Beach Boys

Showing the band portrayed in an unusual, prematurely autumnal atmosphere, the cover of "Pet Sounds" already hinted that the summer celebrated by the Californian Beach Boys — that long summer which seemed like it would never end — was now drawing to a close: the many fans of the time, used to the exuberant, carefree songs about surfing, found themselves puzzled and disoriented by these new melodies, so introspective and musically complex. Even Capitol Records, the label that had been reaping huge profits from the Beach Boys' endless run of hits for four years, greeted the album with little enthusiasm. Lacking adequate promotion, "Pet Sounds", released in May 1966, ended up being a partial flop at home (though in England it was an immediate success, especially with critics). What today is regarded by many as one of the greatest peaks — if not the greatest peak — of pop music proved too complex and profound a work for the average listener of the time: as we know, certain works are born posthumously. Its creator, Brian Wilson, seemed to have already foreseen this on the album itself, when, in the third-to-last track, he sang: "Sometimes I feel very sad/ I guess I just wasn't made for these times". But why did he, who until the previous year had racked up a string of huge hits, decide to overturn such a successful formula? And above all: how could the music of the band that had sung "Surfin' U.S.A." and "Fun, Fun, Fun" suddenly take on such melancholy tones?

The long Californian summer: from "Surfin'" to "Pet Sounds"

Brian Wilson, the heart and soul of the Beach Boys, had never really been a "beach boy": a fragile young man, deaf in one ear since childhood but raised in close symbiosis with music, he had never once set foot on a surfboard. And yet, after forming the band with his two younger brothers Carl and Dennis, joined by cousin Mike Love and friend Al Jardine, he had helped fuel the myth of a happy California: an imaginary world that, set against the backdrop of an endless summer, conjured sun-drenched beaches, sweet golden-haired girls, drive-ins and hot rods, and everything that made up the American youth imagination in its Californian incarnation. The defining element of this earthly paradise was surfing: a sport with roots stretching back to certain indigenous peoples of the Americas, which, between the late fifties and the very early sixties, had become a symbol of freedom. It was the expression of that same explosive freedom which, just a few years earlier, had given birth to rock'n'roll and to youth culture itself.

It was Dennis, the only member of the group who could actually surf, who suggested writing songs about the surfing life. And so, in 1961, Brian wrote "Surfin'": who could have imagined that such a simple, naive song, recorded in makeshift fashion by five kids (Carl, the youngest, was just 15), would mark the start of a new chapter in the history of rock? Then came "Surfin' Safari" and "Surfin' U.S.A.", and success followed swiftly: within a couple of years, the Beach Boys had become the most famous band in the whole of the United States.

Yet, beyond the youthful subject matter of his music, Brian Wilson seemed to be using certain themes symbolically: the myth of eternal Californian summer seemed like a modern version of the ancient myth of eternal youth, while the theme of surfing — the endless desire to ride the highest wave — embodied the notion of life as a challenge, a constant testing of one's own abilities; a theme that, in a country as young and bold in its history as America, had carried epic connotations ever since the days of the pioneers.

From childhood, Brian Wilson played the piano, but he particularly loved singing: in his free time, he would often teach his younger brothers to harmonize their voices; sometimes, especially around Christmas, cousin Mike Love would join in the singing too. This meant that, later on, the Beach Boys' true strength lay in the increasingly complex vocal harmonies Brian went on to compose: he thought of his bandmates' voices as the finest instruments at his disposal. At the same time, though, Brian's vocal harmonies and counterpoints merged with the instrumentation of rock'n'roll, chiefly his brother Carl's guitar. The Beach Boys' early songs, particularly tracks like "Surfin' U.S.A.", "Fun, Fun, Fun" and "I Get Around", conveyed the same energy and the same vivid freshness as the earliest rock'n'roll. There was, however, one difference: their songs carried a sense of innocence and childlike wonder, a playfulness and joie de vivre not found in quite the same way in the music of the first rockers. Looking closer, that so-innocent imagery was, paradoxically, shaped by a subtle nostalgia for something that was already being lost. In those very years, in fact, American youth was beginning to lose its innocence: the assassination of Kennedy and the escalation of the Vietnam War were gradually ushering in a season of unrest; times were truly changing, and before long, youth culture itself would change radically too.

