That's Why God Made the Radio

That's Why God Made the Radio
Studio album by the Beach Boys
Released	June 5, 2012 (2012-06-05)
Recorded	ca. 2005 (Daybreak Over the Ocean), May 2011–March 2012[1][2]
Studio	Ocean Way, Hollywood
Genre	Soft rock[3]
Length	38:53
Label	Capitol
Producer	Brian Wilson (except "Daybreak Over the Ocean", Paul Fauerso)
The Beach Boys chronology
The Smile Sessions (2011) That's Why God Made the Radio (2012) Fifty Big Ones (2012)
Singles from That's Why God Made the Radio
"That's Why God Made the Radio" Released: April 25, 2012 "Isn't It Time" Released: September 28, 2012

That's Why God Made the Radio is the twenty-ninth and final studio album by American

Preceded by the single "That's Why God Made the Radio", the album reached number 3 on the Billboard 200 and was their highest charting studio album of new material since 1965, placing them second all-time with longest span of top 10 albums at 49 years.^[5]

Background

Jim Peterik has said that the album's title came from a comment made by Brian in response to Peterik's description of an AM radio broadcast filtering through a car's oval speaker.^[6]

According to

In the late 2000s, reports began to circulate that the surviving members of the Beach Boys would reunite for a 50th Anniversary tour and album. Despite some uncertainty[8] and initial denials,^[9] on December 16, 2011, it was announced that Brian Wilson, Mike Love, Al Jardine, Bruce Johnston and David Marks would reunite for a new album and The Beach Boys 50th Anniversary Reunion Tour.^[10] The studio reunion was kicked off by a remake of the band's 1968 single, "Do It Again", recorded earlier that May. The next day, the group recorded the album's opening track, "Think About the Days".^[11]

Composition

Wilson and Love discussed the upcoming album and tour in an interview on February 16, 2012. The duo said the album was halfway done with Wilson doing most of the writing and stating that all of the songs will flow into each other. Wilson considers the title track, "That's Why God Made the Radio", to be one of the group's best.^[12] The album ends with a Pet Sounds- and Smile-inspired suite. The suite, originally six tracks and dubbed the "Life Suite",^{[citation needed]} ended up to be the final four tracks on the album: "Strange World", "From There to Back Again", "Pacific Coast Highway", and "Summer's Gone."^[13] One song, "I'd Go Anywhere", was left off as it was unfinished, along with a couple of other tracks.^[13] Thomas described the making:

He really wanted to do like a kind of reflection of California from the standpoint of a, you know, a guy who’s almost 70 years old. So it’s driving down Pacific Coast Highway and thinking about his life in retrospect. So this suite was a series of maybe one or two minute vignettes that he had like 15 of them that he would start and never finish. When I put them together on ProTools, it was eerie to me that they all fit together. It was like, wow. This song was written a year before the song that followed it, but yet they fit completely perfectly: modulation, key move, the whole thing. Then Brian started assembling these little bits and I kind of dreamed… I was 10 years old when Smile was recorded, but I kind of dreamed that was how that happened. I have no special authority to tell you that’s how it did. It just seemed like all these little pieces became like this theme, and instead of being Americana or whatever Smile was, it was his drive down Pacific Coast Highway.^[7]

Many of the songs were written in collaboration with Thomas, whose input sometimes included entire chord progressions.^[7] Classified as baroque pop,^[14] many of the songs have a considerable history: "That's Why God Made the Radio" was written by Brian Wilson, Jim Peterik, Joe Thomas and Larry Millas back in the late 1990s,^[13] and that "about 80 hours worth" of demo tapes were sourced from that period.^[15] "Spring Vacation" originated during Your Imagination and contained new lyrics by Love written reportedly in five minutes.^[7] The track "Summer's Gone" was originally meant to be the final song on the final Beach Boys album, and according to Thomas, the album's original title was Summer's Gone with the intention that it would be the final Beach Boys album. It was changed when Wilson decided he would like to record a follow-up.^[7] The song was written in reflection of his mother's death and the end of Carl's life, who died two months after their mother.^[13] Whereas songs like "From There to Back Again", "Isn't It Time", "Beaches in Mind", "Shelter" and "The Private Life of Bill and Sue" were written for the new album.^[7] During the band's June 15, 2012 show, a slight revision of "Isn't It Time" was performed, with some lyrics altered and a different vocal arrangement for the song's bridge. These revisions later appeared on the song's single release.^[15] The song "Daybreak Over the Ocean" was originally recorded in 1978 by Mike Love for his first, as yet unreleased solo album, First Love (and also re-recorded for his equally unreleased solo album of a few years ago, Mike Love Not War a.k.a. Unleash The Love: this is the version — with additional Beach Boys vocals — that appears on the album).^{[citation needed]}

