Frank Marshall and Thom Zimny's new The Beach Boys documentary, streaming now on Disney+, is more of an origin story about Southern California's most beloved band, somewhat controversially only fleetingly covering any interpersonal conflicts, drug battles, legal battles, or almost anything that happened after 1974. However, the film ends by skipping ahead to the present day in a way that surely all fans can appreciate: with surviving band members Mike Love, Brian Wilson, Al Jardine, David Marks, and Bruce Johnston amicably sitting together on the sands of Malibu's Paradise Cove, the very site where the photo shoot for the cover of Beach Boys' first album, Surfin' Safari, took place.
The sweet scene — which was filmed in September 2023 (five months before it was reported that Wilson is suffering from dementia), and is deliberately presented by co-directors Marshall and Zimny sans audio — ends The Beach Boys on a figurative high note. But it could have ended the film on a literal high note, with a group singalong that took place on the beach that day.
"We sang a cappella. We sang 'Their Hearts Were Full of Spring.' We sang 'Fun, Fun, Fun.' We did few other little songs, and it was just really like a reunion of sorts," Love recalls to Music Times. "All the other negative stuff that people talk about just evaporated and went out the window. ... I know I was touched by the fact that Brian and I were able to sit and talk about things that we had experienced together so many years ago, more than 60 years ago, and that we could still sing and remember our parts to the Four Freshmen song."
Audio of the seaside singalong didn't make it into The Beach Boys, although a few shots of Jardine strumming an acoustic guitar and Love crooning while sitting next to Wilson, during what Marshall has called a "joyful family reunion," appear in the movie trailer. "You'd have to ask Frank Marshall where that footage is, because we were mic'd and it didn't make the cut, literally. I don't know. You could probably come up with it," shrugs Love. (UPDATE: A publicist for the project told Music Times that "the sequence was designed and shot to be a montage for the end of the film, with voiceover and music already in place. We see them reunite, laughing, singing, and having fun, but it was never meant to be a scene."
Fans will surely hold onto hope that the footage, very likely the last time that these five will ever sing together, eventually surfaces as an extra on a DVD set. But in the meantime, in the Q&A below, Love discusses his bond with Brian despite everything they've endured, dispels some "fallacies" examined in The Beach Boys, and reveals if there is any hope that he and Brian will ever collaborate again.
MUSIC TIMES: I was especially moved by the final scene in your documentary, when all of you sitting are on the beach. It's a lovely way to end the film. What was the vibe that day between you guys?
MIKE LOVE: It was amazing, because Brian's been going through a lot of problems with his physical being, but the fantastic beauty of that whole situation was that he was remembering things that happened during our high school years, like when I took him to a football game with Dorsey High School and Fremont High School at Fremont... or when I had a senior trip to go to Catalina and I invited Brian to go with me. He and I were very close back in those times, and he would come over to my house and we'd get kicked out of the house by my dad because he had to get up so early to go to work at Love Sheet Metal. We would go out in his Nash Rambler and listen to the radio and sing Everly Brothers songs. We had so much fun cracking each other up. So, [that film shoot] brought back so many great memories. We sang a cappella. We sang "Their Hearts Were Full of Spring." We sang "Fun, Fun, Fun." We did few other little songs, and it was just really like a reunion of sorts. All the other negative stuff that people talk about just evaporated and went out the window — kind of like it does when we get together around a mic and do those harmonies.
With Dennis and Carl gone, and Brian dealing with all his health issues, it must have been very poignant for all of you to come together like that, after everything that's happened in the past 60 years.
I think everybody was similarly affected. I know I was touched by the fact that Brian and I were able to sit and talk about things that we had experienced together so many years ago, more than 60 years ago, and that we could still sing and remember our parts to the Four Freshmen song. It's a cappella, and the beauty of that type of music and singing influenced us so greatly; those are the distinguishing harmonies that make the Beach Boys sound so unique. When we got together originally, it was not because we were wanting to be famous or thinking we were going to be well-known around the world or anything like that. We got together because of the love of harmonies, the love of singing together.
So, if I heard you correctly, you say you were singing together on the [Paradise Cover] beach when you guys all got together to shoot that final documentary scene?
Yeah.
