A few weeks ago as 2023 reached the home straight, a forty year anniversary passed by without much of a murmur in the wider world, although it was one that resonated with me.
For probably four or five year leading up to 28 December 1983, I had become something of a Beach Boys obsessive, playing 20 Golden Greats on repeat on our little old record player until it was all but worn out.
I clearly remember the murder of John Lennon in 1980, although my seven year old brain may not have fully computed its significance, but the tragic death of Dennis Wilson just three years later really did leave a mark. At ten I was old enough to understand that the drummer of that great band I loved, was no longer with us. What I wouldn't have been able to comprehend at that time, was just what a turbulent life he had led.
So here, to mark forty years since his passing, we remember the life of Dennis Carl Wilson.
Surf's Up:
Dennis Wilson was born on 4 December 1944 in Hawthorne, California, a southwestern suburb of Los Angeles, the middle of the three famous Wilson brothers, with older brother Brian and younger sibling Carl. He was the self described black sheep of the family, once allegedly crying out, "I'm the duck who was born with two chickens."
His restless and roguish nature that earned him the Dennis the Menace nickname belied a more troubled home life. Family patriarch Murry Wilson was well known for his brutal parenting techniques, with Dennis often bearing the brunt of it. He would recall in 1976, "He used to wail on us, physically beat the crap out of us. I don't know kids who got it like we did."
While Brian got into the music, Dennis was all about the girls, cars and sport! He would sing at times, but was not really into it like the other two, although the three of them would often sing together at night in their shared bedroom. Brian remembered, "We developed a little blend which aided us when we started to get into the Beach Boys stuff."
Dennis did start to learn the piano aged fourteen, mostly trying out with the boogie woogie type tunes. In 1960, he started to get lessons on the drums while at Hawthorne High School. By 1961, The Beach Boys was a thing, with Dennis seemingly a member because his mother made the others include him.
It was famously Dennis that was the only Beach Boy who could actually surf. He could be found at Haggerty's, a popular surf spot in South LA County, riding with Eddie Bertrand of Eddie and the Showmen, a rival of local musical favourite, Dick Dale. Carl commented on the difference between the band. "Dennis was the only one who could really surf. We all tried, even Brian, but we were terrible. We just wanted to have a good time and play music."
And it was Dennis who pushed Brian towards using his fledgling song writing skills to pen songs about surf, as it would tap into the phenomenon that was taking the west coast by storm. Their debut record, Surfin', got some airplay and gave them a local hit.
The Beach Boys: Surfin' - here (audio only)
Over the next few years, The Beach Boys would reach international stardom with hits like Surfin' USA, I Get Around and Fun Fun Fun. As the success started, so did the trouble for Dennis. He was not very good with money, being "a little too generous", ending up with an apartment and not much else after the early years of fame.
He was devastated when Brian announced in January 1965 that he would no longer go on tour with the band. It was said that he was a little jealous of all the adulation that Dennis would get on stage, while they ignored the man who had written all the hits. Dennis made it quite clear what Brian's place was - "Brian Wilson is The Beach Boys. He is the band. We're his f***ing messengers. His is all of it, Period. We're nothing. He's everything."
As the 60s went on, Dennis's position in the band became more interesting. On the one hand, Brian started to give him a bit more freedom to write and produce some songs, whilst on the other hand, they started using session drummers more often for the records. This seemed to be something that Dennis was generally okay with, and he retained his position as the touring drummer.
On The Beach Boys Today! in March 1965, Dennis was given the lead on hit Do You Wanna Dance? (which reached #12 in the US) and In The Back Of My Mind. Music journalist Peter Doggett says of the latter song, "[it] showed for the first time an awareness that his voice could be a blunt emotional instrument.... [it had] an urgency that his more precise brothers could never have matched."
The Beach Boys: Do You Wanna Dance? here (tv show recording with new audio)
The Beach Boys: In The Back Of My Mind - here (audio only)
Marriage and Pet Sounds:
July 1965 also saw Dennis wed Carole Freeman, with whom he had a daughter, Jennifer, as well as taking her son Scott from a previous relationship. The marriage would last until 1968.
By 1966, LSD use was becoming an issue, and he would end up contributing very little to the bands most well known record, Pet Sounds. In fact, the only song featuring him on drums is That's Not Me. Brian by now was favouring session player Hal Blaine for most of the work, as he was more reliable than Dennis.
He started to take both songwriting and piano playing more seriously, and in 1968, his song Little Bird was issued as the B-Side of Friends, and Be Still was also included on the Friends album. 1969s 20/20 saw Dennis produce his own songs, Be With Me, All I Want To Do and Never Learn Not To Love. Celebrate The News was the B-Side of non-album single Breakaway, which was a TopTen in the UK that same year.
