Speaker 1: Double Elvis. Blood on the Tracks is a production of
Speaker 1: I Heart Radio and Double Elvis. Brian Wilson was a
Speaker 1: musical genius and one of the greatest songwriters of all time.
Speaker 1: He caught melodies like they were waves. He bottled good
Speaker 1: vibrations like no one else, and he picked up bad
Speaker 1: vibrations too. He broke down, he tripped hard. He didn't
Speaker 1: just hear music, he heard voices. He tried to lose
Speaker 1: those voices by making a teenage symphony to God called Smile.
Speaker 1: But somewhere along the way, Brian Wilson lost his mind instead.
Speaker 1: This is his story. Randa moss In here again working
Speaker 1: through these archives of Brian Wilson tapes. It seems they're
Speaker 1: never ending. There are so many here. The latest batch
Speaker 1: I've been going through and compiling seemed to be from
Speaker 1: Brian at home. There's no dates on these, but they
Speaker 1: seem to be late sixties, perhaps early seventies. They all
Speaker 1: appear to have been recorded on a dictaphone in Brian's house.
Speaker 1: Some of them make more sense than others. There's some
Speaker 1: tapes where he just talks about his family, Maly, his brothers.
Speaker 1: Others are song ideas. I'm not sure these are in
Speaker 1: any way usable for any type of official release, but
Speaker 1: they give us an interesting insight to what he was
Speaker 1: going through at the time. Two years ago, we were
Speaker 1: recording one of the biggest singles of all time. Now
Speaker 1: I'm here alone. I spend most days in the bathroom,
Speaker 1: spend most nights looking at the TV. I don't know
Speaker 1: what I'm supposed to do now, who am I supposed
Speaker 1: to be? I'm having trouble being myself at the moment.
Speaker 1: Some nights I dreams if I'm Me. Other nights I'm
Speaker 1: Dennis or Carl, even my dad. Those ones are the scariest.
Speaker 1: I keep thinking about what has happened over the last
Speaker 1: few years, all those fights, all that money, all that
Speaker 1: blood on the tracks. Chapter six, Brian Wilson isn't himself good? Evening?
Speaker 1: This is one oh five point four b r I
Speaker 1: A n f L. There's some interruptions to us were
Speaker 1: to light, so please bear it with us. Service will
Speaker 1: resume as soon as possible. Keep it, b R f L.
Speaker 1: If you thought we were done with my dad, you
Speaker 1: were wrong. Look I've been putting up with him for
Speaker 1: all these years, so you can shoulder some of that
Speaker 1: pain too. By the time we got to Smile felt
Speaker 1: like a lifetime ago. Hell, even Smiley Smile, the album
Speaker 1: we made after Smile failed, that felt like a lifetime
Speaker 1: ago too. That was the time in my life when
Speaker 1: the music took a back seat to everything else, usually
Speaker 1: stuff like litigation. When you get big in the music industry,
Speaker 1: there's success that comes with it in money too. But
Speaker 1: with money comes money men and companies and contracts and
Speaker 1: agreements and lawyers. I was home one day in bed.
Speaker 1: I was in bed a lot those days. Sometimes I'd
Speaker 1: sit with the TV on static and spend most nights
Speaker 1: looking at the t V. I don't know why I
Speaker 1: found it comfortable. I guess someone told me years later
Speaker 1: that TV static is like the sound you hear in
Speaker 1: the womb looking at the TV. Maybe that was it.
Speaker 1: But I was home, just staring at the screen, alone
Speaker 1: in my room, lost in that gray fuzz. When my
Speaker 1: phone rang. It was our financial manager, Nick Grillo on
Speaker 1: the other end. You've been examining our royalty statements from
Speaker 1: Capital and had uncovered years of unpaid royalties. Have you
Speaker 1: ever been paid as the band's producer, he asked me.
Speaker 1: I don't know. Should I have been Brian. Nick said,
Speaker 1: Capital owes you a lot. Tell me you signed the
Speaker 1: contract yourself. Tell me it was you and not someone else.
