AL JARDINE INTERVIEW

BAM Magazine, 12/18/98 NoExit column by Jim Freek

Call Me Al -- The Quiet Beach Boy Comes Clean on Quitting the Band

� Since 1963, Al Jardine has sustained his position as "the quiet one" in� the Beach Boys by keeping a low profile in a band that have endured more� drama than an entire season of Melrose Place.� After several years of� desperately crass musical attempts that were geared towards the El Torito� happy-hour crowd (remember that "Beach Boys with the Fat Boys" record from� the late '80s?), Al finally split from the Beach Boys earlier this year,� leaving Mike Love as the sole, original member of "America's Band."

� Al is currently focusing his musical energy on unearthing much of the� deeper, non-hit, "album" material from the Beach Boys' vast catalog with a� new band largely composed of Beach Boys' offspring.� The mild-mannered� Jardine took time out of his rigorous rehearsal schedule ("I'm working on� the charts for 'Monday Monday' right now, and it's driving me nuts!") to� speak to BAM.

Q:� Tell me a little bit about your current project.
� Right now we're in the middle of rehearsals for a Starlight Foundation� benefit at the Shrine Auditorium.� [The Starlight Foundation] is a charity� that helps terminally ill children.� We're calling the group "The Beach Boys� Family and Friends," and it includes Carnie and Wendy Wilson, Owen Elliot� [daughter of the Mamas and the Papas' Cass Elliot] and my sons Adam and� Matthew Jardine.

Q:� Do the Beach Boys still exist?� It's pretty much just "The Mike Love� Show" at this point, isn't it?
� That's right.� Michael [Love] and I had been touring for awhile together� and it just didn't seem to be fulfilling, so we had a creative parting of� the ways.� He's still working with "The Beach Boys," and he's doing what I� call the "party circuit" -- the hits.� He has always excelled at doing the� uptempo, lead singing style, but I felt we'd been confined to that for so� many years and I desperately wanted to fill the void when Carl left.� With� the Beach Boys Family and Friends, I hope to produce some in-depth music� from the album material that's seldom ever heard.

Q:� In other words, the touring version of the band started to become� something of a joke?
� Oh yeah.� We had to confine ourselves to just the hits.� We were like a� traveling jukebox, and then we added cheerleaders to the jukebox and it� started to look like an overly decorated Christmas tree.� And it just got� further and further away from the music and more into the Barnum & Bailey� thing, where you pull out all the circus animals, the tent, the chimpanzee� with the organ grinder -- the whole thing.� It just got to be too much of a� circus and I wanted to put the music back in the show, so I created this� idea of doing what I've called the "b-sides."

Q:� What's your personal favorite Beach Boys record?
� There's too many; there's just too much going on there.� I mean, we could� spend a year figuring that out.� Emotionally favorite, maybe "California� Girls."� I just enjoy that particular style, and that song reminds me of� some kind of an anthem.� There are so many things over the years that Brian� [Wilson] has written that I'd totally forgotten about and, quite frankly,� discarded.� There's a real obscure one called "Be Here in the Morning" from� the Friends album that we'll be doing with this new group.� That was� probably the most uncelebrated Beach Boys album, but it has the most� interesting music on it.� It's interesting how reality changes.� We're� somehow confined to our name, the Beach Boys; it confines you to a certain� image, but there's so much there that's so rich.

Q: The two most well-known moments of you singing lead vocals are "Help Me� Rhonda" and "Sloop John B.", yet, you also sang on "Vegetables" from the� aborted Smile project.� Wasn't Paul McCartney at that session?
� Paul helped produced a little bit of encouragement, and he and Brian just� chit-chatted while I was doing the lead.� A real interesting evening.�� "Vegetables" is one of those unheralded and seldom heard tunes from the� "psychedelic era" of the Beach Boys.� We went through all these phases, just� like all the other '60s bands, yet ours were somewhat more subtle.� The� Beatles were "a big explosion," Brian would say, and were kind of a quiet� and long-lasting one.� I always thought we should have done a concert� together with the Beatles.

�� Q:� All the other members of the Beach Boys have released solo albums except� for you...
� Why should I?� I like to be surrounded by harmonies and fullness and� richness and vitality.� Most people have to do it just to get it off their� chest, but what a waste of time.� I've been at the microphone, I've sang the� parts, I've stood next to the people that sang the parts, so I'm more or� less qualified to deliver the goods.� Why should I pander to anything else?

Q:� The Endless Harmony soundtrack/documentary was exciting for a lot of� Beach Boys fans, in the sense that it contained a bounty of unreleased� material, including "Loop de Loop (Flip Flop Flyin' in an Aeroplane)," a� 1969 recording that you actually went in and finished this past year.
� That's a good example of digging into the treasury.� There's some� phenomenally diverse material on that.� It took me 29 years to finish that� song.� That's a typical Jardine move.� I've got another one in the can� that's just like it, called "Don't Fight the Sea."� It's pretty good, but I� just can't seem to get it finished.

Q:� Similarly, the just-released Ultimate Christmas CD contains 1964's The� Beach Boys' Christmas Album plus many of the tracks the band recorded in the� mid '70s for a Christmas album that never saw release.
� This additional, previously unreleased music will help to embellish it,� and it brings a lot of originality to it.� A lot of those songs are not so� highly produced and polished, because, unfortunately, we did the band tracks� in a makeshift studio in the Midwest.� We really tried to add some polish to� it up in my studio in Big Sur by adding a spacializer, which is a process by� which you kind of get a 3D sound.� Hopefully that gave the songs a little� more depth.� On "Santa's Got an Airplane," for instance, you can hear the� sound of the engine going around the room and it spreads the stereo 180� degrees.� My boys, Matt and Adam, actually sing lead on one of the songs,� "(I Saw Santa) Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree."

Q:� I understand that many of the '70s Beach Boys titles from your Warner� Bros. tenure are being reissued next year sometime.
� Those will be out in about March or April.� The Beach Boys Family and� Friends will be exploring a lot of that material, because those are our� favorites.� When the girls [Carnie and Wendy Wilson] were young, we were� literally making a lot of these records at Brian's house in the early '70s,� so the music's in their blood.� It's a dream come true for the girls to� finally be singing a lot of those songs.

Q:� What was your reaction when you first heard the backing tracks that� Brian had recorded for Pet Sounds prior to the band doing the vocals?
� Dismayed.� And that would probably be an understatement.� We'd been� traveling on the road with this music -- the jukebox was out there -- and� when we came back, here's this incredible wealth of material, and it took us� quite awhile to adjust to it.� We approached it like a job and to be brought� up to speed because this isn't music you could necessarily dance to; it was� more like music you could make love to.� Like that great Moody Blues album,� Days of Future Past, it had that kind of complexity to it, so it was quite a� departure.� Once we got the hang of it though, it was magic.� It wasn't� easy, but if it was easy, everybody would be doing it.

Q:� That's an interesting response, considering that 30 years after it's� release, Pet Sounds is universally hailed as one of the most beloved albums� of all time.
� Again, we're confined by our name to a certain criteria, and the messenger� is out there singing the leads, and you're confined to that form.� So, to� break out of that mold you have to take chances, and that's what Brian was� trying to do.� And here I am 30 years later, doing the same thing trying to� express the wealth of music that doesn't fit into that early mold.� It's not� that Mike's not doing a good job, but I'm just trying to represent the other� 90 percent of the music.� It's like Huey Lewis and the News record, "Hip to� Be Square."� We'll be hip without trying to be.

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