The Beach Boys – Little Deuce Coupe Review

What is there to do once the waves have dried up? The Beach Boys attempted to find out once the waters had receded. The splashes they had made in the pop noise ocean were, in turn, a shallow result. But they heard the call of cool on their last album and began to transition away from the mighty waters. Instead, cars were all the rage. Vehicles. Transportation from A to B, that is what the times called for and what the radio demanded. Little Deuce Coupe is an example of, once more, The Beach Boys chasing the popular status, no matter the cost. It is what the times called for, and to head back into these cheap and tacky-sounding singles, especially after Pet Sounds and Surf’s Up, is a fascinating experience. Some, still, would not learn from Little Deuce Coupe. Queen would write I’m in Love with My Car, after all. But these songs are of the time, and for the time.  

One of the lead troubles with The Beach Boys’ pre-Pet Sounds discography is how little difference there is to the rest of the slop of the times. People may remember the Brian Wilson-featuring band, but never for their competition clutch cars, as heard on the title track. The times have changed, of course, but older songs have fared better in similar genres. The trouble, as it is for artists even now, is the pursuit of commercial sound as the lead reason for writing leaves little room for growth. We are not returning to these songs from Little Deuce Coupe because they sound flat for the times but because listeners are smart enough to hear the indifference. Ballad of Ole’ Betsy is an amalgamation of those western-like tones. Freight trains, the comings and goings of loyalty. These are deep topics expanded on across albums in later years, let alone a single, throwaway song which does little more than harmonise.  

Songs longing for the freedom of the open road are heard on more than one occasion, with Cherry, Coupe, Now, a disastrous affair. If you enjoy engine noises and rudimentary 1960s summer percussion noise, then what an album Little Deuce Coupe is. “Giddy up” has likely never been uttered when using a motor vehicle, though the cowboy-like vision it conjures is of no interest to The Beach Boys. The trouble with Little Deuce Coupe is not just the writing but also the lack of heart heard through these songs. If The Beach Boys had, in earnest, been carried by the thrills of roaring through the streets, then Little Deuce Coupe would have been a tad more palatable. Where the previous surfer-based albums had some slight joys to them, Little Deuce Coupe makes a series of remarkable backsteps.  

You can have the finest cars you like, it does not mean an engine is in there. Like the hollow shell of a vehicle in their garage, The Beach Boys has an album without a heart on their hands with Little Deuce Coupe. Even the contemporary references they make, the harmonisations that were such a mainstay of their sound at the time, feel lifeless. Take a listen to No-Go Showboat. Speed is the enemy of this friendly image from The Beach Boys, but at a time when the leather jacket-wearing greaseballs were all the rage, it was time for the band to bring themselves a step or two closer to that iconography. But their dreams lay on the waves, their desire is to pretend to be a surfing outfit, not a family mechanics business. Do not touch their custom machine. Laughable pieces through Little Deuce Coupe are worth hearing, mainly to hear The Beach Boys fawn after chrome plated Ford.