Is The Beach Boys hit ‘God Only Knows’ the greatest pop song of all time?
As The Beatles made their first, unseen steps towards world domination at the start of the 1960s, they were shadowed some 5,000 miles away by The Beach Boys. The Fab Four steeped their formative material in skiffle-infused rock ‘n’ roll. Meanwhile, The Beach Boys took heed of California’s sun-soaked coastline in becoming an early proponent of the surf rock wave.
Like most eminent pop groups of the ’60s, The Beach Boys endeavoured to drive their sound into unchartered territory, always abreast of their friendly rivals’ progress. Although many intriguing leftfield acts contributed handsomely to musical evolution, artists like The Beatles and The Beach Boys chipped away at the vanguard from a heavily pop-conscious perspective.
Having found their footing with sonorous harmonies and persuasive hooks, The Beach Boys entered the avant-pop fray in 1966 with Pet Sounds. Chiefly a product of Brian Wilson’s design, the album maintained accessibility while presenting a monumental challenge to rivals with unprecedented, complex composition and production methods.
Although the album hosted three other hit singles and plenty more worthy of the honour, ‘God Only Knows’ remains its brightest jewel. With Carl Wilson’s twee vocals taking the lead, Brian sought to blow Phil Spector out of the water with contrapuntal vocal harmonies adorning an instrumental orgy of ambiguous key.
Alongside some of its fellow Pet Sounds tracks, ‘God Only Knows’ has been studied in depth by musical theorists and musicologists, many of whom regard it a marvel of popular music. “It’s not really in any one key,” Brian Wilson reflected in Paul Zollo’s More Songwriters on Songwriting. “It’s a strange song. That’s just the way it was written. […] It’s the only song I’ve ever written that’s not in a definite key, and I’ve written hundreds of songs.”
The Oscar-winning sound engineer Eugine Gearty once commended the song’s production in a feature with IndieWire. “[Brian Wilson] was far more complex than The Beatles and mostly like [Igor] Stravinsky in orchestral music where the key changes and key centres change four or five times within a pop tune, which is unheard of,” he noted. “And ‘God Only Knows’ is one of those perfect examples of that.”
Of course, complexity isn’t everything, but it is a significant metric when calculating an objective answer to the titular question. Other objective factors include audience approval and evolutionary influence; this song and Pet Sounds as a humbling and consummate package had both in barrow-loads.
Pet Sounds famously influenced The Beatles’ experimental approach when recording their 1966 masterpiece, Revolver. Specifically, McCartney was awed by ‘God Only Knows’, which he once deemed “the greatest song ever written”. The track inspired Mccartney’s Revolver composition ‘Here, There and Everywhere’ and ten years later, Wings’ song ‘Silly Love Songs’.
McCartney isn’t alone in his adoration for the mid-1960s classic, either. On Brian Wilson’s website, Pete Townshend, the principal songwriter for The Who, described ‘God Only Knows’ as “elegant” and “stunning when it first appeared,” adding, “It still sounds perfect.” Meanwhile, U2’s Bono claimed the song’s string arrangement is “fact and proof of angels.”
So, is ‘God Only Knows’ the greatest pop song ever? Musicologists and eminent songwriters like Paul McCartney and Bono certainly make a stauch case. Naturally, subjectivity rears its ugly head in such matters, but I would argue that it easily upheld this title in 1966. Whether it’s since been usurped is an intergenerational talking point for the holiday season dinner table.
It is impossible to deny the song’s unique composition and enduring global influence, however. Like skeleton keys, songs like ‘God Only Knows’ are in short supply, but when they arrive, they can unlock almost every ear. As Bob Dylan once said: “Jesus, that ear. He should donate it to the Smithsonian. The records I used to listen to and still love, you can’t make a record that sounds that way. Brian Wilson, he made all his records with four tracks, but you couldn’t make his records if you had a hundred tracks today.”
Listen to The Beach Boys’ ‘God Only Knows’ below.
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