The summer immortalized by the Beach Boys was thus one whose illusion of eternity was generated precisely by the specter of its own end: in its carefree spirit, it was the last true summer of rock'n'roll — at least the kind rooted in fifties culture, whose twilight was so exquisitely captured by George Lucas in "American Graffiti", which ends, as it could only end, with the Beach Boys' "All Summer Long": proof of the nostalgic undercurrent running through what, at first glance, might seem like nothing more than a happy song. Although the Beach Boys' early songs were indeed steeped in innocent fun, melancholy would occasionally creep in timidly between one track and the next. Gradually, the truly carefree songs on their albums grew fewer and fewer, while intimate, love-themed songs became more frequent; and love, as we know, often rhymes with pain...

On the other hand, from a strictly musical point of view, it was the Beach Boys themselves — through their leader Brian — who accelerated the departure from straightforward rock'n'roll: the increasingly refined harmonies and arrangements of songs like "Surfer Girl", "The Warmth Of The Sun", "California Girls" and "Please Let Me Wonder" were already pointing toward new musical territory. "Pet Sounds" did not spring from nowhere, then, either in form or in content: the albums that preceded it — the extraordinary "The Beach Boys Today!" in particular, with its more sophisticated arrangements and lyricism — showed that the path ahead had already been set. Though he often had to contend with pressure and interference from Capitol Records and Mike Love, both far more interested in commercial matters than in the pursuit of new artistic expression, Brian Wilson was progressively pushing against the narrow limits of the pop song, with a bold goal in mind: he wanted to transform his Beach Boys from a band for teenagers alone into an avant-garde group, and over the course of 1966 — the year that saw not only the release of "Pet Sounds" but also the epochal "Good Vibrations" — this became the prevailing view among international critics, English critics especially.

The album preceding the release of "Pet Sounds" was "The Beach Boys' Party!" (1965): recorded in haste and with no real ambition, for the young composer its sole purpose was to satisfy Capitol's demands, buying himself more time for the masterpiece he was working on. Paradoxically, it was precisely from this album — the one the band invested the least in, and where Brian's talents went largely untapped — that one of the group's biggest hits unexpectedly emerged: "Barbara Ann". The huge success of "Barbara Ann" was an early sign that the market of the time, at least in America, was not yet ready for a revolutionary album like "Pet Sounds".

The rivalry with the Beatles and Phil Spector

Significantly, "The Beach Boys Party" closed with a cover of Bob Dylan's "The Times They Are A-Changin'". It was the only truly moving moment on that album, because it felt like far more than a mere cover: it was the most sincere admission that, by the middle of the decade, the times really were changing even for the "boys of the beach". While Brian retreated further and further into his own inner world, the sunny surf-California of old was gradually giving way to a new generation, the hippies, far less innocent and carefree; that new era would soon be singing "California Dreamin'", a genuine hymn to a paradise already lost.

Meanwhile, for a couple of years already, new trends had been building up across the ocean: the Beatles, still little known in the States when the Beach Boys were already topping the charts, began to enjoy huge success. The Beach Boys' dominance, virtually unchallenged up to that point, risked being called into question for the first time. On the other hand, the Beatles' arrival in the American charts gave Brian Wilson a positive push to keep raising the bar on his own productions. What followed was one of the most fertile and healthy musical rivalries in the history of rock, marked by mutual admiration between the two camps.

Beach Boys albums such as "All Summer Long" (1964), the aforementioned "Today" (1965), and "Summer Days (And Summer Nights!)" (1965) already showed clear signs of this musical evolution in search of new heights. But after Brian heard the Beatles' "Rubber Soul", he was truly awestruck and deeply moved: he had already decided to push the rivalry to a level never reached before, and that experience only strengthened his resolve.

