Ruin Your Memorial Day Weekend: Let's Listen to The Beach Boys' 'Summer In Paradise'

The insufferable Mike Love takes over the controls on this miserable 1992 record.

May 26, 2023

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This past week, The Beach Boys1 released a Steve Aoki remix of their 1964 smash hit, “Fun, Fun, Fun,” which may sound like a headscratcher of a move. To me, though, it’s just another horrible example of a Mike Love Idea™ that’s searching for ways to make a band that has been around for over six decades appeal to “the kids.” In his team’s playbook, there’s no one fitter for the task than your estranged frat cousin’s favorite cake-slinging Benihana heir DJ.

“Good Vibrations?” Not around here.

Last month, I was making my rounds around the record stores in Albuquerque while working on some stuff for the label when I stumbled upon one that I haven’t been to called WE BUY MUSIC. While the store lacks creativity in its namesake, it excels in quantity of product. I love a crisp, organized record store as much as anyone, but when there are endless cardboard boxes of shit everywhere, you know you’re bound to find some nuggets.

While digging through piles of random CDs, there it was: Summer in Paradise, the absolute Beach Boys bomb from 1992. As a Beach Boys completist, I felt like Indiana Jones looking at the Chachapoyan Fertility Idol. Summer in Paradise is one I’ve been looking for for years, but I wanted to find it in the wild.

The most grating product ever produced by one of rock’s most grating personalities, Mike Love, the album notoriously only sold a rumored one thousand copies upon its release (I’ve read ten thousand copies a few times, which makes more sense). Because of this, it can go for a stupid amount of money these days. On Discogs, the US CD version has copies listed for $50. If you’re a vinyl-or-nothing person, prepare to pony up, as the South Korean pressing (the only vinyl pressing) has sold for $1,550 on the site, with a median sales price of $630.

I happily paid $6 and thanked the store owner for allowing me to bask in this triumph. “Haven’t gotten to that one,” he told me. “Absolutely no need to,” I replied.

Coming back to this idea of Mike Love constantly trying to come up with new ways to get “the kids” into The Beach Boys, things were no different in the early nineties. The band may have had a resurgence and a late-career hit thanks to “Kokomo” and the Cocktail soundtrack, but things were a mess with Love leading the way. Dennis Wilson was dead after drowning in Marina del Rey in 1983. Brian Wilson was still confronting mental health issues while in the toxic, abusive grip of Dr. Eugene Landy. Brian was somewhat involved in the band’s 1985 self-titled record and released his solo debut in 1988, which is by far the best work to come out of this era. Worst of all, The Beach Boys showed up at the Tanner household for multiple episodes of Full House to trade one-liners with the Olsen twins.

Have mercy.

At this time, the hottest television show was The Simpsons, and “Do the Bartman,” a novelty song capitalizing on hip-hop’s commercial breakout, was all over MTV. So what did Mike Love do? That’s right, offer a new song, “Summer of Love,” as a duet with Bart Simpson. The Simpsons producers wisely turned it down, and the song was recycled for Baywatch. This thing is more cringe-worthy than anything Larry David has concocted. Take a look:

It’s not the first time Mike Love’s Beach Boys tried to get in on the hip-hop game (that would be on “Wipeout” with Fat Boys in 1987), but with Love’s nasally chatter as a centerpiece and not a whiff of flow in sight, it’s an actual disaster. When I showed this video to my forgiving wife, her only comment was, “I love that they filmed this during June Gloom,2 and all of the women are wearing swimsuits while these guys are wearing warm jackets. What a buncha assholes.”

It’s tough to consider Summer in Paradise a Beach Boys record. Brian Wilson is nowhere to be found, except for his cameo in the “Summer of Love” video and some writing credits for the album’s butchered version of “Surfin’." Bruce Johnston is the vocal lead on the impotent “Slow Summer Dancin’ (One Summer Night),” while Al Jardine was in and out of the band, showing up on Johnston’s song, as well as an absolutely dreadful cover of “Remember (Walking in the Sand),” which dumps all over the classic version by the Shangri-La’s.

Carl Wilson, bless him, the brother that cared the most about The Beach Boys and led them through decades of turbulence after Brian stepped back, sings on most of the album’s tracks, but, sadly, this is the last record we’d hear him with the band before his passing in 1998. To wash the bad taste out of your mouth, consider listening to his final recorded work on Tom Petty’s “Hung Up and Overdue,” a gorgeous b-side from the Wildflowers sessions.

