The Beatles vs. The Beach Boys

[Madness]

LOL, soundguy!

Funny this topic should swing back to page one. I met Brian Wilson last week here in Nashville at an A&E Network thing. If any of you saw this, you had to be a bit sad about it.

Pretty lifeless, but he still knows the words to his tunes. On the other hand, I guess he's been more or less resurrected from 15 years ago when he looked pretty gone.

Brian and Band went competently thru 3 or 4 tunes. His singing wasn't really that good, but the songs were still thrilling, in a sentimental way, to hear. The band was great, just like all the ringers that the Beach Boys have always hid in front of!

Beach Boys VS Beatles? That's been going on since they started. I like Tbone805's take on this.

A further debate is how much of a recording band were the Beach Boys VS The Beatles? Wouldn't the obvious answer to this question lead one to recognize that you can't really compare them as bands? The Beach Boys 'live' weren't much different than what I saw this past weekend- some incredibly good players playing a great pop composer's music- a bunch of ringers with a couple of good singers. The Beach Boys was just a label to put on Brian's music...


The Beatles, on the other hand- RULE. They were actually a band with their own ideas, and they played on their own records.
Bless 'em all!

[tbone805]

The Beatles were the start of boy bands. Not rock.

The Beatles were the start of Boy Bands? Ok, then Jimi Hendrix was directly responsible for Yngwie Malmsteen and Steve Vai. Even the most numb couch potato can tell the difference between Paul McCartney and Justin Timberlake.

If any band from that era can be said to be the starting place for rock, it's probably The Who or Jimi Hendrix Experience. Both the Beach Boys and the Beatles are much more about a pop aesthetic.

I think what you mean by Pop aesthetic is melody. Its natural to like melodies. Don't fight it. I don't challenge that The Who or Jimi Hendrix were pivotal figures, they just owe so much to the Beatles' pioneering. The Who/Hendrix all had alot of energy, but as far as "music" goes, you're right there's not much aesthetic to be found.

[EasyGo]

If any band from that era can be said to be the starting place for rock, it's probably The Who or Jimi Hendrix Experience. Both the Beach Boys and the Beatles are much more about a pop aesthetic.

Sure The Who were a devastating and influential rock combo, but one cannot deny the pop aesthetic of PT's writing and the top shelf pop vocal harmonies. I'm referring specifically to LPs like 'A Quick One,' 'Who Sell Out,' and 'Tommy," where the pop rides on top of the rock.

While the Beatles and Beach Boys are closer to the pop end of the continuum, you can't really take the rock out of the Beatles or the pop out of the Who.

[Al]

The Beatles vs The Beach Boys...where does The Who fit in to all of this then?..

Not fair to make comparisons between the two,both influencial in their own right!..

If it had to be one of them?..the Fab Four everytime!

[slowlygrowl]

there are universal elements in sound/music that are timeless.
they make the soul flicker. intervals. pulses. rhythms .one might include mahler, but for similar reasons should include the beatles. they are part of a western lineage. as are the beach boys. the baroque boys. both genius.also, there obviously is equal importance in other discoveries other lineages have made.

[soundguy]

first and foremost being the discovery that girlfriends never should be allowed at band practice.

dave

[stillafool]

I hate them both, but at least the beatles had a couple of good songs.

[dobson]

obviously i've missed something, because i can't even compare the beatles to the beach boys.

the beach boys sound like a pop experiment, the beatles sound like a band. and that's just the songs... as for production... if people are applauding brian wilson as a producer, then i'm totally lost. beach boys recordings sound dry as hell, with so little character and nuance. beatles recording are mixed all over the place, and even when the sounds are bad they come across sounding so fucking good.

of course, it's all a matter of opinion. i grew up listening to some beach boys christmas song every year that will haunt me till death.

[joeysimms]

beach boys recordings sound dry as hell

???? You mean dry as in, no reverb? pet sounds is lots of things, but I've never heard it referred to as dry.

[brainfreezebob]

Oh man...
I haven't posted for at least six months, but I'm a huge fan of both bands.

A lot of folks get the Beatles and Beach Boys force fed to them from an early age. Parents have gone on and on about their importance (and thus your generation's music is total crap). 24 radio play of the same singles for decades. The awful commercials that use Beatles hooks to sell you crap, or radio jingles that cop Beach Boys harmonies. I can completely understand wanting to knock them off their pedestal, but it's not going to happen.

The shit is just too amazingly great. If you're listening to "Heroes and Villains", and you think, "This sucks, let's hear Pinball Wizard," you need to track down some weed and listen with a fresh perspective.

If you're listening to "Happiness is a Warm Gun," and you're thinking, "what a boy band," you need to gouge your eyes out. Images have too heavy an impact on your critical faculties.

Seriously, turn the lights off. Grab some decent headphones. Clear your mind of the jingles and best-of lists, and really listen to this stuff.

Now let's do Motown vs Phil Spector.

[bobbydj]

My boy band comment rattled people. Good.

[dobson]

sorry - i meant dry as in boring.

maybe the extreme reverb is the problem i'm having with those recordings - it makes everything sound too "nice". the (later) beatles just seemed more willing to let ugliness happen every once in a while.

recordings that come across as deliberately polished make the music itself sound deliberate, in my opinion. an exercise, theoretical, music school stuff that i have little interest in. not that the beach boys were an extreme example of this, but enough so...

[soundguy]

is it really constructive to add an ignorant comment to a debate just simply to "rattle" people up?

that doesnt seem like a very efficient way to get people to take you seriously.

dave

[hurricaneE]

the Stones vs. the Who is exactly like Sean Connery vs Roger Moore though.

WHAAAT?!!! I suppose you could mean the Stones are foppish like Roger Moore (and I like Moore), while the Who had enormous brass balls, a la Connery, but the way the above is phrased suggests otherwise. Except for Keith, the Stones were just in it to get laid, while every member of the Who was in that band because his life depended on it (and they just happened to get laid). No comparison. And c'mon: Jagger's voice? Ugh! And Charlie Watts vs. Keith Moon? Watts doesn't even know what rock music IS. Which is okay. (To be clear, I adore Exile and love Beggears). -E

BTW: Beatles. I think the best Beach Boys songs (i.e., non-surfing) all have the exact same methadone-y, sweet-but-melancholy vibe, while the Beatles had so much diversity. E.G.: "here, there, and everywhere" could be a Beach Boys tune, but the Boys could never have written "Dr. Robert" or "Tomorrow Never Knows."

[joeysimms]

And c'mon: Jagger's voice?

Much better than Daltrey, IMO.