Catch a wave and you’re sittin’ on top of the world

That’s one thing that’s been lost in the rewriting of sixties history, the optimism. We had hope, we believed we could conquer, we believed life was not limited, and the goal was to go to California, ride the waves and hook up with a surfer girl or surfer boy.

Hard to believe, I know. But this was back before the internet, when the west coast was a dream which you could not experience unless you went there, a magical place where TV and movies were made, our entire nation was inspired by the Golden State.

I know, I know, the rest of the country likes to rag on California these days. About rents, pollution, taxes… But the truth is living there is still pretty damn good, but unlike the Okies most residents of our nation cannot afford to leave their domicile to reinvent themselves on the coast, so they denigrate it.

But it still rules.

And the magic was made by the Beach Boys. They were the soundtrack, along with the east coast Four Seasons until the Beatles broke, until the British Invasion. But unlike Frankie Valli and the rest of the early sixties groups, the heyday of the Beach Boys was not behind them. The apotheosis came in ’66, with not only “Pet Sounds” but Brian Wilson’s pocket symphony, “Good Vibrations.” The Beatles were inspired by this work, and for a long while there, the Beach Boys were at the pinnacle of popular music, and Mike Love has never forgotten it.

Everybody hates Mike Love. The self-assuredness, the right wing views… But when you see him live you get it. HE BELIEVES HIS LEGEND! Why do we give Ringo and Paul a pass but not Mike? Because he’s not gracious about it? John Lennon was rarely gracious.

And unlike his cousin Brian, Mike Love still sounds like himself, he can hit the notes, albeit with less power.

So you’d attend this show and expect a battle of the bands, between Brian and Mike and their respective camps, but that’s not what it was like at all. Mike continuously showed pictures and made reference to the Wilson brothers.

And there you’ve got it. Brian Wilson’s show is a tribute to Brian Wilson and Mike Love’s show is a tribute to the music.

Now Brian is a genius. But everyone knows, especially insiders, he has issues. He’s not an everyday guy, even though he still seems able to channel his skill into magical music, listen to the 2012 Beach Boys reunion LP “That’s Why God Made The Radio,” there’s some masterful work there.

But after the 50th anniversary tour, Mike said he was going on without Brian, doing Beach Boys hits. And Brian’s camp was not happy. But when you reach your seventies, it’s about money and attention, and everybody wants it, especially Mike, who’s angry he never got enough credit for writing so many of the Beach Boys’ lyrics. Performers are complicated people, you cannot see them through the eyes of the hoi polloi, the hoi polloi didn’t write and record these songs.

And the show opened with “Do It Again,” the band’s last real hit until the Brian-less “Kokomo” two decades later.

But the irony of opening with this 1969 hit was lost on the assembled multitude, the ancient wealthy at the Vilar Performing Arts Center in Beaver Creek, Colorado. You’ve got to pay to see the Beach Boys up close, triple digits in this case, and therefore hard core fans are excluded. But the set list was for those in the know.

Jeff Foskett told me Mike writes a new one every night, the show changes, and usually it goes two and a half hours, as opposed to last night’s limited two hour show.

Ergo, “Catch A Wave,” which Jan & Dean rewrote as “Sidewalk Surfin’.” To hear this magical album track made my night, a flood of memories came back, from the era where I knew every cut on the LP, which I purchased, and sat in front of the record player in my room with the album cover in hand fantasizing how great my life would be if we could only move to California.

And “Little Honda.” The hit version was done by the Hondells, but Brian and Mike wrote it.

First gear, it’s all right
Second gear, lean right

Not only were we singing along, Felice and I were leaning in direction. This show was a jet back to what once was. Not exactly nostalgia, just recognition that we’re on the losing end of the hourglass and some of those times in the past were truly special.

And unlike Brian’s set list, Mike and his troupe played all of the surf and car hits. Come on, “409”?

Does any millennial even know what that is? Will anybody in the future? Back when the goal of high school students was to save up enough money to buy a car.

And “Shut Down.” And then “Why Do Fools Fall In Love” from “Shut Down Volume 2”! Come on, you’ve got to applaud these deep album cuts.

How about “Be True To Your School” from “Little Deuce Coupe”? We’re long gone from high school, but we remember it like yesterday.

Of course they played the hits. Everything from “Wouldn’t It Be Nice” to “I Get Around” to “Help Me Rhonda” to the aforementioned “Good Vibrations.” You could not complain there was something you did not hear. And so many hits… No wonder Mike Love feels so good about himself.