Speaker 1: I paused, I can never remember what I signed and
Speaker 1: when it felt like I was always signing stuff. I
Speaker 1: heard Nick flick through some papers and let out a
Speaker 1: heavy sigh. You didn't, he said, finally, Murray did. I
Speaker 1: don't know what I'm supposed to do now. I couldn't
Speaker 1: understand why someone like my dad, who knew business well,
Speaker 1: would let us be so underpaid. It turned out A
Speaker 1: Capital owed me one point five million dollars one point
Speaker 1: five one of the biggest singles of all time, and
Speaker 1: that was for producing a loan. Nick also found out
Speaker 1: that they had used money from the Beach Boy's royalty
Speaker 1: account to pay for an album my dad made called
Speaker 1: The Many Moods of Murray Wilson. Well, Murray Wilson was
Speaker 1: about to experience just one fucking mood from his son.
Speaker 1: I slammed the phone down without even saying goodbye to Nick,
Speaker 1: and jumped in my car. I knew where my dad
Speaker 1: was Sunset Sound Studios, the studio where we'd cut pet sounds.
Speaker 1: He was working on a few new songs of his there.
Speaker 1: We were probably hanging for those two. I burst into
Speaker 1: the studio. He was sitting there at the piano. You liar,
Speaker 1: I screamed. He couldn't have been expecting me, but he
Speaker 1: didn't miss a beat. Why, Brian, what's wrong, he asked
Speaker 1: me softly. All that money. I lost it with him again.
Speaker 1: I keep thinking about what has happened over the last
Speaker 1: few years. I was shouting, throwing stuff around. I called
Speaker 1: him a coward with Charlotte and bad father. He barely
Speaker 1: seemed to listen. He said he was sorry. Then he
Speaker 1: turned back to the piano and played a couple of notes.
Speaker 1: I just stood there and watched. He began to sing,
Speaker 1: but it wasn't really to a melody. It was kind
Speaker 1: of half spoken. You're not gonna like this, he sang,
Speaker 1: but it's for your own good. Then he stopped and
Speaker 1: turned around. I've sold the publishing rights for all the
Speaker 1: Beach Boys songs, he said. I am the owner of
Speaker 1: the company, and it was the right thing to do.
Speaker 1: All that money. I was stunned. Why, I asked him.
Speaker 1: My voice cracked because he replied. I jumped across the
Speaker 1: piano and grabbed the front of his jacket. Why I
Speaker 1: screamed all those fights. He rose up and pushed me off.
Speaker 1: I did it, he yelled, because I was worried. You're
Speaker 1: a spent force, a broken fucking record, literally a loser
Speaker 1: who has lost it. That's why I was so scared.
Speaker 1: All that blood. His face was red with anger. I
Speaker 1: flashed back to being at home in Hawthorne and receiving
Speaker 1: the belt. I felt so small again, like a child,
Speaker 1: a coward in the corner, tears flowing from my eyes.
Speaker 1: All I could get was seven thousand, he said, all triumphantly,
Speaker 1: that money. But they were valued in the millions. I cried,
Speaker 1: not anymore. He spat back. It would turn out that
Speaker 1: we couldn't do anything about it. He was right, he
Speaker 1: had control of the songs. I had signed that over
Speaker 1: to him years before. In the end, Nick said the
Speaker 1: money he'd got for the rights was at least half
Speaker 1: of what we should have received. I don't know what
Speaker 1: I'm supposed to do now. What happened with the money?
Speaker 1: Dad kept it all as a quote unquote transaction fee,
Speaker 1: all that money. On the way home from the studio
Speaker 1: that day, I cried again. I heard California Girls play
Speaker 1: on the car radio and After only the first couple
Speaker 1: of bars, I pulled over. I kicked the radio over
Speaker 1: and over until it stopped working. When I got home,
Speaker 1: I took all my gold and platinum records off the wall.
Speaker 1: They never went back up. One oh five point four
Speaker 1: b R I A n F M is being taken
Speaker 1: over for the next twenty four hours. It's time for
Speaker 1: a new voice. This is Radio D E N N
Speaker 1: I S and it's gonna be a long summer. I
Speaker 1: can't go on like this. How long have I been
Speaker 1: talking to you in here? It feels like forever. I
Speaker 1: need a break. I need to tap out. I I
Speaker 1: don't have any more stories to tell, all right? Hello?
