Special Guest Blogger: Brian Wilson

It all started, as these things often do, in a garage. Not because we were cool, rebellious teenagers with leather jackets and a profound message to deliver. No, we were just three brothers, a cousin, and our friend Al Jardine, making a racket. That’s probably the most rock-and-roll part of our origin story. The rest was just trying to avoid hitting Dennis with his own drumsticks.
Then came the "brainstorm." Surfing. Hot rods. Girls. The quintessential California dream. The funny thing is, none of us were exactly beachy types. I mean, I liked the beach. From a safe distance. With a hot dog but Surfin' it was. And people loved it. They bought the records. They wanted more. So, we gave them more. "Surfin' Safari," "I Get Around," "California Girls." Lots of songs about things we barely did, but made sound like the greatest thing on Earth. It was genius, really. A brilliant marketing scheme disguised as pop music. Who knew? Not us, probably.
Then things got... interesting. My brain, you see, it wasn't content with just three chords and a catchy chorus. My brain was like a mischievous toddler who discovered the entire toy chest and decided to throw everything in the air, just to see what kind of glorious mess it would make. I started hearing
sounds no one else seemed to hear. Layers. Textures. It was all there, in my head, shimmering and begging to be put on tape.
Schizoaffective disorder and mild bipolar disorder they called it although the bucketfuls of LSD, cocaine and marijuana probably didn't help and after a nervous breakdown, I withdrew from regular concert touring to concentrate on songwriting and recording.
This is where Pet Sounds comes in. Everyone talks about Pet Sounds but it nearly broke me.  I spent so much time in the studio, conducting my little orchestra of session musicians, trying to translate the chaos in my head into something tangible, something beautiful. I was trying to capture the feeling of watching a sunset while simultaneously experiencing the dread of a wormhole opening in my living room. You know, everyday stuff.
The guys, my bandmates, they weren't always on board. Mike, bless him, was usually the first to raise an eyebrow but I just knew. I felt it. It was the sound of something new. Something pure. And a lot of very complex chords.
I did try to stop the drugs but by then I was hanging out with people like Alice Cooper and Iggy Pop so that's like being a vegetarian while living in McDonald's.
And then Smile. That album was going to be my grand opus. It was going to be the sound of God, as channeled through my slightly frazzled brain. Or maybe just a really confused Brian. We had fire engines and horse whinnies and a track called "Barnyard" that sounded exactly like what you’d expect.
My brain, you see, was always been a busy place. Like a hyperactive amusement park, but all the rides are playing different music simultaneously, and the clown is also trying to explain quantum physics. Sometimes it's a symphony, sometimes it's just a lot of honking and shouting. For a while there, it
was mostly shouting. Loud, insistent voices, telling me all sorts of interesting and occasionally terrifying things. It made trying to write a simple pop song quite the adventure.
Through it all, the drugs, the suicide attempts, the mental hospital visits, the music kept coming. Sometimes it was a trickle, sometimes a flood.
Sometimes it was just a strange little tune that I'd hum to myself for three days straight until it finally found its way onto a piano.
My brain was finally silenced after contracting COVID and the later effects of that which was respiratory problems but I wrote a bunch of songs about cars and girls and surfing, a few albums that apparently changed the world, a good noise and I managed to put a smile on a few faces along the way
even if my own face was often contorted in a mixture of concentration and sheer bewilderment most of the time.