The Beach Boys
Live at Knebworth 1980

THE REVIEW

"Farewell my friend 
 My beautiful friend 
 Farewell 
 You take the high road 
 And I'll take the low road 
 And we'll meet again 
 Farewell my friend 
 I love you"

             "Farewell My Friends" Dennis Wilson

June 21, 1980, although it's late spring and practically summer, there's no particularly warm weather in Knebworth, England. The band scheduled to perform is used to other temperatures, the sun, the horizon where sky and ocean merge, all perfectly encapsulated in their name: The Beach Boys.

The Beach Boys of 1980 are at the end of their artistic trajectory, after a series of mediocre works like "M.I.U. Album", "L.A. Album" and "Keepin' the Summer Alive". But this concert film is a remarkable historical document, you can finally see the three Wilson brothers together on stage after years and thus the return from the voluntary exile of Brian, a fragile musical genius who had lost himself in the intricate paths of his artistic journey. The band is complete, with cousin Mike Love, friend Al Jardine and Bruce Johnston for one last testimony of their art. All the most well-known songs are performed,  "California Girls", "Little Deuce Coupe", "Heroes And Villains", "I Get Around", "Surfin' USA" and "Barbara Ann", "Fun, Fun, Fun" and an amazing version sung by Mike Love with the audience of "Good Vibrations". On stage, they appear bearded, Jardine in a white suit, Love with a baseball cap, in a snapshot before their imminent end, three years later Dennis Wilson would pass away; here with a beard and long hair, almost like a Christ icon, he sings his painful and heartfelt version of "You Are So Beautiful". 

With the death of perhaps the most fragile brother, the myth of the California boys would be swallowed by the waters of the Pacific Ocean, but from this concert, Brian timidly reemerges, who, overweight and disoriented, tries to reclaim his place in rock history.