Speaker 1: Is this where he's been hiding his head? God, it's
Speaker 1: huge in here, It's huge. My name is Dennis Wilson.
Speaker 1: Brian's my brother. But you probably covered that, right, Cool.
Speaker 1: Brian's got some stories to tell, I'm sure that. But
Speaker 1: I have a story too. It comes around this time
Speaker 1: as well. It involves drugs, orgies, and a serial killer.
Speaker 1: This is my tale. It all started when I was
Speaker 1: driving down the Sunset Strip. It was springtime. The air
Speaker 1: was clear, the sun was bright. I had nothing to do,
Speaker 1: nowhere to be. I was just driving some night dream
Speaker 1: as if I could me. I was recently divorced, and
Speaker 1: I guess I was looking to start living a new
Speaker 1: type of life. Other nights, on Dentish, I saw these
Speaker 1: two women, pitchhikers, you know. I stopped the car and
Speaker 1: they jumped in. Patricia and Ella Joe, those were their names.
Speaker 1: They were headed east, but when they realized that I
Speaker 1: was a beach boy, we ended up back in my
Speaker 1: house bora bilk and cookies. We talked about trains and
Speaker 1: dental meditation, which was an interest we shared. They mentioned
Speaker 1: a spiritual guru they knew the sky called Charlie. They
Speaker 1: asked if I wanted to meet him, and yeah, of
Speaker 1: course I did. I was really in all that stuff.
Speaker 1: First I had to go down to the studio and
Speaker 1: cut something or other, so I left the girls at
Speaker 1: my house. That's how it was back then, like an
Speaker 1: open house sort of deal. But when I came back
Speaker 1: that night, I was more than a little confused. It
Speaker 1: was so strange. There was a school bus parked in
Speaker 1: my front yard. All its lights were on. It looked
Speaker 1: like it had been abandoned. As I slowly walked around it,
Speaker 1: a small man appeared. He looked like even sleeping on
Speaker 1: the street. His hair was a Mess's eyes were wild.
Speaker 1: They had a quality I'll never forget. They burned, you know.
Speaker 1: I felt like when they were looking at you they
Speaker 1: could see something else, something more than normal eyes. But
Speaker 1: they were also broken in some way, haunted even they
Speaker 1: scared me. Those onest I didn't know what to say
Speaker 1: to him, so I just blurted out, are you here
Speaker 1: to hurt me? He smiled, but his eyes stayed the same.
Speaker 1: Does it look like I am, he asked. I didn't
Speaker 1: know what to say. I felt like saying yes, Yes,
Speaker 1: it fucking does. He dropped to the ground and started
Speaker 1: kissing my feet. It was so odd. I don't know
Speaker 1: what I'm supposed to do now. Patricia and Ella Joe
Speaker 1: appeared at my door smiling. This is Charlie, laughed Ella Joe,
Speaker 1: our guru. Charlie was unsettling, but alluring too. I found
Speaker 1: him fascinating. That first night we got high and spoke
Speaker 1: for hours. He told me he was both God and
Speaker 1: the Devil. I kind of laughed at the time, but
Speaker 1: looking back, that turned out to be true in one way.
Speaker 1: Over the next couple of weeks, I saw more and
Speaker 1: more of him, and more and more of the girls.
Speaker 1: Except it wasn't just Patricia and Ella Joe. They were
Speaker 1: more where they came from. He said, Charlie had a family,
Speaker 1: That's what he called them. All women Paul, interested in
Speaker 1: an alternative way of living, all interested in free love.
Speaker 1: Charlie had such a hold over these women. They were
Speaker 1: basically his servants. Every day they'd wake up and wait
Speaker 1: for him. Dream He'd makes them put their hands in
Speaker 1: the shape of various symbols and tell them they were
Speaker 1: shaping the universe, that we were shaping the universe. One night,
Speaker 1: we had a big party. I wanted to show Charlie
Speaker 1: and the girls off to everyone. It was a hot night.