Not that Mike sang all the songs. He gave tribute to Dennis and then his son Christian sang “Do You Wanna Dance.” Brian’s songs were sung by Foskett or lead guitarist extraordinaire Scott Totten.

As for Bruce Johnston…

He did not sing “Disney Girls (1957),” never mind “Tears In The Morning,” but he told Felice he composed “I Write The Songs” as a reaction to radio stations banning “God Only Knows” because of the use of the deity’s name. Foskett and I implored Bruce to come on Sirius XM or do a podcast and tell his stories, but Bruce said everybody knew everything already, and he needed to get paid. But that’s a musician, everyone thinks music should be free, they’re always asked to play for nothing, it takes balls to say you want to get paid. Then again, I wanted to hear more about growing up on La Mesa in Santa Monica with a father who was a bigwig at Rexall. Where we come from…it’s everything.

And Mike even played some of his solo stuff and got away with it!

Because of the video screen. He wrote a song for George Harrison and accompanying its performance was video of the Beach Boys’ and Beatles’ visit to India. Whew! I’d never seen this before, I don’t think anyone has, what a trip back to the past.

And the secret sauce was said video screen. With images from the era. The girls and the boys, the hot rods and the good times. That was then…

And this is now.

The youth are not united, never mind the country at large. But fifty-odd years ago, especially before the Vietnam War ramped up…

We wished they all could be California Girls.

In case you missed the memo, and unless you’re addicted to entertainment industry news you probably did, Netflix just announced its movie “Bird Box” was viewed by 45 million accounts and pundits can’t stop questioning the figure, the methodology, the meaning…

But it’s very clear, distribution is king.

I posit most people were unaware of “Bird Box” until they saw it on their Netflix account, or heard about it from friends. There was not the scorched earth publicity campaign employed by movie studios to make you aware of a film you most likely do not want to see. But you’re paying for Netflix, and since you log in on a regular basis, you saw “Bird Box” was available.

So…

Not only is advertising not a factor, reviews aren’t either.

This is a sea change in the entertainment promotional complex. You must spend widely to make people aware, for a weekend, to overpay for your production. But what if people have already paid and you just need to induce them to view, or not. Actually, Netflix doesn’t care whether you watch “Bird Box” or not, just that you don’t cancel your subscription!

Once again, we see the paradigm shift from one time events to subscriptions. Oldsters still can’t get over this in music, they want to own, but once the industry shifted to streaming, revenue went up!

Counterintuitive only to those stuck in the past. Not only is Spotify good for creators, so is Netflix, with its deep pool of cash and its free spending ways. Sure, the streaming company is overspending now, just like every Silicon Valley, tech enterprise. You invest, you lose, and then you own the market and you’re profitable, can you say Amazon?

And actors just want to work. Used to be declasse to work on television, no longer.

And others above the line like the freedom. There are not the endless studio suits questioning every move.

And the audience likes the availability of new material on a regular basis, scarcity is history, just as it is in the music business. That may be overwhelming, that may be confusing, but it’s the path to the future, even if the NYT tech reporter gave them crap for it.

So welcome to the new world. Where it’s not only superhero movies at the theatre you don’t want to see, but a cornucopia of streaming product, even though “Bird Box” is a genre pic.

And who wants to go to the theatre anyway? With chomping, texting patrons who feel entitled to their behavior because they paid so much.

And you can have a fifty plus inch screen with surround sound for bupkes at home, with no interruptions.

But the oldsters cannot fathom this. Entrenched players cannot fathom this.

But online you compete for dominance. You do this by spending. Good luck Disney and HBO now controlled by AT&T, there’s a first-mover advantage. And the truth is content may be important, but distribution rules. The low monthly Netflix fee is a better offer than the theatre.

Movies killed vaudeville. TV killed movies, just check attendance figures. And now Netflix is killing not only network television, but putting a stake in the heart of theatrical distribution.

Money talks. Sandra Bullock likes the check and subscribers like the value proposition.

What’s not to like oldsters and scribes?

Who ARE those guys?

We were deep into Blue Sky Basin, his mother and Felice had skied down to Tea Cup, Wyatt said he was tired, but Don convinced him to take a ride on Pete’s Express to ski Grand Review.

Actually, that’s flat in Wyatt’s world. Although only nine, he was begging to ski Highline, Vail’s signature bump run, he raved about skiing Dragon’s Teeth, with its EX warning, the only slopes he said he had not been down were the Frontside Chutes, because they’re rarely open.

Not that Wyatt was always this good. His parents invested in lessons to bring him up to speed with his peers. Learning on your own is so tough, I learned to ski via classes, I’m still using the skills I learned in summer ski camp.

But I didn’t start until I was ten.

