Of all the white American pop music groups that hit the charts before the Beatles, only the Beach Boys continued to thrive throughout the British Invasion to survive into the 1970s and beyond. The Beach Boys helped define both sides of the era we broadly call the sixties, split between their early surf, car, and summer pop and their later hippie, counterculture, and ambitious rock. No other group can claim the Ronettes and the Four Seasons as early 1960s rivals; the Mamas and the Papas and Crosby, Stills and Nash as later 1960s rivals; and the Beatles and the Temptations as decade-spanning counterparts.

This is the first book to take an honest look at the themes running through the Beach Boys’ art and career as a whole and to examine where they sit inside our culture and politics—and why they still grab our attention.

Introduction
1. Harmony and Discord
2. Cars and Guitars
3. Suburbs and Surf
4. Studio and Stage
5. Fathers, Shrinks, and Gurus
6. Girlfriends, Wives, and Mothers
7. When Did the Early Sixties End?
8. Jan and Dean
9. Innocence and the Second-Best Pop Album Ever
10. Hip and White
11. The Best Unreleased Pop Album Ever
12. The Beatles
13. Into the Genres
14. Dennis
15. Carl
16. Al, Bruce, and David
17. Mike
18. Brian Solo
19. Storytellers, Historians, and Fans
20. Summer’s Gone, the Endless Summer
Epilogue: Suggestions
Acknowledgments
Notes
Discography
A Chronological Listing of DVDs
Mentioned in the Book
Bibliography