Of all the bands that have come and gone over the years, few have been able to create a style as distinct, long-lasting, and instantly recognizable as the Beach Boys. These California kids became American icons in the early 1960s—and their music remains popular and well-known to this day. But behind the clean-cut image and sweet sounds, there was a lot more going on with this group than meets the eye—and not all of it pleasant. Family feuds, personal struggles, and dealings with sketchy characters are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the story of this beloved band. From the tragic to the hilarious, and everything in between, here are 51 fascinating facts about the Beach Boys.
1. It Started When the Cat Was Away…
The story of the Beach Boys began when California teenager Brian Wilson decided to explore his passionate interest in music. His parents took a weekend trip to Mexico and left him some allowance money to feed himself and his brothers with—but Brian had a different idea. He instead used that money to buy musical instruments and recruited his brother Carl and his cousin, Mike Love, to help him recreate the harmonies of his favorite songs.
Childhood friend Al Jardine and Brian’s other brother Dennis soon joined these efforts—establishing the lineup that the world would soon know and love.
2. They Lived in Terror
The Wilson brothers’ father, Murry, soon discovered his sons’ newfound interest in music and decided to involve himself in their endeavors as their manager. This was both a blessing and a curse for the boys. Murry helped get the group into the public eye, but he also had a chilling dark side. For much of the boys’ childhood, Murry was physically abusive towards his sons. He would beat them for just about any infraction you can think of—but that wasn’t all.
3. Their Father Was a Creep
Murry Wilson was infamously cruel to his sons, and some of his punishments were so bizarre that they’re unforgettable. In one of the strangest incidents where he tried to teach the boys a lesson, he once removed his own glass eye and forced his sons to stare into his empty eye socket.
4. They Shot Back
As much as the Wilson brothers feared their father, they still got back at him from time to time. On one occasion, a young Brian saw that his dad was late for dinner and took the opportunity to get some revenge—the future star went to the bathroom on his dad’s dinner plate! Needless to say, Murry was not impressed…
5. The Trauma Was Lifelong
Murry’s abuse of his sons not only had an emotional impact on them, it had a physical impact as well. Brian actually went mostly deaf in one of his ears as a result of his father hitting him so hard over the years. Thankfully, this hearing impediment did not stop him from composing his beautiful music.
6. There Was Little Truth in Advertising
Despite what you might expect based on this group’s song lyrics, Dennis Wilson was the only member of the band who actually surfed in real life. In fact, Brian has always had an extreme fear of the water and tends to stay as far away from beaches as he possibly can. Who could have seen a plot twist like that coming?!
7. They Needed Help
The boys did not initially know how they would manage to include Dennis in the band due to his lack of musical training. They ended up assigning him to be the group’s drummer, thinking he could pick the skill up as he went along. Because of this, the group often hired professional drummers to fill in for him on many of its early recordings.
8. They Didn't Come Up With Their Name
With the band’s lineup now complete, all the guys still needed was a name. They had initially wanted to call themselves "The Pendletones" after a style of shirt they all used to wear. Thankfully, this plan changed when a record company executive, who didn’t like that idea, came up with the name "Beach Boys" off the top of his head.
9. It Was a Rough Start
The name "Beach Boys" is actually strangely fitting—not only because of its songs but because of its family history. The Wilson family first moved to California to escape the Dust Bowl and Great Depression that had devastated their farming communities back in Kansas. When they arrived in their new state to start their new lives, they quickly found themselves homeless and resorted to living in a tent on a local beach.
How ironic that the very place that reminded this family of its poverty and hardships would one day become the source of all its incredible fame and fortune.
10. They Gave Away a Huge Hit
One of the first songs that Brian wrote in the early days of the group was called "Surf City". Innocently, he decided to give the song to the group Jan & Dean as a gesture of friendship instead of having his own band record it. Jan & Dean’s recording of the song ended up reaching number one on the charts, and Murry was furious that Brian had cost his group a potential smash hit.
11. Did They Rip Chuck Berry Off?
One of the group’s first big hits, and still one of their most popular songs, is the classic summer anthem "Surfin’ USA". However, one person who was not so crazy about it was rock ‘n roll pioneer Chuck Berry—who noticed that the melody sounded suspiciously like an old song of his called "Sweet Little Sixteen".
Although Brian has never denied that the song’s melody was a reworking of the Berry tune, a back and forth copyright dispute between Murry Wilson and Chuck Berry’s record company resulted in the courts crediting the song solely to Wilson, then to both Wilson and Berry. Ironically, the song’s lead singer, Mike Love, received no formal credit at all despite his claiming to have written the lyrics.
12. Their Fans Were Rabid
At the height of their popularity, young female fans went crazy over the Beach Boys. On one occasion, the resentful boyfriends of those fans discovered which hotel the band was staying at and headed over to pick a fight with them. What happened next wasn’t pretty. Dennis Wilson got into a physical altercation with one of the jealous visitors, kicking him between the legs and causing a serious injury.
