By the late 1960s the Beach Boys popularity was at an all-time low due partly to their cultural standing and public image. They were dealing with financial issues caused by two disastrous tours in 1968 and record sales had shown a steady decline since the days of surf, cars and girls. Their current album 20/20, released in February 1969, had sold better than the previous years Friends album but neither matched the success of their earlier albums. Brian Wilson was also suffering from erratic behaviour and had become a recluse, often not leaving his house for months on end. All this affected his reputation within the music business. Of course, there was also Dennis Wilson's friendship with Charles Manson, the Manson Family and the Sharon Tate - LaBianca murders which grabbed unwanted media attention. Their final tour of the year was a dismal affair with crowds often struggling to reach two or three hundred resulting in several cancelled dates. Things needed to change.
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| Photo (c) Annie Leibovitz |
In April 1969 they filed a $2 million lawsuit against Capitol Records for unpaid royalties and production duties and also announced they would revive their Brother Records Label with records to be distributed by Reprise/Warner records.
Sessions for their next album began in January 1969 and would continue, on and off, throughout the year. Over 40 tracks were recorded and early working titles for the new album included Reverberation, Sun Flower, The Fading Rock Group Revival and Add Some Music To Your Day. The sessions were produced by The Beach Boys as a group but also individually by Brian Wilson, Carl Wilson, Bruce Johnston, Al Jardine and Dennis Wilson individually.
The album would go through many changes of track listings as the record was rejected several times. A short while before signing with Reprise the band compiled a 14-track acetate for the label with the title Sun Flower, it was rejected. Renamed Add Some Music (An Album Offering from The Beach Boys) and submitted again it was also rejected. The label felt the album wasn't strong enough. From February through June the band worked on overdubbing and recording new material. Another batch of songs were offered but rejected once again. However, during this time two tracks were selected as single pairing Add Some Music To Your Day with Susie Cincinnati. In July a final master of what would become Sunflower was finally submitted to Reprise and accepted.
Close to three dozen tracks were never used on the album and remained in the vaults although over the years several have found a release as we will discover later.
The album cover featured all six members and was taken by Ricci Martin, Dean Martin's son, at a golf course on Dean Martin's Hidden Valley Ranch in Ventura County, California. The inner gatefold sleeve featured more images, this time by photographer Ed Thrasher on the Warner Bros. studio back-lot.
Despite it's poor showing on the chart the album did receive positive reviews. Writing in Rolling Stone, Jim Miller considered the album, "...without doubt the best Beach Boys album in recent memory, a stylistically coherent tour de force." Although he did end by saying, "It makes one wonder though whether anyone still listens to their music, or could give a shit about it."
Robert Christgau, in The Village Voice, felt that, "...as a coming-of-age record from the Beach Boys, Sunflower is far more satisfying, I suspect, than Smile ever would have been."
Regarded by many as the best Beach Boys album since Pet Sounds this was reflected in other reviews. "The strongest album they released post-Pet Sounds." (Pitchfork), "It stands as the definitive post-Pet Sounds Beach Boys album" (Popdose) and "... in many respects their Abbey Road - a lush production that signaled an end to the 1960s, the decade that gave them creative flight." (Paste).
Sunflower has also done well in various polls, In 1997 it was voted number 66 in the '100 Best Albums Ever' by The Guardian and in 2003, number 380 in Rolling Stone's '500 Greatest Ever Albums of All Time'.
Bruce Johnston, talking in the 1970s, named Sunflower as his favourite Beach Boys album and considered it the last true Beach Boys album as it was the last to feature Brian Wilson's input and involvement.
Back in July 1969 Brian Wilson, along with Mike Love and Bruce Johnston, held an interview with Jack Rieley, who would become the bands manager. During the interview Brian spoke about the band and his feelings saying, "I'm proud of the group and the name but feel the clean American thing has hurt us. And we're really not getting any kind of airplay today." He also felt they hadn't done enough to change their image. With their new album, and input from Rieley, they would write and record a selection of songs which dealt with environmental, social and health issues. It was a plan to restore the bands image and reputation. It would also see Carl Wilson become 'leader' and marking his first major contributions to a Beach Boys album.