Where's that footage? Is that going to be on some director's cut or DVD extras? We need to see that!
Well, you'd have to ask Frank Marshall where that footage is, because we were mic'd and it didn't make the cut, literally. I don't know. You could probably come up with it.
Wow. It's interesting to hear about all this, because the negative stuff is what people tend to focus on, but that's not a big focus of this film. The film is more of an origin story.
It touches upon it a little bit. I mean, Dennis Wilson, the poor guy, couldn't get off the drugs and the alcohol and his life ended way too early, 1983. He drowned, but he was under the influence. And Carl, he started smoking when he was maybe 12 years old, and the statistics aren't good — he passed away from lung cancer a little over 25 years ago. Those are tragic things... there's absolutely no doubt that negative things have happened over the years. But the beauty of this documentary, I think, is it focused on what the Beach Boys are known for globally, and that is our harmonies and our positivity. "Good Vibrations" was rated by a psychologist in Sheffield, England, as the No. 1 song for making people feel good. That's pretty darn special, that our song creates so much positivity and in spite of the things going on at the time.
Friction in family bands is not uncommon, but sometimes friction can make for good art. And one takeaway I got from this film is that the sometimes tense dynamic between you and Brian was at the core of the Beach Boys' art.
Well, the thing is, there was no friction between Brian and Mike, OK? That was other people. It was either Murray Wilson or Dr. Landy or subsequent people who controlled Brian's life. Now Brian needs help physically, but because he's got challenges physically, but mentally, his long-term memory is there, clearly as anybody's. And if it's just he and I, there is no friction. We go back to childhood. The first time I ever remember Brian singing, it was on my grandmother Wilson's lap singing "Danny Boy," and he would charm the birds out of the trees. He had such a beautiful, clear voice. His falsetto voice, that high voice... it sounded like angels singing. So, that's a fiction that there's any negativity or friction between us. What the chemistry was is he was so inordinately, brilliant at structuring chord progressions and harmonies, and I would come in with hooks and lyrics.
But surely you are aware that the Brian/Love conflict is at the heart of the Beach Boys mythology.
It was put out there on purpose by certain people, but anyway, to me, no. ... For instance, they said I didn't like the Pet Sounds album. I named it! I came up with the name Pet Sounds. And I went with Brian to play it for our A&R person at Capitol Records. It was the Capitol Records salespeople that couldn't understand what was going on with Pet Sounds. But somebody said that I didn't like it. That's bulls---, so to speak, because I sang on everything that was called upon. We did maybe 25, close to 30 takes on one section of "Wouldn't It Be Nice" to make it perfect. And I called Brian "dog ears" because he could hear sounds that obviously other human beings couldn't. I called him a "Stalin of the studio" because he was such a taskmaster when he said, "Do it again!" I said, "That was perfect," and he'd go, "No, do it again!" There's one CD of the Pet Sounds boxed set that has just the vocals; if you listen to those, it's pretty fantastic. ... My point is, that is an absolute mistruth that I didn't like the Pet Sounds album. I don't know who said that or what, but it took on a life of its own. But I know it's B.S.
Where do these mistruths come from, then?
I don't know. I could come up with theories and ideas or individuals who have been negative towards me, but it'd be a waste of time. The fact is our music thrives, has survived, and has even gotten more globally well-known through streaming and other things.
It was shocking to me when the film noted that it took 34 years for Pet Sounds to even go gold. The film also said that the perceived failure of that album at the time broke Brian's heart. How did you take it? Did it break your heart?
I thought it was a missed opportunity by Capitol Records. They didn't necessarily know how to promote the Pet Sounds album. It's hard to say why it didn't get that recognition, but it always had recognition from musicians. For instance, Bruce Johnston took that record to England, and Derek Taylor, who had been the Beatles' publicist, was our publicist at the time, and he set up a bunch of meetings for Bruce. But Keith Moon of the Who said to Bruce, "You better get up to your suite. John [Lennon] and Paul [McCartney] are waiting to hear Pet Sounds!" And so, Bruce played the record to those guys twice through, and that inspired them to do whatever came after that. There was a lot of reverence towards Pet Sounds. McCartney came to a party in Malibu for Carl Wilson's birthday, and he said to Brian, "I was driving along Mulholland Drive playing Pet Sounds with tears in me eyes. When are you going to give us another Pet Sounds, Brian?" That's Paul McCartney. ... So anyway, irrespective of what it sold or didn't sell, that's kind of fantastic that one of the leading. most creative and successful songwriters in the universe felt like that about our album.
