All hell broke loose. People on all sides of the issue started expressing their opinion, louder and louder. Finally, Watt got called on the carpet by Nancy Reagan, who said that if we attracted the wrong element, then she was the wrong element because she was a huge fan of ours. That was a surprise to me, though I had heard the Reagans’ daughter, Patti, liked our music. The next thing I knew, President Reagan was inviting us to play privately at the White House. I got to meet the president and the First Lady, and they were so complimentary about our music. I don’t remember whether we met James Watt.

  I found myself at the White House again in 2004. My band and I were on the SMiLE tour, and we were playing the Warner Theatre in Washington, DC. Melinda decided she wanted to take a White House tour. I don’t know how she arranged it, but we all got into a car—me, Melinda, Daria, Delanie, Gloria, and Jerry—and we drove to the White House gates, where we were met by a guide. He was a nice young guy, and he took us through the whole place. It was incredible. We walked past the Situation Room. We went to the Press Room and I stood at the podium and did a fake Nixon voice. We went into the Rose Garden and saw the Bushes’ dog, Barney. President Bush wasn’t there during that time. He was in Texas. But I talked to the guide about him. I asked what time he woke up, what time he ate breakfast, and what his favorite breakfast was. I don’t remember the an
swers. We invited that guide and his family to our show that night.

  I wish I had remembered what President Bush ate for breakfast because I could have made a joke about it when we went back to Washington, DC, for the Kennedy Center Honors. It was a few days of events, including a performance, a reception, and several meals. I was staying with the whole family—again, Melinda, Daria, Delanie, Dylan, and Gloria—in an incredible suite at the Mandarin Oriental hotel. All the other honorees were there also, and some other people from my band and my life. Jeff Foskett and his wife, Diana, were there. David Leaf and his wife, Eva, were there. Melinda’s friend Susan was there. Ray Lawlor was there. It was a full group.

  I was nervous when we got to the hotel and more and more nervous as the week went on. The night of the White House reception was the worst—I mean, it was the best, but I was the most nervous. I paced around the hotel corridors until it was time to get into my tux. I called Ray. “Come help me get dressed,” I said. He helped with the tie and the buttons and the shirt. It’s really complicated. I didn’t feel completely dressed until Melinda hung the Kennedy Center Honors medal around my neck.

  We still had about two hours until the ceremony, so Ray and I went down to the lounge in the lobby in our tuxes. It was an amazing elevator ride. The elevator stopped a few floors below us and in walked Diana Ross and her daughter. “Brian!” she yelled. “Oh my God!”

  I yelled back, “Diana!” I don’t think we had seen each other since the T.A.M.I. Show in 1964. That was forty years, which was hard to believe. We had both come a very long way from the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium.

  Two more floors and another stop: this time it was Steve Martin and Martin Short. “Hi,” I said.

  “It’s the two amigos,” Ray said, and the two Martins laughed.

  The last stop wasn’t a Kennedy award-winner, but it was almost better: Cameron Diaz. I remember thinking that first she was in my song—she was in the lyrics of “South American,” on Imagination— and then she was in my elevator.

  Ray and I hung out at the lobby lounge drinking Diet Cokes. I talked a bit to Steve Martin. Then it was time to head for the White House. When the limo pulled up, I couldn’t believe it. From Hawthorne to here. I might have even said it out loud. Some men in suits ushered us into a reception area where all the honorees and their families were standing. I don’t think I ever felt so proud. President and Mrs. Bush came around and we were introduced. “I am honored to meet you, Mr. President,” I said.

  President Bush shook his head. “No, Brian,” he said. “The honor is mine. I am honored to meet you.” I couldn’t believe it, you know? I remember how gracious the Bushes were to us. They were so nice. The president walked over to Gloria. “Mrs. Ramos,” he said, “would you like me to sign anything for you?” You can’t imagine a nicer guy. And Condoleezza Rice came up to Melinda and me to talk about music—she told us she was a classically trained pianist, but most importantly she was a California girl. She said she was probably going to go back to Stanford when she was done in the government. Then we all had pictures taken with the president and went to the Kennedy Center for the ceremony and performance.

  The rest of the night was a blur, though I can pick out moments. Art Garfunkel gave a nice speech about me while a film was shown. The audience gave me a standing ovation. I was focusing all my energy on just keeping it together. It would have been so easy to be overwhelmed. Then people started performing. Lyle Lovett did a great take on “God Only Knows,” and then Hootie and the Blowfish came out and sang “I Get Around.” Then they segued into “California Girls” and I saw all these powerful Washington people act like any other crowd: they started dancing. First it was Senator Ted Kennedy. He stood up. Then the distinguished gentleman next to him stood up. Pretty soon the whole place was rocking. I took a peek over at President and Mrs. Bush, and at Secretary Rice. They were up, too, singing along with every word. Music is bipartisan.

