Pet Sounds

Album art for "Pet Sounds".

For the people that are not familiar with the Beach Boys, Brian Wilson is the leader and founder of the Beach Boys.  Brian began writing music since he was sixteen years old.  By the age of 21 Wilson already founded the Beach Boys and had the opportunity to have total production control by his record label at the time (Capitol Records).  

In 1964, the same year the Beach Boys got their first number 1 hit with the doubled side single “Don’t Worry Baby” and “I Get Around”, Brian Wilson decided to stop touring with the band, because of his mental illness (Howard, 2004).  Instead of touring around the world with the rest of the band, he stayed at home producing, writing, and arranging more songs for the Beach Boys.

Prior to the recording of Pet Sounds, the Beach Boys were recognized by their  “fun-in-the-sun songs” (Howard, 2004), like their album “Surfin’ Safari” that has songs that talked about “tanned girls, hot rod cars, and surfing endless waves.” (Howard, 2004).  Basically, their songs talked about the younger society in California and the United States in general.  The Beach Boys were well known worldwide before recording Pet Sounds.

Pet Sounds was Brian Wilson’s masterwork as described in the book “Sonic Alchemy” (Howard, 2004).  About two years before recording the album Pet Sounds, Brian was introduced to Marijuana and LSD. These two substances made a huge impact on Brian’s approach in music recording and production for Pet Sounds. His arrangements became richer and more complex, taking his production deeper than teenage-have-fun songs. There is a noticeable change in his production in the song “God Only Knows”. The horn section in the introduction of the song gave a different texture to the “Beach Boys sound”.  Also, the strings made the chord progressions thicker and the drums patterns helped to set a more psychedelic environment.

Another influence or reason for Wilson to make the Pet Sounds album was after listening to the album “Rubber Soul” by the Beatles.  Wilson’s first impressions were: “I really wasn't quite ready for the unity. It felt like it all belonged together.  Rubber Soul was a collection of songs... that somehow went together like no album ever made before, and I was very impressed. I said, "That's it. I really am challenged to do a great album."(Stevens, 2007).

Pet Sounds was categorized as “one of the first psychedelic rock masterpieces” by J. DeRogatis in the book Turn On Your Mind (2007).  The use of organs and strings helped the album to set a mood that was not common in the 60s.  Also, Brian used Phil Spector’s session musicians, because he admired Spector and wanted to use his famous “wall of sound” and shape it to his own perspective.

Pet Sounds is an album that transports me to another place, a place where tranquility dominates.  The melodies in Pet Sounds make me feel that everything is going to be fine.  For example, in the song “God Only Knows” in the chorus section where it says “God only knows what I’d be with out you”.  Pet Sounds made an impact in the music industry in the mid 60s.  This album allowed artists from that time to experiment more deeply with music by finding and mixing different textures/sounds from different instruments and styles of music. 

See "Reference" tab for information about the sources.