Speaker 1: There was booze everywhere. Everyone was on acid. Charlie was
Speaker 1: chatting with Neil Young and Mike Love over at the piano.
Speaker 1: They were singing some song I didn't recognize. I think
Speaker 1: Charlie wrote it. When I walked over to join them,
Speaker 1: Neil beamed at me. This is Charlie, said, he's an
Speaker 1: improv genius. Where did you find it? I laughed and
Speaker 1: said I found him in my front yard. Charlie cut
Speaker 1: in and said found me at the gates of hell.
Speaker 1: We all laughed. He grabbed my hand and said it
Speaker 1: was time. I don't know what I'm supposed to do now.
Speaker 1: I didn't know what he meant, but he moved us
Speaker 1: into the center of the lounge area and announced to
Speaker 1: the room that it was the hour of love. He
Speaker 1: clapped his hands and all of the women, all of
Speaker 1: Charlie's followers, started to undress and keep thinking about what
Speaker 1: has happened. Almost immediately, everyone was kissing, hugging, touching. Charlie
Speaker 1: walked around the group and handed out more acid. He
Speaker 1: walked up to Mike and offered him attack uh like decline,
Speaker 1: and then came over to me as Patricia was trying
Speaker 1: to take my shirt off. Can I take a shower?
Speaker 1: He asked? A shower Mike. I laughed at him, I
Speaker 1: think you might want to do that after, but he
Speaker 1: cut me off. I'm not taking part in this, he said,
Speaker 1: motioning to the origin in front of him. It's hot
Speaker 1: and I'm sweating, and we have to get back to
Speaker 1: the studio. I was being led into a forest of
Speaker 1: limbs by Patricia, so what I said to him was sure,
Speaker 1: but I couldn't concentrate. Who am I supposed to be.
Speaker 1: I was worried about Mike. I was worried about letting
Speaker 1: my band down. As you probably can tell, I had
Speaker 1: no intention of going to that session. He was added due.
Speaker 1: I wanted to apologize, or at least put out any
Speaker 1: fires that might have been billowing. I'm sure Ryan's told
Speaker 1: you Mike can lose his temper. I found him in
Speaker 1: the bathroom. Your friend, Charlie, he said, real name, Charles Manson. God,
Speaker 1: he sounded like he was some square TV detective. You
Speaker 1: know he spent half his life in jail, right. I
Speaker 1: rolled my eyes, but stopped halfway through because another voice
Speaker 1: answered him, well, not quite half, but almost. Manson stood
Speaker 1: at the door. He was completely naked and smiling. I'm
Speaker 1: sorry you don't want to play, Mike. He said, I'm married.
Speaker 1: Mike told him. Manson shrugged and then said love his love.
Speaker 1: There was a silence, and I thought that might be it.
Speaker 1: But Charlie seemed to change. There was a shift in him.
Speaker 1: He grew incredibly intense. He looked at me with those
Speaker 1: burning eyes. He walked towards Mike. He shouldn't leave the group,
Speaker 1: he whispered in Mike's ear, No, you must not leave
Speaker 1: the group. I got angry and told him he does
Speaker 1: whatever the funk he likes. But as he went to
Speaker 1: walk past, Charlie put his arm out and cornered him,
Speaker 1: pushing his whole body on it. One no one leaves
Speaker 1: the group, he whispered again. I didn't know what the
Speaker 1: funk was about to happen, but I knew these two
Speaker 1: would be like a couple of freight trains colliding if
Speaker 1: it came to blows. Mike moved his head close to
Speaker 1: Charlie's ear and nearly spat on him, saying, get your
Speaker 1: dick off my fucking clothes. He shoved him aside and
Speaker 1: strode out of the room. Charlie had his back to me,
Speaker 1: but I caught his face in the mirror. His eyes
Speaker 1: were burning so hard I thought he might shatter the
Speaker 1: thing into pieces. Dream A few minutes later, we're back
Speaker 1: downstairs other nights on Dennis. More guests had arrived. One
Speaker 1: of them was someone Charlie had been dying to meet,
Speaker 1: even my dad. I remember them shaking hands. I served
Speaker 1: up introductions, Charlie, this is Columbia Records Best Producer Darry Melcher.
