Defend the Indefensible: Mike Love

LMAO

So I’ll actually try to defend the indefensible. This song (which I found while poking around on the Feel Flows box) is terrific and one of Mike’s best lead vocals:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PLYSGeAaPEw

That song is also on the two-disc version, it's one of the better outtakes; it certainly would have been preferable to the Mike song that made it on Surf's Up. His vocal has a jaundiced edge without sounding snide or sarcastic, which is unexpected.

I wouldn’t change a thing about surfs up, even student demonstration time. I sort of like that it disturbs the mood of what would otherwise be an impeccable dinner party record.

Sweet and Bitter is great. It's one of several substitutions (along with 4th of July, Wouldn't It Be Nice To Live Again, and Back Home) that would have made the album much stronger.

xp i don't think i'd categorize the b-side of Surf's Up as a dinner party record. "A Day in the Life of a Tree" -> "Til I Die" -> "Surf's Up" isn't exactly the lightest Beach Boys track run.

I liked how impressed he was by the goings on, but I was disappointed that the writers didn't have the guts to make a character intone ponderously "so now the dance of the dragons commences..."

the one time I saw what Mike Love calls "The Beach Boys" in 2010, he talked about some radio station that first played their music, and then he talked about how that station had drastically changed now, and he said "now they play music like this", and Mary J Blige "Family Affair" comes on, and he makes a horrified look.

it was somewhat hilarious as he seemed to think this was a new song despite it being 9 years old, less hilarious that it came across as "ewww URBAN music"

oops, wrong thread

no this the right thread

At this point, I would be very surprised if Mike Love lavished praise on anything that wasn't old and lily-white.

Mike Love fantasy decapitation when?

xp i don't think i'd categorize the b-side of Surf's Up as a dinner party record. "A Day in the Life of a Tree" -> "Til I Die" -> "Surf's Up" isn't exactly the lightest Beach Boys track run.

― Western® with Bacon Flavor

dinner donner party record (shout outs to jeanne thornton's _summer fun_)

I may have mentioned it before but I put together my own Surf's Up mix of just Brian, Dennis, and Carl songs and it's become one of my favorite Beach Boys records to listen to. Starting in 1970 Beach Boys records start becoming really patchy, with high highs and low lows. Dennis pulling his songs from _Surf's Up_ really hurt the record. Here's what I have:

Fallin' In Love
Sweet Mountain
Long Promised Road
Sound of Free
(Wouldn't It Be Nice To) Live Again

Feel Flows
4th of July
A Day in the Life of a Tree
Til I Die
Surf's Up

That final three-song stretch is unfuckwithable, of course. Some of the Dennis songs I think were intended for his solo album which was to be called, uh, _Poops Hubba Hubba_, apparently. And "Sweet Mountain" isn't a Beach Boys song at all but "A Day in the Life of a Tree" doesn't have lead vocals by a band member either, and just like with that song, they all sing on the outro.

The Mike song is _good_, one of his best songs along with "Big Sur", but it doesn't really fit. There's a certain sort of purity to having an all-Wilson Beach Boys record...

There's a certain sort of purity to having an all-Wilson Beach Boys record...

True. When the first Pet Sounds box set used Brian's vocal for the stereo "Wouldn't It Be Nice" bridge (something Love put a stop to on all subsequent releases) I thought it was an improvement for similar reasons.

True. When the first Pet Sounds box set used Brian's vocal for the stereo "Wouldn't It Be Nice" bridge (something Love put a stop to on all subsequent releases) I thought it was an improvement for similar reasons.

― birdistheword

i thought it was because they couldn't find the master tape for the love bridge when the first box came out, and then they found the tape. was that a cover story?

It's a bullshit story. Listen to the 2001 standalone release where they restored Love's vocal on the stereo mix. Love's vocal is flown in from the final mono mix, and the result clearly has phasing issues which was unavoidable at the time. They can probably do a better job of it with the same "demixing" tools Giles has been using.

Spotted in an FB group:

1979 BOMP! Magazine: Nick Lowe on Mike Love:

"Like what's that bloke's name… Mike Love? Is he the one that wears that hat all the time? What a wanker that bloke is! When he came over to England, I saw him on the television. He was being interviewed and he was like this crass American tourist and he all but said your policemen are wonderful and I just came over here for the girls, you got so many pretty girls here. I thought, for fuck’s sake, what is this wimp doing? He had on this sort of LA beige suit on and the beads around his neck. He just looked like the biggest wanker I'd ever seen. And his stupid little yachting cap!"

Cupid must be angry at Mike Love.

Those aren’t the Beachboys and I doubt they voted
Mike Love is ,in the opinion of almost every musician I know , a shithead , most assuredly has no talent at all , and , as you can probably tell ...I just don’t like him https://t.co/GLZwvSFN2h

— David Crosby (@thedavidcrosby) October 19, 2020

:)

The best thing about that tweet is how he says two terrible insults, seems to be stepping back to deliver a death blow...and ends on a mild opinion.

https://i.imgur.com/G3G9INc.jpg

Mike still on the circuit

Is he doing the Biggie tribute?

He’s a member of Beats Antique