After the release of Sunflower, Stephen Desper, the bands engineer, had assembled a selection of tracks, mainly outtakes, for a follow-up which he called Second Brother Album. Rieley hated the tracks and called them "forgettable" and at a meeting with Mo Ostin, a Warner Brothers executive and massive Brian Wilson fan, took one listen and said, "No way."
With the exception of a handful of tracks the new album was recorded at sessions running from January through to July 1971. However, Brian was less involved in the production.
The original planned title of the new album was Landlocked but this changed and it would take it's name from the closing track Surf's Up.
Released in August 1971 on Brother/Reprise Surf's Up was the Beach Boys 17th studio album and the follow-up to Sunflower. In the UK it was issued two-months later.
The album featured two of Carl Wilson's first important solo efforts, Long Promised Road and Feel Flows and was an indication of what was to come from him in the future. Mike Love took the old Leiber & Stoller classic Riot In Cell Block Number 9 and reworked it as Student Demonstration Time, which apparently disgusted Dennis Wilson and embarrassed Carl. Brian felt the lyrics were too intense. Till I Die was a track that Brian had been working on for a few months while Take A Load Off Your Feet was written with Al Jardine, who also contributes Lookin' At Tomorrow (A Welfare Song) and co-wrote A Day In The Life Of A Tree with Rieley and Brian. Bruce Johnston's only composition on the album was Disney Girls, a song he wrote "...because I saw so many kinds in our audiences being wiped out on drugs" and he wanted to recreate a time when people were more naive and healthier. Brian loved the harmonies on the song.
Surf's Up bought the album to a close and originally Brian didn't want it included and on giving in insisted Carl sing the lead vocal. When this didn't work they went back to the original 1966 recording and overdubbed a new vocal from Carl. Brian appeared as the session was ending and added the songs final lyrics.
Dennis Wilson had none of his songs on the album and was keeping them for his own solo album which he planned to release in 1971 but the project, to be provisionally titled Poops/Hubba Bubba, was shelved.
Once again there were many songs recorded and left on the shelf including Wouldn't It be Nice (To Live Again), My Solution, H.E.L.P. Is On The Way and an attempt at Seasons In The Sun, a song written by Jacques Brel and Rod McKuel which would become a hit in 1974 for Terry Jacks. Mike Love was quoted as saying their version of the song was so wimpy they had no choice but to throw it away.
The album cover artwork was based on an early 20th-century sculpture 'End Of The Trail' by James Earle Fraser. Located in Waupun, Wisconsin it depicted a weary Native American hanging limp as his tired horse approaches the edge of the Pacific Ocean. It embodied the suffering and exhaustion of people driven from their native lands. It was an appropriate cover image for the album. However, it wasn't the first choice for an album cover. With it's original working title Landlocked a cover was designed featuring white lettering printed over a photograph of a dark field. Thankfully this was discarded in favour of the cover we now know.
Chartwise it performed better than Sunflower, reaching number 29 on the US charts, their highest placing since 1967, and number 15 in the UK.
Two singles were released in America Long Promised Road b/w Deirdre and Surf's Up b/w Don't Go Near The Water the former becoming the bands sixth consecutive US single that failed to chart.
Rolling Stone wrote, "The Beach Boys stage a remarkable comeback. An LP that weds their choral harmonies to progressive pop and which shows youngest Wilson brother Carl stepping into the fore of the venerable outfit." In Time the reviewer described it as, "One of the most imaginatively produced LPs since last fall's All Things Must Pass by George Harrison and Phil Spector." Other reviews praised the album with comments including, "This is a good album, probably as good as Sunflower, which is terrific...It is certainly the most original in that it has contributed something purely its own." and "It won't disappoint anyone at all. They've produced an album which fully backs up all that's recently been written and said about them."
Of course, not everybody was so positive. The Rag felt that all the press furor over the groups reputed comeback was rubbish and the album suffered from horrendous production and engineering and a lack of focus. Writing in The Guardian, Geoffrey Cannon felt the album was inconsistent while Robert Christgau, in The Village Voice, liked Disney Girls and Take A Load Off Your Feet but found most of the other songs forgettable and the album the bands worst since Friends in 1968. He put a lot of the blame on Van Dyke Park and Jack Rieley commenting that, "Van Dyke Park's wacked-out lyricist meandering is matched by the sophomoric spiritual quest of Jack Rieley, and the music drags hither and yon." Fortunately most people disagreed.
