The last laugh

June 20, 1942 – June 11, 2025

BRIAN WILSON shaped the ’60s pop-culture revolution, culminating in The Beach Boys’ masterpiece: Pet Sounds . But where did his incomparable songwriting gifts come from? Stephen Troussé investigates, while former bandmates and collaborators recall a genius at work. “He was a miracle, a walking miracle,” we learn. “There’ll never be another one like him. Everybody loved Brian.”

WE WERE THE first band of our generation that started to grow up,” Billy Corgan says, reflecting on the making of the Smashing Pumpkins’ 1995 grand opus, Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness. “The b

AL JARDINE WILL be the first to tell you he didn’t play much guitar for the Beach Boys in the Sixties. Early Beach Boys albums — like Surfin’ Safari (1962) and Surfin’ U.S.A. (1963) — feature plenty o

STARS PAY TRIBUTE