{"id":40668,"date":"2007-12-26T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2007-12-26T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/reviews\/ride-the-wild-surf\/"},"modified":"2007-12-26T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2007-12-26T00:00:00","slug":"ride-the-wild-surf","status":"publish","type":"review","link":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/reviews\/ride-the-wild-surf\/","title":{"rendered":"Ride The Wild Surf"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\tThe year is 1964. Lyndon Johnson is president of the United States<\/st1:place><\/st1:country-region>, the Red Sox stink and 14-year-old David Bowling is the apple of his grandmother\u2019s eye.<\/p>\n

And so with $2 safely tucked in my pocket I set off on what would become a lifelong adventure. I was about to purchase my first record album \u2013 which is the one I\u2019m reviewing today, a real vinyl record, not some digitalized prissy CD.<\/p>\n

My original intent was to purchase the Beach Boys Concert LP but was advised by my family that I might be receiving that particular album for Christmas or my upcoming birthday. Therefore, I had to go to plan B. <\/p>\n

Herioux\u2019s one-stop music in Woonsocket<\/st1:city>, R.I.<\/st1:state><\/st1:place> just sold records. It is the type of Mom and Pop store that has all but disappeared from our country\u2019s landscape. I would purchase hundreds of records from the old gentleman behind the counter over the course of the next eight years. <\/p>\n

Plan B was to just select the record that happened to catch my eye. It came down to Jan & Dean, Dick Dale and Roy Orbison. Dick Dale played instrumental surf music and Roy Orbison looked a little like me. Ride The Wild Surf <\/i>by Jan & Dean had a Beach Boy sound plus girls in bathing suits on the cover. I was 14, so this was a no-brainer. <\/p>\n

Forty-three years is a long time in music collecting and life. My record collection has grown to some 30,000 albums. But I still remember Ride The Wild Surf <\/i>as my first album purchase, the one that got me started down this road. And really, it\u2019s quite a good choice.<\/p>\n

Jan & Dean produced some excellent singles and a number of poor to average albums during the first half of the 1960s. Ride the Wild Surf <\/i>is probably their strongest studio album. <\/p>\n

Jan Berry was just a cut below Brian Wilson as a studio technician. He was able to take two average voices and combine them into a soaring group sound. Jan & Dean\u2019s problem was that they were unable to produce that sound on stage. <\/p>\n

\u201cSidewalk Surfin\u2019\u201d was the major hit from the album. Jan & Dean capitalized on the fad of skateboarding that was sweeping the nation. It is an infectious uptempo and dated piece of Americana<\/st1:place><\/st1:city>. The harmonies and concept of surfing on land, which you could even do in Woonsocket<\/st1:city>, R.I.<\/st1:state><\/st1:place>, made this song a hit. \u201cRide The Wild Surf\u201d is a classic mid-sixties surf song with harmonies built around a simple theme. <\/p>\n

Unlike many Jan & Dean albums, there are also a number of other excellent songs. \u201cA Surfer\u2019s Dream\u201d is one of the better ballads to come out of the surf music era. \u201cTell \u2018Em I\u2019m Surfin\u2019\u201d was covered by a number of early surf groups. \u201cShe\u2019s My Summer Girl\u201d and \u201cWiamea<\/st1:placename> Bay<\/st1:placetype><\/st1:place>\u201d were both above average efforts for the duo. <\/p>\n

There were some of the usual Jan & Dean gaffes on the album. \u201cSkateboarding Part 1\u201d and \u201cWalk On The Wild Side\u201d are instrumentals by a duo that didn\u2019t play any instruments. \u201cSurfin\u2019 Wild\u201d was just plain out of tune vocally and \u201cThe Submarine Races\u201d was a common and failed try at comedy.<\/p>\n

Ride The Wild Surf <\/i>has justifiably disappeared in the mists of time. It was an average album at best. Yet music is more than just sounds. Music evokes memories and takes us to places to which we will never travel. Ride The Wild Surf <\/i>is an album that represented life\u2019s possibilities for me. When I play this record I am not a grandfather but am back in junior high school. Hopefully everyone will have music of this kind in their past and present. <\/p>\n

I may be the only person in the world to would rate this album an A, but hey, it\u2019s my review and my first. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":59,"featured_media":29140,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[7979],"rating":[5646],"class_list":["post-40668","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-jan-dean","rating-rating-a"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/40668","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/59"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40668"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/40668\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29140"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40668"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40668"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=40668"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=40668"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}