So we’re riding Pete’s and it’s cold. The safety bar is down, that’s something they teach youngsters that oldsters ignore. And when we got off the lift, Don told Wyatt to lead the way, to show me his turns, but Wyatt protested that Don wasn’t ready.

Don’s a snowboarder. I made Wyatt promise he would never become one. They’re famous for sitting in the snow and strapping into their gear. And rolling their eyes when they come to flats. And my biggest complaint is that they can’t see behind them, and get agitated when you tell them you’re on their blind side. Furthermore, snowboarders are mostly Gen-X’ers, as in old, and attitude is a bit long in the tooth for these guys.

But I was afraid Wyatt wouldn’t know which way to go. So I said I’d lead until we hit the fork.

And when we did, Wyatt complained he didn’t know which way to go. You see Grand Review is laden with trees, the path is not obvious.

Now I don’t have any kids, never had the inkling until back in 1990, when I was riding the lift with my nephew Andrew at Snow Summit. We were only about six feet off the ground, but he was excited. The same way when he got mini-air over mini-bumps. Seeing the sport through his eyes inspired me.

But I was not inspired to get out early today, because it was in the single digits. Believe me, I’ll get out there, in any temperature, but the colder it is, the longer I linger, waiting for it to warm up.

But Don texted and said it was tolerable. So I suited up and rode the gondola to find not only Don and Jenny, but Wyatt in his orange Spyder suit. With his Salomon skis and his Rossi boots. I’d asked him the night before the brand of the skis he had, but he didn’t know. Oldsters are into equipment, it appears youngsters are not.

And just as we were getting to the Back Bowls, Don informed me Wyatt had to eat.

This didn’t make sense to me, we’d only been out there for an hour, I’d given him most of my Balance Bar… But it appears young kids don’t suck it up, they need to be fed on time.

This is after Wyatt and I rode up Chair 14 with a young girl and her father. The father, a banker from San Diego, was voluble and thrilled we were both there with youngsters. But Wyatt couldn’t get over the fact that Claire was meek and short and was in the fifth grade when he was only in third! He kept mentioning it during the day. Kids have their own social hierarchy, actually, thinking back, it’s worse than that of adults.

So after we stopped at Two Elk to pee and feed Wyatt pizza and chips, we ventured to China Bowl, and then Siberia. And then we convinced Felice to go to Blue Sky, which is not easy.

Ultimately, the group broke up, Felice and Jenny back to Two Elk and us guys up Pete’s to Grand Review. But it turned out the women didn’t stop in Two Elk, when we got there at 2:45 they were nowhere to be found. Still, Wyatt needed the break, to warm his feet. I told him my dogs felt the same way too. This is when he also informed me, as we were drinking hot chocolate, that those slices of pizza earlier were just a snack, on a normal day he’d eat TWO pizzas! But this was not a normal day, we were skiing 20,000 vertical feet.

So with Wyatt flummoxed at the top of Grand Review, I decided to lead.

Now like I said, it’s inundated with trees, you make your own route. And it’s just long enough to be too long for most people, everybody stops. But not me. Then again, should I? To give “tired” Wyatt a break?

And what route should I take? Should I be worried about skiing between tight trees? Would I be responsible if he hit one, they’re very unforgiving, usually you die, would his parents ever forgive me, would I ever get over it?

Then again, I didn’t tell Wyatt to follow me.

And I threw in more turns than usual. And I crossed the slope a bit. Figuring if Wyatt was following me, I’d give him a fighting chance.

But when I didn’t stop and I was cruising quickly, I figured there was no way he’d be behind me. I didn’t look, because that’s a route to disaster, skiing demands total focus, or you fall.

But I’m zipping by everybody else on the slope. The snow is good, but there are some firm spots. And my feet are frozen but I’m digging it, I don’t want to sacrifice, that’s one of the reasons I didn’t have kids to begin with. I didn’t want to stop and wait, I was enjoying testing the limits.

And when I got to the catwalk, which Wyatt refers to as “Flat Jacks,” I stopped, exhaled and…

Wyatt was right there behind me.

We went with the Strasburgs to the Swiss Chalet. Remember that SNL skit with Garrett Morris, SEND US YOUR FONDUE FORKS!? Well, at the Swiss Chalet they’re still using them, and to be honest I haven’t eaten that much in a year, I mean can you say no to chocolate fondue?

And at first we covered Wyatt’s story. How Greta is torturing him, how he’s involved in this Odyssey Project, where he and his buddies are competing to build a mobile vehicle in eight minutes that will fit in two suitcases. Wyatt is nine. Don said he looked bored, so we asked him questions. Funny with little kids, you alternately tease them and ask them sincere questions. Does he have a girlfriend? What books is he reading?