13. Fame Had a Dark Side
With one hit song after another, the Beach Boys became an enormous sensation—but that success came at a cost. In the middle of a plane ride between concert stops, Brian Wilson suffered a full-blown nervous breakdown. His bandmates rushed to his aid as he began shrieking uncontrollably and shouting into his pillow.
For the sake of his mental health, the group decided that he would retire from touring with them. He would instead stay home and focus solely on songwriting and recording from that point on.
14. They Found a Star
Replacing the group’s founder and creative mastermind was no easy task, but the guys somehow managed to luck out—and launch another awesome music career in the process. The person they found to take Brian’s place on stage was the one and only Glen Campbell—though the world had not yet heard of him. After choosing to go solo rather than stay with the band for the long-term, he went on to become one of the most popular singer-songwriters in country music history.
15. He Had Good (and Bad) Vibrations
Although staying home gave Brian the time he needed to focus on creating more incredible music, it quickly took a dark twist. Around this time, a friend introduced Brian to illicit psychedelic substances. He began taking them, and they changed his life forever. At first, they opened up new avenues of creativity for him that would take the Beach Boys’ music to new and fascinating places—but their effects also added tremendously to the mental health struggles that he was already facing.
16. He Heard Strange Sounds
Another complication in the saga of Brian’s mental health was that he was plagued with "auditory hallucinations". Specifically, he would frequently hear imaginary voices in his head. The voices would tell him how awful he was and how they wanted to kill him. It’s hard to imagine how difficult it must have been to have gone through so many struggles at once, especially with millions of fans following each development.
17. They Gave Him A Not-So-Fond Farewell
Wilson family patriarch Murry had always been tough on his boys—but eventually, things got so out of hand that they just couldn’t take it anymore. The Wilson brothers decided to fire Murry as the group’s manager in 1964. Needless to say, this did not stop him from continuing to let his sons know just how he felt about each and every career decision they made from that point on.
18. Two Can Play at That Game!
When Murry’s sons fired him, his reaction was utterly cold-blooded. He actually created and managed a knockoff group called the Sunrays, who imitated the Beach Boys’ style and tried to become their new rivals. Although this new group picked up a few local fans in California, it never quite reached the level of success that Murry likely hoped it would.
19. He Found a Passion Project
In 1965, Brian listened to the Beatles’ Rubber Soul album and it completely blew his mind. He took this newfound inspiration and began devoting himself to creating an album he was sure would be like no other the world had ever seen. Time would prove that his vision would come true, and music history was about to be made.
The product of his tireless efforts was the album Pet Sounds, released in 1966. The experimental nature of the music and the meticulous way in which Brian composed, arranged, and produced each track completely shocked fans and musicians all over the world. But although the album is seen as a classic today, it was far from an instant success at the time...
20. His Bark Was as Big as His Bite
Many fans were confused at first by the new and unusual styles of Pet Sounds, especially by the unprecedented use of things like bicycle horns, water bottles, and even a live dog as musical instruments. But music critics were extremely impressed and the album is now regarded as one of the most influential in history.
21. They Were Rockin’ and a-Reelin’
Given the ambitious nature of the Pet Sounds project, there was no way the band could finish it in time to meet the record company’s expectations. Since the band was required to put out new material sooner than this album would be ready, they hastily threw together a record called Beach Boys Party, consisting entirely of casual covers of popular songs.
One of the songs on this impromptu album was "Barabara Ann," which became one of the group’s signature songs and remains a beloved classic to this day. That’s right, an iconic song was the product of corporate interests trying to stifle a band’s creativity. I guess success really can come when you least expect it!
22. There Was Paranoia in Their Ranks
One song that Brian wrote for Pet Sounds was called "Hang on to Your Ego". Some fans think the song alludes to the use of psychedelic substances. Mike Love took serious offense to the lyrics of the song and this caused a major conflict between the group’s members. In the end, Brian agreed to change the lyrics and the new song became "I Know There’s an Answer".
23. They Had to Tread Carefully
This lyrical dispute was only the beginning of the conflict that Pet Sounds created between cousins and bandmates Brian Wilson and Mike Love. On Wilson’s end, he viewed the project as a piece of art and insisted on getting every detail exactly right. For this reason, he would sometimes make musicians repeat specific parts over and over again for hours or even months on end, while at other times he refused to record at all based on how he was feeling that day.
24. When Cousins Clash
Meanwhile, Love was very concerned at what changing the style of the group’s music would mean for its future. Afraid that the public would be unable to relate to Wilson’s experimental new styles, Love allegedly once chastised his bandmate in the middle of a recording session—demanding that he stop "[messing] with the formula" that had gotten the group where it was.