Thomas describes the two sides of the album as the "dark side" and the "sunny side", and also believed that it was important for a Beach Boys album to have a sunny side, catering to both "hardcore Brian Wilson fans" and "Beach Boys fans".^[7] For the album, Wilson is credited as the sole producer, a first for the group since 1977's Love You, while Love is credited as executive producer, and Thomas for "recording". Thomas explains his and Wilson's roles in production:

Brian is still, as you would imagine, the taskmaster in terms of what people play. He’s in charge of those sessions. ... He arranges all the vocals and produces the record. I record it because I think he really likes the fact that technically… you gotta kind of keep up on all the techniques that are available to us right now and that’s kind of what my role is. He’s not going to tell me to use an

U-67. He trusts me in that way. But he’s the producer in absolutely every way. I couldn’t even begin to think that anybody could produce Brian Wilson. It would be like how can anybody direct Richard Burton, you know?^[7]

28 songs were written and recorded for the album.[16] Al Jardine stated that Carl Wilson's voice would be featured on the new album. Jardine said he had a song Carl had sung on and recorded and it would be used on the new album, with the name of the song being "Waves of Love".^[17] Jardine said he only wished there was a way to include Dennis Wilson as well.^[13] However, while pre-recorded segments from both Carl and Dennis Wilson are featured during concerts on the band's 50th Anniversary Tour, neither "Waves of Love" nor any vocals from Carl or Dennis are featured in the final version of the new album. Johnston contributed one song titled "She Believes in Love Again", a song he wrote in 1985 (and that was recorded by the band on that year's The Beach Boys); however, the song was not included on the final version of the new album. According to Johnston before its release, the album's track listing was determined by Capitol.^[18]

Release

Promotion

The first single from the album, "That's Why God Made the Radio", made its national radio debut April 25, 2012, on

Critical reception

Professional ratings

Aggregate scores
Source	Rating
Consequence of Sound	B−[26]
Digital Spy	[27]
Entertainment Weekly	B+[28]
The Guardian	[29]
Los Angeles Times	[30]
NME	6/10[31]
Paste	6.0/10[32]
Rolling Stone	[33]
Spin	6/10[34]

According to

In 2013, Mike Love said that he was disappointed with the album's direction. "I was hoping to get together with Brian on That's Why God Made the Radio, but a guy who was involved in the production of that album engineered it otherwise,"[40] Love explains, "I talked to Brian about a year before we even started doing any of the recording for [the album]. He and I talked about doing a project and he was excited about doing it, but it never came to fruition at all. It was given another direction—not by me and not by Brian but by others. We were supposed to be allowed to get together to write songs from scratch like we did in the '60s, but that was never to be."^[41]

Commercial performance

The album debuted at No. 3 in the US album charts and became the group's highest-charting album in 38 years—since 1974's compilation Endless Summer and highest-charting studio album since 1965's Summer Days (And Summer Nights!!). It also became the band's first US top 10 studio album since 1976's 15 Big Ones and the highest-debuting album of their entire career.^[42] The album made its debut in the UK charts at number 15 giving the group their highest studio album debut since 1971's Surf's Up. The album debuted at number 15 on the Canadian Albums Chart.^[43]

Track listing

Compact disc and web release

Vinyl release

Bonus tracks

Personnel

According to AllMusic and Craig Slowinski.^[25][48]

The Beach Boys

• Al Jardine – vocals; whistle (on "From There to Back Again")
• Bruce Johnston – vocals
• Mike Love – vocals
• David Marks – guitar; harmony and backing vocals (on "That's Why God Made the Radio")^[49]
• Brian Wilson – vocals

Additional musicians

(track number in parentheses)

Recording personnel

Artwork

• Lawrence Azerrad – graphic design
• Guy Webster – photography

Charts

References