Where We'd Be Without You

When I was a kid, Cracker Barrel was sacred ground.

They had it all. Biscuits, sweet tea, and that strange triangle golf tee game that calls you an ignoramus if you can’t hack it. What more could you ask for? 

Another bizarre yet charming perk of the Barrel in the mid-2000s was a shelf of CDs topped with little buttons that would play samples of each album in case you had never heard Elvis before. One morning, I stumbled from the dining room to the lobby with a belly full of bacon, blissfully unaware that my life as I knew it was about to change. 

I aimlessly pressed on several of the albums when I came across The Beach Boys' Greatest Hits. When I clicked on the photo of five beach blonde boys in striped shirts. The opening guitar riff from “Fun, Fun, Fun” rang out, and time stopped. It was like that scene in The Wizard of Oz when everything went from black and white to popping technicolor.

I needed more. Badly. I gave up most of what little money I had saved in my wallet and brought the disk home with me. 

After a few spins. That CD became my prized possession. I brought it in the car. I brought it out on the front porch to listen to with the neighborhood kids when it was too hot to play baseball.I had no idea what I had discovered in their music, but I felt it in my bones.

Eventually, I grew older, and my teenage angst didn't allow much space for wholesome songs about pretty girls and being true to your school. Then it happened. Through one rabbit hole or another, I discovered Pet Sounds. It met me at the divine crossroads of adolescence and mid-college existentialism. When that musical “big boom” happened, it completely redefined what music was and what it could be. 

To this day, Pet Sounds remains my all-time favorite record because it's the first collection of songs that genuinely took me somewhere. The contrast of beautiful soundscapes and tear-jerking lyricism will forever rock me, regardless of what season of life I find myself in.

Brian called Pet Sounds his “teenage symphony to God,” a quote that I do my best to emulate every time I pick up a pen. To call Mr. Wilson an inspiration of mine would be a colossal understatement. I choose instead to view him as a like-minded soul who left us with a lifetime’s worth of artillery to withstand the bad days and make the best days that much better. 

When Brian passed away last week, I knew I had to write something to pay respect, but I wasn’t sure what. Putting my finger on his significance in some overarching way is impossible, so instead of trying, I’ll let his words do the talking.

“I want people to understand that I’m here to create for them. To create for people so they’ll know I’m a source of love and they can depend on my name.”

Rest easy and sail on, sailor.