Thursday March 1 to Sunday March 4, 1979
Radio City Music Hall, New York, NY
As 1979 began, the Beach Boys were finishing up the LA (Light Album) with Bruce Johnston producing. The album is chiefly remembered for the inclusion, at the behest of Bruce, of an eleven-minute remake of Brian’s 1967 Wild Honey tune “Here Comes the Night,” set to a disco beat. Bruce’s friend Curt Becher had suggested to him that the song would be perfect for a disco remake. Bruce was excited by the idea of a Beach Boys disco -single. He told a reporter “It’s the best time to do it. Because it’s out there, it’s happening. I keep telling the guys it’s like a costume to wear for one number if we were doing a show.” The rest of the group seemed less sure. Carl commented, “We’re not going disco… one of the cuts on the album is a disco cut. It was Bruce’s idea to do it.” Dennis was characteristically blunter, telling Music World and Record Digest, “I hate it. I never did like it. Certain lines I like…certain disco songs I like…but that one is dead. It has the most boring drumming… thump…thump…thump.” Despite their mixed feelings, the group premiered the song at Radio City with red disco lights flashing above the all white stage. Audience members booed. Ken Emerson of The New York Times declared it an “out and out failure.” Mike Love commented that the detractors “Were probably some hard core Beach Boys fans who’d like us to play nothing but ‘Barbara Ann’ and ‘Surfin’ USA.” His defense, however, seemed half hearted, considering that he apologized to the audience before playing the song. Beach Boys fans were not disco enthusiasts. The song was so badly received that it was gone from the set by April (though it briefly returned in May.)
The venue was unusual for the group, with an orchestra pit separating performers from the audience. Carl was slightly put off by it. He told Time Barrier Express, “I can’t really see the audience too well…I’m used to being able to have eye to eye contact…I prefer being right with the audience. I love that.” The set list for the March 3 concert was printed in the fanzine Add Some Music and consisted of “California Girls,” “Darlin’,” “Do It Again,” “In My Room,” “Caroline, No,” “Good Timin’,” “God Only Knows,” “Be True to Your School,” “Catch a Wave,” “It’s OK,” “Sloop John B,” “Rock and Roll Music,” “Lady Lynda,” “Sumahama,” “Surfer Girl,” “Heroes and Villains,” “I Write the Songs,” “Here Comes the Night,” “Help Me Rhonda,” “Wouldn’t It Be Nice,” “I Get Around,” “Surfin’ USA,” “You Are So Beautiful,” “Good Vibrations,” “Barbara Ann” and “Fun, Fun, Fun.” It is also known that “Disney Girls” and “Angel Come Home” were performed on March 2.
Performing with the group were Ed Carter on bass, Bobby Figueroa on drums, Phil Shenale on Oberheim synthesizer, Sterling Smith on piano, Carli Munoz on organ and newcomer Mike Meros on clavinette and synthesizer. Meros had played on “Here Comes the Night” and was sitting in to teach the song to the band. Meros recalled, “I was blown away. Truth is, I wasn’t that familiar with all their stuff. So I sat in my room and wrote down all the charts. We got out on stage, and it’s Radio City, right? And I put the charts under my feet, and the crowd is cheering, and I’m looking down at my feet the whole night.” Meros got the gig due to his association with Bruce, who was back permanently with the group. Bobby Figueroa recalled, “I was happy to have Bruce there. He’s a very talented guy. Also, he was very good at mediating between the guys and making suggestions and finding compromise. I noticed that he was kind of a peacekeeper a little bit at first.”
Dressed in a jogging suit, Brian appeared on the first night (he skipped the rest of the engagement), though after the opening number he headed backstage, occasionally peeking out from behind a curtain. Ken Emerson of the New York Times reported, “The other Beach Boys added an element of suspense to the evening by continually trying to coax Mr. Wilson back out. Finally he reappeared and picked inaudibly at the keys like a sulky child at his dinner while one or another of the group or its entourage sat beside him on the piano bench and cheered him on.’ Dennis played all four nights but was drunk on at least two of them and seemed bent on creating controversy, sporting a t-shirt that said, “Pity about Mike Love” at one show. Mike downplayed the problems with his cousin. He told Record World, “Dennis and I are the most obviously competitive in the group. Brian’s passive, Carl is kind of a moderator, Al is very straight, while Dennis is the rebel and I am the eccentric. We get on each other’s nerves sometimes…but it’s not a big thing. We’re both just very volatile.”
