‘Cows in the Pasture’: Brian Wilson’s bizarre attempt to make a country record with his manager on lead vocals
If you ever wonder how impactful Pet Sounds truly was, allow me to divert you to a Paul McCartney quote.“I’ve just bought my kids each a copy of it for their education in life—I figure no one is educated musically ‘til they’ve heard that album.”
When The Beach Boys released that album in 1966, the course of music had undoubtedly changed. The Beatles would follow on with their own take on experimental pop, and the power of the harmonised voice would be at the forefront of musical trends. The thing is, neither The Beatles nor The Beach Boys played host to any part-time vocalists. In both bands, all the parts of the wider harmonies were filled by musicians whose voices would flourish in a standalone environment.
The same applies to some of the other harmonic greats of music: Crosby, Stills and Nash, Fleetwood Mac and Eagles in particular. Their combined voice is made up of individually great voices, and so debunks the idea that harmonies can hide mediocrity.
By the time 1970 rolled around, Brian Wilson was desperately searching for his next kernel of innovative genius. Pet Sounds marked a stark departure for Wilson, from doo-wop pop sensation in the early 1960s to experimental genius, ready to pave the way for alternative commercialism. But history has always taught us that with great success comes great expectation, and the weight of a follow-up weighs heavily around the neck.
All of The Beach Boys’ releases after their opus accurately told that story, and Wilson began clutching at ideas to the point of lunacy. One of which was the album Cows in the Pasture. In 1970, Wilson enlisted the help of The Beach Boys’ talent manager and promoter Fred Vail to provide vocals for a country and western album.
He called Vail into a hotel room and proposed the off-beat idea, stone-faced and completely bemused by Vail’s obvious reservations to pursue the project as a completely inexperienced musician. “I said to him, ‘Have you written any country songs?’” Vail recalled to Rolling Stone. “And he said, ‘Well, no.’ I said, ‘Do you have any idea who you’d like to use as musicians?’ He said, ‘Well, no. I’ve only worked with the Wrecking Crew for the most part. You find the songs. You select the musicians. We’ll go to Wally Heider’s Studio. We’ll start working on the album.‘”
The pair got to work on the project and recorded 14 songs. But given the scrappy and erratic nature in which the project got off the ground, the album remained consigned to privacy for several decades. It seemed as though the project would remain a product of Wilson’s desperate creative pursuit and nothing more, until this year, it was announced that the album would be released alongside a documentary in late 2025.
The four-part series will tell the story of the initial idea, as well as provide footage of Veil re-recording the songs in the studio, with an array of guest singers, including Wilson himself. “It’s been a roller coaster,” Veil said. He added, “It shows me that the stuff we recorded in April ’70 is timeless. I was really, really proud of this record, and even though it sat in the can for decades, literally, I always was thinking, ‘Man, that’d be great to get back into the studio and finish this thing.’ And now that’s happening.”
While the idea may have been one of pure irreverence in 1970, it came from a chapter of Wilson’s life that also delivered The Beach Boys album Sunflower. While it wasn’t quite Pet Sounds, it undoubtedly had some stunning moments on there, notably ‘All I Wanna Do’ and ‘Cool Cool Water’. So if that batch of music was anything to go by, we will be in for quite a treat.
