Top Ten of Ten: #5 The Beach Boys-Pet Sounds (1966)

Ok so let’s get this out of the way. I am a true Beatles fan! I didn’t grow up with them because they broke up before I was even born. I did listen to them a lot as a child growing up in the late 70’s and 80’s. My dad played them many times. I began collecting their music in the early 90’s and I appreciate so much that they have done. But it’s so hard to narrow it down to one album. Sure I could say Sgt Pepper’s however, a thing changed for me in 1997. So for that last 14 years I can honestly say something profound that I am sure has been talked about forever. I noticed that the Beach Boys’ 1966 album Pet Sounds was continually mentioned. So in 1997 I officially became aware of this masterpiece. I always dismissed the Beach Boys as surfin’ and California sunshine. So, why the fuss surrounding Pet Sounds? “No one is educated musically until they’ve heard Pet Sounds…It is a total classic record that is unbeatable in many ways”, Paul McCartney once proclaimed. Wow was he right! Without Pet Sounds, Sgt. Pepper probably wouldn’t have happened… Pepper was actually an attempt to equal Pet Sounds. What the hell made countless other music stars bow to 1966’s Pet Sounds? I was about to find out. Listening to it numerous times I constantly kept saying that Brian Wilson  was so far ahead of his time that we still have not caught up to it yet. Brain Wilson intended for the album as a whole to have been one big hit, rather than just a song or two. It was the whole rather than the individual songs that was important. Part of his brilliance was the ability to take simple lyrics that spoke of basic human feelings and create an emotional impact through his music and harmonies. I remember reading somewhere that the more you live, the better it gets. Pet Sounds’ legacy is that it changed the way albums were recorded and created. What I found out was that this album not only is the best album from the 1960’s but actually paved the way for…..well more than one can possibly imagine.