REVIEW: All Summer Long - The Beach Boys (1964)

I really like this album cover so here's a big, pretty HQ version.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 This album is definitely the most 'progressive' work the Boys had made up to this point, and frankly - this is DEFINITELY sacrilege - this is the first Beach Boys record I actually come back to as an album. The British Invasion had officially commenced, and after Beatlemania, the Beach Boys knew that they had to react in order to not get swept up in the deluge - and indeed they did! All Summer Long is quite obviously their lushest record so far, and you could definitely make the case that it's the best. I was a bit tired of writing more-or-less the same thing for a bunch of songs for the last couple albums, so I'm very grateful for getting to the album where Brian really starts to stretch his wings as a producer - just listen to that guitar on Little Honda, or those pounding drums on Hushabye, or the layers to All Summer Long. Which is to say - I would probably take this one over the last few. (I have playlists of the first couple records with the filler excised. Sorry, not sorry!) Not to say I don't love Fun, Fun, Fun or Surfer Girl or any of their other early hits! But I don't think it's as big of a stretch to say this record is a leap forward - albeit maybe not as big of one as some people make it out to be.

Of course, it's not like this record is a hidden masterpiece on the level of Pet Sounds. Compared to the complexity and lushness of Today or Summer Days (and Summer Nights), this record still sounds a little bit bare - but it's hard for me to take points off for that. And as I'll get into, the second half doesn't quite live up to the new sounds of Side A. Still, this album is probably the pinnacle of the 'California Sound', before the Boys ended up experimenting further - but that experimentation is one of my favorite things about them. It's not an issue on this record, but I am very glad they branched out.

And it's also not like the Beach Boys instantly went from nothing to something here, either - Little Deuce Coupe and Shut Down, Volume 2 were both admittedly rush jobs, and even then, they definitely had signs of where the Beach Boys would end up heading. In the two years between Surfin' Safari and this album, the Beach Boys have come a long way, and it's not like they split all of said distance in a few months.

Still, though, "I Get Around" is probably the best of their up tempo singles up to this point. It's one of those songs where everything just... works. Listening to these records in sequence, I've been really struck by how the Boys constantly seemed to be iterating on their own records - going from "Surfin" to "Surfin USA" to "Fun, Fun, Fun" - and this song seems like the natural end of that progression. It's catchy, a load of fun, and manages to be lush and immediate at the same time - just enough layers in the arrangement to get lost in the song, but the production job never threatens to overtake the melody itself or subdue the "rock" part of "surf rock". There's a reason this song is still known and beloved, and if you haven't heard it... maybe stick your head out of the rock you've been living under?

All Summer Long (which unfortunately gives you results for some Kid Rock song now when you look it up...) is also fantastic. I have no idea how to articulate my feelings on it better than that this song just EXUDES summery vibes. Everything from the lyrics to the instrumentation just immediately makes me think of summer - not summer just by itself - but the mythic ideal of an American summer. Lounging on a California beach, having a picnic for lunch, watching surfers, it's all the exact kind of lifestyle that the "California Sound" elevated into legend, and I don't think there's a single song in the Beach Boys canon that captures that more succinctly than this.

Hushabye is the first Beach Boys song where I immediately go "oh, yeah, he's going for Phil Spector here" - and of course it sounds fantastic. The combination of angelic harmonies, pounding drums, and piano is fantastic, and although it's a cover I have to complement the Boys in selecting it and adapting it. The melody is angelic and the whole thing is complemented in the best way possible by the overall arrangement.

Little Honda is maybe my favorite of the early Beach Boys rockers that never ended up as singles. Just listen to that guitar! If "I Get Around" didn't exist this would be the obvious choice for single, I'd say, but fortunately it does. This is still definitely one of the best Beach Boys car songs, and the arrangement really shows that Brian was starting to add some gorgeous texture into his songs. Something about the low hum of the backing vocals combined with the guitar really "saturates the tape with sound", as Van Dyke Parks would say (a quote that I am probably going to use repeatedly, because it really captures one of my favorite elements of BW's production style)

We'll Run Away is my personal pick for a great Beach Boys song that everyone seems to constantly forget about. The moment at 0:30 where the instrumental suddenly cuts out as a harmony comes in is just perfect - it might be a trick that Brian would reuse, but it's just great. This is a very yearning, teenage angst-y love song, one of those classic blissfully romantic 60s tunes. The only thing I don't like about it is how Brian randomly goes out of tune at the end. It has to be on purpose... but like.. why?

I will momentarily stop gushing about this record because there's another fucking surf instrumental. Thank the Lord that this is the last one I will have to deal with - and also thank the Lord it's actually sort of good. It's not astonishing or anything but it's fun! For filler. It's still bringing the album down. If this is "Carl's Big Chance", I don't know if Carl is making the team. Sorry Carl.

Side B also kicks off well with "Wendy", which is also pretty filler-y, but still good enough that it would've been a highlight on... pretty much all of their albums before this. It's catchy, it's charming, it's fun, it's well arranged.

Do You Remember is a slightly less charming ode to the original rock'n'rollers. It's still fun! Not really anything to write home about or that I'd listen to by myself. 

Girls on the Beach is another ballad - and once again, it feels a little bit beneath most of Side A - but it's still very, very good. Their harmonies are just fucking gorgeous and I will absolutely sit here and listen to whatever schlock just to hear them. And you can also really tell that Brian's skills in arranging everyone's vocals are improving as time goes on! Shout out Brian Wilson.

Drive In is also a fun car song, which similarly would be a highlight in most of the albums before this. It's definitely very catchy. And car. It's very car.

Our Favorite Recording Sessions is stupid filler.

Don't Back Down is yet another fun catchy surf song. I am really running out of things to say about these semi-generic but still enjoyable surf songs. I like ... I like how they sing. I don't know! It's good!

Overall Side A of this record is a pretty dramatic change for the better. Side B... not so much! But it's still very enjoyable and I would definitely say this is my favorite Beach Boys record up to this point. 8/10. Points deducted for Our Favorite Recording Sessions and Carl's Big Chance, but I am listening to this record in 2022 and I have this thing called a skip button.