The Beach Boys Review

Overall 5.00 of 5 (by 1 user)

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LauraBelle
South Elgin, IL

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And We Had Fun, Fun, Fun

Classic Rock Fan, a storyteller, music lover, Beach Goer, mother of 2

Pros

Classic Music, Iconic, Everyone Having Fun

Cons

Only 2 original members

MAR

2008

If ever there was a great set-up for a story, it's this one. We went down to visit my grandfather after my grandmother passed away, and switching hotels from a dirty, disgusting one, we broke the CD/alarm clock we were using to play the lullabye CD to help my daughter fall asleep at night. All parents can understand the horror of that moment, not knowing how you'll get your 18 month old to sleep. With no other choices, we put an oldies station on the radio for her, and it worked like a charm that night. Once we got home, we continued to play the oldies, instead of getting her a new CD player.

Thus began my daughter's fascination with oldies music. She knows 'em all. The past year or so she's been borrowing her dad's Beach Boys CDs and eventually put them on her iPod. She loves the Beach Boys. I chanced upon the knowledge that this iconic band was going to be playing at the Cocoa Beach Pier on Spring Break, minutes away from my in-laws' house, and I knew we had to go. We bought tickets to see the Beach Boys on the Pier and gave them to my daughter for Christmas.

She wasn't too sure what to think at first, as only 11, she hadn't been to a concert before and wasn't sure what to expect. The closer and closer we got to the concert date, though, the more she was excited.

When I bought the tickets, I had my choice of two different seating sections on the actual beach for $69 or $99, or I could choose the general admission SRO seats for $29. Thinking I didn't really need to be that close and personal to this band, and that we mostly just wanted to hear them, I went the cheaper route. We were told we couldn't bring chairs in, but we could brings towels and blankets.

The whole pier had been closed off for this event. For these general admission seats, people were either spread out on blankets and towels, or were lining the pier itself to get a bird's eye view. The people in the condos on either side had the best seats in the house; they could see and hear from the balconies or rooftops and didn't pay a dime. Not to worry about the business at the pier, though, as they had some makeshift bars set up, and the normal bar was churning out the drinks as well. In addition, they had their restaurants open for business, and a local pizza joint was selling pies seemingly by the dozen.

A few local bands provided adequate warmup/opening duties, and the Beach Boys finally took the stage. As a person that was born in 1964, while this band was in the midst of their popularity, they are truly iconic to me, and to hear them singing the music I grew up with, and that my daughter now loves, having beach parties in the bathtub with her Barbies, was in some ways surreal. They played all their hits. Everyone sitting around us had a different favorite, and everyone got to hear theirs, from California Girls to Kokomo. A few non-Beach Boys tunes were played as well, such as California Dreamin'. They even came out for the hoped for encore and played the last few hits we still hadn't heard yet.

Only two of the original Beach Boys are a party of this incarnation of the group, Mike Love and Bruce Johnston, with no Wilsons in attendance either. I was kind of hoping the writer's strike would still be continuing by this point. Not that I'm not looking to new shows finally being on the TV, but I thought maybe if ER wasn't filming, we'd get to see John Stamos, but that wasn't the case. Either way, with just Love and Johnston, it still provided enough of a backbone to the original group.

By the end of the evening, no one was sitting anymore. The kids were all hitting a few beach balls around, and the adults were all dancing, many of us with people sitting around us that we didn't know. There is something about shared music that bonds people, and classic music that has been around for forty years is no different. They may not have sounded as good as they did forty years ago, but it really didn't matter as much as just hearing the music. It was a great concert experience for my kids, being both of their first concert (mine was Shaun Cassidy, and my husband's was Ted Nugent), and it's definitely a Christmas present my daughter will always remember.

Last edited on Mar 30, 2008