Aside from the now common inter-group issues, the band appeared tight and rehearsed. However, Richard Forlenza of NY Rocker, who attended on Friday, noted, “The band seemed constricted, as if the slightest bit of spontaneity would send the whole structure tumbling. Only Dennis could be counted on for an occasional surprise, holding up the show so he could change his shoes, placing a Heineken bottle on the grand piano when the pianist began the Bach intro to ‘Lady Lynda,’ walking offstage for the performance of the discofied ‘Here Comes the Night.’ I sensed that Dennis is perhaps not all that happy with everything the band does, but his solid 4/4 drumming and spirited vocal on ‘Angel Come Home’ were the highlights of the show for me.”
Friday April 20, 1979
Market Square Arena, Indianapolis, IN-with Ian Matthews (8:00 PM Show)
The group toured with Ian Matthews, a former member of Fairport Convention who had a hit with “Shake It.” Musicians on this trip were Ed Carter, Carli Munoz, Phil Shenale, Charles Lloyd, Sterling Smith and Bobby Figueroa. Although the tour was ostensibly to promote LA (Light Album), the group played only four songs from it and “Here Comes the Night” was conspicuously absent. Toledo Blade columnist Jim Yavorcik reported that Bruce “loved the cut but now feels it was a mistake to include it on the LA (Light Album) because people just cannot accept the Beach Boys doing disco.” The single tanked on the charts as did the LP.
CBS had been subsidizing their tours, but as sound mixer Tom Murphy recalled, “When ‘Here Comes the Night’ and the album weren’t selling well that’s when the record company stopped giving tour support and there were cutbacks. They started cutting members of the band and eventually they got down to cutting me.” In fact, Murphy was one of the first people to go. When he flew to Indianapolis, Carl Wilson and Jerry Schilling asked him to take a walk. “I remember we were walking across the huge basketball arena in Indianapolis, Carl, Jerry and I. Carl was not speaking. Jerry did all the speaking for him. Jerry said, ‘Tom, we’d like you to help us here. We have to do layoffs and we have to cut expenses and we’d appreciate if you would not go to Dennis about us laying you off so that the tour can continue and Dennis doesn’t go nuts. So would you mind just leaving and not seeing Dennis first.’ What was funny to me was that Carl wasn’t talking he was just standing there. So I said to Carl ‘Is that your wish Carl?’ Carl sort of nodded and Jerry said, “yes that is Carl’s wish too.’ So I said ‘Ok’ and Jerry and I flew back to LA on a plane together…I could have argued with them, but I was burned out anyway.”
15,000 people turned out in Indianapolis. Zach Dunkin of the Indianapolis News reported, “Last night’s 28 song show opened the group’s tour and like most tour openers it had its bugs…Three of the best done tunes were songs from the current LA (Light Album)-Love’s ‘Sumahama,’ Jardine’s ‘Lady Lynda’ and Carl’s ‘Good Timin.’ A rare misfire was ‘Shortenin’ Bread,’ a song that was rehearsed heavily yesterday. It was supposed to be one of those sing-a-long jobs, but the crowd never quite got into it.” The photo was taken on March 25 when the BBs performed at an Easter Seals telethon in Los Angeles, emceed by actor Jack Klugman.