Speaker 1: Charlie grinned as he took his hand. I'd love to
Speaker 1: come audition for you, sir. Terry politely informed him he
Speaker 1: only lived down the road. I didn't know it then,
Speaker 1: but that meeting would be the start of one of
Speaker 1: the most horrific and famous murders in the history of
Speaker 1: this country. We'll be right back after this word. We were.
Speaker 1: Charlie Manson stayed in my house for a while. That's
Speaker 1: what it was like back then. You know. Of course,
Speaker 1: if I knew what was going to happen, I would
Speaker 1: have made him leave, called the police, done something anything.
Speaker 1: In those days, Charlie wanted to be a rock star.
Speaker 1: He was desperate to be one. That's why he came
Speaker 1: here California. I mean, well, he was good at it,
Speaker 1: to be honest. He wrote good songs. One from that
Speaker 1: time was called Ceased to Exist when it was well fine,
Speaker 1: hardly up to the standard of what Brian was writing,
Speaker 1: or any of us for that matter, but it was good.
Speaker 1: He wanted to record it, and then he wanted the
Speaker 1: Beach Boys to record it, and so he did. At
Speaker 1: the time, it was like why not. It ended up
Speaker 1: being a B side to a song called Bluebirds over
Speaker 1: the Mountain. It also appeared on the album. By the
Speaker 1: time it made it onto our record though the song
Speaker 1: had changed structurally musically. Lyrically it changed a lot. It's
Speaker 1: name was changed, it became never Learned Not to Love.
Speaker 1: When I first told Charlie we were going to record it,
Speaker 1: he was ecstatic. He saw this as his first step
Speaker 1: to becoming a rock star. When he actually heard the song, however,
Speaker 1: it wasn't so happy. I keep thinking about what has happened.
Speaker 1: That dude had been mixed and mastered and sent to
Speaker 1: my house on tape. When it rived, I left it
Speaker 1: out for Charlie to listen to. I left to record
Speaker 1: more songs for down at the studio. When I came
Speaker 1: back home, I could tell something was wrong. I walked
Speaker 1: in the front door, and rather than being greeted by
Speaker 1: the carnival of Charlie's family, the whole place was quiet,
Speaker 1: silent even. I walked into the living room and Charlie
Speaker 1: was sitting there all on his own, his elbows on
Speaker 1: his knees, leaning forward on the couch with his head
Speaker 1: on his thumbs, looking pensive. Where the girls, I asked,
Speaker 1: They're upstairs, having a moment of silence, he said, a
Speaker 1: moment of silence. I asked, yes. He said his words
Speaker 1: were ice cold. I'm having trouble being myself. I heard
Speaker 1: someone move upstairs. Charlie jumped up and out of silence.
Speaker 1: Then he marched up to me and brought his face
Speaker 1: right up to mine. Our lips are practically touching. You
Speaker 1: changed the song, he whispered, just like he had done
Speaker 1: with Mike in the bathroom at the party. Just some
Speaker 1: of the structure. I said, I don't care about structure.
Speaker 1: He told me, you change my words. My words are
Speaker 1: all I have. Don't you see? I thought he might
Speaker 1: cry or I don't know I have a stroke. He
Speaker 1: was speaking so intensely. I'm having trouble. I need to
Speaker 1: show Terry Melcher that I'm a musical genius. How can
Speaker 1: I do that? When you changed the song? I explained
Speaker 1: that Terry the Columbia producer, Charlie had become obsessed with
Speaker 1: I wouldn't care about a beach boy song. I told
Speaker 1: him we could record something new, but that only made
Speaker 1: it worse. He stormed over to the couch, where he
Speaker 1: picked up a white envelope and thrust it under my nose.
