Pet Sounds Entry

I was in middle school when I listened the Beach Boys for the first time from the radio. The sound of songs were totally different and new to me with my Asian cultural background. After I listened the Beach Boys, I started to have a dream about living in the U.S. The California Sound was so attractive to me back then. After 30 years as a huge hit in the late ‘50s and early ‘60s, the California Sound still affected me as a teenager in Asia. The California Sound was that powerful.

 I think the music of the Beach Boys before Pet Sounds focused on harmony and catchy melodies. Their music was more like a commercial. Probably, the Four Freshmen influenced Brian Wilson a lot in his youth and that might have affected Wilson’s early work a lot.

As the oldest brother of the Wilson brothers, Brian Wilson played a huge role in the band. Also, he was the main songwriter of The Beach Boys and wrote most of the songs. He wrote the song “Surfin’” and made a contract with Capitol Record. I honestly think the Beach Boys' success came from Brian Wilson, as he was the founder, writer, arranger, and producer of the band and created their unique sound, which brought huge success to the band from all around the world.

I think Brian Wilson’s motivation came from The Beatles. It was because of how much of a huge effect the Beatles were in American culture and Brian Wilson was so motivated. That pushed him into creating something unique and Wilson made Pet Sounds with a little inspiration from Phil Spector.

Pet Sounds opened the new generation of the recording industry and it was very experimental. Brian Wilson created instrumentals in this album with full use of his creative mind. He used different percussion sounds, several bass instruments, accordions, and other wind instruments that created an amazing and new sound. Also, the lyrics of Pet Sounds were different. Before Pet Sounds, they used to talk about surfing, love, and girls. However, the lyrics of Pet Sounds were about expression of their mind and thoughts of how they viewed the world.

From Pet Sounds, their music changed a lot compared to albums before Pet Sounds. As a listener, I expected the songs I used to listen. I needed to listen several times to get used to it. As an industry professional, Pet Sounds opened a new era of recording with creative experimentation of instruments and systems.