Beach Boys ride crest of teen craze
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Brace yourself for a shock!
The average teenage girl in the U.S. spends between $8 and $10 a month for rock ‘n’ roll records. Kids buy 80% of single records, 40% of albums sold each year. They accounted for an astounding $250 million of the $580 million spent for platters in 1964.
The highly publicized Beatles are, of course, top sellers in this market. Second place goes to a West Coast (Hawthorne, Calif.) group called the Beach Boys, who don’t even have a press agent. Nevertheless these lads have sold in excess of 10 million singles and albums.
Both organizations record for and are considered the ‘backbone’ of Capitol.
Don’t Ask
Just who are the Beach Boys? Don’t ask the teenagers around your domicile or you’ll rate a contemptuous look. It would be like inquiring of the average adult, “Who’s Bing Crosby, Perry Como or Frank Sinatra?”
The Beach Boys consist of three Wilson brothers—Brian, 23; Dennis, 21; Carl, 19—a cousin, Mike Love, 24; and a neighbor, Alan Jardine, 22. These lads got together about four years ago and with brother Brian elected boss-man decided to create a new concept in rock ‘n’ roll music based on the “social life” of teeners.
Wilson, who died Wednesday at 82, was one of music’s true visionaries, if that’s the right word for a guy who dealt in the endless possibility of sound.
Musically awkward at the start, the five soon coordinated their strumming, thumping and wailing into harmonies with a hot rock beat.
First Hit
Then one day Dennis, Hawthorne’s camp “surf fiend” came home from the beach with an idea—a tune themed on the new surfing craze. He mulled it over with Brian, and the latter wrote “Surfin’.” The rookie artists waxed it at an obscure recording studio at their own expense. And sold it.
They were on their way to fame and fortune.
Leader Brian, rugged looking, intellectually inquisitive and mildly eccentric, admitted their rise to popular stardom was simple and uncomplicated. “There is little to tell about our long, bitter struggle for success, which never happened that way,” he declared.
“Expanded rock ‘n’ roll music is generally divided into ‘sound’ classifications,” he explained during an interview at Capitol Records. “There’s the English sound, which is still pretty much early r ‘n’r—they got it late; the Detroit sounds, which is rhythm and blues; and the Spector sound, which results from extensive use of background instruments not usually associated with rock ‘n’ roll, such as oboe, harp, violins, horns etc.
Works Fine
“Then there’s our West Coast sound, which we pioneered and which has put us at the top in record sales. Our songs (he writes most of them) tell stories about teeners; what they do and what their feelings are. We base them on activities of healthy California kids, who like to surf, hot rod and engage in other outdoor fun. It seems to be working out fine.”
Brian foresees a long continuance of this type of music. “We catch the kids young,” he said. “About 12, I’d say. Their social life is associated with their music, and as they grow older it has become part and parcel of their frame of mind.
“Naturally older teeners and those in their early 20s turn to a more discreet type of rock ‘n’ roll. They lose some of the rebelliousness of youth. But the beat has become so ingrained in their lives that they’ll never forsake it altogether. At least, that’s what we believe.”
Rock Show
The Beach Boys, who will star in a big rock ‘n’ roll show Saturday at the Hollywood Bowl, own quite a collection of gold records, awarded for platter sales of a million or more. Their latest single, “Help Me Rhonda,” which was taken from a new album, has ridden the top of the charts for weeks. Sales have exceeded 750,000. The album, called “Beach Boys Today,” is over 340,000 in eight weeks.
Personal appearances keep the Beach Boys occupied between recording sessions, and have proved lucrative. They receive as much as $20,000 guaranteed for one-night stands, plus a percentage of profits.
“Eventually we’ll cut these road trips down to a bare minimum,” Brian said. “But they’re certainly paying off right now. We’re looking for a good movie.”
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