http://www.bostonmusicspotlight.com/article.php?id=2409
BMS talks with founding member Mike Love
By Jennifer Carney, Contributing Writer
7/24/2009
Few things evoke the summertime better than a Beach Boys tune. Their
music is as reminiscent of summer as the scent of suntan lotion, a
dripping ice cream cone, or the salty spray of the ocean. The songs
of the Beach Boys conjure the timeless jubilation of the season in
such a way as to make it universal, encapsulating a time that is
timeless, and a place that exists for everyone.
Mike Love has been with the Beach Boys since their inception, and is
often the subject of heated debate among music fans. His role in the
band has been an uneasy one at times, but he remains a stalwart
guardian of the band's musical legacy. He exemplifies the laid-back
charm of a Southern Californian, and recently was gracious enough to
take a break from a formidable touring schedule to chat with Boston
Music Spotlight.
Boston Music Spotlight (BMS): You're playing five dates in New
England this month. Does playing here hold any special memories for you?
Mike Love (ML : Yeah, we go back a long ways. In fact, the first time
we ever came back east, we were at a ballroom in, I think, Hull. Was
it called the Surf Ballroom? We're talkin' early '60s, like '62 or
'63. Well, our first big national hit was "Surfin' Safari", and that
was 1962 and so on the basis of that we did a lot of touring. Before
that, we did shows but they were confined mainly to the West Coast
Southern California, Arizona and that kind of thing. But then the
next big hit, which was "Surfin' USA", which was in 1963, we started
getting asked to go all over the place, including to Europe and to
South Africa and Australia and Japan. Well, actually, Japan and
Australia were in 1964 and the reason why I remember that is because
my cousin Brian was still in the group when we went to Australia and
Japan back then and also England.
So, very early on we were out on the Cape and we did shows Don Law
Presents all over the place in New England. So, we actually planned
[this tour] that way because we really like hangin' out in the Boston
area and the entire New England area. I always look forward to going
to Faneuil Hall like a tourist because they've got so many food
selections! I usually go to an Indian restaurant there and have my
South Indian dish that I really like a lot. We have a great time in Boston.
BMS: You're still a practitioner of Transcendental Meditation. Does
that help you get through such a jam-packed touring schedule?
ML: TM is extremely crucial for me! [Laughs] It's important because
what it does is it allows me to go to a deeper level of rest and even
deep sleep through the mental technique that you're taught. I do it
twice a day, and it's been a huge help over the years. In fact it's
pretty much doubtful I'd be able to do the amount of touring we are
doing and have done without that as a vital component of it. It's
practical and it's helpful and restful and energizing, so I do it every day.
BMS: Did you ever imagine that you'd be performing for five decades?
ML: It is amazing, and what's really phenomenal is that you look out
into the audience…for instance, South Shore Cohasset the theater
there…every year we go there there's a row of kids and their moms
behind them and the same thing happens out in Hyannis. It's actually
kind of a crack-up to see it year after year! [Laughs] And you see
multiple generations; you'll see senior citizens, mature adults,
young adults, dating-age kids, teenagers, pre-teens, all the way down
to children.
Also, we've been obsessed about making the songs conform as close as
humanly possible to the original recordings. So when people tell me
that we sounded better than ever, I say, "Well, yeah, we've been
practicing for 48 years!" [Laughs] So, when people ask us if we're
ever gonna retire, I say, "Well, let me get Tony Bennett on the line
and find out what to do!" [Laughs]
BMS: To what do you attribute the longevity of the Beach Boys?
ML: Well, you know the Beach Boys, The Beatles and Motown are the
three most dominant musical genres on "oldies" radio for one thing.
Every year in a soundtrack album, there's another Beach Boys song
too, you know?
But if you look at the words and subject matter, it's all very
youth-friendly, very youth-oriented. I mean, because we were young
people growing up in Southern California and extolling the virtues of
the lifestyle and the scenery there, be it through "California Girls"
or "Surfin'" or all the great car songs. So, yeah, we just documented
a lot of the vignettes that are goin' on in daily life growing up in
Mid-America.
BMS: What one song really gets the crowd going?
ML: "Kokomo" is the biggest sing-along we've got and "Help Me,
Rhonda" is pretty big, too. In fact, we have the audience sing along
to "Help Me Rhonda"; we actually stop the instrumentation and have
the audience carry on the chorus. So, that's a big sing-along, but
"Kokomo" is incredible in terms of the sing-along part of it.
BMS: Did you intend for "Kokomo" to be such a big hit?
ML: No, not really…it was written for the inclusion in the film
"Cocktail" and the director of the film asked for a song for when Tom
Cruise went from New York to Jamaica. And so we wrote the song and
gave it to him as a demo and he said, "That's the best song you've
made ever," or "in years" or words to that effect. So the director
actually called it a hit long before it even came out. In fact, the
record company that had the soundtrack wasn't a believer in the song,
but… it eventually went to number one, and it became the
biggest-selling single of our career bigger even than "Good
Vibrations" which until "Kokomo" came out was our largest-selling single.
So, when you think about the inclusion of soundtracks, oldies radio,
and occasional commercials and re-runs of "Full House", which is one
of the most-performed re-runs of sitcoms there is…I mean, John Stamos
is one of the most visible guys in America. [Laughs] He's supposed to
come up to Boston to do some shows with us at least the Hatch
Shell; he's threatened to make an appearance there. [Laughs] The
girls really like it, of course.
BMS: Is there any truth to the story that you and Paul McCartney came
up with 'Back in the USSR'?
ML: Well, what it was, was that I was in India at the Maharishi's
place and Paul McCartney came to the breakfast table with his
acoustic guitar and said, "Hey, listen to this, Mike: [sings] Flew in
to Miami Beach B.O.A.C. …" and all that. He sang me the verses of
"Back in the USSR" and I said to him, "Paul, you ought to talk about
all the girls around Russia Moscow girls, Ukraine girls, Georgia on
my mind…" and he did. He did the entire music thing, and I just gave
him the idea for that for the bridge. The next time I heard it was
when it was out on the "White Album". But I guess my being there
influenced him in the Beach Boys way. [laughs] We've even done "Back
in the USSR" on stage because it's fun to do; it's sort of like "Fun,
Fun, Fun" only with different lyrics, you know?
BMS: What do you think the legacy of the Beach Boys will be?
ML: As far as the music is concerned, The Beach Boys' music is, I
would say, tremendously…hugely…enormously positive. In fact, when you
think about Beach Boys music, people usually think of a good time
they have a good feeling about it. You know, it's only the people who
nitpick and get into who said what to whom and who did what to whom
and the negative things…and that has really not much to do with the
music, you know? The musical part of it is Brian and I writing "Good
Vibrations" together or me writing the words to "California Girls"
when he was doing that brilliant track.
We [the band] are just the lucky recipients of all that talent
merging and coming up and crafting some of the more memorable songs
in pop radio. So, I think the legacy of the Beach Boys is gonna be
uplifting music, a sonic oasis to get away from the problems of life;
and if there are problems in life, maybe you listen to "In My Room"
or "The Warmth of the Sun".
So it's like even though there's a cumulonimbus cloud over your life,
there's a silver lining somehow. [Laughs] But that's me because I
always try to accentuate the positive, you know, in lyrics and in our
music. And I think it shows up years later when people come to a
Beach Boys show and they're in a good mood before they go and
hopefully an even better mood after they leave.
--
The Beach Boys will perfrom at the South Shore Music Circus in
Cohasset on Friday at at the Hatch Shell in Boston on Saturday. For
more information and for a complete touring schedule, visit their
official website. http://www.beachboysband.net/
.
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