As we memorialize Brian Wilson’s death on Wednesday at age 82, it is difficult to comprehend the vast extent of his musical legacy. Indeed, the scope of his creative imprint is all but incalculable. As the leader of The Beach Boys, he elevated American music and the notion of recording artistry in one fell swoop in the mid-1960s. In so doing, he stoked the aspirations of no less than The Beatles, establishing a loose rivalry that would reshape the face of popular music in the bargain. That legacy continues to resound into the present day.
Much has been written about Wilson’s well-known struggles with mental health-related issues and drug abuse. But perhaps his greatest peril—and simultaneously, his most formidable strength—involved artistic ambition. In the early ’60s, he contented himself as the pop songsmith behind a succession of Beach Boys hits in “Surfin’ USA,” “Surfer Girl,” “Fun, Fun, Fun,” “I Get Around” and “Help Me, Rhonda,” among a host of others. But by 1964, Wilson had come to realize that his ambitions for popular music were much grander than The Beach Boys’ sun-kissed brand could ever hope to accommodate.
Things began to come to a head with “Don’t Worry Baby,” Wilson’s thinly veiled rewrite of The Ronettes’ “Be My Baby,” which he considered to be pop’s finest moment. After The Ronettes and producer Phil Spector declined to record the composition, The Beach Boys landed a Top 40 hit with the song. But Wilson nevertheless felt the sting of rejection, as well as the notion that he could be—nay, should be—producing more profound music than The Beach Boys’ fanciful image seemed to imply.
“The Beach Boys” during a recording session, 1966. (Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images)
Wilson’s aspirations for a more lasting legacy began to flower more fully by 1965. Freed from the tyrannical control that his father Murry had exerted over The Beach Boys’ direction as their manager, Wilson made a self-conscious stab at greatness. With the hit single “California Girls,” Wilson began shifting his approach to the group’s music precipitously, devoting inordinate effort to constructing the song’s introduction. His ambitions were buoyed even further by The Beatles’ breakthrough LP “Rubber Soul.” For Wilson, the album was a revelation, challenging him to rethink the possibility of a record album as an artistic statement.
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In 1966, Wilson led The Beach Boys in the production of “Pet Sounds,” the magnum opus that elevated the group’s stature for all time. With standout tracks like “Wouldn’t It Be Nice” and “God Only Knows,” “Pet Sounds” found Wilson pushing the boundaries of experimentation and instrumentation in the studio, foisting his name among the likes of Beatles producer George Martin in terms of redefining the bounds of recording artistry.
That same year, with his painstaking production of The Beach Boys’ blockbuster single “Good Vibrations,” Wilson seemed poised to explore even greater musical ramparts. Unchecked drug abuse and his deteriorating mental condition stalled Wilson’s efforts on The Beach Boys’ next album, “Smile,” which he billed as a “teenage symphony to God.” Meanwhile, The Beatles, with their own ambitions having been stoked by Wilson and The Beach Boys’ attainments with “Pet Sounds” and “Good Vibrations,” produced generation-eclipsing artistic statements of their own with “Revolver” and “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.”
While the balance of his creative life would be overshadowed by “Pet Sounds” and “Good Vibrations,” Wilson’s visionary approach to the recording studio has echoed across the decades, demonstrating that popular music held the power both for stimulating mass entertainment, as well as elevating the senses. Paul McCartney has famously remarked that “Pet Sounds” “blew me out of the water,” adding that “no one is educated musically till they’ve heard that album.”
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