the Beach Boys image of good-time surfing white young men occupies a very narrow niche and is overlaid with American imagery; it is not very relatable outside the US and perhaps limited inside too. And what proportion of the population is into surfing? And what do we think of the surfing set? Surely it is still a very small and privileged group. were they 50s or 60s? You can imagine them appearing in Happy Days. The ambiguity of their time frame carries through to their music, which often contains up-beat 1950's Doo-Wop and barbershop elements. The Beach Boys absolutely invented their own style and upped the ante for studio production in popular music, but their influences are present in their music. ([song]: "Oom bop bop") their "wall of music" production style in [song] is great, but it means you can't sing the song yourself. Sure, there are snatches of vocal and background-vocal that are easy, and famous, but can you sing the whole song? A quick YouTube search revealed a small handful of cover versions, half of which were by barbershop groups. This puts the song on a pedestal, and out of the reach of regular people. The vocal range needed for these songs adds to the problem. Yes, the middle section of Bohemian Rhapsody is almost unsingable too, but not quite, and most people can have fun attempting it. the well-known Beach Boys songs are all happy-clappy upbeat songs about girls, hanging out, having fun fun fun, and surfing. The truly great songs and bands have a wider range of emotion. coming back to the wall of sound and production style, it seems that their songs tend to be quite uniform all the way through and a bit "clinical". Perhaps lacking "soul", never offering a commanding guitar solo, or dropping the bass to create a peak. They might be 10 all the way through, but never go to 11. I asked my wife if she would classify [song] as a really great song and she replied "I don't know, would you classify YMCA as a really great song?". So there you have it.
>>75060889
I like the idea but comments on popular music I like is almost always incredibly embarrassing.