Beaches, Cars, & Girls: How the Beach Boys Songs Echoed Michigan

Rock stars have died...and they will continue to die:
John Lennon, George Harrison, Freddy Mercury, David Crosby, Elvis Presley, Little Richard, Chuck Berry, Jimi Hendrix, Jim Morrison, Janis Joplin...I could go on and on.

But the recent passing of Beach Boys founder, leader, producer, and songwriter Brian Wilson hit me the hardest. His music was the soundtrack to my youth, as it was for millions of others growing up in the 60s.

When I was a teenager, I wanted to learn how to surf.....but living in Mid-Michigan made it difficult. Although Michigan is surrounded by beaches with some good waves on Lakes Michigan, Huron, and Superior, it was almost like living in California, but we didn’t have the same surf vibe as on the west coast. So, the closest I came to surfing was with a boogie board; just throw it in a swimming pool, take a running leap, and land. Hey, I was able to surf for maybe two seconds, but it was something, anyway.

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How Did the Beach Boys Songs Echo Life in Michigan?

Michigan is also known as an auto state: millions of cars were cranked out over the decades...and The Beach Boys wrote and sang about the glories of owning your own car – the dream of every teenage Michigan boy.

After Brian was through producing and singing songs about surfin’ and cars, he turned to another favorite male past time: girls. And Michigan has some of the best in the country; oh, my gosh, do we ever! Michigan girls were even slyly mentioned in not one, but two lines in the song “California Girls”:

The Midwest farmers daughters really make you feel alright
And the northern girls with the way they kiss, they keep their boyfriends warm at night

And we northern/Midwest Michigan boys already knew that.

It wasn’t just the music that impressed me about Brian Wilson, it was his resilience. He suffered a lot of crap from his abusive father, Murry, who once whacked him in the head with a board, making him deaf in one ear. Because of that incident, Brian was never able to hear stereo. To further torture his sons (he called it ‘punishment’), Murry would take out his glass eye and force his sons to look into the gaping hole. This guy was a cruel, sick man...yet Brian survived his youth to make such beautiful, lasting music.

With his brothers Carl and Dennis, cousin Mike Love, and friends Al Jardine and David Marks, Brian formed The Beach Boys after Dennis suggested he should write a song about surfing. This prompted their first successful single in 1962, “Surfin’” followed by their first Top 40 tune, “Surfin’ Safari”. Brian was mainly interested in creating the music for the recordings, while many times he relied on others for the lyrics. Mike handled many of the lyric chores on some of the band’s biggest tunes, but thanks to Murry, who took it upon himself to be the boys’ manager,  Mike’s name was kept out of the credits, greedily giving sole credit to his son. Decades later, Mike was given his due, his name was added to the past credits and is now recognized as a major lyricist and contributor to the Beach Boys’ success.

Those who know me know I am a HUGE Beatles fan, with many, many vinyl records, DVDs, books, you name it. But even so, I always put The Beach Boys one step ahead of The Beatles and I’ll tell you why.

Although Lennon & McCartney were the major Beatle songwriters, they were not the producers, or sound creators. That task was handled by George Martin, probably the #1 music producer in England. He was responsible for the sound of The Beatles, and added some extra odd touches and instrumentation, as in songs like All You Need Is Love, I Am the Walrus, Yesterday, A Day in the Life, and basically every song in the Beatles’ catalog, except for the tunes on the Let It Be album. Sure, the Beatles had a lot of input, but Martin was THE producer.

Brian took care of all the album production for The Beach Boys throughout the 60s. Writing, creating, performing, touring, producing, little odd touches here and there.....he did it all for the whole 60s decade without any production help from anyone else. That's why I put him a notch ahead.

Again, even though people think of California when they hear a classic Beach Boys tune, I think about my youth, growing up in Michigan. The high school football & basketball games, after-game dances, cruisin’, burgers, girls...and Brian’s music supplied the soundtrack to my Michigan upbringing. And I am so grateful for that...and him. My favorite Beach Boys tunes are hard to pinpoint, there are so many:

Dance, Dance, Dance
I Get Around
Help Me, Rhonda
Do It Again
Wouldn’t It Be Nice
Fun, Fun, Fun
California Girls
Don’t Worry, Baby

Click any of the above titles, listen and enjoy!