It Was 50 Years Ago Today: ‘Beach Boys Concert’ by The Beach Boys

December 16, 1964
Beach Boys Concert by The Beach Boys
#1 on the Billboard Top LPs chart, December 5, 1964 – January 1, 1965

Despite their status as one of the most popular and critically beloved bands in rock ‘n’ roll history, none of the Beach Boys’ studio albums has ever topped the US albums chart. In the early-to-mid 1960s, rock was still largely perceived as a singles medium. The Beach Boys were popular enough that their LPs managed to squeeze into the Top 10, but the album charts tended to be dominated by show tunes, easy listening pop, and comedy records. Before Meet the Beatles! went to #1 in February 1964, the rocking-est albums to top the chart that decade were Elvis Presley’s movie soundtracks and Ray Charles’ Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music.

In this context, then, it’s all the more impressive that the Beach Boys managed to top the 1964 albums charts at all, even if it was with one of their lesser offerings. As the title suggests, Beach Boys Concert purports to be a live album, however, in keeping with the style of the times — and Brian Wilson’s perfectionist streak — recordings of shows from December 1963 and August 1964 were pieced together and heavily reworked in the studio.

While many of the changes are standard-issue tidying-up — vocal overdubs and the like — some are more extreme. Two of the tracks, “Fun, Fun, Fun” and “I Get Around,” are just the original studio recordings with a few overdubs and slight alterations: the former sped up slightly, the latter with its organ line removed. (“I Get Around” also features a blatant audio seam between the onstage introduction and the song itself.) Most grating, though, are the girlish screams dubbed on top of the tracks. These looped recordings sound especially phony on tracks where genuine, enthusiastic crowd noise bleeds through, such as the audience interaction on “Let’s Go Trippin’.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CSCCG8P7PJI

But Beach Boys Concert isn’t intended to be audio vérité. Instead, it’s meant to provide the listener with an idealized Beach Boys live experience right in his or her own bedroom. It also serves as a repository for the songs that the band regularly played live, but hadn’t yet recorded in-studio. Only five of the 13 tracks are familiar Beach Boys hits, including “Little Deuce Coupe” and “In My Room.” The rest are covers, with a strong bent toward novelty songs. Wondering what Mike Love’s Boris Karloff impression sounds like? Check out “Monster Mash”! Needing a version of Jan & Dean’s “The Little Old Lady from Pasadena” that’s slightly different from the original? Beach Boys Concert’s got you covered!

While the Beach Boys originals are the highlight of the set, several of the covers provide insight into the roots of their sound. The Four Freshmen’s “Graduation Day” spotlights the Beach Boys’ intricate four-part harmonies, while the Dick Dale instrumental “Let’s Go Trippin’” does the same for their surf-rocking bona fides. “Johnny B. Goode” fills the required Chuck Berry quotient, as “Surfin’ USA” isn’t included. And who could ever get enough “Papa-Oom-Mow-Mow”?

The 13 tracks whizz by in under 32 minutes, including a solid chunk of time allotted to the Mike Love stage patter that the kids crave. (As hammy as he is, though, he does manage to revv the audience up and keep the show moving.) Beach Boys Concert is a pleasant listen, with the band in high energy and good (overdubbed) voice, even if the whole record ultimately feels inessential.

Nevertheless, the historical significance of the album extends beyond its status as the Beach Boys’ only #1 album of the 1960s. On December 23, 1964 — while Beach Boys Concert was the #1 album in America — Brian Wilson suffered a panic attack shortly after playing with the band on the TV variety show Shindig! He then retired from live performances, focusing instead on crafting ever more ambitious productions in the studio. Beach Boys Concert acts both as a final record of Wilson’s onstage tenure with the band, and as a capper for the group’s cars-and-surfing era. After this, the Beach Boys would expand into more elaborate, emotional, and experimental territory, extending their sound beyond the early ‘60s surf-rock milieu into something timeless.

It Was 50 Years Ago Today examines a song, album, movie, or book that was #1 on the charts exactly half a century ago.

Sally O'Rourke

Sally O’Rourke works in an office and sometimes writes about music. She blogs about every song to ever top the Billboard Hot 100 (in order) at No Hard Chords. She has also contributed to The Singles Jukebox, One Week // One Band, and PopMatters. Special interests include girl groups, soul pop, and over-analyzing chord changes and lyrics as if deciphering a secret code. She was born in Baton Rouge and lives in Manhattan. Her favorite Nugget is “Liar, Liar” by The Castaways.