Saturday April 21, 1979
Riverfront Coliseum, Cincinnati, OH-with Ian Matthews (8:00 PM Show)
James Chute of the Cincinnati Post noted that the Beach Boys did not play Here Comes the Night and “the songs they did play from LA Light simply sounded like the sixties Beach Boys hits with a touch more slickness. So, the musical question becomes, how well did they recreate the ageless Beach Boys sound? The answer ranges from extremely well to occasional mass-confusion…With Bruce Johnston onstage playing keyboards and occasional guitars…the band has seemingly rekindled the desire to perform. It was technical problems with the sound system and occasional timing lapses in the show …, that marred last night’s performance. When the sound system was functioning properly, the Beach Boys and their six-piece band sounded vintage.” The set list at this show consisted of: “California Girls,” “Sloop John B,” “Darlin’,” “Good Timin’,” “Do It Again,” “Little Deuce Coupe,” “In My Room,” “God Only Knows,” “Shortening’ Bread,” “Be True To Your School,” “Catch a Wave,” “It’s OK,” “Lady Lynda,” “Sumahama,” “Surfer Girl,” “Angel Come Home,” “Heroes and Villains,” “Help Me Rhonda,” “Wouldn’t It Be Nice,” “Rock and Roll Music,” “I Get Around,” “Surfin’ USA,” “You Are So Beautiful,” “Good Vibrations,” “Barbara Ann,” and “Fun, Fun, Fun.”
In regard to the sound problems, Philip Shenale, playing his last tour with the band, noted, “They didn’t know what they were supposed to demand from the monitors. In 1971 I saw Alvin Lee stop his show for ten minutes till the monitor guy got his shit together…The Beach Boys never did that. I mean in the late 70s a lot of guys would say excuse me I can’t hear myself, but the Beach Boys thought it was still 1970. Unless you were a technological guy…you would never know (how it could sound) …Brian could have been up on that, but he was in his thing. In my monitoring system I heard all the keyboards and the instruments, but the backing vocals were really not there. I was in my late twenties, and I didn’t know what to ask for myself. But what about (stage manager) Jason Raphalian? No road managers took responsibility for what needed to be done. I worked with Tori Amos for the last twenty years. John Witherspoon was one of the few guys that was a great road manager, and he is her manager now. In retrospect, the guys who supported the Beach Boys were totally not up to the job. There was no unity in the Beach Boys, so they didn’t get the best person for the job.”
Sunday April 22, 1979
Centennial Hall, University of Toledo, Toledo, OH-with Ian Matthews (7:00 PM Show)
This concert attracted a capacity crowd, so hell bent on having a good time they ignored feedback, bad sound mixing, missed cues on songs and dysfunctional behavior. Jim Yavorcik of the Toledo Blade reported, “Dennis Wilson seemed disorientated as he pranced about the stage, forcing Brian and keyboard man Bruce Johnston away from their pianos at one point…He also had a few problems with his only lead vocal of the night, forgetting the words to ‘Angel Come Home.’ But Dennis returned to his drums for some inspired playing and finished the show quite strong.”
Dennis had been a heavy drinker and drug user for years and by 1979, as engineer Tom Murphy recalled, “Drugs and alcohol were his life and music had become his secondary hobby.” Many insiders felt that the problem was that he had few outlets for all his pent up energy. He had largely abandoned recording sessions for his second album Bambu when the Beach Boys sold their studio to Tom Scott. Sterling Smith recalled, “That was the real decline of Dennis. Because when Dennis came back (from the road) instead of harnessing his drug confused but nevertheless very creative talent to some positive degree, Dennis had nowhere to go so he ended up just being the partying guy.” He began missing occasional shows and was often not in a condition to play anyways, though his animal magnetism was so great that audiences forgave all. The photo was taken at the taping of the Midnight Special TV show in March.
Monday April 23,1979
Southern Illinois University, Carbondale, IL-with Ian Matthews, (8:00 PM Show
The April tour was enlivened by the presence of Fleetwood Mac’s Lyndsey Buckingham and Christine McVie, who’d begun dating Dennis in the fall of 1978. Phil Shenale commented, “I loved Christine McVie-she’s the best! She could drink any man under the table. And still, she’d be a laugh. That’s who Dennis would hang out with-Christine and Lyndsey.” However, Sterling Smith recalled, “Dennis…had stayed up all night in a partying mode and he missed the whole show. I think that was the first time that had happened in the whole time I had been there. And we thought, ‘Wow, this is not a good sign.’” Dennis was also absent the next night in Murfreesboro. Unfortunately, such absences became common in the next few years as Dennis slid further into alcoholism.
