Instead of dredging up the past and reviving abandoned masterworks, Brian
Wilson embarks a new journey by returning to Capitol Records and exploring the
sunny side of Southern California on That Lucky Old Sun. Wilson
describes the album as an “interwoven series of ‘rounds’ with
interspersed spoken word” — an autobiographical glimpse of the idyllic
California that Wilson so vividly captured with the Beach Boys in the early
60s.
Originally commissioned by the Southbank Centre for its 2007 opening season,
That Lucky Old Sun was a collaborative effort, with lyrics
from band mate Scott Bennett, and the spoken word narratives written by Wilson’s
lovable partner-in-crime, Van Dyke Parks. He gathered his band together and
ended up debuted the record at London’s Royal Festival
Hall in September 2007. Like Smile before it, the buzz behind
the six sold-out shows turned the album into a classic before Wilson even stepped
into the recording studio.
The piece opens with a short take on “That Lucky Old Sun,” the
classic 1949 song written by Beasley Smith and Haven Gillespie, and covered
by Frankie Laine, Louis Armstrong, Frank Sinatra and Ray Charles, to name a
few. Doubling as a recurring theme, the tune gets a pretty lush arrangement,
thick with Beach Boys-like harmonies. Segueing into “Morning Beat,”
Wilson skips and jumps through the lyrics, painting pictures of Los Angeles,
before falling into the first of the spoken-word narratives, “Room With
A View.”
At times, the narrations are like a colorful geography lessons, albeit read
with a certain stiffness — yet, the ambitious musical interludes are infectious
enough to maintain the momentum. “Forever She’ll Be My Surfer Girl”
is a simple ode, strong enough in its projection to make it irresistibly powerful.
With a talented cast of musicians, singers, and whatnot, the arrangements are
consistently full and realized. The celebratory spunk of “California Role”
is just as dramatic and sweeping as the introspection of “Oxygen To The
Brain” and “Midnight’s Another Day.”
To end on its intended high note, That Lucky Old Sun recasts
the California dream Brian Wilson wrote so eloquently about in the early 60s
as a savior of the soul, as well as affirmation of his life coming full circle.
The earnest, upbeat “Going Home” is a little too much on the nose.
It’s “Southern California” that properly sums up the man’s
views on the paradise he helped put on the map nearly a half-century ago. Despite
rapid changes altering the sunny disposition and radiance of Southern California,
it apparently remains a main source of true inspiration for Brian Wilson.
~ Shawn Perry
