A Cork on the Ocean: Beach Boys and Wilson Brothers song-by-song

When I saw them at the Hollywood Bowl back in 1982, they opened with "It's O.K," then launched right into "Dance Dance Dance."

The original version that wound up as a CD bonus track has a terrible 2nd verse with lyrics that don't rhyme:

In my car a wild record drives me out of my tree
And I push all the button for a station that swings

I'm glad they decided to re-record it.

 

Effervescent: 5/5.

 

"Dance Dance Dance" is deceptively complex.. What a great sound! I love that break with the guitar solo.. the soaring vocals.. incredible recording! 5/5

 

The production on this is next level, incredible IMO. Doesn't sound like Phil Spector at all, by the way.

The stereo mix sparkles (I posted the one from Sounds Of Summer, perhaps not the best mastering.) That chugging six-string bass is so cool sounding, and when Carl and Glen come in the energy goes up. It's an incredibly energetic, percussive, chiming, ringing song that manages to satisfy the sweet pop yearnings and yet rocks pretty hard. That jump in key in the middle of the third verse is masterfully done by all involved. You watch the live versions and they don't even bat an eye.

Lyric is fun and not meant to be any more than that, but it has its cleverness and Carl's riff is super catchy and rocking. I love his guitar solo. Vocals from all are incredible. Drums and percussion thunder. Live versions are incredible.

5/5

Nashville version feels limp without the supporting players and production flourishes. Lyrics are not as good either. It's still a good rock and roll song, what with the riff and all , but lacks the glossy pop majesty of the final version.

3..5/5

 

Dance dance dance
5/5
Classic

 

All agreed, including the rank:

5/5

 

Tomorrow, I’m going to start holding up songs from The Beach Boys’ Christmas Album.


In order to avoid the debacle of the year before that saw The Beach Boys almost miss their contractually obligated deadline, forcing them to record Little Deuce Coupe in two-three days and fill it with four previously unreleased songs, Brian seems to have planned 1964 better.

For the third studio album of the year (and fourth album altogether), rather than presenting a new album of mostly originals, The Beach Boys would release a Christmas Album, in time for the holidays. It would be recorded in late spring/early summer thus allowing Brian and the band the freedom to tour without having to worry about a follow-up album.

Brian’s hero/rival Phil Spector had already released his own classic Christmas album in late 1963: A Christmas Gift to You from Philles Records.


Brian had attended at least one of the sessions and had played piano on a track, though it’s not known if what he played made it on the final record — Spector kicked him out of the session before it was finished. So Brian’s album was very much inspired by his own desire to follow in the footsteps of his idol and also by his very real love of Christmas and Christmas music.


The Beach Boys’ Christmas Album killed a number of birds with one stone: first of all, it fulfilled the brutal stipulation in their contract; second of all ( as the album was 7/12ths non-original traditional Christmas carols and songs) it took the songwriting burden off of Brian, who had already written two original Christmas songs by the end of 1963, which meant he only had to come up with three more.

Furthermore the album's structure, which would feature original Beach Boys pop/rock songs on one side, while featuring ornately produced traditional Christmas songs arranged and, for all practical purposes, produced by Brian’s childhood idol and role model Dick Reynolds on the other side, significantly reduced Brian’s burden of writing arrangements.


Conveniently, the album would also please both teenage fans and and their easy-listening loving middle-aged parents.

Finally, by recording The Beach Boys’ Christmas Album with Dick Reynolds, Brian would also be able to observe Reynolds's methods in the studio, and The Beach Boys’ Christmas Album is seen by some as an important step towards Brian’s development away from rock and roll to the more ornate orchestral pop of 1965 and especially 1966.

It was all arranged ahead of time, and thus less than a month passed between the completion of All Summer Long and the start of the recording of The Beach Boys’ Christmas Album on June 18th, 1964.

Dick Reynolds was an old-school professional and the backing tracks of the lushly orchestrated seven songs that were his charge (plus two outtakes) were all recorded in the space of about two days; The Beach Boys actually recorded their vocals live in the studio with the orchestra, although there was vocal double-tracking later and some of the vocals recorded this day were later completely re-recorded.

