What if the Beach Boys had played Monterey?

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by RayistaGeoff, Aug 14, 2005.

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  1. JohnnyQuest

    JohnnyQuest Forum Resident

    Location:
    Paradise
    From wiki...

    "The Beach Boys, who had been involved in the conception of the event and were at one point scheduled to headline and close the show, failed to perform. This resulted from a number of issues plaguing the group. Carl Wilson was in a feud with officials for his refusal to be drafted into military service during the Vietnam War. The group's new, radical album Smile had recently been aborted, with band leader Brian Wilson in a depressed state and unwilling to perform (he hadn't performed live with the group since late 1964, although he would do so in Honolulu, Hawaii in August 1967). Since Smile had not been released, the group felt their older material would not go over well. The cancellation permanently damaged their reputation and popularity in the US, which would contribute to their replacement album Smiley Smile charting lower than any other of their previous album releases."

    :doh:
     
  2. captwillard

    captwillard Forum Resident

    Location:
    Nashville
    Didn't the Mama's and Papa's play?
     
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  3. S. P. Honeybunch

    S. P. Honeybunch Presidente de Kokomo, Endless Mikelovemoney

    We have the medley from Michigan in October 1966 for all to hear on Endless Harmony Soundtrack: great job from The Beach Boys. Somehow there is this feeling that Monterey should be a battle of the bands with The Beach Boys having to prove themselves. Not sure why that is the case. Jimi Hendrix was a guitar hero and The Beach Boys, Mamas and Papas, etc. were vocal groups who were able to wow a crowd as well. No one ever questions vocal group CSN or CSNY's ability to wow a crowd at Woodstock. Why do you not think that The Beach Boys were capable of the same at Monterey?
     
  4. JohnnyQuest

    JohnnyQuest Forum Resident

    Location:
    Paradise
    This thread also brings up another interesting thing I read about psychedelia & the counterculture movement that relates to the Beach Boys.

    "The Beach Boys' 1966 album Pet Sounds also paved the way for later hippie acts, with Brian Wilson's writing interpreted as a "plea for love and understanding." Pet Sounds served as a major source of inspiration for other contemporary acts, most notably directly inspiring the Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. The single "Good Vibrations" soared to number one globally, completely changing the perception of what a record could be. It was during this period that the highly anticipated album Smile was to be released. However, the project collapsed and The Beach Boys released a downgraded version called Smiley Smile, which failed to make a big commercial impact but was also highly influential, most notably on The Who's Pete Townshend."

    Were any of you guys around and old enough to witness the impact of Pet Sounds/Good Vibrations with that scene?
    How anticipated was Smile?
     
  5. jdlaw

    jdlaw Forum Resident

    Location:
    Michigan
    Monterey had a highly intelligent audience. I don't doubt for a second that well performed versions of their 1966/1967 material wouldn't have went over well. That stuff was as cutting edge as anyone else on that bill.
     
  6. jdlaw

    jdlaw Forum Resident

    Location:
    Michigan
    I'm replying to a 10 year old post, lol, but I disagree in regards to the Hawaii 1967 concerts. I find those shows to be amongst the most intriguing of their entire career.
     
  7. davenav

    davenav High Plains Grifter

    Location:
    Louisville, KY USA
    The Hawaii performance leads me to believe that Monteray would have been a disaster.

    Refusing to perform also led to disaster.

    It was a no-win situation.
     
  8. jwb1231970

    jwb1231970 Ordinary Guy

    Location:
    USA
    I actually think that their Hawaii concert which was really stripped down versions of songs would have gone over really well with the stoned crowd. Up until then the BB's never had the opportunity to play to a crowd of that culture (stoned) so those versions may have fit right in.
     
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  9. JohnnyQuest

    JohnnyQuest Forum Resident

    Location:
    Paradise
    I would've killed to hear the creepy version of "Wind Chimes".:love:
     
  10. Helmut

    Helmut Well-Known Member

    Location:
    Germany
    I don't think history would have been much different if the Beach Boys had played there. Janis and Jimi stole the show and that's what people remember today, forgetting that even "Simon & Garfunkel" were there..
    It's like Live Aid, where most people only remember "Queen" stealing the show.
    The main problem of the Beach Boys by then was Brian Wilson drifting away and Monterey would not have stopped that. As it was just a concert, attended by a limited group of people. It was the movie, that later made it bigger than it really was.
    Same as Woodstock....
     
