OAN Staff Brooke Mallory
4:07 PM – Wednesday, June 11, 2025
Brian Wilson, who has been widely hailed as a brilliant visionary and musical genius, being the creative force behind the Beach Boys — who captured the spirit of early 1960s culture and reshaped the landscape of pop music with the iconic album “Pet Sounds,” has died at 82.
The family has not yet disclosed a cause of death.
“We are heartbroken to announce that our beloved father Brian Wilson has passed away,” Wilson’s family announced in a post on Instagram. “We are at a loss for words right now. Please respect our privacy at this time as our family is grieving. We realize that we are sharing our grief with the world.”
Last year, the artist’s legal representatives stated that Wilson had a “major neurocognitive disorder (such as dementia)” and recommended that he be placed under a conservatorship.
Wilson is widely regarded as one of the most gifted songwriters, composers, and producers in the history of American popular music.
As the creative engine behind the Beach Boys, he helped propel the band to international acclaim with chart-topping hits like “Wouldn’t It Be Nice,” “Don’t Worry Baby” and “Good Vibrations”— the anthems that came to define the spirit of carefree, summertime escapism.
Despite his musical ties to old school surf culture, Wilson has explained in past interviews that his personal fascination with the beach stemmed from its aesthetic and introspective qualities, rather than any passion for surfing.
While the group popularized an idealized vision of Southern California as a sun-soaked utopia, its catalog also revealed a more contemplative side, with introspective songs like “In My Room.” The original lineup was essentially a family affair: Wilson’s brothers Carl and Dennis played lead guitar and drums, while his cousin Mike Love and childhood friend Al Jardine completed the hit-making ensemble.
In the mid-1960s, spurred by the artistic innovations of the Beatles and his own expanding creative vision, Wilson conceived “Pet Sounds,” a groundbreaking concept album that fused elements of pop, jazz, and the avant-garde into a richly orchestrated, emotionally resonant album.
Although Pet Sounds was not an immediate commercial success, it captivated rock critics and impressed many of the music industry’s most influential figures—including the Beatles, who credited the album with inspiring them to create “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.“
“I figure no one is educated musically ’til they’ve heard ‘Pet Sounds,'” Paul McCartney said in the past. “I love the orchestra, the arrangements — it may be going overboard to say it’s the classic of the century — but to me, it certainly is a total, classic record that is unbeatable in many ways. I’ve often played ‘Pet Sounds’ and cried.”
Brian Wilson’s innovations—most notably his pioneering use of the recording studio as a compositional tool—played a pivotal role in elevating pop music to the status of a legitimate and potentially transformative art form.
“That ear… He should donate it to the Smithsonian. The records I used to listen to and still love, you can’t make a record that sounds that way,” Bob Dylan once said. “Brian Wilson, he made all his records with four tracks, but you couldn’t make his records if you had a hundred tracks today.”
However, Wilson’s life was also marked by mental turbulence, earning him a reputation in top music circles as a tortured genius. He grappled with an onslaught of mental health issues and substance abuse, as many talented artists have historically, often channeling his struggles into haunting lyrics and emotionally rich soundscapes.
For years, he lived under the influence of celebrity psychologist Dr. Eugene Landy, who exerted near-total control over his personal and professional life. Landy was eventually legally barred from contacting Wilson and he died in 2006. Their toxic and controversial relationship was portrayed in the 2015 biopic Love & Mercy.
In later decades, Wilson largely retreated from the public eye as he continued to confront his own personal demons. Still, he remained creatively active—recording solo albums and occasionally performing live. His influence endured across generations, leaving a profound imprint on artists ranging from R.E.M. and Radiohead to Daft Punk and Wilco.
Wilson received a number of prestigious accolades, including two Grammy Awards, inductions into both the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and the Songwriters Hall of Fame, and he was also honored by the Kennedy Center in 2007.
He was married twice—initially to Marilyn Rovell, and later to former car salesman-turned-talent manager Melinda Ledbetter, who passed away last year.
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