Meanwhile, the young composer's greatest source of admiration was Phil Spector: the famous American producer, drawing inspiration even from Richard Wagner, had for some years already been bringing a kind of symphonism to production – the so-called "wall of sound" – aimed at elevating the pop song to the status of a work of art. Taking Spector's lesson to heart, Brian took up the challenge with the Beatles. "Pet Sounds" was the fruit of this rivalry: with the Beatles, with the master Phil Spector, but above all with himself. He was firmly determined in his goal: "I want to make the greatest rock album ever made." Also expressing the intention of bringing a new "spiritual value" to music, his work was conceived not merely as a step up in the Beach Boys' output, but as a new frontier for popular music as a whole. "Pet Sounds" also marked the coming of age of the "album" as a format: although the Beatles' "Rubber Soul" had paved the way, never before had a record shown such internal coherence, such quality of arrangement and depth of lyrics. At that point, it was the Beatles' turn to try to return the favor: in the words of George Martin, the band's famous producer, "Sgt. Pepper's was an attempt to equal Pet Sounds". An attempt that, in the opinion of many, fell short.

The making of the album

During 1965, the year he began working on the album, Brian Wilson was 23 years old. Having withdrawn from touring to devote himself entirely to composing, he nurtured the idea of his masterpiece in fertile solitude, leaving it to his bandmates to carry the music around the world. "Pet Sounds" was, in effect, almost a solo album, conceived more like a classical work than a conventional rock record. Brian was not only the composer of the music, but also the arranger and producer, as well as the lead vocalist on most of the tracks: he wanted total control over every aspect of his masterpiece, from conception to finished product. In essence, he took on single-handedly the roles that in a band like the Beatles were split among different people (McCartney and Lennon for the musical ideas, George Martin for most of the arranging and production).

But while Brian Wilson's true inner language was music, he felt the need to be paired with someone who excelled at putting into words those same emotions he expressed through notes: for this purpose, he recruited the young and talented Tony Asher, and the two spent a couple of months working tirelessly, starting sometimes from a lyric, sometimes from a musical idea. Tony Asher was the man who managed to translate Brian Wilson's inner world, becoming in a sense its interpreter. This is how the core body of songs that make up the album came together, and the group could then move on – still without the rest of the band – to recording the instrumental parts.

Here Brian had access to a studio with a full orchestra at his disposal, choosing to work with several talented musicians from Phil Spector's "clan"; this wasn't entirely new, since he had already been gradually experimenting with them on previous Beach Boys records. Compared to earlier work, though, the sheer number of instruments and timbres grew enormously; the songs seem to expand into small, vividly colored symphonies: the musical architecture no longer rests on guitars, but on a bed of classical instruments (violins, brass, piano, harpsichord, harmonica, accordion, saxophone, flute, clarinet and several others), joined by two basses (one electric, one not), guitars, drums and various percussion. On top of that, one occasionally finds the presence of unusual instruments; among these, the use of the theremin stands out (though it seems to have been a slight variant of the instrument), employed in "I Just Wasn't Made For These Times": this is thought to be the very first use of it on a rock album; it would be used again in "Good Vibrations", recorded during the same sessions.

Among the album's various innovations, one standout is the use of the bass, which doesn't simply follow the melody in a supporting role, but forms unpredictable counterpoints that calibrate the emotional tension: in "Don't Talk (Put Your Head On My Shoulder)", for instance, the bass seems to resonate like an actual "heartbeat" while Brian sings "listen to my heart... beat". Paul McCartney has said he was greatly influenced by the use of bass on "Pet Sounds".

Another revolutionary element, and one of the most memorable on repeated listens to the album, is the expressive use Brian made of percussion, exploring its timbral possibilities beyond any convention: track by track, small instruments such as vibraphone, triangle, marimba, tambourine and bells make their appearance, magically enriching the songs (listen in particular to "Let's Go Away For Awhile" and "Sloop John B." to hear it for yourself). In this regard, one should also mention drummer Hal Blaine: thanks in part to his so-called "wonder box" (a collection of bizarre objects with unusual sounds), he was always ready to bring many more of Brian's ideas to life. One particularly curious example is remembered: in the instrumental track "Pet Sounds", empty soda bottles were even used as percussion.

Brian Wilson worked with each musician individually, to get exactly what he wanted, exactly as he had imagined it. During the sessions, he conducted his orchestra using dynamics in a way never before seen on a rock record, blending timbres and instruments so as to produce a rich, unified sound that was much more than the sum of its individual parts. Following Phil Spector's lesson (whose core teaching had been that "two instruments combined together create a third, new sound"), Brian Wilson achieved his own extraordinary, personal "wall of sound". But he still had one more thing up his sleeve to make it all even more magical: the voices of the Beach Boys.

