Acclaim, money and love
Michael Hann on an aging rock singer's appearance at the Royal Festival Hall
If the old men of the British rock aristocracy were sentient last week, they should have been paying attention to an extraordinary event at the Royal Festival Hall in London. There they would have seen (and some of them doubtless did) the way to combine the three things aging rock singers most desire yet so rarely receive at the same time: the fawning approval of rock critics, the unbridled adoration of fans and the rapid disappearance of tickets at 50 quid a pop. Acclaim, money and love in one easily digestible pill — why, it might even be better than drugs.
The person sweeping up the plaudits was Brian Wilson, an overweight man of 59 with a singing voice that might make you cringe at a karaoke night, a history of drug abuse and mental illness, and a legend as pop's lost genius. Wilson was the songwriter and producer of the Beach Boys, who famously suffered a complete breakdown in 1967 while recording Smile, the album that was hailed before its release as the best pop record ever made. The only problem being that it was never released — never even completed, for that matter. All we know of Smile are the fragments that were issued in the late Sixties and early Seventies — the marvellous single Good Vibrations, the songs that were resuscitated as the highpoints of subsequent Beach Boys records, such as Stills Up and Heroes and Villains — and some scraps of music that were released a decade or so ago on a box set of Beach Boys recordings.
Before his breakdown, Wilson was considered to be one step ahead of the Beatles. After, it was hard enough to stay one step ahead of the nursing home. Though he continued to work, intermittently, he never again came close to recreating the coruscating beauty of the music recorded for Smile and its predecessor, Pet Sounds, which itself is routinely voted the best pop album ever made in critics' polls.
Which is where the Royal Festival Hall comes in. It is not. naturally, uncommon for minor groups (featuring one original member! And his stepson!) of a certain vintage to tour provincial arts centres, playing their hits of 35 years ago in a perfunctory manner to people seeking the Proustian rush that will enable them to relive teenage fumblings outside the Locarno. Nor is it remotely unusual for the millionaire dinosaurs of rock to wheeze into the nearest stadium every third year with a preposterous stage show designed to conceal the gaping cracks in the new album they are trying to promote.
The great achievement of Wilson's four nights at the RFH, however, was to find a new path for performers with no new songs to sing. New music from old stars is no longer a desirable commodity. Mick Jagger's recent solo album sold a magnificent 954 copies on its first day of release. David Bowie and Paul McCartney are currently without recording contracts. But these musicians think of themselves as artists, who would never dream of doing anything so vulgar as resorting to the cabaret circuit of revival shows to find an audience. They are also mind-bogglingly rich and have no financial need to do so. But still they need the critical plaudits and unyielding admiration of their fans; without that oxygen, they are just rich men in big houses.
Wilson's shows at the RFH were his attempt to redefine himself as the curator of his own art. Rather than promising either an evening of your favourite surfing songs or a night of unremittingly tedious new material, he billed the performances as part of his Pet Sounds tour. By which he means 45 minutes of each show is taken up with a complete rendition of the Pet Sounds album, uninterrupted from start to finish. The arrangements are as they were when Wilson wrote them, aged 23: no new guitar solos, no extended showcase for the keyboard player. Just the songs, as they were recorded.
By treating his old recordings with such respect — and implicitly inviting the audience to do the same — Wilson has escaped the fate of so many of his contemporaries on the 'party' circuit and reignited the interest of the highbrow rock critics, who were uniformly awestruck by the familiar, 35-year-old music they heard. Just as the 'Unplugged' trend of the 1990s allowed pop's elder statesmen a way to appear in touch with modern trends, so the full album performance allows them to appear serious.
So what should the likes of Bowie, Jagger and McCartney do? Easy: copy Wilson. Drop the ludicrous attempts at staying 'relevant'. Bowie has no more likelihood of shaping the future of rock than Chas 'n' Dave, and Jagger's desperate attempts to convince the world that his new recordings are as exciting and vital as the ones he was making in the late Sixties would be laughable were they not so cringeworthy.
But . .. imagine Jagger and the other Rolling Stones agreeing to scrap their next tour of football grounds and pencilling in, instead, a series of performances in prestigious halls — the Carnegie, maybe; the Albert Hall; an opera house or two. Ditch the new songs, ditch even the greatest hits sets and play something different. How about the double album Exile On Main Street, from start to finish? Sure, it's 30 years old, but people would be fighting for tickets to see it performed, no matter how exorbitant the price, and for the first time in a quarter of a century the Stones would have the critics on their side. What about Bowie? That's simple: if people are still talking about Ziggy Stardust, he could perform that. And maybe Hunky Dory in the second half of the show. And no one would even expect him to wear make-up and glittery catsuits anymore.
But who's got the most to gain here? Step forward Paul McCartney, and vanquish our memories of The Frog Chorus. How about Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band in concert? He's even got a march on his rivals in that the Beatles had stopped touring by the time of their landmark album, so the world has never heard it performed live, in full. Naturally, the lack of Lennon and Harrison might raise some hackles, but what's a little ruffling of feathers when you've got a reputation to rehabilitate?
But before our grizzled heroes file away their pension books and take to the road once more, just one little plea: keep this idea away from Cliff Richard, eh chaps? The world is not yet ready for Summer Holiday: the complete performance.
Michael Hann is editor of The Editor' section of the Guardian.
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