Beach Boys’ Brian Wilson honours rock music idols in Pet Sounds

Brian Wilson is keen to repay a debt of gratitude.

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There’s something ironic about Brian Wilson paying tribute on record to the greats of rock ’n’ roll, pioneers such as Chuck Berry,­ ­Little Richard and Jerry Lee Lewis. After all, Wilson himself is considered one of the greatest innovators in rock history.

The Beach Boys musician and songwriter’s output, in the 1960s in particular, raised the bar for American music with classic songs such as Good Vibrations, I Get Around, God Only Knows and I Can Hear Music, to name only a few of the hits that made the Beach Boys a global phenomenon.

Yet at 73, Wilson, who is in Australia for a series of shows starting at Bluesfest in Byron Bay this weekend, is about to acknowledge his debt to those rock ’n’ roll craftsmen on an album of cover versions, albeit one that has yet to be recorded and has no release date.

“It’s going to be called Brian Wilson Sings the Great Rock ’n’ Roll Artists,” the Californian star says. “It’s going to be good. I learned a lot about how to write rock ’n’ roll songs from Chuck Berry.”

Indeed one of the Beach Boys’ early hits, Surfin’ USA, was so like Berry’s Sweet Little Sixteen that Berry eventually was given credit for writing it. The band also had a hit with Berry’s Rock ’n’ Roll Music.

Whether we ever hear what Wilson has in mind as a salute to his early peers remains to be seen, but it’s the substantial Wilson catalogue, in particular the landmark 1966 Beach Boys album Pet Sounds, that is about to be celeb­rated in Australia.

Wilson and his band the Wondermints, alongside his former Beach Boy bandmate Al Jardine, will perform Pet Sounds in its entirety at the Australian shows as well as dipping into the Beach Boys greatest hits, of which there is a rich assortment.

Pet Sounds long has been considered one of the best albums of all time, regularly topping critics’ and readers’ polls on such matters. Its 13 songs, including Wouldn’t It Be Nice, Sloop John B, God Only Knows and Caroline, No took pop music in a new direction 50 years ago, one created by the young genius Wilson, who spent months crafting it after leaving the touring band to concentrate on working in the studio. Just as the Beatles were taking Britpop by the scruff of its neck and reinventing it with the albums Revolver, Rubber Soul and Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, Wilson was abandoning his band’s early surf music for a more complex, orchestrated, psychedelic sound.

That search for musical perfection came at a price, however. The album also marked the beginning of Wilson’s well-documented downward spiral, when drugs took over and his health deteriorated to the point where he spent time in a psychiatric hospital, later became a recluse for almost two years and then for a period that stretched from the mid-1970s to the early 90s fell under the influence of psychologist and psychotherapist Eugene Landy.

The story of Wilson’s career to the point where he eventually freed himself from the then disgraced Landy’s unorthodox practices was well documented in 2014’s critically acclaimed biopic Love & Mercy, named after the opening song on Wilson’s self-­titled debut solo album in 1988. The film, starring John Cusack as the older Wilson and Paul Dano as the younger, is an accurate portrayal of events, according to its subject.

“They all played their characters very precisely,” says Wilson, who had no direct involvement in the making of director Bill Pohlad’s movie. “I wasn’t involved but my wife was. It really took me back to that time when I was creating Pet Sounds.”

Wilson still bears the scars of those years of ill-health. His noughties and this decade’s renaissance, during which he has toured regularly, including in Australia, has been marked by a deterioration in his singing voice, but he continues to be revered by fans for the contribution he has made to music with a wealth of material that has been so influential and has stood the test of time.

His favourite few minutes from that vast catalogue is God Only Knows, one of the songs he co-wrote for Pet Sounds with lyricist Tony Asher. “I think that is my best song because the melody is such a good melody and the lyrics are pretty good too.”

Wilson last performed Pet Sounds in Australia in 2002 and followed it up in 2007 by performing that album’s long-lost follow-up, Smile, in 2004. As he approaches his 74th birthday in June, there must be a strong chance that this will be our last opportunity to see one of the greatest albums in history performed by the man who created it, but Wilson is keeping an open mind.

“My health is good and it is still a great experience to do a concert,” he says. “I don’t know if it’ll be the last time. All I know is that we’ll play it in its entirety and it should go very well.”

Brian Wilson’s Pet Sounds 50th Anniversary Australian tour begins at Bluesfest, Byron Bay March 28, followed by Sydney Opera House March 29 and 31, Melbourne Palais April 3, Adelaide Entertainment Centre April 5 and Perth Riverside Theatre April 7.