Surf's Up is the seventeenth studio album by American rock band The Beach Boys, released on August 30, 1971 on Brother Records and Reprise. The album was released to more public anticipation than the Beach Boys had previously had for several years. The album's title is taken from the song of the same title written by Brian Wilson and Van Dyke Parks for the abandoned studio album, Smile.
In the fall of 1970, after the commercial failure of the Sunflower album, the Beach Boys hired Jack Rieley as their manager. Rieley, a DJ, had impressed the band with his falsified credentials (a supposed Peabody Award-winning stint as NBC bureau chief in Puerto Rico) and ideas on how to regain respect from American music fans and critics. His first initiative was to have the Beach Boys record songs with more socially aware lyrics. Rieley also insisted that the band officially appoint Carl Wilson "musical director" in recognition of the integral role he had played keeping the group together since 1967. He also demanded the completion of "Surf's Up" for release by composer and erstwhile bandleader Brian Wilson, a song that had taken on mythical proportions in the underground press since the demise of Smile three years earlier. He also organized a guest appearance at a Grateful Dead concert in April 1971 to push the Beach Boys' transition into the counter-culture.
According to Rieley in 1996 posts to the "Smiley Smile" message board, the band had split into two camps: the artistically inclined, drug using, bashful Wilson brothers and the commercially-oriented, teetotalling triumvirate of Mike Love, Al Jardine, and Bruce Johnston. In his opinion, if the group were to return to their mid-1960s heights, the former group would have to fully assert itself. To this end, Rieley all but ordered Al Jardine to stop work on "Loop de Loop", an intentionally juvenile and childlike collaboration with Brian Wilson that Jardine thought would revive the band's commercial prospects.
Brian Wilson initially refused to work on "Surf's Up", now the eponymous track of the band's new album. In light of this, Carl Wilson overdubbed a new vocal in the song's first part, a backing track dating from November 1966. The second movement was composed of a December 1966 solo piano demo recorded by Brian Wilson, augmented with vocal and moog bass overdubs.
To the surprise and glee of his associates, Brian Wilson emerged near the end of the sessions to aid his brother and engineer Stephen Desper in the completion of the third movement, which combined the end of the 1966 demo with "Child is Father of the Man" (another Smile outtake) for the coda and a final lyrical couplet possibly written by Rieley. The newly recorded lead vocals - sung by Al Jardine over a choral backdrop featuring all the Beach Boys - were sped up by Desper for continuity purposes in an attempt to make them sound more like they did in 1966.
The album also included "'Til I Die" a song Brian had been working on since mid-1970. Though Mike Love was reported at the time to dislike it, he has praised and performed the song in recent years. Brian Wilson spent weeks arranging the song, crafting a harmony-driven, vibraphone and organ-laden background that closely resembled the halcyon-era sonic tapestries of Pet Sounds.
"Long Promised Road" and "Feel Flows" were Carl Wilson's first significant solo compositions; both songs were almost entirely recorded by him. "Student Demonstration Time" (essentially the R&B classic "Riot In Cell Block #9") and "Don't Go Near the Water" found Love and Jardine eagerly embracing the group's new topical-oriented direction. "A Day in the Life of a Tree" was Brian Wilson's sole new contribution. Several attempts at recording the song were made before the pump organ-led arrangement was settled upon. The slightly off-key lead vocal from Rieley have been praised by reviews for fitting for what a dying tree would sound like personified. Van Dyke Parks and Al Jardine join Rieley to sing the song's coda. According to Al Jardine, Rieley sang the song because "no one would sing it because it was too depressing."Bruce Johnston's "Disney Girls (1957)" was hailed as a masterpiece by Brian Wilson and has been covered by Art Garfunkel and Cass Elliot.
The Dennis Wilson songs "4th of July" and "Wouldn't It Be Nice To Live Again" were excised from the final running order shortly before release. Although "4th of July"'s elagaic tone and lyrical relevance made it a logical thematic choice, Rieley has claimed that it was met with a reception of "glaring envy" by Wilson's bandmates. The song was duly replaced with an Al Jardine and Brian Wilson composition "Take a Load Off Your Feet", a song worked on in late 1969 during the Add Some Music sessions, but augmented to fit the atmosphere of the rest of the record. In the case of "Wouldn't it Be Nice to Live Again", a disagreement between the middle and younger Wilson brothers resulted in the song being left off the album. Dennis wanted the song to be the final track on the album, segueing out of "'Til I Die", while Carl felt "Surf's Up" should have that place. As a consequence, Dennis took the song out of the album's final running order.
This LP was mixed for Quadraphonic reproduction (also compatible for Stereo). It was to be played back by using the long extinct Dynaco or EV Stereo-4 decoders. However, this recording (LP or CD) can be played back in Quad by most of today's audio-video receivers. The surround sound information can be extracted using the Dolby Pro Logic setting. The Carl and the Passions LP and some of the songs on the Sunflower LP were also mixed with this process.
The Beach Boys are an American rock band, formed in 1961, who gained popularity for their close vocal harmonies and lyrics reflecting a Southern California youth culture of cars, surfing, and romance. Brian Wilson's growing creative ambitions later transformed them into a more artistically innovative group that earned critical praise and influenced many later musicians.
The group was initially composed of singer-musician-composer Brian Wilson, his brothers, Carl and Dennis, their cousin Mike Love, and friend Al Jardine. This core quintet was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Class of 1988.
The Beach Boys have often been called "America's Band", and Allmusic has stated that "the band's unerring ability... made them America's first, best rock band." The group has had thirty-six U.S. Top 40 hits (the most of any U.S. rock band) and fifty-six Hot 100 hits, including four number-one singles. Rolling Stone magazine listed The Beach Boys as number 12 in the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time . According to Billboard, in terms of singles and album sales, The Beach Boys are the No.-1-selling American band of all time.
Many changes in both musical styles and personnel have occurred during their career, notably because of Brian Wilson's mental illness and drug use (leading to his eventual withdrawal from the group) and the deaths of Dennis and Carl Wilson in 1983 and 1998, respectively. Extensive legal battles between members of the group have also played their part. After the death of Carl Wilson, founding member Al Jardine left to pursue a solo career. Currently, the surviving members of The Beach Boys continue to tour in three separate bands: "The Beach Boys Band" with Love, Bruce Johnston, and a rotation of backing musicians; Al Jardine's "Endless Summer Band" with Jardine, his sons, and several former Beach Boys backup musicians; and Brian Wilson with a 10-piece band including members of The Wondermints and Jeff Foskett, who toured with the Beach Boys in the 1980s and 1990s as a backing guitarist/singer.
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