Surf's Up has appeared in many polls with New Musical Express ranking it number 96 in their 1974 list of 'Top 100 Albums Of All Time' and in 1993 it had risen to number 46 in their list. In the 2000 book All Time Top 1000 Albums it was ranked at number 230. It was also listed in the book, 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die.
Interestingly Bruce Johnston, who wouldn't work with the group again until the L.A. (Light Album) in 1979, would later criticize Surf's Up saying, "To me, Surf's Up, is and always has been, one hyped-up lie! It was a false reflection of The Beach Boys and one which Jack (Rieley) engineered right from the start. It made it look like Brian Wilson was more than just a visitor at those sessions. Jack made it appear he was there all the time." Although he would also state about Rieley, "All I can say is that at the beginning, I thought that what he was trying to do was absolutely right on the money. He helped the band become aware of what our niche was in pop music."
This all brings us to the latest Beach Boys compilation/release... Feel Flows.
Released in August 2021 this 5-CD set, presented in a 48-page 12" x 10" hard-backed book, is sub-titled, The Sunflower & Surf's Up Sessions 1969 - 1971, and was compiled/produced by Beach Boys archivists Mark Linett and Alan Boyd. It includes 133 tracks with 108 previously unreleased. A mix of live recordings, outtakes, alternate versions, remixes, backing tracks and vocal only tracks which helps the listener understand the creative process which resulted in both Sunflower and Surf's Up.
Released with the full co-operation of the surviving band members it proves that the Beach Boys were not a spent force at this time and shows them at a critical stage of their careers. Every member appears to be overflowing with ideas and with a new sense of liberation. It also marks the return of Brian Wilson as an active member of the group following his physical and mental deterioration following the Smile sessions.
Disc one features the original Sunflower album along with previously unreleased tracks from the period and live recordings. The second disc covers Surf's Up, with the original album supported by more unreleased live recordings and unreleased tracks from the sessions. Discs three and four cover the Sunflower and Surf's Up sessions respectively and also features a number of A Capella tracks. The final disc contains various tracks from 1969-1971 some of which were recorded but eventually dropped from the albums.
Among the unreleased tracks from both album sessions are Susie Cincinnati, Two Can Play, San Miguel, H.E.L.P. Is On The Way, My Solution, Big Sur and Seasons In The Sun. In 1973 a new recording of Big Sur would find a release as part of California Saga on their Holland album.
We get to hear A Capella versions/backing vocals of many of the tracks including Break Away, Add Some Music To Your Day, Cotton Fields, the beautiful Forever, Surf's Up and Long Promised Road. Work in progress recordings gives the listener the opportunity to hear alternate versions of Don't Go Near The Water, Take A Load Of Your Feet along with session highlights including Loop De Loop, At My Window, Cool, Cool Water, Deirdre and much more.
Of particular interest is the wealth of material written by Dennis Wilson and intended for his first solo album, Poops/Hubba Bubba, but never released. Tracks include I'm Goin' Your Way, Old Movie (Cuddle Up), All Of My Love/Ecology, Barbara, Hawaiian Dream, I've Got A Friend and Behold The Night. Many of these were co-written with Daryl Dragon of Captain and Tenille fame who scored hits with Do That To Me One More Time, Muskrat Love and Love Will Keep Us Together.
The set also shows what a dynamic live act they were and on this set we are treated to eleven live recordings covering the period 1970 to 1993. Highlights include Add Some Music To Your Day (1993), Riot In Cell Block Number 9 (1970), Surf's Up (1973), Disney Girls (1982) and Student Demonstration Time (1971).
The set ends with two tracks which would eventually be recorded for the 1972 album Carl And The Passions - "So Tough", You Need A Mess Of Help To Stand Alone and Marcella.
My only complaint about the set is the book which is mainly a collection of old quotes from band members taken from various interviews supported with some basic text. A set like this deserved a more informative liner note detailing the recordings etc along with studio shots, memorabilia and sleeves. A minor point that doesn't distract from the quality of the music.
Feel Flows is proof, if any was needed, that the Beach Boys never stopped creating great music. Sit back, relax, turn the lights down and Add Some Music To Your Day.