Colin Gibson of the Southern Illinoisan noted, “As the Beach Boys showed Monday night at SIU Arena in Carbondale, they do pretty much the same thing they’ve been doing for the last 18 years. It was an old favorite, Help Me Rhonda, that brought the near-capacity crowd to its feet halfway through the show…but their disco experiment Here Comes the Night was well received too. …The group did play some songs that were not likely to be heard at a Beach Boys Concert, like Shortening Bread and Lady Lynda, which was based on a Bach composition…(Brian) Wilson played piano, sat out a few songs and sang one, Sloop John B…His brother, drummer Dennis Wilson, did not appear at all.”
Tuesday April 24, 1979
Murphy Center, Middle Tennessee State University, Murfreesboro, TN-with Ian Matthews, (8:00 PM Show)
The Beach Boys returned to MTSU for the first time since 1967. Dennis was again absent but Roy Orbison came backstage to rehash old times with the group about their 1964 tour of Australia and New Zealand. The Midlander Yearbook noted, “The almost immortal Beach Boys, minus their popular drummer Dennis Wilson, played their way into the hearts and ears of a record crowd in Murphy center…The Beach Boys were easily able to transcend the barrier of another generation’s pop music to listenable, danceable, and pleasurable songs…Overall the Beach Boys and MTSU worked well together, despite a distorted sound system that sometimes caused problems and distracted from the whole concert.”
Wednesday April 25, 1979
Roanoke Civic Center, Roanoke, VA-with Ian Matthews
Despite dismal weather outside the civic center, Chris Gladden of the Roanoke Times wrote that the Beach Boys created sunshine inside with ‘an exhilarating concert… California Girls opened the concert followed by a stunning Sloop John B…Love then introduced Shortening Bread… Though the Beach Boys later work is impressive, they seem to know which way the wind blows …and provide a mix heavily weighted toward old hits. Lady Lynda, Good Timin, a slightly disco Here Comes the Night and Sumahama…are recent tunes they offered the crowd that demonstrate that the Beach Boys are not content to rest on their past record. And Carl sang a lovely God Only Knows …It was a poignant tune as was In My Room, an introspective tune that was given added meaning by a subdued Brian at the piano who at one time in his past withdrew into a drug induced mist.” The photo is another image from the Midnight Special TV Taping in March. Bobby Figueroa and Phil Shenale can be glimpsed in the backing band.
Thursday April 26, 1979
Carolina Coliseum, Columbia, SC-with Ian Matthews (8:00 PM Show)
Friday April 27, 1979
Stokely Athletics Center, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN-with Ian Matthews (8:00 PM Show)
A capacity crowd turned out at UT. Monica Langley of the Daily Beacon declared the group, “nothing short of outstanding,” but couldn’t help acknowledging the dysfunctional behavior that was now commonplace at a Beach Boys show. Langley reported, “Dennis Wilson, the drummer, acted crazy as he jumped onto the piano, danced on his chair, laid down on the stage while kicking his feet in the air and spilled his beer all across the stage. On the other hand, Brian Wilson, the oldest of the brothers, was so nonchalant that he contributed little to the concert’s success. Wearing green sweat pants and a windbreaker, he played the piano and walked across the stage twice rather routinely with his arms in the air."
Saturday April 28, 1979
Rupp Arena, Lexington, KY-with Ian Matthews (8:00 PM Show)
Christine McVie and Lindsey Buckingham sang a few songs with the band at this show. The photo by Ed Roach shows McVie with the band.
Sunday April 29, 1979
Greensboro Coliseum, Greensboro, NC-with Ian Matthews (8:00 PM Show)
Blair Pethel of the Greensboro Daily News raved that the Beach Boys “drained every last bit of energy from the audience” of 8000 fans. She noted that Mike “was a great showman. He danced, clapped, battered back and forth with the audience and generally got everyone who was still sitting standing.”
