Uncanny

EFLUX MEDIA

STAR TELEGRAM

USA TODAY

NY TIMES "Brian Wilson sings with boundless enthusiasm on 'That Lucky Old Sun,' his first full album of new songs since 2004. That was when he remade and completed 'Smile,' the attempted masterpiece he had abandoned amid drug use and mental illness in 1967. In 'Oxygen to the Brain' on the new album, he sings, 'I wasted a lot of years.'"

"Lately Mr. Wilson, 66, has overcome his stage fright and toured extensively, performing the complete 'Pet Sounds'and 'Smile' along with other hits he wrote for the Beach Boys. 'That Lucky Old Sun,' which was commissioned for a performance last year at the Royal Festival Hall in London, is a latter-day sequel to those two albums. It applies their elaborate structures and sounds to a concept: a day in the life of Los Angeles, from one dawn to the next."

"Los Angeles becomes the same sunny city Mr. Wilson defined with the Beach Boys in the mid-1960s, now tinged with regrets for lost time. 'Goin’ Home' declares, 'At 25 I turned out the light/’Cause I couldn’t handle the glare in my tired eyes/But now I’m back.'"

"Produced by Mr. Wilson, the music is packed, even overstuffed, with echoes of his Beach Boys marvels: chugging rhythms, creamy vocal harmonies, oom-mow-mow nonsense syllables and favorite instruments like bass harmonica, temple blocks, chimes and French horn. 'That Lucky Old Sun' is an uninterrupted suite of 17 tracks that lasts 38 minutes, barely longer than 'Pet Sounds.' Except for the title song, a pop standard by Haven Gillespie and Beasley Smith, Mr. Wilson wrote the album with his band’s keyboardist, Scott Bennett, and with Van Dyke Parks, who provided wordplay-laden lyrics for 'Heroes and Villains' and other 'Smile' songs. (Mr. Parks also wrote songs for Mr. Wilson to sing on 'Orange Crate Art,' a 1995 album that portrayed California with a wider historical sweep.)"

"The lyrics — and nutty spoken-word passages written by Mr. Parks — sketch a Los Angeles filled with lovers and dreamers, but they circle back to Mr. Wilson’s own story. In 'Midnight’s Another Day,' a spacious, swaying ballad about chronic depression, he sings, 'Swept away in a brainstorm/Chapters missing, pages torn' and climbs toward a choral revelation, 'All these people make me feel so alone.'"

"Mr. Wilson and his collaborators strive mightily to make 'That Lucky Old Sun' a new career landmark, and after the simplistic ditties that filled his previous solo albums, it’s a breakthrough. But too often the songs are patchworks of Mr. Wilson’s past glories, making references that are far too recognizable. For all its determined optimism 'That Lucky Old Sun' ends up as more an affirmation of Mr. Wilson’s legacy than an expansion of it."

ALLMUSIC BLOG "As a thematic topic, 'That Lucky Old Sun' is ripe for integration into Brian Wilson’s California myth-making. A Tin Pan Alley chestnut from the ’40s, it contrasts the ease of the sun’s transit each day with the hardship of human toil on earth, a sort of 'Ol’ Man River' set in the sky."

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WEST COAST MUSIC BLOG

EXAMINER "The Sixties was a weird decade - Viet Nam, Woodstock, LSD, sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll, hippies, yippies, dropouts, Jesus Freaks, and some of the most creative music to hit the airwaves since the invention of radio. Ground Zero was California and no band in the country said ‘California’ like The Beach Boys. Cranking out hits like “Little Surfer Girl,” “Sloop John B,” “Help Me, Rhonda,” and “Good Vibrations” The Beach Boys were the All American band. Yet, according to a documentary from Zeit1, there was a dark undercurrent that infiltrated the decade and extended its influence into the band when The Beach Boys’ drummer, Dennis Wilson, became involved with a cult led by Charles Manson called "The Family." THE BEACH BOYS AND THE SATAN puts the Beach Boys rise to success into context with rarely seen footage of the band, while it exposes the Summer of Love's darkest side and investigates the connections between some of the most controversial characters of that period (Anton La Vey, Kenneth Anger, and Brian Wilson) and their connection to the Manson Family. The documentary, which hits video stores on September 30, includes interviews with Kim Fowley, Don Was and the creative force behind the Beach Boys, Brian Wilson. Originally released in 1997 THE BEACH BOYS AND THE SATAN has been unavailable for nearly ten years."

DIXIE DINING "This wonderful new collection from Collector’s Choice Music is slated to be released on August 26th...I have always been a fan of Jan and Dean — their approach was innocent and fun-loving, although their own personal story was not always sunshine and surf’s up. This 2-disc compilation includes all the massive summertime hits plus a good number of rarities. In all, some 42 tracks make for an ocean full of wonderful memories. "

THE SUN "You must have the new Dennis Wilson Pacific Ocean Blue/Bambu collection. It’s great to have all the stuff that wasn’t on the original record. His voice is so rough compared to the other Beach Boys. "

PREFIXMAG

AMAZON "EMI and Amazon.com have joined forces to bring you a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity! Enter below for your chance to win a trip to Los Angeles for you and a guest to see Brian Wilson perform at the world-famous Hollywood Bowl on Saturday, September 13. The winner will receive 2 round-trip airfare tickets, 2 nights accommodations in Los Angeles and 2 tickets to the show."