Live horse racing at Canterbury Park in Shakopee gets underway this Saturday - but before that, they're going to the beach. The Beach Boys, to be more accurate.
The legendary California group will be in the Twin Cities for night of music and certainly nostalgia at Canterbury, fittingly as Minnesota heads into the weekend that unofficially kicks off summer.
Perhaps no artist in music history embodies the feel-good, summer vibes like the "Good Vibrations" group still out performing their hits over six decades (!) after they burst on the pop scene in 1961.
Still led by founding member Mike Love and Grammy-winning Bruce Johnston - but without key songwriter and producer Brian Wilson for many, many years now - the Beach Boys perform Thursday night at 7:30 p.m.
Johnston, who was in Eau Claire, Wisconsin Thursday morning, took time to talk to Tom Hauser on the WCCO Morning News about their upcoming show and the history of one of music's most iconic groups.
Hauser: I'm glad you're spending some time there and you're going to be spending some time with us here in the Twin Cities, tonight. The gates open at 6:30 show begins at 7:30 at Canterbury Park and we're excited to hear the Beach Boys.
Johnston: Well, can I just say something about my connection to Minneapolis-St. Paul? You might really like this. I won't babble on. When I was in high school in 1958, I was in a band that backed backed up Richie Valens for summer of 1958. It was very cool. I was excited to kind of be inching my way into the music business. And then a year later, the band that I was in this was called Sandy Nelson Band. He and I and one of the guys, we wrote a song called Teen Beat which went and sold a million singles. So moving on, there was a station that was changing their name and they and their format, and they they invited Jan and Dean. I was in high school with them. Neil Sedaka, Sandy Nelson band and the local-ish Fargo boy, Robert Velline who became Bobby Vee and The Shadows, and we were to play at the opening of the radio station celebration, of comin online. I'll just tell you their format was top 40 and it's 1959 and they kept going 'Color radio, color radio.' Anyway, so that's my first connection. I'm not gonna go through the whole thing because they're still around as an FM station, but I love your talk show format. I think it's great.
Hauser: I was floored when I realized this, that you wrote the song, "I write the songs." I'm a big Barry Manilow fan, so obviously he's the one who took it to number one. You won a Grammy for that, and I noticed it when I was doing some research that it has been recorded by over 200 artists, including Frank Sinatra. I happened to see a clip just randomly, not knowing I'd be talking to you, where Frank Sinatra performed the song on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson and he changed the words a little bit and he said, 'I sing the songs.' Do you remember that?
Johnston: Well, he said, 'I sing the songs' all the way to the bank, so, I was a happy guy. But yeah, you've got a lot of people listening to you. My mission in life is to tell you that if you want to be in the music business, you can actually have my life. You can have it from Richie Valens to now. I just got a double platinum album. I'm an old guy now, but I'm still surfing. I just got a double platinum album for producing a part of The Weekend's album. The Weekend! I wrote the song with him and I'm still puffing away. I'm hoping for a lot more writing right now.
Besides performing, we do like 150 to 185 shows a year, and we love the music and we're going to Europe pretty soon and then we've got a two nights in Salt Lake City with the Salt Lake City Symphony. So we are rocking our brains out.
Hauser: Yeah, you are still very active. You're still very up-to-date. In fact, The Weekend is going to be playing at U.S. Bank Stadium here in Minneapolis next month. So, very timely, that you bring up The Weekend. The last time I saw you in concert, sadly it was back in 1999, and I'm not sure if you were with the band in this particular show. But in Tokyo, you played a show and it was a part of a trade mission and it was sponsored by Northwest Airlines at the time, and Governor Jesse Ventura was on a trade mission to Tokyo of all things, and we were standing like ten feet from the stage while you guys were playing. It is an outstanding show and I assume it'll still be outstanding tonight. I imagine you play the hit parade from the Beach Boys?
Johnston: Well, we play everything that you want to hear. It's like a Sees Candy sampler. You know, you open it up and you get every shape of chocolate, whatever you want. So, you of course hear "Wouldn't It Be Nice", "Pet Sounds" and "Sloop John B", you'll hear "God Only Knows", you'll hear tons of other hits. My favorite, of course, because it's the first recording I ever made with the band, "California Girls", on and on and on and on. And we move the songs around a little each night so no one's going to be bored, and a lot of hits.
You know, we don't just live in the past. We're just trying to let people hear everything live. By the way, when we play live, we play the no tracks, we sing the songs in the original keys, and it is pretty cool. I'm very proud to be part of this.
Hauser: I love the song "God Only Knows". It got new life in the movie 'Love Actually' I believe in the in the closing credits of that movie. Was that a big boost for that song because that movie around Christmas time is so popular?
Johnston: It helps, but we kind of have a lot going at all times. By the way, when you listen to that recording, there were five or six voices on it, but it still didn't sound right. Everybody went home except Brian, Carl, and me, and he, Brian, says, 'hey, let's do it again. Let's start over.' And we're kind of tired, but so 'God Only Knows' is like Crosby, Stills and Nash. There are only three voices on it singing three vocal parts. It's Brian, Carl his brother, and me. And it's Paul McCartney's favorite song. He says, 'by the way, that's my favorite song except your album cover of Pet Sounds is the worst album cover I've ever seen 'cause there's a big goat on it.'
Hauser: Bruce, I could talk to you all day long. I love the Beach Boys. Looking forward to the show tonight.
Johnston: It's going to be fantastic, and we'll see you in a few hours.
You can find more information on the show here and tickets are still available.