Wild Honey (1967)

Wild Honey is the thirteenth studio album by the American rock band the Beach Boys, released on December 18, 1967, by Capitol Records. Recorded between September and November, it was the group's first foray into soul music, influenced by the R&B of Motown and Stax Records, and their second album to credit production collectively to the band. It continued the lo-fi style of Smiley Smile.

Following the recording of an attempted live album (Lei'd in Hawaii), the Beach Boys had been inspired to regroup as a self-contained rock band, partly in response to critical assertions that they were "ball-less choir boys", and purposely distanced themselves from prevailing rock trends. Brian Wilson ceded some of his role in the production to Carl Wilson, a trend that continued on subsequent records. Mike Love also returned as Brian's main songwriting collaborator for the first time since Summer Days (And Summer Nights!!) in 1965. Wild Honey became the band's worst-selling album at that point, charting at number 24 in the U.S. Lead single "Wild Honey" peaked at number 31, while its follow-up "Darlin'" reached number 19. Most critics dismissed or declined to review the album. In the UK, it peaked at number seven.

In later years, a greater appreciation formed around the album's simplicity and charm; it has been credited with presaging a back-to-basics approach adopted by contemporaries including Bob Dylan and the Beatles, and with pioneering the DIY pop genre. In 1979, the track "Here Comes the Night" was redone by the group as a disco single. In 2020, Wild Honey was ranked number 410 on Rolling Stone's list of the “500 Greatest Albums of All Time”. A remixed and expanded edition, titled 1967 – Sunshine Tomorrow, was released in 2017 and contained the album's first stereo mix.

Background

The Beach Boys' previous LP Smiley Smile, released in September 1967, peaked at number 41 on US Billboard charts for what was their worst performing album to date. A controversy involving whether the band was to be taken as a serious rock group had critics and fans divided, as journalist Gene Sculatti wrote at the time, "the California sextet is simultaneously hailed as genius incarnate and derided as the archetypical pop music copouts." The unfinished album that Smiley Smile came to replace, Smile, had acquired considerable press, and Capitol Records was still interested in putting the album out. In July 1967, an internal memo circulated around Capitol Records that discussed imminent plans to follow up Smiley Smile with a 10-track version of the original Smile, but this never came to fruition.

Instead, the group traveled to Honolulu and attempted to record a live album, titled Lei'd in Hawaii. There, Wilson intimated to a reporter that he enjoyed the contemporary "pop scene" and acknowledged that, even though "the Beach Boys are squares", he did not feel personally hurt by such a reputation, citing the band's past successes and the enjoyment they get from recording. However, Carl Wilson later said that Wild Honey was partly conceived as a response to criticisms against the band for "sounding like choir boys". He recalled, "there was one review that said Brian actually sounded like Mickey Mouse. That really tore him up." Upon their return to Los Angeles, in September, the group decided that the recordings were not suitable for release and attempted to redo the project as a live-in-the-studio album. After this, the band recorded the material that formed Wild Honey.

Meanwhile, two days after the release of Smiley Smile, Carl had produced some recordings for the songwriter Stephen Kalinich, who later became a collaborator for the group, and the songwriter's partner Mark Buckingham. All of the tracks remain unreleased. In October, Murry Wilson, the band's original manager, made his recording debut with the album The Many Moods of Murry Wilson, with one track composed by Al Jardine and produced by an uncredited Brian.

Style and production

Wild Honey is a soul album that mixes pop and R&B styles. According to Mike Love, the band made a conscious decision to be "completely out of the mainstream for what was going on at that time, which was all hard rock/psychedelic music. [The album] just didn't have anything to do with what was going on." Brian said, "we decided to make a rhythm'n'blues record. We consciously made a simpler album. It was just a little R'n'B and soul. It certainly wasn't like a regular Beach Boys record." It was recorded mostly at the band's private studio—located in Brian's home—and may be retrospectively viewed as the second installment in a consecutive series of lo-fi Beach Boys albums. The recording sessions lasted only several weeks, compared to the several months required for their 1966 hit "Good Vibrations". Musicologist Christian Matijas-Mecca noted that "while the album's sparse production aesthetics and stripped-down sonic palette are deceiving, the album is arranged with an attention to detail and tonal clarity."