The covers-heavy 15 Big Ones was the album that brought Brian Wilson back from insanity, but he wasn't quite all the way back. But he was definitely back for 1977's Love You, which brings out some of Brian Wilson's playful yet insane sense of humor.

Track Listing

1. Rock and Roll Music
2. It's OK
3. Had to Phone Ya
4. Chapel of Love
5. Everyone's in Love with You
6. Talk to Me
7. That Same Song
8. TM Song
9. Palisades Park
10. Susie Cincinnati
11. Casual Look
12. Blueberry Hill
13. Back Home
14. In the Still of the Night
15. Just Once in My Life
16. Let Us Go on This Way
17. Roller Skating Child
18. Mona
19. Johnny Carson
20. Good Time
21. Honkin' Down the Highway
22. Ding Dang
23. Solar System
24. Night Was So Young
25. I'll Bet He's Nice
26. Let's Put Our Hearts Together
27. I Wanna Pick You Up
28. Airplane
29. Love Is a Woman

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Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #75571 in Music
• Brand: Beach
• Released on: 2000-08-15
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: Original recording reissued, Original recording remastered
• Dimensions: .24 pounds

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Touted by a highly suspicious media blitz ("Brian is Back!"), 1976's 15 Big Ones caught the nostalgic wave generated by the surprise success of Endless Summer and Spirit of America, the double-album compilations of the Beach Boys' mid-'60s, summer-music prime, and rode it close to the crest of the charts. One doesn't have to get much further than the tepid (albeit top 10) cover of Chuck Berry's's "Rock and Roll Music" to realize that band founder/original creative spark Brian Wilson may indeed have been back, but sounded like he was working under duress--if he was working at all. With a covers-heavy tack best described as a parody of the band's original trademark sound, wed to some of the mid-'70s worst production trends, it's an album that shows just how much the public still yearned for the band's classic sound, even if their faith ended up being "rewarded" by the likes of Mike Love's embarrassing "Everyone's in Love with You" and "T.M. Song." Conversely, Brian was definitely back for '77s Love You, an album that's become something of a critic's darling, if only because it hews so bravely to the strange musical vision that seeped from Wilson's then-troubled mind. Brian's synth-heavy production managed to be at once dense and minimalist, while the songs remain some of the most consistently loopy concoctions the band ever recorded. While his vulnerable romanticism is also on display, it's Wilson's playful sense of humor that dominates, from strange odes to "Johnny Carson" and the "Solar System" to innocent romps like "Ding Dang" and "Mona." A quarter-century later, it's an album that can still both surprise and delight. Both albums are digitally remastered on a single disc. --Jerry McCulley

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Customer Reviews

1976/77 all over again...
When I first played this CD I was instantly transported back to 1976/1977, an innocent time of high-unemployment, double-digit inflation, and anomie, all of which made these albums such a giddy escape when I was much younger and not at all concerned about what was "hip" music. You will hear 15 BIG ONES attacked endlessly, but what made it seem like a letdown that Bicentennial summer wasn't the music but the "Brian is Back!" hype. In retrospect, the ablum is perfectly apiece with John Lennon's ROCK N ROLL or Bowie's PIN-UPs, cover albums that invoke the performer's love of the music of his youth. 15 includes do-wop, gospel, Spector, and amusement-park anthems. The originals are self-consciously lightweight, but who---beside the Eagles, for heaven's sake---didn't want to be lightweight in 76? The message can be summed up by Track 2: "It's OK." Not great, but good enough for fun.

LOVE YOU, by contrast, IS great. Go try and find another album less interested in image or self-consciousness ... it doesn't exist. It's a group of goofy, sweet, innocent odes to roller skating, young love, babies, and Johnny Carson (and not necessarily in that order). The compositions, however, are not as simplistic as their lyrics suggest. There are complex chord changes, time registers, doodle-bugging bass lines (most played on a Moog), and melodies galore. The innocence is infectious. Yes, your friends will think you're the squarest of the square when they catch you mouthing the words "Honkin down the gosh darn highway" or "Solar system brings us wisdom." But then again, the truly hip and in-the-know don't care if they seem goofy. Buy it, try it, share it with your little kids. They'll make you understand just how fun and sweet it is to love LOVE YOU.

Its About Time
At long last I can put my turntable in storage. Some of my favorite Beach Boy music is finally on CD. I can't imagine anyone who loves the classic Beach Boys' songs not appreciating some of the great music contained on these two albums in this double release. 'It's O.K.',' Rock and Roll Music', 'Let Us go on this way' and 'Honking down the highway' give you that old Beach Boy rock and Roll jolt while love songs like 'The Night was so young' and 'Let's put our hearts together' stack up pretty close to classics like 'Don't worry baby' or 'Warmth of the Sun'. Fresh new songs by Brian abound especially on the 'Love You' tracks with 'Solar System' topping my favorites. I'll admit there are some thin tracks on '15 Big Ones' but I also like 'That same Song' and 'Back Home' which were the 1st efforts of Brian's at new material in a while. Then came 'Love You' and with the exception of 'Ding Dang' I love every other track. 'I wanna pick you up'is one of the most beautiful songs ever written about the joys of being a parent of a newborn. My biggest dissapointment about this album was that it made you feel Brian was back and was going to flourish with more masterpiece albums and that never happened, after all the guys only human but boy did he fool us into thinking otherwise for so long. If he had written nothing else but 'God Only Knows' the world should still be grateful. Buy this album, put on a set of headphones and enjoy a lot of great Beach Boy music.

You can't ignore Love You!
Let's get 15 Big Ones out of the way first. This was Brian's first step back into production after a hiatus of the last three years. It consists of 8 covers, and 7 originals some of which were exhumed from the outtake archive. It's pleasant but mostly disposable,the high points being the vocal trading on "Had To Phone Ya" and the cover of Spector's "Just Once In My Life" in which Brian and Carl sound like they really mean it.

Love You! is just about all Brian in terms of production, composition and instumentation. Carl and Dennis help with some of the music, but Al and Mike are almost guest vocalists. This album is dominated by ancient (for 2000) synthesizers, making it very different to any other Beach Boys album and on another planet to Pet Sounds. Some people hate it for that, and you will probably see many different opinions in these reviews, so here's mine. It's brilliant. The songs are strong with tunes that survive any production treatment, the album is revolutionary in some ways in pre-dating new wave, and Brian writes as a disturbed thirtysomething pretending to be a teenager, and looking for love and acceptance and someone simply to hold him through the night.

You won't want to start your Beach Boys collection here, but if you are in any way serious about the group, you have to get this.