The Surf Was Up

The Beach Boys are, in many ways, a strange band. To most of humanity, they will never outrun their early 60s selves, the adolescent crooners of surf and car culture, embodying the faded California Dream. The ultimate Boomer act, Mike Love with his goofball hats, waving around a tambourine. The songs are catchy, but so what? By the latter half of the 1970s, the Beach Boys had regressed into an oldies act, their number called. They would make money forever, but never be taken as seriously as they deserved to be.