The new tracks played by The Beach Boys were also recorded in about one day... and a further two or three days were devoted to recording more vocals, overdubbing guitar and double-tracking the original vocals. In all, The Beach Boys’ Christmas Album took six sessions over a period of 13 days to record, in which time The Beach Boys played just one concert in San Jose; in this time Brian also produced the “Single Mix” of “Little Honda” (released in 2014) as well as the backing track for “Don't Hurt My Little Sister”, (which would not be released for about 9 months.)

Immediately after The Beach Boys' Christmas Album was completed on June 30th, The Beach Boys embarked on an intense American Summer Safari Tour.


This tour continued, in fact, well into the autumn. At some point during the summer, Brian started smoking marijuana, which he found inspired his music in a positive way. However, it also made him paranoid and he was particularly became increasingly worried that Marilyn Rovell would cheat on him while he was away. All three Wilson brothers and Mike Love also drank heavily on the tour to get to sleep and to calm their nerves, and some may have begun dabbling in harder substances: Mike has claimed he saw a syringe in Brian's room at some point on the tour, though I've never seen another source that mentioned hard drug use so early.

In October, the Concert album was released and the legendary T.A.M.I. shows were filmed; and in November, The Beach Boys left for a short but intense promotional tour of Europe recording spots and performances for radio and TV in the UK, France, West Germany and Italy, as well as playing seven shows and making a quick stopover in Copenhagen.


As they were preparing to depart, Brian witnessed Marilyn smile at Mike and Brian became worried and jealous, irrationally interpreting the smile as the young Marilyn falling in love with his suave, ultra-confident (and legendarily womanising) cousin.

This basically ruined the entire European tour for Brian, who spent every night making very long and very expensive trans-Atlantic phone calls with his 16 year old girlfriend. And I think it was at this point (though it may have been earlier, on the Summer Safari tour) that he proposed marriage to her, realising that he couldn’t bear the thought of losing her. In all, he is said to have racked up $5000 in phone bills during the European promo tour, which lasted about three weeks.

The promo tour of Europe saw The Beach Boys being greeted with enthusiastic fans, some of them famous themselves. When Rolling Stones' manager Andrew Loog Oldham met The Beach Boys, he enthused about their music and expressed admiration for the management job Murry Wilson had done for the band. Not realizing it was meant as a compliment, Dennis replied by punching Loog Oldham in the face.

But after that they had a merry time.

Except for the fact that Mike was arrested and jailed in Germany for smashing in the car window of someone who had scammed him out of some money.

In the midst of the European tour, on November 9th, 1964, The Beach Boys’ Christmas Album was released. The Beach Boys were riding high in their most successful year. The very week their Concert album topped the charts, The Beach Boys’ Christmas Album charted at #6 on the charts.

It regularly re-entered the charts every year throughout the sixties, until Capitol deleted their catalogue, in fact; and The Beach Boys' Christmas Album eventually became one of The Beach Boys’ most perennial and best-selling albums: as of 2012, it had sold over 912,000 copies in the U.S. alone and it is the Beach Boys’ third highest-selling non-compilation album and their 11th overall.

It still regularly makes the charts and spent five weeks in the Hot 200 as recently as December2022/January 2023. (That’s the very year we are in, for those who are not in the know.)
NOTE: The Beach Boys Christmas Album entered the Billboard Chart for December 9th (today) at #101.

Furthermore, Christmas compilation albums (which included The Beach Boys’ Christmas Album in totality) Ultimate Christmas and Christmas With The Beach Boys have sold a further 85000 and 135,000 apiece respectively.

Christmas Harmonies, another repackaging, sold 30,000 and a rather bizarre twofer containing Christmas and Summer Days (And Summer Nights!!) Called Holidays & Hits sold 35,000.