Once all the instrumental parts had been recorded, the contribution of the other Beach Boys – just back from an exhausting tour of Japan – was essentially limited to their vocal performances, following Brian's most meticulous instructions: their voices were truly reduced to musical instruments, perhaps the most important ones, in the hands of a single demiurge who embodied every aspect of his own creation. Carl Wilson's youthful voice was chosen for the lead part on that miracle of a song, "God Only Knows", which, thanks in no small part to Carl's extraordinary vocal performance, was famously called by Paul McCartney "the greatest love song ever written". Mike Love was given lead vocals on "That's Not Me" and "Here Today", plus a couple of others where he shared vocal duties with Brian. Brian himself reserved the lead vocal for the most autobiographical tracks: "You Still Believe in Me", "Don't Talk (Put Your Head On My Shoulder)", "I Just Wasn't Made For These Times" and "Caroline, No".

The remaining Beach Boys, including Bruce Johnston, who had joined the band to stand in for Brian at live shows, had to settle for backing vocals. To give an idea of just how meticulous Brian was, it's said that he secretly re-recorded some of the parts assigned to his bandmates himself, in pursuit of something as close to perfection as possible. This quest for a perfect sound was also one of the reasons the album was ultimately mixed in mono rather than stereo: Brian wanted the listener's experience of the sound not to be affected by external factors (such as the positioning of the two speakers or one's distance from them), but to come out exactly as he had conceived it. In truth, there was also another, more fundamental reason for preferring mono: due to being almost completely deaf in his right ear, Brian Wilson was unable to properly perceive stereo sound.

The content

While "Pet Sounds" clearly marks a revolutionary turn compared to the band's earlier output, it would be misleading to think of it as a radical rejection of the Beach Boys' past music; it's better described as a maturation, or rather a shift in perspective: whereas up to that point the group had conjured a musical imagery so vivid it became almost "visual", like a daydream, "Pet Sounds" now internalizes that fantastical world and renders it poetic. In doing so, it also casts new light on the earlier period, revealing for the first time aspects that had until then remained hidden: seen through the lens of "Pet Sounds", the Beach Boys' earlier imagery turns out to be grounded in nostalgia, as if it had been an attempt to exorcise it. "Pet Sounds" still contains summer (in "Wouldn't It Be Nice"), but for the first time it expresses above all the atmosphere of what had previously been left out: the long shadows cast by the California sun, the rainy days and rough seas, the unease over something slipping away. Looking closely, this note of melancholy is also an element that characterizes the surfer's iconic figure, in his romantic wandering in search of a solitary challenge against a nature that is at once friend and foe. Even one of the very first songs written and sung by Brian Wilson, "Lonely Sea", seemed to reveal the other side of surfing, foreshadowing the meditative mood of "Pet Sounds". In another song, "In My Room", a particularly autobiographical track, Brian confessed to the public his own introspective nature; this is what the sunny California sung about by the Beach Boys really was: a fantasy world born in Brian's mind while, in the reassuring solitude of his room, he hovered between childhood memories and dreams for the future. But if, up until then, the exuberance of the Beach Boys' music had been an antidote to his inner demons, on "Pet Sounds" that fragile balance seems to break down: here the carefree mood seems to last only an instant, because in place of the illusory "endless summer" there is the melancholy awareness of an impending end. The end of summer, and with it, of youth.

So what is the content of "Pet Sounds"? First of all, it can be said that it contains a "story", which is why many consider it the first true "concept album". But at the same time, it's also something more. Not only does it contain a story, it stages the story of all stories: the "fable of initiation", a plot so ancient and universal that for some semiologists it constitutes the deep core of any narrative. It is, that is to say, the inner journey of every individual, the painful separation from an original state of innocence in order to undertake, through a series of experiences in which the relationship with the opposite sex is central, the path of life. "Pet Sounds" is the tale of the passage from one thing to the other, or in simpler terms, the passage from adolescence to adulthood (though it's actually a story that remains ever alive and current in each of us, because it is from our relationship with that essential core that, according to psychoanalytic theory, we derive our personality). The first and last songs are the two strongest moments of the album, and it's in relation to these two opposing poles that all the others find their place and their meaning. In the song that opens the album, a young protagonist expresses the pre-adolescent desire to grow up, to become an adult so he can marry the girl he loves: "wouldn't it be nice if we were older"… (it's interesting to note how the concept of "growing up" is expressed with a word that in English also means "ageing": as if hinting from the very start at a secret identity between the two things, though it's still unknown to the protagonist who, being still too young, simply wishes to grow up).