Speaker 1: Open it, he cried. Patricia appeared at the top of
Speaker 1: the stairs and asked if Charlie was okay. Charlie screamed
Speaker 1: at her to shut up. He was read now. His
Speaker 1: face was haunted, his eyes just burning. The envelope was
Speaker 1: almost empty except for one thing, something fairly heavy. I
Speaker 1: opened it and straight away saw the pointed gold tip
Speaker 1: of a bullet. What is this supposed to mean? I
Speaker 1: asked this, he said, grabbing the bullet, holding it above
Speaker 1: his head. This is for your fucking kids, if you
Speaker 1: ever fucked me over again. He walked around the room,
Speaker 1: holding it above him as he spoke. I could hardly
Speaker 1: believe it. Charles Manson threatening my own children in my
Speaker 1: own house, the house he'd been staying in rent free.
Speaker 1: In fact, everything was free. Come to think of it,
Speaker 1: we had already spent a thousand dollars alone on the
Speaker 1: shots for the gnarrhea that swept through the place. I
Speaker 1: couldn't hold my anger back. No one threatened my family
Speaker 1: like that. I jumped at him and tackled him to
Speaker 1: the floor. I heard his arm crack onto the coffee
Speaker 1: table as he fell, but I didn't care. I sat
Speaker 1: on top of him and grabbed that arm and bend
Speaker 1: it back as hard as I could. I wanted him
Speaker 1: to feel maximum pain. He dropped the bullet and I
Speaker 1: tried to get a punch in, but he blocked me.
Speaker 1: Patricia ran over and tried to pull me off, and
Speaker 1: I pushed her back, and she and up on the floor,
Speaker 1: crying for Charlie. While I was distracted, he managed to
Speaker 1: get free from under me, and I saw him grab
Speaker 1: for the bullet. I looked at his other hand, fearing
Speaker 1: he'd have a gun. Nothing, thank god. Without warning, he
Speaker 1: dove on top of me, flattening me to the floor.
Speaker 1: His breath was hot and wet in my face. He
Speaker 1: held the bullet to my temple, pushing it hard into
Speaker 1: the skin. Don't fuck me over, he screamed, don't, don't, don't.
Speaker 1: He pushed the bullet in harder and harder. I could
Speaker 1: feel the skin breaking. I didn't say anything. I was
Speaker 1: lost in those eyes, those burning, tired eyes, those ones
Speaker 1: the scariest. My free hand was frantically skating around the carpet,
Speaker 1: looking for something, anything to get me free, and I
Speaker 1: felt it. The tape, the tapes. Have never learned not
Speaker 1: to love what I was supposed to do now. They
Speaker 1: came in a pretty weighty box, and it was bulky.
Speaker 1: It spanned the full reach of my fingers. I grabbed
Speaker 1: it and drove it in the back of Charlie's head.
Speaker 1: His eyes seemed to grow huge when I did that,
Speaker 1: but I didn't care. He fell to the side and
Speaker 1: I was free. Who am I supposed to be? I
Speaker 1: left on top of him and punched him right in
Speaker 1: the face, right in the same place that years later,
Speaker 1: with sport a swastika tattoo. Patricia yelped in pain as
Speaker 1: if she had been hit. Charlie was unconscious. That was
Speaker 1: the last time I saw him face to face. A
Speaker 1: few months after that, Charlie instructed his family to go
Speaker 1: to ten thousand fifty Cello Drive and kill everyone there.
Speaker 1: Abigail Forrester, volcheck Rakowski, Stephen parents, J C. Bring, Sharon Tate,
Speaker 1: and Sharon's unborn child. They all died that night. Why
Speaker 1: ten c l O Drive, you might ask, because that's
Speaker 1: where Terry Meltrie used to live around the time I
Speaker 1: introduced Charlie to him at that party. He never did
Speaker 1: get that audition. It's hard to get over something like that.
Speaker 1: In fact, it's impossible. I think of those six people
Speaker 1: all the time. How can I not some days when
Speaker 1: I go surfing early in the morning, after I've been
Speaker 1: up all night. I turned in the morning sun rising
Speaker 1: over the ocean, and I pray that their souls are
Speaker 1: at peace. It's been two days since journalist Tom Nolan
Speaker 1: got the tip, two whole days. Once again, he walks
Speaker 1: to the corner of Fairfax Avenue in West third Street,
Speaker 1: up to the shops front door, and he knocks. Nothing.