If you add all together, then, in fact, The Beach Boys’ Christmas Album has sold more than 1,000,000 copies and may in fact be the highest selling Beach Boys’ album after Pet Sounds, discounting compilations.

The tracklist:

1. Little Saint Nick [single version] (Brian Wilson, Mike Love)
2. The Man with All the Toys (Wilson, Love)
3. Santa’s Beard (Wilson, Love)
4. Merry Christmas Baby (Wilson, Love)
5. Christmas Day (Wilson)
6. Frosty The Snowman (Walter Rollins, Steve Nelson)
7. We Three Kings of Orient Are (John Henry Hopkins, Jr)
8. Blue Christmas (Billy Hayes, Jay W. Johnson)
9. Santa Claus Is Comin’ to Town (John Frederick Coots, Haven Gillespie)
10. White Christmas (Irving Berlin)
11. I’ll Be Home for Christmas (Kim Gannon, Walter Kent, Buck Ram)
12. Auld Lang Syne (Traditional, arranged by Wilson)

I’ll follow up the album with the following extra album tracks:

• The Lord’s Prayer (Traditional, arranged by Wilson) {B-side, Little Saint Nick, November 1963)
• Little Saint’ Nick [alternate version] (Wilson, Love) {released as a bonus track to the CD issue The Beach Boys’ Christmas Album, 1991)
• Christmas Eve (Wilson) {outtake, released on Keep An Eye On Summer: The Beach Boys Sessions 1964, 2014)
• Jingle Bells [backing track] { outtake, released on Keep An Eye On Summer: The Beach Boys Sessions 1964, 2014)

I’ll hold up the The Beach Boys’ Christmas Album as a whole on the same day as this last entry…And I’ll follow that up with a double-post:

• Keep An Eye On Summer: The Beach Boys Sessions 1964
• Sessions 1964

And so I'll start holding up the remaining 7 songs from Today!, all of them completed in January 1965, on December 27th.

And then on the 28th of December, I’ll start holding up the 7 remaining songs from Beach Boys Today!

Note on the mixes: originally The Beach Boys’ Christmas Album was released on mono and stereo, the latter mixed by Chuck Britz. The 1991 CD reissue featured "Little Saint Nick" in stereo, but the following three songs in mono (fold downs, I believe) and the rest of the album in remixed, narrower stereo.

The Ultimate Christmas and Christmas with The Beach Boys compilations were released in stereo (I believe the band songs are original mixes, and the Reynolds songs are the 1991 remixes.)

The Christmas Harmonies compilation includes everything in mono but I believe they are fold-downs and not original mono mixes. But not sure.

There’s also a digital mono/stereo version of The Beach Boys’ Christmas Album on HD Tracks, iTunes, etc. and it seems that those may have the original mono mixes, not mere fold downs. But I can’t be sure: I get a bit confused with all these different mixes. I do know that things should not be this complicated, but they are.

 

DDD - One of the 60s greats. Blaine's percussion is perfect, but Dennis's drumming's pretty good too. Brian shines and the group harmonies are totally locked in. The session tapes are brilliant.
5/5

 

Dance, Dance, Dance
Without dissecting this song, or indeed going in to the intricacies of the composition, I can only say it's utterly brilliant. Bouncy, joyful, and irresistible, that opening guitar riff sets the tone and away we go, 5/5

 

Something I failed to mention about Glen Campbell's acoustic guitar line: he doesn't play exactly the same notes as Carl and Ray are playing, but plays a third or a fifth up, harmonizing. This was actually at first a mistake on his part in one of the takes and Brian liked the sound of it, so it was made part of the song.

In the sessions Brian teases Campbell about not being able to read music.

 

Dance, Dance, Dance
Carl's first writing credit on a hit single?
I love this but there's not much to say about it that hasn't already been said. The majority of the Beach Boys' big 60s hits I regard as flawless and impeccable in their way and I can't give each one less than 5/5

 

Dance, Dance, Dance

Wonderful classic BB song, gotta love it.

