Brian Wilson is Gone

I was genuinely heartbroken to hear that Brian Wilson died. It feels like the passing of an era — in a different way than Sly Stone’s recent death.

Not that I was a huge Beach Boys fan growing up. The whole surf music scene was a bit before my time. By the late '70s, when I was saving up allowance money to buy albums by Elton John, Steely Dan, or Pink Floyd, the Beach Boys already seemed passé. At bar mitzvah parties, I’d cringe at the sight of parents dancing to “Surfin’ Safari” or “Surfin’ USA,” doing their best Chubby Checker moves, while I’d slink off to a corner and smirk.

It was only later, when many of my rock heroes — from Paul McCartney to Elvis Costello to even Van Halen — began citing Brian Wilson as a musical genius and an influence, that I started paying attention. Suddenly Pet Sounds was being hailed as perhaps the greatest rock album of all time — often listed just behind Sgt. Pepper. That made me reconsider. These guys weren’t just singing about California girls and beach parties.

“Good Vibrations” had bizarre, experimental, beautiful musical elements — mid-song key changes, and who puts a theremin in a pop song? And that arpeggiated bass intro (I was learning to play the instrument at the time) grabbed me immediately. Then came “Wouldn’t It Be Nice” and “God Only Knows” — two of the most harmonically rich and emotionally sophisticated pop songs ever written. I began to understand: Brian Wilson, along with Lennon and McCartney, was one of the most important composers of the pop era, helping elevate rock music from commercial fluff to something resembling genuine art.

But back to those bar mitzvah parties.

These days, I keep hearing stories about musicians making much of their income playing private gigs for billionaires. Sure, there are still a few superstar acts — Bruce Springsteen can still sell out Wembley for five nights, and Taylor Swift, who has been building her following since the early 2000s — but they’re increasingly rare. For many others, the new live music economy revolves around corporate parties, weddings, and yes, bar mitzvahs.

When I was growing up, the idea that an act like Led Zeppelin or the Rolling Stones would play a private event was laughable. They were untouchable, living gods of music, flying around the world in private jets not to serve others but to fulfill their own debauched mythologies. We idolized them because they seemed so far beyond us.

Today, the script has flipped. Now it’s the tech billionaires who live the jet-set life of excess, while many musicians — some of them legit chart-toppers — are left to hustle for a living. Beyoncé, Drake, even someone named Flo Rida (apparently a huge star) — have all reportedly played bar mitzvahs for kids who’ll never understand how rare and absurd that once would have been.

It’s a commentary on our time. Back then, singer-songwriters were revered as mystics, poets and visionaries. We studied liner notes, memorized lyrics, lived inside their albums. A new tour announcement was like the coming of a prophet. Scoring a concert ticket felt like gaining entry to a holy rite. We sang every word together, our voices merging with theirs. Listen to any live album from that era — you can hear the devotion in the crowd.

That era is gone. Brian Wilson is gone. I’m now approaching the age where I might be invited to a grandchild’s bar mitzvah. I just wish I knew a few billionaires.