  The last act in the tribute show was a boys choir group from England called Libera. They came out wearing white robes and sang “Love and Mercy.” It just kept building and building. Everyone was crying. When they ended by dropping a bunch of beach balls from the ceiling, I could sense how powerful the night was for everyone, not just for me. I’ve had so many great nights in my life, but that was one of the greatest. At one point I scanned the crowd and saw Smokey Robinson on the aisle, half-turned toward me, clapping like hell and smiling.

  The idea of America that was part of the Kennedy Center awards was always around the band. One of the Beach Boys’ greatest hits records from the mid-’70s was called Spirit of America. People built their idea of America, especially California, from the things we talked about in our songs. We weren’t the only artists like that, of course. In 2009 I was playing a benefit show at the Count Basie Theatre in Red Bank, New Jersey. The whole time we were playing our show, there was a guy sitting in a folding chair on the side of the stage. I sit on the side of the stage sometimes myself during sound check, so I was paying special attention to the guy. I couldn’t tell who he was at first. I couldn’t see very well from the stage. But he definitely was someone—everyone who walked past him shook his hand.

  It turns out it was Bruce Springsteen. He was so quiet there on the side of the stage. It was almost like he was taking notes. At the end of that show, he came onstage and sat in with us; he played guitar on “Barbara Ann” and sang harmonies on “Love and Mercy.” I remember turning and seeing him standing next to Taylor Mills, our pretty blond backup singer, and thinking that all singers have moments when they are just guys (or girls) standing at microphones. It doesn’t matter how famous they are. They still have to go to the microphone and sing. Bruce came by afterward and hung out for a little while. He had really nice things to say about the band and how perfectly it fit the music. He said that the songs were American masterworks. It was nice of him to say. He has written some himself.

  After that, after the Kennedy Center, after Lucky Old Sun, Ray was in Los Angeles visiting me. He didn’t bring any pizza that time. We went to the Beverly Glen Deli. That’s where I like to go. I have been going there for at least fifteen years. They have a big diner menu with lots of choices and everything is good. We were eating dinner, and my mind was drifting a bit while Ray talked. I was thinking about movies—first, that movie Educating Rita, with Michael Caine and Julie Walters. He was brilliant in it, I thought. Then I was thinking about On Golden Pond and how strange it must have been for Jane Fonda to work with her dad, and then I was thinking about An Officer and a Gentleman, which had that great song “Up Where We Belong.” Jack Nitzsche, who did “The Lonely Surfer,” cowrote that song. Joe Cocker sang it. Something about thinking about Joe Cocker made me think about “You Are So Beautiful,” and that made me think of an older song, “I Was So Young (You Were So Beautiful.)” It wasn’t a song I knew that well, but I remembered hearing it. It was an early George Gershwin song. That made me think of something else. “Oh, no,” I said.

  “What?” Ray asked.

  “I signed to do a Gershwin album,” I said. It was a joke, but not completely a joke. I had remembered and then forgotten.

  “What do you mean?” Ray said.

  “You know, an album of George Gershwin songs that I would arrange and sing. They even agreed to let me finish some of his unfinished songs.”

  “That’s great,” Ray said. “That’s awesome.”

  I told Ray that I had to go through all the great Gershwin songs and pick the ones I thought I could do well with my voice and my band. I had been talking about the songs with Paul Von Mertens, who was in my band and had ideas about which songs would be best for the project. And then I told Ray what I remembered. “The record company needs the first list of songs I might want to do by Tuesday.” It was almost Tuesday.

  We finished up eating and then Ray drove me home. I used to live down near Shaquille O’Neal. I never really hung out with him, but sometimes I would see him getting out of a car or getting into one. Paula Ab
dul and John Fogerty were near there also. But then we built a house farther up the hill. When we got inside, Ray went right to the computer and started calling out the names of Gershwin songs. “What about ‘Summertime’?”

  “Definitely,” I said.

  “What about ‘It Ain’t Necessarily So’?”

  “I’m not sure about that one.” It wasn’t one of Ira’s best lyrics. It had a dark vibe. But it was a song I liked singing.

  “What about ‘I Loves You, Porgy’?”

  “Yeah, yeah,” I said. “I have to include that. And it has to be sung a certain way. Are you writing this down?”

  Ray turned and frowned at me. “You write it down, Brian. It’s your album. It should be in your handwriting, don’t you think?”

  I got a piece of paper and started writing down all the songs that sounded good to me. Ray and I worked on the list until he had to leave that evening to fly back to New York.

  The next morning I woke up early and went to look at the list again. But I couldn’t find it. I called Ray in New York.

  “Hello?” He sounded tired.

  “Ray,” I said, “do you have the list? I can’t find it.”

  He sighed. “I’ll retype it for you.”

  “And then what?”

  “Then I’ll fax it to you.” He paused. “You do know how to use the fax machine, don’t you?”

  “Of course I know how to use the fax machine,” I said.

  About twenty minutes later, the machine started whirring and a piece of paper came through. I took it out and called Ray back.

  “You got it?” he asked.