The one singer Brian Wilson couldn’t look in the eye: “It was a little tense”
Being in the same room as Brian Wilson during the 1960s would have been enough to make anyone a better musician.
He wasn’t the kind to teach everyone how music should sound, but when looking at the way that he approached every one of his songs, it all felt like second nature whenever he made a new record or came up with that one melody that twisted how everyone thought about pop music. That’s not an easy thing to do all the time, but when Wilson had his own issues later on in his career, he felt that there were some producers who were too difficult for him to understand.
Granted, anyone who was ever in the same room with Wilson would have probably felt like a third wheel whenever they got behind the board. This is the same person who wrote Pet Sounds, for God’s sake, and even if, when you look at the questionable track record that he had after that, the fact that he could write an arrangement good enough to break anyone’s heart in the time that it takes most of us to make a half-decent sandwich is the reason why he’s compared to Mozart all the time.
He wanted the chance to make the best music that he could, but by the 1980s, that had been kept at bay for way too long. Thanks to “love and care” or therapist and all-around asshole Eugene Landy, Wilson had already grown into a shell of himself, even when making albums like Love You. He needed some time to get his bearings again, but when working on his first-ever solo album, the idea of getting someone like Jeff Lynne in the studio didn’t sound like the worst idea in the world.
Electric Light Orchestra had already been considered the clearest successor to The Beatles, and since Wilson saw himself in competition with The Beatles throughout his career, this was the perfect way to get back into his classic period. Everything seemed to be working out fine, and Lynne was ready to work with Wilson on anything, but even when he was talking about the direction that the song ‘Let It Shine’ could go in, the former Beach Boy felt uncomfortable about not being able to look Lynne in the eye.
The fact that he wore shades at night was strange enough, but Wilson felt that the shades ended up being a major sticking point for him, saying, “It was a little tense. He tends to wear shades at night. He wears shades all the time. I think they’re prescription. So I got into the habit of looking at him but not his eyes.” But for Lynne, that might have been one of the few times where those shades were practical.
Anyone would have been a little bit intimidated telling Wilson what to do, and despite the Beach Boy being one of the most humble men in the music industry, it was bound to be a little bit difficult trying to figure out what he wanted out of any particular song whenever they first got down to business. But the shades did tend to follow Lynne around all the way to his induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
Even when Dhani Harrison was on hand to induct the band on behalf of his father, he made a few jabs at Lynne’s appearance whenever he showed up at his old man’s house, saying, “I could tell that a lot of my dad’s friends were from outer space, including Jeff. Their eyes are far more sensitive to Earth’s bright sun than normal humans, so they required special lenses to protect them during the day and most of the night.”
It might have been odd for Wilson when working with Lynne, but he didn’t mean him or the rock world any harm. He was simply a rock and roll alien in many respects, and it was up to him to find those little spaces in between the cracks of every single mix to turn a simple pop song into one of the greatest symphonies that the planet had ever heard.
