Brian Wilson Quotations

Summer means happy times and good sunshine. It means going to the beach, going to Disneyland, having fun.

If there's not love present, it's much, much harder to function. When there's love present, it's easier to deal with life.

I think I need the demons in order to write, but the demons have gone. It bothers me a lot. I've tried and tried, but I just can't seem to find a melody.

I still believe that something is right only when it feels right.

What in the world is a hangover cure?

I'm just a shy and retreating kind of person. Sometimes I get in a real talkative mood - but not very often.

If you're going to write a song, try to get together with a collaborator because it's better to write with collaborators.

I consider myself to be a crusader of love. I try to spread love around the world as best I can because I know I have a handle on love.

Don't get married until you're certain that you're marrying the right girl. How did I know my wife was the one? I'd seen her for a couple of months. I liked her. She was a very creative person and she had a very good grip on politics and business.

Pop music has been exhausted. The innocence has been exhausted. I think we've lost the ability to be blown away by music.

The Beatles, the Rolling Stones and Phil Spector. Those were my idols.

You know, Rolling Stones songs all sound kind of the same.

I'm not a genius. I'm just a hard-working guy.

I think I'm a vocal genius, not a musical genius. I like background vocals. I consider myself a voice, not a singer. A voice is a sound, and singing is what you do with that sound.

I always do get a little bit paranoid when I get a lot of attention. But I get used to it.

You know what? I'm not always in a positive, happy place. But I'm able to concentrate enough to come up with a really good song.

It's like when a guy gets a divorce from his wife. You part ways. That's what I did with The Beach Boys.

I think cursing is a bunch of malarkey.

To wear a floral shirt is an experience.

Every now and then I hear voices in my head, but not very clear. I can't understand what they are saying. It's a mental illness. I have been diagnosed as a manic depressive.

I meditate and I also think about meditation. Which is funny. I think about Maharishi, about just the idea of meditating. It gives me something.

I play piano all the time. I'm always at my piano, playing music.

I would listen to Little Richard and Fats Domino and Chuck Berry, and I would listen to how they played their riffs, and after I taught myself that, I taught myself to play my own kind of stuff.

The Beach Boys have always been a part of the '60s spectrum, with The Beatles and that kind of thing. They were a part of the music business like everyone else. And they did quite well as a singing group, and I finished a lot of good records, and I'm very proud of them.

I believe that writers run out of material, I really do. I believe very strongly in the fact that when the natural time is up, writers actually do run out of material. To me it's black and white. When there's a song there's a song, when there's not there's not.

I'd earned over a million dollars by the time I was old enough to vote.

I think in terms of emotions. And feelings. So sometimes what I say may not always be clear. But creatively, there's a lot to be said for that way of thinking.

I have stage fright every single concert I've ever done. I have at least four or five minutes of it. It's absolute living hell.

I listen to oldies but goodies stations, '60s and '70s music.

Probably not much of a song left in me, you know, if any, because I've written so many, some 250 songs or 300 or whatever it is.

I wake up in the morning and I say 'Ahh! Today's the day for a song! I'm going to write a song today!' And I do. I write a song.

First of all, I want people to understand that I'm here to create for them. To create music for people so they'll know that I'm a source of love. And they can depend on my name.

Any article's good. Long as it's publicity, I think that's all that matters. I think it's advancement for my career.

Gershwin inspired me very much. The concept of 'That Lucky Old Sun' was inspired by 'Rhapsody in Blue' - not influenced, but inspired.

I like the piano - I'm always about 15 feet away from a piano.

My brother Carl taught me how to play bass. I'm a self-taught keyboard player, though - I figured out our harmonies at the piano.

My mother used to tell me about vibrations. I didn't really understand too much of what that meant when I was just a boy. To think that invisible feelings, invisible vibrations existed scared me to death.

The keyboard is my whole life. My life is centered around either sitting at my keyboard or driving my car. Those are the two most important things, more than anything else. Being at my keyboard, it's the happiest time for me.

You want to know my real pleasure? Food. I love chocolate. I can't get enough chocolate. I can't help it. But my biggest pleasure of all is exercise. I really get off on exercise.

Politics goes in one ear and out the other. I don't even know the president's name for sure. That's how stupid I am.

I can write songs, I've had songs in movies, but I can't compose film scores, you know?

I get off on hearing other people's voices. I like voices: they're my favourite things on records.

I wanted to emulate Bob Flanagan, the high voice in the 'Four Freshmen.' I wanted to sing high like he did.

I was very, very financially secure my whole life. I have been very lucky to say that.

We have to find balance between the need to distinguish high impact sites such as banks, while retaining the accessibility of SSL for smaller organizations.

I hate those old falsettos, I really do, and it's embarrassing since I've grown up.

Surfing music is dead. It was just a summer craze for kids on the beach. I'm finished with it.

Chuck Norris has been known to throw a baseball 100 mph. I've been known to throw Chuck Norris 100 mph.

I met Paul in 1967, Ringo in 1985, and I saw George Harrison in a nightclub somewhere in L. A. I never met John.

You're called a genius by people, and then your whole life you become the part.

