Taken further, you might say that the Beach Boys’ long history of feuds, friendships and lawsuits exemplifies two sides of the American character. On the Brian side we have an uncompromising blue-state idealism, and on the Mike side we have red-state utility and sticking with the formula. If you buy into the Beach Boys’ myth, no analogy seems too highfalutin. We’re talking Jefferson versus Hamilton, Buckley versus Vidal, Gore v. Bush, Occupy Wall Street versus Tea Partiers. It should only take a few seconds to contrive your own parallels.I guess it's always been easy to hoist them as "America's band", since they based a lot of their early hits on things we most associate with America: youth, cars, and girls. And it's easy to see the Brian/Mike political divide, since Brian is the typical liberal pussy while Mike is the typical conservative asshole who doesn't mind scamming the semi-retarded out of millions of dollars. And they seem to be the only great rock n' roll band who's never minded their songs being co-opted by the GOP, unlike everyone else. Mostly, and I know he was only in his 20s himself at the time, but it's a shame MIke Love didn't realize that he had a true genius at his disposal:
Wilson, the childlike Icarus, had his artistic wings clipped by the lead singer Mike Love, his cocksure cousin, who wanted to stick with the proven formula of singing about girls and cars, fun and surf. Wilson then withdrew, crestfallen, into a self-imposed exile and battles with personal demons and drugs. Love, meanwhile, led an increasingly ersatz Beach Boys on a long strange trip that culminated in playing the private 2008 Romney “campaign reunion” event in Houston that doubled as a John McCain fundraiser.I mean, there's so few of us: Mozart, McCartney, Wilson, Spector, and me - that's about it, right? Dang. That makes me sad. See: :(
Just a week or so ago I mentioned Wilson's genius. Shit's scary, bro.
2 comments:
Living here in Allentown, where they're closing all the factory whistle blows, Man rises from bed and puts on his clothes, Man takes his lunch, walks out in the morning light, It’s the working, the working, just the working life.
arkived! :)
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