In the final song, by contrast, the newly reached post-adolescent condition is accompanied by disillusionment and regret for a golden age now lost forever: the protagonist weeps for a girl he was in love with when he was young, but who has now grown up and no longer matches the ideal she once represented for him. In between, caught in the tension between these two complementary opposites, a series of experiences symbolize the difficult journey of adolescence.

We don't know how much time passes between the trembling anticipation of "Wouldn't It Be Nice" and the regret over lost love in "Caroline No", nor do we know whether it's the same girl. It's certainly not real time, but symbolic, inner time, in which the synchronic dimension prevails over the diachronic one. It seems, in fact, that the opposites are often present at the same time, and even when they appear distinct (as in the relationship between the first and last songs), they are nonetheless united by something that could be described as a perpetual state of dissatisfaction: sometimes understood as positive stimulus and desire, sometimes as regret.

The message of great depth the album seems to suggest, then, is this: the younger you are, the more you long to grow up; yet at the same time, the more you grow, the more you regret no longer being young. The paradox is that you can never pinpoint the moment when one thing turns into the other, and yet we spend half our lives longing to grow up, and the other half mourning our lost youth: forever caught in tension, first toward the future and then toward the past, unable to truly live the one certain dimension, the present (as expressed in "I Just Wasn't Made For These Times").

If "Pet Sounds" is all this, it is at the same time also a precise autobiographical story of its creator: the album of Brian Wilson's musical maturity was also the work in which he staged his own arrival at adulthood, his difficult relationship with his father figure and with the opposite sex. His genius lay in managing to express his own deepest fears and emotions in universal terms: isn't that, after all, the secret of every work of art? As Peter Ames Carlin excellently put it in his recent book on Brian Wilson, "Pet Sounds was conceived as a tragedy about the end of youth and the inevitable fading of beauty, and its tragic hero was the sad-eyed young man sitting shyly at the piano on the back cover."

The album, track by track

As mentioned, the record opens with the exuberant chirping of guitar that introduces "Wouldn't It Be Nice": a triumph of harmony and a symbol of a new pop symphonism, it's the song that most recalls, albeit in a different context and with far greater musical maturity, the Beach Boys' earlier style: it's almost as if the Beach Boys were performing themselves, paying tribute to and bidding farewell to their own past repertoire at the same time.

The following "You Still Believe In Me" is perhaps the track most laden with hidden connotations and meanings, and its very genesis is rather mysterious as well: originally, it was titled "In My Childhood", but Brian wanted Tony Asher to write a completely different lyric. And yet, strangely, it still holds subconscious echoes of childhood, which blend with the new meaning: starting with the opening sound which, ringing out like the ghost of an old music box, introduces the sweet childlike nursery tune that acts as the song's true leitmotif; it seems Brian and Tony achieved that sound by plucking the strings of a piano directly. Halfway through the song, we then hear a bicycle bell that evokes another undefined feeling of childhood memory. This track also shows how Brian Wilson and Tony Asher worked together on music and lyrics: at the point where Brian sings "I wanna cry", with Mike Love's voice layering over his own, the syllables stretch out so much that the words and the music become indistinguishable from one another.

"That's Not Me", sung by Mike Love, marks a first moment of reflection: the protagonist recounts having tried to live on his own, to prove that he'd grown up and become independent, only to discover that, deep down, it isn't so great being far from his hometown and from the only girl he loves. One might wonder whether this change of heart is a sign that he hasn't grown up yet, or rather a sign that he's beginning to. Probably both at once.

"Don't Talk (Put Your Head On My Shoulder)" is a love song of extraordinary lyricism and great musical complexity, and it's one of only two tracks on the album with no counter-melody vocals (the other being "Caroline No", and there seems to be an invisible thread linking the two). In this song the relationship with time already feels different, because on a night when anything could happen, it isn't the future that occupies the protagonist's thoughts: "Being here with you feels so right/we could live forever tonight/let's not think about tomorrow/and don't talk, put your head on my shoulder". Worth noting is that when Brian sings "listen… listen… listen", the effect is very intense, as he seems to be speaking directly to the listener, inviting them to listen to the music itself in order to grasp what he considered the spiritual essence contained in the album.