The Beach Boys: Celebrate The News - here (audio only)
This period saw generally poor sales for the band, as they struggled to cope with the waning interest in the surf pop idyll of their early years. Dennis would rant that, "Because of the attitude of a few mental dinosaurs intent on exploiting our initial success, Brian's huge talent has never been fully appreciated in America and the potential of the group has been stifled." He was basically saying that, unlike The Beatles, they had not been allowed to evolve as a band and move in the creative directions they might have wanted to.
This attitude had been apparent when the band were recording for what should have been Smile, the follow up to Pet Sounds. Many, including some of the band themselves, wanted Brian to persist with surf, cars and girls and stay away from the more experimental stuff. Dennis stuck by him, saying of the work they were doing - "It's so good it makes Pet Sounds stink!"
The connection between the two brothers seemed to be getting stronger. "As Brian's music became more complex and intricate, so did Dennis' drumming on stage. By now, Dennis was no longer playing drums on the records [not 100% true], but it's as if he was translating, in live performance, the shifts and moods that Brian was laying on the music world by sibling telepathy." (All About Jazz)
Dennis and the Killer!
On 6 April 1968, while driving through Malibu, Dennis picked up two hitchhikers, Patricia Krenwinkel and Ella Jo Bailey. On the 11th, he picked the same pair and ended up taking them back to his house, He discovered they were followers of Charles Manson, just out of prison after a twelve year stint, who they saw as a guru.
He went off to a recording session, and when he returned he found that his house had been overtaken by around a dozen or so followers, and the man himself greeting him in the driveway. After chatting, the two men became friends, something Wilson would long regret.
Dennis would house several of Manson's followers over the coming months, spending an awful lot of money on them. He also started writing music with Manson and Terry Melcher, noted for his work producing The Byrds. The Manson 'family' got stranger, smashing up Wilson's Mercedes and Ferrari. As he got more unnerved, Wilson tried to distance himself from them, even leaving his own house to get away from them. They were eventually evicted, but not before they had stolen pretty much all of his possessions.
It is a little unclear what, if anything, Wilson knew about the Manson family's killing spree (at least nine dead across the summer of 69), there is a belief that he knew at least something, but was terrified to go to the authorities. One story says that Manson left Wilson a bullet with a threatening message that "every time you look at it, I want you to think how nice it is your kids are still safe."
Biographer Mark Dillon comments that, "Some attribute [his] subsequent spiral of self-destructing behaviour - particularly his drug intake - to these fears and feelings of guilt for ever having introduced this evil wizard into the Hollywood scene."
Sunflower and the 70s:
The 1970s dawned with The Beach Boys sixteenth studio album, Sunflower, which contained quite a few tunes from Dennis. There was Slip On Through, Got To Know The Woman, It's About Time (co-written with Carl and Al Jardine) and the single Forever, which some consider to be Dennis' finest work. Written with his friend Gregg Jakobson, Brian was moved to remark that it was "the most harmonically beautiful thing I've ever heard. It's a rock and roll prayer."
The Beach Boys: Forever - here (audio only)
Following his divorce from Carole two years earlier, 1970 was also the year for his second marriage, this time to Barbara Charren, with whom he would have sons Michael and Carl.
Dennis also did some writing with Daryl Dragon, one of their touring musicians, and recorded Sound Of Free, which was put out in Europe under the name Dennis Wilson and Rumbo. It featured Lady as its B-Side, which was an outtake from the Sunflower recording sessions.
An injury to his hand in June 1971 was so bad, that Dennis was unable to play drums again until 1974, meaning that Ricky Fataar had to step in to fill his shoes. He found himself reduced to playing a little keyboard and doing his backing vocals, when they played live. This proved frustrating, as Jon Stebbins notes. "It hurt him deeply. He felt like a caged animal. His drinking became worse and his participation in the band became erratic."
Pacific Ocean Blue:
After solo sessions held in dribs and drabs over many years, by 1977 Dennis Wilson had a mass of songs ready to record. He signed a two album solo deal with Caribou Records and the result was Pacific Ocean Blue. It was an album that was generally well received, but commercially a bit of a flop, only hitting 96 on the US chart. A modest west coast had been planned, but had to be cancelled when the record company withdrew support.
Wilson himself at the time thought the album had "no substance" - but he did later remember that "when my record was finished, Brian the first to hear it. In the middle of some tracks he'd say "I can't stand this" and walk out of the room. Sometimes he'd laugh. Sometimes he'd cry. I guess he was thinking that he'd seen me grow up as a musician."
Dennis Wilson: Pacific Ocean Blues - here (audio only)
In subsequent years it has become something of a cult classic. If you haven't heard it if worth checking out - it has a distinct 70s west coast feel, with bits of the boogie woogie he loved as a youngster and some more funky elements, with piano and horns to the fore. Thom Jurek, writing in AllMusic, says that the album, "reveals a songwriter who was looking to stretch out on his own and engage a vision of music that stood far outside what the Beach Boys were capable of handling or executing... Pacific Ocean Blue is a moody view of the SoCal landscape, and of Wilson's own interior life - or his struggle to have one."