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  11. Bill

    Bill Senior Member

    Location:
    Eastern Shore
    You haven't heard the recordings of the Hawaii shows, which were deemed to be unusable and presumably tossed into a landfill. Accordingly, the group assembled in the studio to simulate a show on which audience sounds could be added and released. Remember the "live" versions of I Get Around and Fun Fun Fun on the 1964 Concert album? Same deal.
    Stated simply, the "Hawaii" recordings were no more of a live performance than Barbara Ann was performed at a party with cokes, chips and swingin' guys and gals.
    As for the reaction to Pet Sounds, Good Vibrations and the upcoming SMILE album, although it was a hit in England, Pet Sounds stiffed here, resulting in Capitol panicking and releasing a greatest hits album two months later (yep, right after Monterey). Good Vibrations, on the other hand, was an absolute sensation, raising the group's profile and anticipation for SMILE. When it failed to appear and Heroes and Villains didn't come out until the following summer (a lifetime between releases in those days), the wind dropped out of the sails as folks were discovering the new sounds of the Beatles and emerging groups like Traffic, Cream and the Hendrix Experience. Despite fans of Smiley Smile here, when that album emerged, it did so to yawns, resulting in Wild Honey following shortly thereafter.
    I was a big fan of the group then and now, but those are the facts.
     
  12. dolstein

    dolstein Senior Member

    Location:
    Arlingon, VA
    I have to take issue with the suggestion that the Beach Boys' failure to perform at the Monterey Pop Festival was a disaster. How many people outside of the LA-SF corridor were even aware of the Monterey Pop Festival? I suspect most of the record buying public in the U.S. didn't learn about the festival until the documentary came out. Was it a missed opportunity? Sure. But I find it ludicrous to suggest that missing that festival somehow destroyed the band's commercial prospects.
     
  13. Jerry

    Jerry Grateful Gort Staff

    Location:
    New England
    Maybe if they jammed with one of the hipper acts at Monterey, they would have been well-received by the hippies. In fact, it happened just four years later!

     
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  14. davenav

    davenav High Plains Grifter

    Location:
    Louisville, KY USA
    Take it up with the Beach Boys. They are on the record about this, and they say the world passed them by, because they didn't appear.
     
  15. dolstein

    dolstein Senior Member

    Location:
    Arlingon, VA
    As we all know, the Beach Boys are right about everything. :shh:

    There are a lot of reasons why the Beach Boys' commercial prospects took a nose dive. Not performing at a music festival attended by at most 90,000 people wouldn't make the top ten.
     
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  16. S. P. Honeybunch

    S. P. Honeybunch Presidente de Kokomo, Endless Mikelovemoney

    The Beach Boys lived in Los Angeles. They were overly focused on media and popular acclaim all the while trying to get hit records with a crude home studio and crude production values. The world passed them by because they became less and less interested in making commercial records and more interested in making music for themselves and their own passions.
     
  17. JohnnyQuest

    JohnnyQuest Forum Resident

    Location:
    Paradise
    What an unlikely pair. Grateful Dead is always brought up when I search Psychedelic bands but from what I've heard their music sounds more like Roots rock.
    Their album covers,logos,imagery are psychedelic themed but that's about it. As you can tell I'm quite unfamiliar with their work. What is psychedelic about their sound?
     
  18. Jerry

    Jerry Grateful Gort Staff

    Location:
    New England
    Listen to their early years, pre-1969. That's when they were psychedelic.





    Now, back to the un-psychedelic Beach Boys.
     
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  19. davenav

    davenav High Plains Grifter

    Location:
    Louisville, KY USA
    Monteray wasn't just any old concert. It was an important moment in time, and it was intended to be that. Brian Wilson, as one of the organizers, intended that.
     
  20. davenav

    davenav High Plains Grifter

    Location:
    Louisville, KY USA
    I love it on the Fillmore recording, when Bill Graham introduces the BB's as "The other California band."
     
  21. mando_dan

    mando_dan Forum Resident

    Location:
    Beverly, MA
    No way, I think you're 100% on the mark.
     
  22. dolstein

    dolstein Senior Member

    Location:
    Arlingon, VA
    Sorry to burst your bubble, but while there was a lot of great music performed at the festival, it did not change the world. It certainly didn't have a cultural impact significant enough to affect the Beach Boys' commercial fortunes. Seriously. Take a look at the line up of bands who performed at the festival. And then look at where those bands were five year later. By 1972, the Grateful Dead and the Who were probably the only bands that were still doing big business (the Steve Miller Band would take off a few years later, but they were a completely different band by then). It's pretty obvious that the Monterey Pop Festival had zero impact on their commercial success. As for the Who, while this was an important gig, the band didn't really achieve commercial success in the U.S. until a few years later with Tommy and their performance at Woodstock.
     
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  23. Seederman

    Seederman Forum Resident

    If a band as un-hip as the Association could play Monterey, I think the hippies would have accepted the Beach Boys just fine.
     
  24. willy

    willy hooga hagga hooga

    They could've set fire to a surfboard or Mike play theremin with his teeth or something.
     
  25. Bill

    Bill Senior Member

    Location:
    Eastern Shore
    Well, there's this:
    [By] 1967, the Beach Boys had become cultural dinosaurs. And it happened almost overnight.…Monterey was a gathering place for the "far out" sounds of the "new" rock, and the Beach Boys in concert really had no exotic sounds to display. The net result of all [their] internal and external turmoil was that the Beach Boys didn't go…and it is thought that this non-appearance was what really turned the "underground" tide against them.

    David Leaf
     
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