(Credits: Far Out / Jethro Tull)
Sun 10 August 2025 7:00, UK
It hasn’t been a great year for music. Marianne Faithfull, Ozzy Osbourne and plenty of other legends passed away. One that seemed to shake the world most viciously, though, was Beach Boys legend Brian Wilson.
Everyone has their own memories of Brian Wilson, the Beach Boys and how they impacted music. Brian Wilson was very much credited for being one of the greatest songwriters in the world, and his music is something that continues to resonate today. When news of his death was announced, people felt it everywhere, and as a result, tributes began to flood in.
One of the most touching tributes came from Paul McCartney. It’s a fact that we wouldn’t have gotten the best out of the Beatles or the Beach Boys if they had not been making music at the same time. Their friendly rivalry encouraged both bands to try other things and made room for said bands to be inspired by one another. Subsequently, McCartney had a lot of nice things to say about Wilson.
“Brian had that mysterious sense of musical genius that made his songs so achingly special. The notes he heard in his head and passed to us were simple and brilliant at the same time. I loved him, and was privileged to be around his bright shining light for a little while,” he wrote, “How we will continue without Brian Wilson, ‘God Only Knows’.”
McCartney was one of thousands of tributes as musicians and fans alike poured in, sharing their love for the songwriter. His ability to use harmony, layering within music, and his unique approach towards songwriting mean that very few people dislike Brian Wilson’s work. However, Jethro Tull frontman Ian Anderson is here to throw a spanner in the works.
It probably won’t come as much of a surprise that the prog rock and experimental mastermind wasn’t a huge fan of the Beach Boys’ take on surf music; however, even people who didn’t religiously listen to the Beach Boys still had some time for them. This, unfortunately, wasn’t the case for the Anderson, as he always felt that the Beach Boys’ style of music was overly happy and, as a result, came across as fake. When asked about his opinion of Brian Wilson and the Beach Boys following Wilson’s passing, Anderson wasn’t worried about making his opinion known.
“With all respect to Brian Wilson and his recent passing, I was never a Beach Boys fan,” Anderson admitted, “I did actually go, I was dragged along by someone at Warner Brothers to see the Beach Boys at Madison Square Garden, I think the night before we were playing there. I really didn’t want to go because I knew of The Beach Boys. It was that sort of tinsel sort of rather fake happy happy, you know, Californian thing. It just didn’t appeal to me at all.”
Anderson ended up going to the gig, and didn’t have his opinion changed by what he saw. “He persuaded me to go, you know, ‘Come on you’ll enjoy it, they’re really great, great harmonies, great singing’,” he recalled, “I lasted probably half a dozen songs and had to slip away into the darkness because it just wasn’t for me.”
It seems that even the music of legends isn’t for everyone…
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