Holidaze 12/20/19

The Beach Boys released their original Christmas album the year I was born--1964, for those who care--and, like every other album they'd recorded to that point, it was a hit, rising to number 6 on the Billboard music chart. The album itself was schizophrenic, though, split evenly between original songs ("Little Saint Nick," "The Man with All the Toys," "Merry Christmas Baby") and more traditional holiday fare ("Frosty the Snowman," "White Christmas"). Throughout, though, the harmonizing the Boys had become famous for.

In 1977, in an effort to satisfy their contract to Warner Bros., the Beach Boys recorded a second Christmas album, only to have it rejected (and shelved) by the studio. It sat in the vault for a couple of decades, until The Beach Boys Ultimate Christmas was released in 1997, with some of the tracks from the aborted 1977 effort included.

I lost my copy of Ultimate Christmas--along with every other CD I owned--when I had to abandon La Casa del Terror back in 2016. However, through the magic of Amazon.com, I landed a copy of the CD last year.

And? I love it to pieces.

Every Picture Tells a Story 5/24/12

The Chicago Theatre makes it clear that taking pictures with cameras or cell phones during performances is decidedly frowned upon, even though there were at least a dozen people around me snapping away--some even shooting video--without a peep from security except for the guy in front of me, who was told to knock it off. (The five guys in front of him who were doing the same or worse? Not a word to them.)

However, during intermission, I did take some pictures of faces around the theatre--and you all know how I love faces on buildings.

Where I'll Be Tonight

If you had asked me a year ago if I thought a Beach Boys reunion tour could ever happen, I'd have said not just "no," but "HELL NO!"

The reasons are many. Though the group never technically ceased to exist--lead singer and original member Mike Love has toured with numerous configurations of the band, often including Al Jardine (also an original member who's been in and out of the band over the years) and Bruce Johnston (who first joined in the mid-'60s) and various backing players (at one point, John Stamos was the drummer--no, really)--it hasn't been the same since Brian Wilson departed the group decades ago. The parting was not harmonious, with enough bad blood to send lawsuits and countersuits flying every which way.

Adding fuel to that fire was Wilson's subsequent solo career, which took a while to get going, but has been highly successful for more than 10 years. (I saw him a decade ago at House of Blues Chicago, and that concert remains one of the best shows I've ever seen.) Wilson's greatest solo success, in fact, was a revisit to the Beach Boys' most infamous projects: The never-completed album Smile, which Wilson re-recorded with his current backing band and finished writing with Van Dyke Parks. The results yielded not only adulation from his many fans, but critical success and robust sales as well.

Then there's the matter of mortality: Two of the band's founding members--Brian Wilson's younger brothers, Dennis and Carl--are both dead. (Dennis died in a drowning accident in 1983; Carl was taken by brain and lung cancer 15 years later.) So any possible reunion would be incomplete.

And yet, here we are, in 2012--50 years after the Beach Boys released their first single--and a reunion tour has been snaking its way across the country, arriving at the Chicago Theatre tonight.

The roster is as original as it can be without Dennis and Carl. Brian is on board, as are Love, Jardine, Johnston and David Marks (who briefly replaced Jardine in the early '60s, rejoined the group in the late '90s and had a pretty successful solo career in between). All reports indicate that the shows thus far have been amazing.

Tonight, I get to experience that for myself--well, as much as one can experience any performance from the high end of the balcony at the Chicago Theatre. (How people ever watched movies in this joint, I'll never know.) And I hope the protests of the NATO Summit (which wraps up today) don't interfere with the concert beyond making transportation more tricky than usual.

More anon.

The Power of Proofreading

Since I work in downtown Chicago, I often take the opportunity on my lunch breaks to walk around and take pictures of the world-famous architecture around me. One of my most frequent subjects is the Chicago Theatre, long one of the greatest movie palaces in the world, now a live-performance venue that often hosts big-name music and comedy acts.

Yesterday, I wandered over there to take a picture of the marquee featuring the Beach Boys, who will be playing there Monday the 21st and Tuesday the 22nd. Something wasn't quite right, though: I checked online to be sure the show hadn't move due to the NATO Summit (which will clog streets here over the weekend and into Monday). Nope: According to both the theater's website and the email blast they sent out later Wednesday afternoon, the first Beach Boys show is indeed still on for Monday the 21st.

This is an important thing for me to know--I have a ticket for that Monday show.

When I passed the Chicago Theatre this morning, the marquee was still wrong, so I posted a comment on their Facebook page: "The marquee says the Beach Boys are playing the Chicago on May 20 & 22--it should be May 21 & 22. Anybody got a spare '1' for the marquee?" Shortly thereafter, they commented back "We found '1'!"

At lunchtime today, I wandered over to the Chicago marquee again. This is what I saw.