And Don and I talked the obligatory music business, it’s so different talking to a promoter as opposed to a label person, it’s all about whether you can sell tickets or not.

And then we talked about revolution.

Last night Don was with a seventy year old who spoke of music’s leading role in the youthquake of the sixties. The question is, can it happen again?

First is the threshold question, do you want a revolution?

I do. I’m willing to sacrifice, I want change, the end of income inequality, opportunity for all. But I know many don’t agree with me. On both the left and the right. Unlike in my formative years, wealth is no longer inherited, it’s made. And people worked really damn hard to make it, and they have contempt for those who did not. This is a gigantic problem. Along with the fact that no one involved in the 2008 Wall Street crash went to jail. They jailed the bankers in Iceland and the country rebounded. Here, the aftermath of the crash lingers on.

And then there are the people who like things the way they are. I’m confounded. I remember when skiing was a middle class sport. But a lift ticket at Vail this week is $209, and I got on the lift with a class of youngsters all decked out in Bogner and Moncler, and as Jenny said about Wyatt, they outgrow this stuff in a year. But most people have never flown private, they’ve got no idea how the rich really live.

So I ask you once again, do you want a revolution?

You could lose out. What comes first, your job or what’s right?

But assuming you want a revolution, what is the trigger?

Don said it would be like Kent State, some trigger-happy person shooting David Hogg and some other anti-gun protesters.

I’m not sure that would do it, horrible, of course, but would there be a national uproar?

I thought it would be when they got rid of abortion, but it’s nearly impossible to get an abortion in certain states today and there’s been no conflagration, so I don’t think that will be it. Which begs the question, can anything trigger a revolution in America?

Don talked about the environment. But we’ve had hurricanes and fires, and still there’s been no revolution.

And in the sixties, everybody under twenty five was a Democrat, and that’s no longer true.

And all males were afraid of getting their ass shot off in Vietnam, there is no draft today.

Then again we had leaders.

We’ve got no leaders today.

We’ve got brands, that’s the goal of seemingly all youngsters, to capitalize on their “talent” and fame to make money. As for saying no, I never hear that word, no one leaves money on the table.

Then I thought of the Arab Spring, how an overeducated fruit vendor reached his limit, was willing to sacrifice. Is that how it’s gonna happen here?

And then we get back to leaders. You literally put a target on your back, Abraham, Martin and John were shot. Are you willing to risk death?

And if you raise your head above, believe me you get feedback, hate mail, you become an instant pariah. I know, I experience it every day, I’m gonna get it in response to this diatribe. People don’t want you to speak your truth, especially if it’s not theirs. Everybody wants you to stay in your own lane, but this is not how history works.

Martin Luther King was a preacher, but he became a civil rights leader. And fifty years later despite his lionization, there’s still hatred, states that won’t make his birthday a holiday.

Everybody’s trying to pull you down into the hole they’re in.

That’s a paraphrase of a line in Bob Dylan’s “It’s Alright Ma (I’m Only Bleeding).” Dylan got so frustrated, watch “Don’t Look Back,” that he removed himself from the dialogue.

Then again, the leaders of the sixties revolution were middle class, educated. Whereas today the middle class is shrinking, and everybody’s worried about economics, whether they can eat and have a roof over their head. You could have a minimum wage job and make it back then, now you can’t.

And there are a lot of issues. Shouldn’t health care be a right? The newspapers are debating whether outsiders should get into Harvard. Those in the upper class who’ve sent their kids to private schools don’t want this. So is it class warfare or ideological warfare or…

And Don said the revolution won’t come from pop music.

And I agree. And I also don’t know if the revolution can come from music at all, it’s not the sixties with the advent of the Beatles and the addiction to radio. But even more it’s values, doing what is right is less important than doing what will fatten your wallet.

And I can’t say that we came to any conclusions. Turns out we all want change, we’re all up for revolution, but we could not figure out what the hot button issue would be and who would trigger it.

And maybe we’re too far gone. Have you been reading about that book “How Democracies Die”? We’re on the road to destruction, first and foremost the leader minimizes the media, labels it untrustworthy and demands faith in himself, only he knows what’s right. And no matter what Trump does my inbox fills up with people who says he’s right and I just don’t get it. They employ expletives, they use racial and scatological epithets. They want to shut me down.

But the issue is bigger than Trump.

It’s bigger than immigration.

Or as Rodney King once said, “Can’t we just get along?”

It appears not.

Is change a-comin’?

You tell me.