busy doin' nothin'

But not for some. Drugged, bemused, prematurely middle-aged, the Beach Boys gazed out across the waves, landscaped of their adolescence, and could never quite make up their minds, whether to stick with what they knew, or whether to head up into the canyons, float on those magic cushions......

Print-ad style poster for the single Wouldn’t It Be Nice/God Only Knows (from the album Pet Sounds)

mona (deconstructed mix) || the beach boys

Um

Wonderful photo

Vintage print ad for Pet Sounds by The Beach Boys in Billboard Magazine (recon.)

i would lick late 70s fat brian wilson clean

“[Carl] reflects on the changing fortunes of the group with a philosophical air. What has been, has been. What is, is. What will be, will be…. Perhaps the serenity he exudes was something he didn’t have to learn. […] What were they trying to say? Carl smiles at the question. The Beach Boys have never espoused causes. Never taught anything. ‘Our intention is to comfort. To make it nice. We just wanted to say what we wanted to say.’” - article by Jeani Read, The Province (December 20, 1974)

Mike: Never mind that, just pose for the picture.

(x)

“Back in those days, when you signed a union contract, the leader would sign it. So [it read], ‘Carl Wilson and four musicians known as the Beach Boys.’ The union would have the leader sign it and the promoter sign it and the agent sign it. So, my guess is that the Steel Pier gave the contract to some secretary who was probably new on the job and told her to order posters like you always do for this act. So, I can just imagine the Beach Boys getting to the Steel Pier for the gig and Michael getting out of the car and just dying when he saw the poster! Because in huge letters it said ‘Carl Wilson’ and in smaller letters ‘and the Beach Boys.’ Love must have been having a hemorrhage when he saw that!” - Fred Vail, Beach Boys Gigs “We were friends for thirty-five years, during which time [Carl] was the most unchanged of ‘the boys,’ the on stage leader, and, perhaps his biggest contribution, the ‘peacekeeper.’” - Fred Vail, Facebook (2026)