5/5

 

An easy and vivacious 5

 

Danve Dance Dance
I think this may be the first of their hit singles I am not giving a 5 to. This one seems a little less inspired and more the result of attempting to craft a hit. Still well produced and fun just not quite as essential or memorable.
Rating 4

 

'Dance Dance Dance' - For some reason, I have this in logged in my mind as one of their lesser songs and therefore generally enjoy it more than I expect to when I actually listen to it. That said, I still reckon it's good rather than great, despite the ever-improving arrangement and production magic dust being sprinkled by BW. 4/5.

 

Turn it up all the way is what I do when I play "Dance,Dance,Dance"
Great rocker. Good energy.
5/5

 

The Beach Boys speed through “Dance, Dance, Dance”, yet they never seem to me to be going too fast, the tempo is just right at their fast pace. Hal and Dennis’s drumming is rock solid and the harmony singing never seems rushed, despite the pace they take the song at. (Compare any of these Beach Boy versions to the Fendertones version, which I think is great, and the Fendertones rush through it, The Beach Boys cruise through it.)

”Dance, Dance, Dance” (Nashville version) is a little rough, but still a lot of fun. 3.5/5

“Dance, Dance, Dance” (LA version) has many more musicians, but it never sounds cluttered. 4.5/5

“Dance, Dance, Dance” ( live at the TAMI Show, LA) is how I always imagine The Beach Boys live in 1964, in sync with each other vocally and instrumentally. If we’re rating it, 4/5

“Dance, Dance, Dance” (May 30, 1989 live at the Universal Amphitheater, LA) from Songs From Here and Back does sound cluttered, but it’s still great. It’s nice to have both Brian and Carl up on stage together (if Lance’s credits are correct, and I have no reason to believe they aren’t), even though Mike dominates the mix (and his voice is beginning to show signs of age.) If we’re rating it, 3.4/5

 

Dance, Dance, Dance

A rockin’ tune that leaps out of the speakers with its unbridled sense of fun. Fantastic guitar parts and a killer tambourine that ramps the excitement up another notch in just the right way at just the right time. Actually all the percussion is really immaculately arranged here, something I expect we’ll be seeing a lot more of, and if anyone was unsure whether the Beach Boys could come up with a great guitar hook, look no further.

I can’t give it full marks, as I feel a tiny sense of contrivance in the lyrics, like uncool kids trying to sound cool, they don’t always come off quite right to me. I will probably get some flack for that statement, but that’s just a very subtle thing with this song for me. Most of the time my inner skeptic is assuaged and I am totally won over by the music, which really does, in fact, make you want to get up and dance around (which I am all too ready to do, provided no one else is around).

4.5/5

 

Dance,Dance,Dance

Never really apprecisted this song, until the stereo mix.
Thought it was really not much there.
Catchy but a slight song.
Discotheques were popular back then
Hearing the different mix brought out all the parts.
The guitar lines, the castanets, and the rising harmonies.
The songis like a rocketship, going up.
Thunderbirds are Go!
Propelling into the sky.
Almost punk rock in it's speed.
You can not sit still, while this is playing.
A sugar confection of a song.
Short but sweet.

4.5/5

 

The s

Linnett’s mixes are hit and miss on the Today! album in particular (probably due to the source material) but this one sounds incredible!

 

DDD

Obviously an iconic Beach Boys track. Cool riff. Not quite peak level greatness for me, though, so only....

4.5

 

Dance Dance Dance

Love the energy, especially from Carl.
For some reason I don’t remember this song when it came out. Heard it lots of times back in the ‘80s in radio commercials. A company (Radio Shack?) ran the ad for several years, touting their batteries with DDD playing in the background. As the song modulated to a higher key towards the end, the ad person spoke about how long lasting those fabulous batteries were.

4.5/5

 

You couldn't make this stuff up if you tried...

 

Had Murry been there they would have incurred tens of thousands of dollars in swear-fines.

 

Juvenile humour for a 22 year old and insensitive.
I guess the group of guys spurned him on.
I could see it happen.
Glad it was dropped.