Monday April 30, 1979
Capitol Centre, Largo, MD-with Ian Matthews (8:00 PM Show)
For the last show of the tour, Christine McVie again joined the band, singing harmony on the encores of “Good Vibrations,” “Barbara Ann,” and “Fun, Fun, Fun.” Geoffrey Himes of the Washington Post commented that the concert “was a sharp contrast to sloppy, halfhearted local concerts of recent years. The vocals were strong and the arrangements were executed precisely.”
Friday May 11, 1979
Broome County Veteran’s Memorial Arena, Binghamton, NY-with Ian Matthews
Perhaps hoping to drum up enthusiasm for the fading LA (Light Album), the band played five-songs from it on this east coast tour. Even “Here Comes the Night,” excised from the set soon after Radio City, was back (though it was gone by May 15). Due to financial constraints, the backing band was now a stripped down group consisting of Carli Munoz on organ, Ed Carter on bass and guitar and Bobby Figueroa on extra percussion. Mike Meros took over keyboards. Bobby Figueroa had nothing but praise for him. “He was unsung in my mind. He was a great player, great guy, and a real fun dude. He had his quirks like all of us do but he took his job quite seriously and did it quite well." The opening show in Binghamton attracted 6000 fans.
Saturday May 12, 1979
Civic Arena, Pittsburgh, PA-with Ian Matthews
Sunday May 13, 1979
Community War Memorial, Rochester, NY-with Ian Matthews (8:00 PM Show)
A crowd of 10,000 people turned out in Rochester. Jack Garner of the Democrat and Chronicle opined, “The new material included five songs from the Light Album. Their new single ‘Good Timin’, the disco cut ‘Here Comes the Night’, Jardine’s ballad on a Bach melody, Lady Lynda, Brian Wilson’s cutesy rock version of ‘Shortenin’ Bread’, and Mike Love’s oriental influenced ‘Sumahama.’ The disco cut seemed more tightly controlled in concert, and brought home the unusual and difficult vocal arrangements of the tune."
Monday May 14, 1979
Nassau Coliseum, Uniondale, NY-with Ian Matthews (8:00 PM Show)
A good quality tape of this concert and the following night in Springfield survives. Dennis was in good form for this often-erratic period in his career, as was the rest of the group.
Tuesday May 15, 1979
Civic Center, Springfield, MA (8:00 PM Show)
The set for this show consisted of: “California Girls,” “Sloop John B,” “Darlin,” “Shortenin’ Bread,” “Do It Again,” “Little Deuce Coupe,” “Roller Skating Child,” “Peggy Sue,” “In My Room,” “God Only Knows,” “Good Timin’,” “Be True To Your School,” “It’s OK,” “Catch a Wave,” “Lady Lynda,” “Sumahama,” “Surfer Girl,” “Angel Come Home,” “Heroes and Villains,” “Help Me Rhonda,” “Wouldn’t It Be Nice,” “Rock and Roll Music,” “I Get Around,” “Surfin’ USA,” “You Are So Beautiful,” “Good Vibrations,” “Barbara Ann,” and “Fun, Fun, Fun."
Wednesday May 16, 1979
Memorial Auditorium, Buffalo, NY-with Ironhorse (8:00 PM Show)
Randy Bachman’s new group Ironhorse opened a number of shows on this tour. Carl hit it off with Bachman and ended up getting together with him to do some writing. Carl told a reporter, “We went to a ranch to write some songs. We had two days, and we cranked up 5 tunes." The songs would appear on the Beach Boys next album Keepin’ the Summer Alive. The photo shows the BBs at a signing that took place at the Record Theater prior to the concert. Dennis did not attend the event.
Thursday May 17, 1979
Community War Memorial Arena, Syracuse, NY-with Ironhorse (8:00 PM Show)
Michael Kern of the Syracuse Post Standard noted that the show "could have taken place in 1975 or 1970 or 1965-which is just fine with Beach Boys devotees. Very little has changed as far as the group's live performances go. Mike Love is still a ringleader extraordinaire, Carl Wilson's vocals are still as sweet as ever, and brother Dennis Wilson remains the group's enfant terrible... Best of the new material was "Angel Come Home," in spite of Dennis Wilson's mumbled, raspy vocals (a la Joe Cocker)."
