Throbbing Wilsons -The Beach Boys and Electronic Music

Besides the obvious songwriting, harmonies and studio work, the Beach Boy's influence stops there. But one underrated factor in their history are the brief flirtations with electronic music. I'm not talking about Steve Levine's 1985 self titled album for the Boys or 1989's Still Cruisin'. Electronic music was everywhere then!

Oh Steve Desper, the sound engineer who worked with them for a little bit! Let's look at the drums in "Do It Again." It has this muffled electronic beat throughout the entire song.
According to Desper on how the sound was created, "[He] moved four of the Philips PB heads very close together so that one drum strike was repeated four times about 10 milliseconds apart, and blended it with the original to give the effect you hear."

To me the one of the best production moments comes on 1970's "All I Wanna Do." Another one by Desper, this sonic masterpiece invented both Shoegaze and Chillwave respectively 20-40 years prior! The intro appears to have a very altered Fender Rhodes playing with a echoed out as fuck guitar line. The research is hard to find on this track but bear in mind, this is the most hip BB song of all time. 






Steve Desper mixed an early version of Brian's "'Til I Die." It has a very quiet electronic drum in there. Listen for it!

How about Dennis? In 1970 he released a single under the name Dennis and Rumbo (aka Daryl Dragon aka the Captain). This song "Lady" has a very weird drum machine beat that I can't seem to find out how it was produced. Clearly not of its time! The drum machine sounds a bit like the Cocteau Twins would use it. Obviously because both Shoegazers Lush and the Vaseline's Eugene Kelly have covered it.

Another cool Dennis track is "Steamboat" from 1973's Holland. It has this very cool bass pedal sound and percussion effects. With the song being about a steamboat as well, this is very proto-
industrial.

Other notable electronic moments: The steady bass/bass pedal in "Cabinessence." Though not electronic the sound sums up the heavy bass sound in modern electronic music. The Beach Boys Love You released in 1977 has Brian's synth noodles all over it!