Brian Wilson demos
In the unlikely event you’ve already exhausted the riches to be found in The Beach Boys’ Feel Flows box set, Brian Wilson just dumped a whole heap of unreleased tracks onto his upgraded website, brianwilson.com. Unsteady 1976 piano demos for The
Beach Boys Love You contain as much pathos as genius, but there’s also plenty of evidence that Wilson continued to make good music well into his solo career. Navigate tacky synths and occasionally strained vocals on a clutch of ’80s finds, then head for the 1995 sessions where producer Andy Paley placed Wilson’s craftsmanship into much more sympathetic, Pet Soundsinspired settings. Many of these songs – notably the gorgeous Gettin’ In Over My Head – eventually surfaced in different versions, but the demos are definitive. “The only time I ever really jumped out of my chair in 30 years was when I heard Andy [Paley]’s stuff,” Wilson told me in ’95. It remains one of myriad Wilsonrelated disappointments that their creative partnership was never properly fulfilled. JM