As I have written many times before, The Beach Boys are my favorite band. This live version of their classic street racing tale “Shut Down” is super good because it appears they are actually performing the song rather than lip synching to a pumped in track. What cracks me up is that these guys are singing about fuel injected Corvettes and Max Wedge Dodges to a room of screaming teenage girls! After the girls yelp ealy in the song you can see Brian Wilson look at the other guys a laugh at about the 20-second mark.

The band has certainly had their ups and downs which have been well documented over the years. Brian Wilson’s spiral into addiction and mental issues, Dennis Wilson’s travails down the same path (including a friendship with Charlie Manson…before he started killing people), the fighting between the other members of the group and the bizarre and rocky relationship that the Wilson boys had with their father (which probably spawned many  of their problems later in life) all contributed to the band’s rise and fall. The living members of the band went on tour last year and I saw them twice. Both shows were fantastic and of the quality I had hoped they would be. Those harmonies and Wilson’s awesome compositions have help up for 50 years and will hold up for 500 more. Just listen to this “simple” car song and pay attention to all the wild musical stuff that is happening. It is great.

PRESS PLAY BELOW TO HEAR THE BEACH BOYS PERFORM SHUT DOWN LIVE IN 1964 –