25. God Only Knows Where We’d Be Without It
When the drama subsided and the landmark album finally did come out, it changed everything. Among those impacted by it was a certain Beach Boys fan by the name of Paul McCartney. Yes, that Paul McCartney. In addition to calling the track "God Only Knows" one of his favorite songs of all time, Pet Sounds inspired him to go even farther with his musical innovations on the Beatles’ own upcoming albums. The results included Revolver and Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.
26. He Struck Out on His Own
When the Beatles responded to the Beach Boys’ Pet Sounds with Revolver and Sgt. Pepper’s, a friendly rivalry between the two groups was officially underway. Brian set out to outdo those classic albums with an even more innovative project called Smile. As exciting as this plan was for the entire music world, its completion would soon prove to be easier said than done...
27. There Was Little to Smile About
Unfortunately, the pressures of working on the Smile album had dark consequences for Brian Wilson. He became increasingly insecure about his ability to compete with the Beatles’ latest releases and eventually could not handle it anymore. Although Smile looked set to become another groundbreaking moment in music history, the challenges ultimately became too much for Brian to handle and the project was scrapped.
28. He Loved What He Saw
With all the turmoil that the group experienced, it’s no surprise that some of its members needed a bit of a break around this time. For Mike Love, this meant a trip to India to explore a newfound interest in transcendental meditation. Love spent several weeks devoted to this new interest of his and has continued to meditate regularly ever since.
29. So They Met Again
During Love’s time in India, it just so happened that another popular musical group was taking up meditation and staying in the same academy as him while doing so. Yep, you guessed it—it was those pesky Beatles again! While hanging out with his musical rivals over the next few weeks, Love claims to have given Paul McCartney some songwriting tips for what ultimately became "Back in the USSR".
30. He Was Living on the Edge
As Love meditated in India and Brian battled his inner demons, another bandmate was handling the turmoil in an utterly chilling way. Dennis Wilson, the free spirit of the group, was a little bit out of control. He had long been unable to stop himself from sleeping with as many partners as possible, even while married.
This led to a divorce around the same time that he had begun using hard and dangerous substances. But even he could never have predicted the insane turns that were about to come next for him (more on that later).
31. Father Knows Best?
As if the late 1960s were not a weird enough time for the Beach Boys already, that era also saw Murry Wilson popping back up in a very strange way. Not only did he come out with an album of his own in 1967, but he also shocked his sons by suddenly selling the publishing rights to the entire Beach Boys catalog. Many believe that he forged Brian's signature on documents in order to achieve this.
32. Things Came to a Head
Following the late 1960s, things went from bad to worse for Brian’s mental health. He stopped contributing to the group for a while and opened up a short-lived health food store called the "Radiant Radish". When that effort didn’t work out, his life quickly spiraled completely out of control. At one point, he just stopped getting out of bed completely.
His bandmates even built a studio in his house to try and motivate him to come downstairs, but even that didn’t seem to help much.
33. A Con Man Swindled Him
To try and help Brian, his loved ones hired a then-popular celebrity therapist named Eugene Landy. This turned out to be a huge mistake. Under the guise of getting him healthy again, Landy essentially took over Brian’s entire life and, disgustingly, took advantage of his emotional state—all seemingly for personal gain.
Landy forbade Wilson from communicating with his family or participating as a Beach Boy, as well as regulated who he could speak to and what he could do at all times. He also began giving himself a cut of many royalty payments coming in for Wilson’s music, and put himself down as a co-author of new solo material Brian was creating.
34. She Saved Him
While Brian was still living under the control of Dr. Landy, he began dating a car saleswoman named Melinda who slowly started to notice that something seemed off about his relationship with his doctor. Over time, she managed to collect enough information to alert the Wilson family to what was going on. Thanks to her intervention, Wilson threw Landy out of his life and had his psychological license stripped.
35. It Was a Reminder of a Dark Time
Strangely enough, before Wilson gave Landy the boot, he had credited himself as a co-author on a solo album that Brian wrote, produced, and released under his guidance. This album actually became a success and contained the popular song "Love and Mercy". It didn’t take long for Landy’s name to be removed from the authorship credits on subsequent editions of this album…
36. They’ve Still Got It!
The Beach Boys shocked the world in 1988 when they released the song "Kokomo"—an instant classic that became their first Number One hit since "Good Vibrations" in 1966. The 22-year separation between these two tracks marked the longest-ever span between two Number One hits by any single band.
37. He Lost It
In 1988, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inducted the Beach Boys to their ranks. No one was surprised to see the Hall of Fame honor them, but many were surprised by how it all went down. For no apparent reason, Mike Love decided to turn his acceptance speech into a bizarre diatribe against many of his fellow rock stars. The speech definitely left a lot of people scratching their heads…
38. It Didn’t Stop There
Love’s speech was just one controversy. The Hall of Fame snubbed Bruce Johnston, which outraged fans. Johnston had been a loyal bandmate to the group since 1965 and appeared on many of the group’s most iconic songs and albums.