There's nothing greater than a girl.... Well a kid, your daughter, but that's a girl too.

I've never written one note or word of music simply because I think it will make money.

Being single is like liking a Phil Spector record.

I have an instinct for music, or a feeling about it, and I'll have my feelings guide my hands.

You don't really know what to believe until the Government denies it.

Freedom and Liberty cannot exist without Individual Responsibilty. Failure to exercise Individual Responsibilty forfeits your right to self-governance and delivers it to Government which, through force, will set the parameters of your life.

I earned my famous name.

I have auditory hallucinations, I hear voices saying derogatory things, like I'm terrible and I'm going to die, and they're usually worse in the afternoon.

You know Chuck, Buddy, and Elvis paved the road. The roots are deep inside us, it's the rhythm in our soul.

All of the artists did such a beautiful job I can’t thank them enough. I’m just honored that God Only Knows was chosen. God Only Knows is a very special song. An extremely spiritual song and one of the best I’ve ever written.

So it's 1976 and we're still riding on our past success. I mean I've gone on like that for I don't know how long.

People are part of my music. A lot of my songs are the result of emotional experiences, sadness, pain, joy, and exultation in nature and sunshine and so on...like 'California Girls' which was a hymn to youth.

You say how you feel, and songs don't lie. Songs are the most honest form of human expression there is--there's nothing that lies about a song.

I think about God, yes, and I wonder if there is a God. And if there is a God, will God please help me through my hard trips.

J.S. Bach was easily the greatest musical innovator in the history of the world. He was so advanced for his time. There's a spiritual depth to his music. You can listen to it and it's like meditation.

I'm doing good. I've had a slight nervous breakdown in the '60s. I got through that. And I got through the '70s. And I was in a doctor's program during the '80s and then I met Melinda and we've been together ever since. I've got a happy life.

I'm happy; I'm a happy person.

Humor - it helps to make the vibe better - it loosens up the vibrations.

The idea of taking a song, envisioning the overall sound in my head and then bringing the arrangement to life in the studio...well, that gives me satisfaction like nothing else...My state of being has been elevated, because I've been exercising, writing songs...No masterpiece ever came overnight. A person's masterpiece is something that you nurture along.

I sit and I write automatically. I don't really try to write. My subconscious mind takes over and writes the songs for me. Songs come very easily for me. When I'm inspired, it takes me 20 minutes to write a song.

I approach my music-making as an art-form--something pure from the spirit to which I can add dynamics and marketable reality. Music is genuine and healthy and the stimulation I get from molding it and adding dynamics is like nothing else on earth.

The only reason I'd ever get a sex change operation is to see what it's like to be right all the time.

Love and mercy that's what you need tonight. Love and mercy to you and your friends tonight.

I believe that music is God's voice.

Some people might think that sex is the highest experience you can have. I tend to think that music is.

So I called him up! ... I was surprised that he said he didn't think I was involved because I really was. So I called him up.

Megan is our new coach for the beginner program of the Piranhas, and she did a great job. This was our biggest club year, with a number of team records, and I attribute a lot of the success to her, because she got our younger swimmers going quick.

Now, they can at least know that in the California market, something will be in place for 10 years.

Obviously, my first goal is to win the event, but I had it in the back of my mind that I could break the record, so that was a goal and I'm disappointed I fell short in the event.

People will have to make do. We don't really have a choice.

It becomes a bit of a chess match, because I have to put my A swimmer hopefully in a spot where she will swim better than their A swimmer.

Organized crime is taking a more sophisticated approach and hiring software engineers, researchers and others to help exploit the systems out there, and they are coming up with increasingly ingenious attacks, often leveraging key infrastructure components that are hard to shut off.

it doesn't look like that is going to happen by anything we've heard thus far.

Most are supportive before they look at the economics.

We continued to utilize the branch, but we did not need all the offices that made up the five-story building.

The quality of due diligence prior to approval of certificates has fallen.

You don't actually get money if you produce more power. You can zero out your bill. One of the guys on our tour hasn't had an electric bill for two years now.

We actually have more clear sunny days in mid-Oregon than they do in Southern Florida.

Timothy White was the best friend an artist could ever have. The music business lost a true giant when we lost Timothy so suddenly.

What they do, they do well. They are pretty goal driven and work hard.

This is a song my dad and I wrote in the late '60s,

This album is really special and people will love it to death.

There's certainly no reason why the electorate shouldn't be exposed to the differences in the ideas and personalities.

the number one rated news show in the world!

The audiences in the U.K. like me more than in America.

The last thing I would ever want to do is offend my favorite pop musical genius icon,

I'm disappointed, yeah. If that's what is meant to happen, now I just have to take the doctor's word and take it slow and come back stronger.

I know we can beat them, ... We just haven't been playing. We either play a bad first half or a bad second half. But we're pretty banged up (with injuries).

I had a little nerves in the first set and he has a great serve. I wanted to block his first serve low and take some chances when I had a good look. It feels great. My mom and dad flew up from San Diego and my aunt was here and it makes it feel better. It feels good to win my first ATP match.

I have rarely felt so welcomed in such a wonderful community that has given so much music to so many of us.