"I'm Waiting For The Day" hovers between a reflective and an exuberant mood; this is perhaps the last song to express a youthful longing for the future: "I'm waiting for the day, when you can love again".

"Let's Go Away For Awhile" is the first of the two instrumental pieces, and shows how the music on the album, even without words, is rich enough to communicate directly with the listener's imagination. This track is truly an extraordinary kaleidoscope in which the whole Californian imagery seems to mirror and languidly reverberate. As the title suggests, it's also the track that ferries the album toward a new development.

As a prelude to the second half of the record (the last track of the original "side A"), we find "Sloop John B": an old traditional folk song that, on Al Jardine's suggestion, Brian Wilson had brilliantly arranged in the Beach Boys' style. The fact that the track wasn't specifically written for "Pet Sounds" has led some to consider it the one song the album could have done without; on the contrary, on closer inspection, it turns out to be a fundamental piece of the puzzle: given that we've identified the album as a stage-by-stage journey from adolescence to adulthood, "Sloop John B", the seventh of thirteen tracks, symbolically represents the attempt at a first decisive step across the boundary. Picking up the theme of the previous track, it tells, in a bizarre and visionary way, of a fantastic voyage aboard a ship called the Sloop John. At first it seems like an exuberant song, and it certainly is; however, in this context, what stands out most is the repeated invocation of the refrain "let me go home, I wanna go home": it seems to suggest that precisely what should be the first great step toward maturity, toward new frontiers, already carries within it the first regret and the first longing to turn back, "home". On the other hand, this very longing is a sign that it's already too late to turn back. In the second half of the record, then, alongside inevitable growth, the "fear of loss" will keep growing as well.

In the following "God Only Knows", anxiety about the future begins to surface in the protagonist's consciousness, though it seems to dissolve into an ecstatic state: "God only knows what I'd be without you". This is one of the album's most sublime and deservedly celebrated moments. It's said that Brian Wilson, during the vocal sessions, even arranged for moments of prayer together with his brother Carl; the latter, as has been recalled, gave this song what was the finest performance of his career.

"I Know There's An Answer" is a song written even before the album's genesis. Though musically sophisticated, it's perhaps the least clear in the context of the work, partly because the original lyrics were ultimately changed at Mike Love's request. The altered section is precisely the one that, giving the song its title, expresses its core idea: "I know there's an answer/I know but I have to find it by myself". Everyone is free to interpret that as they wish…

“Here Today” explicitly voices disillusionment about love, endangered by time: “Love is here today/ and it’s gone tomorrow/ It’s here and gone so fast.” Listen especially to the song’s instrumental bridge, which almost seems to translate the idea of “fleetingness” into music.

In “I Just Wasn’t Made For These Times”, as mentioned earlier, the protagonist feels unable to live in the present or to express himself the way he’d like to. When Brian sings “sometimes I feel very sad”, it’s truly one of the album’s most intense and moving moments.

“Pet Sounds” is the second instrumental track: it bears the album’s name, but is actually an uneasy, quivering prelude to the final song, where an explanation for that title will be found.

At last, “Caroline, No”: this is the song Brian Wilson has always considered, and still considers, his favorite on the album; it's no coincidence that it was also the only single of those years released under his own solo name — it was too intimate a song to go out under the “Beach Boys” banner. “Carol, I Know”: that was the song's original title, and it seems Carol was the name of the first girl Brian fell in love with, back in his school days. Was she perhaps also the one hiding behind the sunny “surfer girl” icon he had celebrated in previous years? Either way, here Carol embodies an even more universal symbol: she is the symbol of original loss, of the end of innocence, of the clash between ideals and reality. That's how “Carol I Know” became “Caroline No”: the words sound the same, but the concept is different. Brian in fact reinterpreted Tony Asher's lyrics, which, starting from the title, focused more on accepting growing up, and made it even more intense and moving: in “Caroline, No” regret is joined by refusal, the expression of an inner conflict not yet settled and that can never be fully healed. “Caroline, No” thus represents the other side of growing up, the one kept hidden in “Wouldn’t It Be Nice”: the protagonist almost seems to want to accuse the girl of having changed from how he remembered her, starting with the fact that she no longer wears her hair long as she once did; in truth, it's only an attempt to hide from himself that the real reason is something else, something the girl herself is subject to as well: time. Caroline has indeed changed, but only because she has grown up like everyone else. Her change thus reveals the relentless face of time, which spares not even the beauty of ideals — those same ideals that seem everlasting when one is young. It's worth quoting the song's lyrics in full, along with the translation:

Where did your long hair go?