Smile was another important, groundbreaking record that wasn't understood or appreciated at the time.
Well, Brian shelved that album, as you know. They did "The Elements" and they were doing the "Fire" session, and there was a fire around town somewhere. Brian was under the influence of something or other, and felt that the "Fire" session had caused that fire down the road, so he actually got overwhelmed and put that album away. ... That was a challenging time, because Brian was doing a lot of stuff that he might've been better off not doing — LSD, things like that. You don't make all the greatest decisions when you're under the influence of that. At least that's my observation. Some of the [Smile] stuff was too much under the influence, although I sang on all the records and I participated on it and there was some beautiful music and fantastic tracks. But there's some challenges to it that we didn't handle very well. The enormous amount of drugs being done — that was challenging. There were several of us that didn't do the drugs, Bruce and Al and myself. But then the Wilsons were very involved in a lot of non-prescribed medications.
Well, a lot of people were experimenting with drugs in the '60s, and there is this idea that some artists make their best work by expanding their minds on substances of various kinds.
That's possible. But I've always thought that people are creative in spite of rather than because of [drugs]. That's my personal opinion. Maybe people who listened to Timothy Leary would have a different opinion: "Turn on, tune in, drop out." That was his motto, but it wasn't mine.
Did you resent it at all when Brian went in that direction? Did you feel it derailed the band?
Well, what the documentary describes, but maybe doesn't really describe properly because you can't describe everything, is there's two bands... the recording band and the touring band. I think that's something people lump all together, but there are two distinct different bands. And the touring band went through all kinds of evolution as well. I mean, one time we had Charles Lloyd in the band, or Glenn Campbell. Another time we had Blondie Chaplain and Ricky Fataar from the South African group called the Flames. They're fantastic musicians. ... There's the two different bands, so if an individual like Dennis was all screwed up on drugs and alcohol, we would actually ask them to not be part of the group for a while. We just told them, "Get yourself together." We tried to get Dennis to go to rehab, but he would maybe go for one night. And it doesn't work that way. And unfortunately, he was unable to get off that stuff. But he is still part of the group. Every night onstage we have our video and we show Carl doing "God Only Knows." We have tons of footage of Carl Wilson and the rest of the band as well. We have [footage of] Dennis Wilson playing the drums and all this kind of thing. We honor everybody's contribution. That's the way I feel it should be done.
I've always been involved in the live music part of it. I mean, the recording process is one thing, and the albums we did in the studio are great, but the live music has had an enormously powerful effect on bringing happiness to millions of people over the years. I have more to be thankful about and to be appreciative of and more blessings from seeing the [live] effect of "Good Vibrations" and "Kokomo" — songs that I had a lot to do with lyrically and singing musically — and all those great songs. I would never say anything negative about Brian's contribution, for sure, but I would say that truthfully — and I think he agrees with this — that he probably shouldn't have done certain things that he did, in terms of lifestyle choices.
What do you think Carl and Dennis would think of this film?
They would like it, because they're in it! [laughs]
There's a moment in the film where you actually tear up talking about the love you have for Brian. Is there any possibility of you two musically collaborating again, or has the sun set on that for various reasons?
Well, I think as long as Brian is alive and can get to a piano, he's going to be able to do just fine. As far as collaborating musically, if that were permitted, and if we were able to do that, that also would be really great. But I'm concerned about his physical wellbeing. What I think I'd like to do is just go by his house and visit, not with any preconceived notions of doing anything, but just to see how he is and just hang out together. I think there's enough history and enough music that's been done that we can celebrate and be grateful for, and honored by people's positive feelings and remarks and stuff. ... It's more important for me to just go and see Brian, because when we're together, we go back to childhood and all the other stuff that has been a burden to him, and an annoyance to me perhaps, goes out the window. It's irrelevant. It doesn't mean anything.
This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.
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