Speaker 1: No one's inside. The lights are all off. Silence. Nolan
Speaker 1: turns around and makes his way back to where he
Speaker 1: came from. He sticks his small reporter's notepad back into
Speaker 1: his pants pocket. He walks the streets of West Hollywood
Speaker 1: for a while, and the city is winding down. The
Speaker 1: glow of the day is gone. Another l a night
Speaker 1: is starting to unfold, and there's a sense that anything
Speaker 1: can happen. In that sense is the only thing that
Speaker 1: prevents him from hailing a cab and call all in
Speaker 1: a night. Instead, he walks a few more blocks to
Speaker 1: the Melvin Theater. Written in large letters on the theater's
Speaker 1: marquee is the word scammen shame, Nolan translates out loud.
Speaker 1: He plunks down his money and spends the next one
Speaker 1: and three minutes lost in a surreal world of horror,
Speaker 1: courtesy of the master Swedish filmmaker Igmara Bergmann. When the
Speaker 1: film ends, it's almost midnight, Nolan is emotionally shook up
Speaker 1: and the streets feel different than they did earlier. That
Speaker 1: evening postile unsafe, He walks quickly once again, heading for
Speaker 1: Fairfax and Third, trying to cast the images of the
Speaker 1: film he's just seen out of his mind, and as
Speaker 1: he approaches the corner, his heart skips. He sees the
Speaker 1: lights on in the shop. He's never seen the mom before.
Speaker 1: He looks closer and the door is open too. He's
Speaker 1: definitely never seen the door open. As he stands now
Speaker 1: on the other side of the street, he watches a
Speaker 1: man inside the shop walk past the open door. He's
Speaker 1: barely visible, there's so little light, but he can just
Speaker 1: see it. Tim He thinks, funk, it's actually him. It's
Speaker 1: actually true. Seconds later, no one is bounding over the
Speaker 1: crosswalk and practically jumping up the curb. He stops outside
Speaker 1: and looks up at the large sign, an elongated red
Speaker 1: radish with green leaves shooting out the top in the
Speaker 1: center in a faded white tight are the words radiant, radish.
Speaker 1: Nolan takes a beat and then walks inside. After only
Speaker 1: one step, it feels like he's back in that movie theater.
Speaker 1: It's dark inside, really dark, unlike any shop he's ever
Speaker 1: been in. He looks up and sees all the ceiling
Speaker 1: lights have been shut off and the only light is
Speaker 1: a ghostly fluorescent glow emanating from the food pins. Nolan
Speaker 1: takes a deep breath and through his nose and he
Speaker 1: can smell vegetables, dirt, slight tang of mildew, and something else,
Speaker 1: something he recognizes but couldn't put his finger on. Tills
Speaker 1: that was it. He can smell that stale air that
Speaker 1: seems to almost exclusively exist in urged jars of pills.
Speaker 1: Nolan spins around and sees the front wall the place
Speaker 1: adorned with a jar upon jar of pills. A small
Speaker 1: ladder leads up to the ceiling and the places like
Speaker 1: a Victorian pharmacy. He lowers his eyes to the counter
Speaker 1: in front of the wall, where he sees a large
Speaker 1: open jar, a stick of celery, and amount of what
Speaker 1: looks like salt. Finally, his eyes come to rest on
Speaker 1: the only other person in the shop, Nolan looks at
Speaker 1: him properly for the first time, and the man's head
Speaker 1: is bowed down, fumbling with something in his hands. His
Speaker 1: long hair dangles there. He's wearing a bathrobe. It's striped,
Speaker 1: loose pajamazon underneath, but Nolan keeps staring, and finally the
Speaker 1: man looks up. Can I help you with anything? He asks?