Mostly, though, Summer in Paradise is a true Mike Love-certified turd. Digging into the album’s liner notes, Love says:

“The Summer of ‘91 found Terry and I literally walking in the sand on Martha’s Vineyard, discussing ideas that would ultimately result in creating this album. Seeing all the people on the beach taking full advantage of the sun, sand, and surf, we couldn’t help but observe that this was truly ‘Summer in Paradise.’ We then set out to design an album that would be the quintessential soundtrack of summer, and we recorded over the past year on the Pacific Coast at Carmel.”

Name-dropping Martha’s Vineyard and Carmel is classic snobbish Mike Love and reminds me of his episode of Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous (trigger warning: if you don’t want to see a hatless and shirtless Mike Love, don’t click that link). Elsewhere in the credits, he thanks Monterey County Bank, Cypress Inn in Carmel, and The Beach Plum Inn on Martha’s Vineyard. I’m sure it was a pleasure having you, Mike.

The totally 90s insert with incredible art from Robert Lyn Nelson

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The “Terry” mentioned above is Terry Melcher, who made a name for himself by producing The Byrd’s first two records with Mr. Tambourine Man and Turn! Turn! Turn!. Melcher worked with many legendary bands over the years (including some tambourine work on Pet Sounds), but co-writing “Kokomo” solidified his late eighties and early nineties songwriting relationship with Love.

On top of receiving songwriting credits for six of the twelve terrible tunes on Summer in Paradise, Melcher also produced the record, which is notable because the album was one of the first to be recorded and mixed in a beta version of Pro Tools. This digital audio workstation software still dominates the industry. Melcher’s production approach has often been described as “sterile,” and it doesn't get much more aseptic than the programmed drums and bass found on most of Summer in Paradise.

The record’s only single is a neutered take on Sly & The Family Stone’s classic, “Hot Fun in the Summertime.” Yes, four of the songs on this baby have “summer” in the title. Need a change of subject? On top of the updated version of “Surfin’,” there’s also “Still Surfin’.”

Regarding “Summer of Love” and this version of “Surfin’” that could be used by a Bond villain as a form of torture, Love has this to say in the liner notes:

“We wondered what The Beach Boys’ first song would sound like, had we started out in the 90’s instead of the 60’s. The result was the new version of ‘Surfin’.’ It really is incredible to hear your first song recorded in a new musical context 30 years later. ‘Summer of Love,’ in a mid-60’s Beach Boys style, is light and fun-totally for the young.”

Yeah, in 1992, the kids listening to Alice In Chains’ Dirt and Dr. Dre’s The Chronic totally viiibed with this, Mike.

The most offensive song on Summer in Paradise is thanks to John Stamos, who had been playing in The Beach Boys’ live band since the mid-eighties. The band supposedly brought him onboard after watching women run after him backstage (aye yai yai), and he became a fixture of their resurgence while appearing in the “Kokomo” video. What better way to capitalize on this than have him cover one of Dennis Wilson’s most beloved songs in “Forever?” I guess the thinking, or lack thereof, was that Dennis was the drummer, and now Stamos is the drummer, so let’s have him sing Denny’s old songs. As a Dennis Wilson fan, I can’t make it past the first verse of sterilized excrement.

Summer in Paradise and its predecessor, Still Cruisin’, are the only Beach Boys albums never to receive a reissue, and you won’t find them on any streaming services, which is probably for the best. The album packaging and contents are advertised as a recyclable Eco Pak, which is perfect because it belongs in a trash bin.

It’s both incredible and astonishing that the same band that crafted the forward-thinking and hugely influential Pet Sounds also released this rubbish that already sounded outdated upon its release. The Beach Boys may try to erase it from history, but listen to Summer in Paradise via YouTube if you dare. Preferably with a second potent cocktail.

Enjoy the holiday weekend!

Want to listen to some much better Beach Boys records?

Whatever that means in 2023. Sure, everyone got together for that lame Grammy solute to the band a few weeks ago, but if you buy a ticket to see The Beach Boys these days, you’re getting the Mike Love Show sans Brian Wilson and Al Jardine.

For the uninitiated, May Gray and June Gloom are a “special” time of year in Los Angeles when the weather is often overcast while waiting for summer to kick in.