Boy Genius

When The Beach Boys Met Charlie Manson

In The Spring of 1968, Beach Boys drummer, Dennis Wilson, picked up a couple of teenage hitchhikers and brought them back to his house on Sunset Boulevard. Later the same evening, the girls returned to the house accompanied by their ‘guru’, a dark-haired, wild-eyed, charismatic drifter named…Charles Manson. Now Manson seemed strange, very strange, but he offered Dennis the best illegal substances, and access to his flock of girls, all of whom were completely submissive to Manson’s bidding. For Dennis, a man who was always drawn to the darker side of excessive indulgence, this seemed too good to be true. All Manson wanted in return (apart from food, drink, money, a place to live and access to everything Dennis owned) was the chance to record the songs that he had recently written. And who better to help him achieve that aim than a founding member of a pop group that sold records and concert tickets by the bucket load?

Dennis subsequently introduced Manson to the creative genius behind the Beach Boys, his brother Brian Wilson. They even recorded together, and their sessions produced a mix of pop and avant-garde music which Beach Boys singer, Mike Love, described at the time as “chanting, barking…a million laughs”. Even so, Dennis remained convinced about his new friend’s musical prowess. and introduced him to producer Terry Melcher up on Cielo Drive. Melcher passed up the opportunity to work with Manson, which elicited the fury in Manson that was never far from the surface. Manson felt the same uncontrollable rage when Dennis took one of his songs, “Cease To Exist”, rewrote the lyrics, recorded it with the Beach Boys as “Never Learn Not to Love” and removed Manson’s name from the songwriter credits. This was an insult that Manson used as justification to scam many more months’ worth of gifts and favours from his famous friend.

Eventually, Dennis lost his tolerance to Manson and his grasping ways, and he eventually moved out of his Sunset Boulevard house in order to get Manson and his coterie of disciples out of his life. This led to Manson threatening not only Dennis, but also his young step-son, Scott. And the situation got worse when “Never Learn Not to Love” turned up as the B-side on a Beach Boys single which actually made the charts.

The subsequent exploits of Charles Manson and his “family” have been well documented; in January 1971 he was found guilty of seven counts of murder and one of conspiracy, and has languished in prison ever since. We will never know whether his unsuccessful attempts to launch a career in music on the back of his friendship with Dennis Wilson was the tipping point that led to madness, uncontrollable fury and murder. And we will never know how close Dennis, and his even more famous brother, Brian Wilson, came to being victims of Manson’s murderous rage.

About the Author

Jon White is the founder of ticketola.com – a ticket exchange created exclusively for live music fans.

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