Oh, Caroline, no.

Who took that look away?

Could I ever find in you again

Oh, Caroline, no.

_________________________

Where did your long hair go?

Who took that look away from you?

Could I ever find in you again

oh, Caroline, no.

While the listener is still suspended in the bittersweet atmosphere of the song as it fades almost into silence, suddenly, in a countermove, they're thrown off by the swelling sound of a passing train; two dogs can also be heard barking, almost as if to accompany the departing passenger to the very end. Even before we ask ourselves what it means, we already know what the train represents: it marks the end of summer, the final departure, the farewell to youth. The shift from music to noise seems to symbolize the abrupt break from that original state of innocence, the one children share with animals (here represented by Brian's two dogs we hear barking… and here, finally, are the real "pet sounds" the album's title refers to: it's almost as if the whole record were nothing but the fruit of a memory, or a dream, of the passenger on the train). After that train, nothing can ever be the same again. Not even the listener.

And yet, right from that final receding sound of the train, it's impossible to pin down in any single way the vague, conflicting feelings — a blend of sweetness and nostalgia, of emotion and catharsis — that listening to "Pet Sounds" stirs up: while it's true that up to this point we've found a message with a pessimistic undertone, it's equally true that the album seems to possess some secret power that makes it, at the same time, reassuring and healing. One explanation for this complex ambivalence might also lie in the fact that, during the genesis of these songs (as we've seen with "You Still Believe In Me", "Sloop John B.", "I Know There's An Answer" and finally "Caroline, No"), original meanings were often joined and overlaid by new ones, while still keeping a faint trace of what came before.

Carl Wilson once said, about the music his brother wrote, that "the idea of writing music that could make people feel better had become like a mission." Brian, for his part, has always insisted on the spiritual value — and indeed on the great message of love — contained in "Pet Sounds". Following that same path, his next milestone would be called "Smile". But that, as many will know, is another story.

"Pet Sounds" today: the second life of an immortal album

If "Pet Sounds" is an album that changed the lives of countless listeners, its author himself was never quite the same after it either: discouraged by the lukewarm response from audiences of the time to what had been the ultimate expression of himself, and despite the huge success of "Good Vibrations", he entered a long, deep creative and personal crisis (albeit punctuated by occasional flashes of genius), from which he only began to recover thirty years later, in the mid-Nineties. Those years, which saw "Pet Sounds" spread on CD, also marked the beginning of a second life for his masterpiece. A key milestone was the 1997 release of the "Pet Sounds Sessions" box set, which also unveiled the album's first-ever stereo mix.

In 2000, wrong-footing critics and audiences alike, Brian Wilson resumed touring with ever-growing enthusiasm: something that would have seemed utterly inconceivable just a few years earlier. But since wonders never cease, Brian also decided to take the whole of "Pet Sounds" on the road with a tight-knit group of musicians: those lucky enough to witness it describe it as a once-in-a-lifetime, almost mystical experience. To get a sense of that tour, you can listen to the "Pet Sounds Live" CD: it's a different "Pet Sounds" from the one made in '66, and Brian's voice betrays the weight of the years, yet the result is just as moving - in some ways, even more so. Perhaps precisely because of his long absence from the scene and the many hardships he faced, his interpretation of "Pet Sounds" today feels not only credible and authentic, but still capable of astonishing and moving us.

Finally, the latest developments: in the summer of 2006, to mark the album's fortieth anniversary, "Pet Sounds" was reissued in a new edition. In the meantime, Brian Wilson also announced that 2006 would be the last year he would tour the album in full. It's perhaps a little sad to think about, but for every beautiful thing, as "Pet Sounds" itself seems to teach us, there is always a last time. After that, immortality.

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29/10/2006