Mike Love: Anti-Hero Or Villain?

The Beach Boys’ controversial lead singer talks to Elliot Stephen Cohen

“It’s wonderful to be here tonight, but I also think it’s sad that there are other people who aren’t. People like Paul McCartney, because he’s in a lawsuit with Ringo and Yoko. I know Mick Jagger won’t be here. He’s gonna have to stay in England, but I’d like to see us at The Coliseum and he at Wembley Stadium, because he’s always been chickenshit to get on stage with The Beach Boys.”

“Now a lot of people are gonna go out of this room tonight, saying that Mike Love is crazy. Well, they’ve been saying that for years. Ain’t nothing new about that!” (Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame Induction Speech, New York, 1988)

Beach Boys lead singer Michael Edward Love, born 15 March 1941 in Los Angeles, California, has been an enigma to Beach Boys fans for five decades. Always in the media shadow of older cousin Brian Wilson, one of rock’s true musical geniuses, on one hand Love has been perceived as a calculating opportunist involved in some nasty lawsuits over the past decade with former band members, as well as, allegedly, at times bullying his fragile cousin, without whom many Beach Boys fans believe the singer would never had a proper career in music.
On the other hand, Love was the lead vocalist on nearly all of the …

by Elliot Stephen Cohen
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