Speaker 1: Nolan stutters, you're You're Brian Wilson. The man in the
Speaker 1: bathroom nods slowly Tom Nolan, Nolan says, extending his hand
Speaker 1: from Rolling Stone magazine. Brian doesn't offer his own hand. Instead,
Speaker 1: he explains that he's not doing interviews, but he can
Speaker 1: serve Mr Nolan if he needs anything. B twelve, says
Speaker 1: the journalist. Brian runs his hands over the jars behind
Speaker 1: him as Nolan watches, unable to take his eyes off
Speaker 1: one of the greatest living pop stars just standing there
Speaker 1: in a bathrobe. All he can think is three years ago,
Speaker 1: Brian Wilson changed the world with good vibrations, and now
Speaker 1: he's working here. No one heard the rumors he got
Speaker 1: the tip, and that's why he kept coming back to
Speaker 1: see it with his own two eyes. But he never
Speaker 1: imagined it would actually be true, I came yesterday and
Speaker 1: earlier tonight. No one says, but you were closed. We
Speaker 1: opened one I want, Brian replies, grabbing a couple of
Speaker 1: tablets from a jar that definitely isn't B twelve. He
Speaker 1: tosses him up in the air and catches both in
Speaker 1: his mouth, and then he swallows hard. He pulls a
Speaker 1: small bottle off the shelf and puts it on the counter.
Speaker 1: He looks at Nolan. You get a call a call?
Speaker 1: No one asked a call from your doctor. Brian says, well,
Speaker 1: now unless there's a call, well we can't. Brian shrugs.
Speaker 1: No one thinks it's a joke, but Brian stare indicates otherwise.
Speaker 1: No one makes his excuses, and after an awkward silence,
Speaker 1: decides to leave the store, trying to work out if
Speaker 1: after watching scom and he slipped into some strange alternate reality.
Speaker 1: His exit is interrupted by Brian, who says, I used
Speaker 1: to be Mr. Everything you know, jumping on jets one
Speaker 1: city to another, producing, writing, arranging, singing, planning, teaching, and
Speaker 1: to the point where I had no peace of mind
Speaker 1: and no chance to actually sit down and think or
Speaker 1: even rest. So that's why I'm in this, and he
Speaker 1: motions to the bathrobe. Nolan smiles. This, Brian says, pointing
Speaker 1: to the store, this is for me, for me alone.
Speaker 1: They called me a genius, but I'm not a genius.
Speaker 1: I'm just a hard working guy. No one doesn't know
Speaker 1: quite what to say. He just leaves his card on
Speaker 1: the counter and tells Brian to give him a call
Speaker 1: the next time he wants to talk about his career.
Speaker 1: And then he steps out into the l a night,
Speaker 1: and once again Brian Wilson is alone when no one
Speaker 1: gets home that night. He listens to his battered copy
Speaker 1: of Good Vibrations, but it doesn't sound the same. All
Speaker 1: he can think about is that man he saw earlier
Speaker 1: in that bathroom. You can't get the image out of
Speaker 1: his head. And now the song playing on a stereo
Speaker 1: seems to have lost some of its joy, And the
Speaker 1: more he listens more the joy is slowly torn from
Speaker 1: the song, leaving behind so much Blood on the Tracks.
Speaker 1: Blood on the Tracks is produced by Double Elvis in
Speaker 1: partnership with I Heart Radio. It's hosted an executive produced
Speaker 1: by me Jake Brennan, also executive produced by Brady sat
Speaker 1: Zeth Lundy is lead editor and producer. This episode was
Speaker 1: written by Ben Burrow, mixing and sound designed by Colin Fleming.
Speaker 1: Additional music and score elements by Ryan Spraaker. This season
Speaker 1: feature Chris Anzeloni is the voice of Brian Wilson. This
Speaker 1: episode featured Spencer Grow as the voice of Dennis Wilson.
Speaker 1: Sources for this episode are available at double elvis dot
Speaker 1: com on the Blood on the Tracks series page, follow
Speaker 1: Double Elvis on Instagram at double Elvis and on Twitch
Speaker 1: at s Graceland Talks, and you can talk to me
Speaker 1: per Usual on Instagram and Twitter at disgrace Land Pod,
Speaker 1: rock and Roll, or Dead