Dennis Wilson: Rainbows - here (audio only)
Meanwhile, ABC in Australia refer to it as "the record the band [Beach Boys] should have made in the 1970s but could never quite deliver."
The following year, Wilson started work on his second record, to be called Bambu. He was working with Beach Boys touring keyboard player Carli Munoz, but the record was never quite finished as the sessions ended through lack of money, and also the issues he was having with drug and alcohol abuse. It would eventually see the light of day in 2008, when it was added to the re-issue of Pacific Ocean Blue.
The final years:
The second half of the 70s started to see things get even more tumultuous. His marriage to Charren had ended in 1974 - he then married, twice, Karen Lamm, who had previously been married to Robert Lamm of Chicago. They were married in 1976, divorced in 1977, re-married in 1978 and divorced again in 1980!
Before that last one was even officially over, Wilson had taken up with Christine McVie of Fleetwood Mac. A turbulent three year relationship swooped on a rollercoaster of love and smashing things up, all under a fairly constant haze of narcotics. She remembered what he was like - "Half of him was like a little boy and the other half was insane."
He was being consumed by alcohol, cocaine and heroin. He had issues with his speaking voice and was pretty much unable to sing at times. He often forgot how to play the drums and as a result of all this, his attendance at band events was erratic.
In 1981, Brian's girlfriend of the time, accused Dennis of encouraging him to buy $15,000 worth of cocaine. Brian's bodyguard, Ricky Pamplin, and a young cousin, Stan Love, found out and assaulted Dennis.
Things were starting to come to a head. The band forced Brian back into rehab with the dreaded Eugene Landy, and Dennis was told that he was next. Finally, in September 1983, he was told to check into rehab or be banned from playing live with the band. He became homeless and led a nomadic existence.
There were a few days spent at a clinic in Arizona, before he found himself back in California, at St John's Hospital in Santa Monica on 23 December 1983. He left there on Christmas Day, before getting into a violent altercation at the Santa Monica Bay Inn, which meant he was back in hospital getting his wounds treated. His friend Chris Clark tried to get him readmitted for rehab, but the doctor felt he was beyond help.
Dennis was out at Marina Del Ray and drinking all day on the 28th. He entered the water that afternoon, apparently to look for some of his ex-wife's possessions that had been thrown off a boat during an argument during their divorce. It is possible that he suffered a 'shallow water blackout' - but whatever happened that day, Dennis Wilson drowned.
We know Dennis would have wanted to continue in the tradition of the Beach Boys. His spirit will remain in our music. (Beach Boys statement following his death)
He left behind another wife, Shawn Marie Harris (who wasn't even born when the Beach Boys had their first hits) - they had married earlier that year, had a son called Gage who was born in 1982, and were already separated by the time of his death. She claimed to be the daughter of Beach Boys lead singer (and cousin to the Wilson brothers) Mike Love, but he always has denied that.
On 4 January 1984 Dennis Carl Wilson was buried at sea by the US Coastguard, something that was typically only reserved for Navy and Coastguard personnel (unless cremated). It required an intervention by no less than President Reagan. Brian and Carl were unhappy with the arrangements and felt he should have had a 'traditional' burial, but his widow insisted it was what he had wanted.
Life and Legacy:
Adam Webb, writing in the Guardian in 2003, said of Dennis Wilsons songs, "At his best this would sound like Kurt Cobain produced by Phil Spector."
There are reflections on how his childhood affected him in later life. "Like his older brother Brian, Dennis was bullied mercilessly by his father. His wild side masked an underside that was, by turns, brooding, self-loathing, sensitive and anxious. Dennis's music reflected this edginess and exhibited little of his happy charm, setting it apart from Brian's music."
The sleeve notes Dennis wrote for the 1964 All Summer Long album almost read like a eulogy for himself. "They say I live a fast life. Maybe I just like a fast life. I wouldn't give it up for anything in the world. It won't last forever, either. But the memories will."
Mike Love had once described Wilson as a "drugged out no talent parasite." But in actuality, it seems that Dennis was the glue that kept the Beach Boys together, as Brian's mental health spiralled out of control in the late 60s. When the band were criticised as being out of date, Dennis was the one trying to keep them relevant.
Earle Mankey was Chief Engineer at their Brother Studio during the 70s, and he recalls: "Dennis was just the nicest guy ever, the nicest Beach Boy, but he was crazy a lot of times, so that made it difficult. But with Dennis there wasn't any subterfuge in what he did. It was always - here's what I have inside and I'm going to give it to the world."
"Dennis died without knowing his true worth, without his talents being recognised by others and without anyone beside him to hold his hand. He died before he could tell his story and seek help. He died trying to live the best way he could." (Pubali Dasgupta - Far Out, 2020)
Here are the Beach Boys in their prime, on the Ed Sullivan Show in 1964.
And here they are the same year on the TAMI show.