39. Things Were Not Very Harmonious
In the 1990s, Mike Love shocked and angered many Beach Boys fans when he decided to sue his cousin Brian for songwriting credits on many of the band’s classic songs. In the end, he managed to win credit for having co-authored 35 of the songs in question, while failing to convince the judge he had contributed to an additional 44.
40. All Good Things Must Come to an End
Tragically, Carl Wilson passed from lung cancer in 1998, a development which finally brought the run of the original Beach Boys lineup to an end after nearly 40 years. From this point on, Love has held the exclusive license to tour under the Beach Boys name. While Bruce Johnston has continued to take part in Love’s new incarnation of the group, both Brian Wilson and Al Jardine have instead chosen to pursue solo careers.
41. If at First You Don’t Succeed, Try Try Again
In 2004, more than 35 years after he started work on it, Brian Wilson finally completed and released the Smile album. Wilson completed the album as a solo effort rather than with the Beach Boys, and fans eagerly welcomed it. Another reminder to never give up on your dreams, kids!
42. He Screwed Them
Beach Boys fans were ecstatic in 2012 when all the living members of the group reunited in honor of the band’s 50th anniversary. Not only did Brian and Jardine rejoin Love and Johnston, but even original guitarist David Marks returned for the occasion—one which included a tour and a brand new album. But then, Love told Brian, Jardine, and Marks that he no longer wanted them in the band—a shocking move that confused and angered many fans.
43. Old Feuds Die Hard
No matter what year it is, there never seems to be a shortage of strange clashes between Brian Wilson and Mike Love. In 2020, they found themselves at odds again when Love agreed to perform with his current incarnation of the Beach Boys at a major hunting convention. Wilson publicly opposed the booking on the grounds that the hosts are supporters of trophy hunting, something he views as animal cruelty.
44. Welcome to the Family
The Beach Boys' feuds today were nothing compared to Dennis Wilson's wild life throughout the 70s and 80s. When Dennis innocently picked up two young female hitchhikers one day in 1968, he had no way of realizing that a new and colossally bizarre chapter was about to begin for. Although the world had not yet heard of it, these two women belonged to the now infamous cult known as the "Manson Family," led by Charles Manson.
And these folks were about to become a lot more to Dennis than just some hitchhikers...
45. He Brought Danger Home
Dennis invited the girls to his home, and it wasn’t long before they had invited the rest of the cult members to join them there as well. Before he knew what hit him, the entire Manson Family had moved into Dennis’ home full time. No, you didn’t read that wrong. An entire cult actually lived in the home of one of the Beach Boys.
46. It’s Not What You Know, It’s Who You Know
Before the bloodshed, Manson had been an aspiring singer-songwriter, having turned to music as a hobby during a prior unrelated stint in a penitentiary. When he learned that members of his cult had befriended a Beach Boy, he saw it as a perfect opportunity to try and advance his career. So, he befriended Dennis and tried to get as close to him as he could.
47. He Gets Around
For a short time, Dennis basically became a full-fledged member of the Manson Family. He even participated in some of the cult’s strange rituals, such as their chanting sessions and even parties where all members would sleep together. It took some time before things got weird enough for Dennis to start questioning this situation…
House Of Manson, Gravitas Ventures
48. Dennis Set Him Off
At one point during this saga, Dennis was so fond of Manson that he actually got the Beach Boys to record one of his songs! The song was originally called "Cease to Exist". Dennis made a crucial decision and changed the title and lyrics. This set Manson off, leading him to threaten Dennis. He then forced them to leave his house. Lo and behold, just a few months later, they ended up on the front page of every paper in the nation for their violent acts.
House Of Manson, Gravitas Ventures
49. Dennis Crossed a Line
At the same time, things continued to get crazier in Dennis’s life too—until he crossed a disturbing line. He impregnated and married a 16-year-old girl who purported to be his cousin and bandmate Mike Love's daughter, although he denied paternity. This caused Love to seek a restraining order against Dennis, even while still performing with him.
50. Tragedy Strikes
Sadly, Dennis’s wild side ultimately became his downfall. By 1983, he had become a homeless nomad. Tragically, just before the end of that year, Dennis dove into shallow water to try and recover some belongings of his ex-wife’s. He drowned in the process, making him the band’s first casualty. He was only 39.
51. His Final Resting Place Was Apropos
Wilson's family wanted a traditional burial. Existing laws restricted sea burials for non-veterans. Regardless, then-President Ronald Reagan intervened and arranged to have Dennis buried at sea as a tribute to his role in the Beach Boys. I guess he felt that Dennis had contributed so much to the country through his music that this exception was justified.
Defense.gov Photos Airman Kathleen Gorby
Sources: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40
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