Surf Girl

The Warmth of the Sun is designed to serve as a companion piece to 2003's Sounds of Summer: The Very Best of the Beach Boys, and as such, it is perfect. While that earlier volume contained most of the Beach Boys' biggest hits, the cornerstones of the catalog such as "I Get Around," "Surfer Girl," "California Girls," and "Fun, Fun, Fun," the follow-up is, in its own way, just as strong and just as enjoyable. In fact, while listening to it, a fan might wonder why the compilers in 2003 didn't just make Sounds of Summer a double album, include all of this material as well, and be done with it. Certainly, songs like "Catch a Wave," "409," "Surf's Up," "Wendy," and, of course, the title track are every bit as essential to a basic Beach Boys collection as any given track on the previous set. But The Warmth of the Sun not only stands tall by itself, some hardcore fans might prefer it, as some of the tunes on the first collection are so overexposed that there is little desire to ever hear them again. Gems included in this sequel, such as "You're So Good to Me," "Let Him Run Wild," "'Til I Die," "The Little Girl I Once Knew," and "Disney Girls (1957)" don't exactly have the high profile of "Help Me, Rhonda" or "Barbara Ann," but that's why it's so refreshing to listen to this set list: some of these great songs have been so neglected ("Friends," "Please Let Me Wonder," and "Kiss Me, Baby," for example) that they sound almost like lost hits in this context. Even the lack of material from Pet Sounds is a relief – while that album is indeed one of the greatest ever recorded by anyone, and while "Caroline, No" should have been included on one volume or the other (it's not), anyone who needs to experience the Pet Sounds material should just buy that album anyway. There are by now literally dozens of Beach Boys comps available in as many configurations, but The Warmth of the Sun is one of the most enjoyable pure listening experiences among them.

It's almost too easy to underestimate the importance of Jan & Dean in the history of rock & roll and its evolution into rock. The mere mention of their name today evokes images of suntanned California teens dancing and surfing on the beaches of Malibu. The ultimate good-time music act of the early '60s – who only earned one gold record (for "Surf City") – the duo get credit for inspiring lots of smiles and providing the soundtrack to countless parties, but few listeners, critics, or pop culture historians appreciate just how important they were musically during the first half of the 1960s, or how long it took them to achieve the level of craftsmanship that characterized their music as much as their high harmonies and catchy choruses.

Explore the incomparable footprint of the Ramones' musical legacy with a boxed set featuring the band's seminal albums. With the 1976 release of their debut album, the Ramones issued a manifesto with their groundbreaking sound, inspiring countless others to pick up guitars and rock. Formed in the Forest Hills section of Queens, NY in 1974, the Ramones were completely original, forgoing a whole new sound and direction for music and giving birth to punk.

The soundtrack to Quentin Tarantino's darkly funny crime classic Pulp Fiction manages to re-create the film's wildly careening sense of style, violence, and humor by concentrating on the surf music that comprises the bulk of the movie's incidental music and adding a few sexy oldies integral to the film's story ("Let's Stay Together," "Son of a Preacher Man," "You Never Can Tell"). Of course, the inclusion of dialogue and Urge Overkill's seductive cover of Neil Diamond's "Girl, You'll Be a Woman Soon" doesn't hurt either.

It was a musical cocktail born in a marketing meeting: Two parts easy listening, one part jazz, a healthy dollop of conga drums, a sprinkling of bird calls, and a pinch of textless choir. Serve garnished with an alluring woman on the album jacket for best results. Liberty Records co-founder Si Waronker called it Exotica; the soundtrack for a mythical air conditioned Eden, packaged for mid-century, tiki torch-wielding armchair safariers. In the five years after Exotica—Martin Denny’s 1957 landmark Liberty debut—arrived, hundreds of other ethnographic forgeries washed up in record racks all over the U.S., bearing titles like Sophisticated Savage, Sacred Idol, Chant of the Jungle, Polynesian Paradise, Exotic Paradise, Taboo, Primitiva, Forbidden Island, Afrodesia, Hypnotique, Percussion Exotique, and a barrel’s worth of other portmanteaus. “All of those ica and itiva endings I came up with because I thought I was being cute,” Waronker said. “And I don’t know why, but nobody got wise.”

Interpretations of six “Pet Sounds” compositions are among the highlights of this celebration of Brian Wilson’s songwriting genius. It’s hard to believe 12 years have passed since “Pet Projects: The Brian Wilson Productions”, one of the first releases in our much-admired Producers series. Not before time, Wilson now joins such greats as Randy Newman, Laura Nyro, Goffin & King, Dan Penn, Bacharach & David, Jackie DeShannon and Serge Gainsbourg in our high-profile Songwriters series.

It was a musical cocktail born in a marketing meeting: Two parts easy listening, one part jazz, a healthy dollop of conga drums, a sprinkling of bird calls, and a pinch of textless choir. Serve garnished with an alluring woman on the album jacket for best results. Liberty Records co-founder Si Waronker called it Exotica; the soundtrack for a mythical air conditioned Eden, packaged for mid-century, tiki torch-wielding armchair safariers. In the five years after Exotica—Martin Denny’s 1957 landmark Liberty debut—arrived, hundreds of other ethnographic forgeries washed up in record racks all over the U.S., bearing titles like Sophisticated Savage, Sacred Idol, Chant of the Jungle, Polynesian Paradise, Exotic Paradise, Taboo, Primitiva, Forbidden Island, Afrodesia, Hypnotique, Percussion Exotique, and a barrel’s worth of other portmanteaus. “All of those ica and itiva endings I came up with because I thought I was being cute,” Waronker said. “And I don’t know why, but nobody got wise.”

The Beach Boys Beginning their career as the most popular surf band in the nation, the Beach Boys finally emerged by 1966 as America's preeminent pop group, the only act able to challenge (for a brief time) the overarching success of the Beatles with both mainstream listeners and the critical community. From their 1961 debut with the regional hit "Surfin'," the three Wilson brothers – Brian, Dennis, and Carl – plus cousin Mike Love and friend Al Jardine constructed the most intricate, gorgeous harmonies ever heard from a pop band. With Brian's studio proficiency growing by leaps and bounds during the mid-'60s, the Beach Boys also proved one of the best-produced groups of the '60s, exemplified by their 1966 peak with the Pet Sounds LP and the number one single "Good Vibrations." Though Brian's escalating drug use and obsessive desire to trump the Beatles (by recording the perfect LP statement) eventually led to a nervous breakdown after he heard Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, the group soldiered on long into the '70s and '80s, with Brian only an inconsistent participant.