Al Jardine
Al Jardine performing and singing with his Endless Summer Band at the Quick Chek New Jersey Festival of Ballooning Reddington, New Jersey on July 24, 2009.
Background information
Born	Alan Charles Jardine (1942-09-03) September 3, 1942 (age 83)
Origin	Lima, Ohio, U.S.
Genres	Rock and roll
Occupations	Singer, musician, composer
Instruments	Vocals, guitar, bass, double bass, piano, keyboards, synthesizers, banjo, ukulele, mandolin, drums, saxophone, percussion
Years active	1961–present
Labels	Capitol, Warner-Reprise, Columbia
Website	www.aljardine.com

Alan Charles "Al" Jardine (born September 3, 1942) is a founding member of top-selling American music group The Beach Boys, a guitarist, composer and occasional lead vocalist. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1988.

Jardine was born in Lima, Ohio. His family moved from Ohio to San Francisco, California, and later to Hawthorne, California. At Hawthorne High School, Jardine met a fellow student, Brian Wilson where, recognising Brian's unigue musical gifts, he first posited the idea of forming a band. Jardine's primary musical interest was folk, and he learned banjo and guitar specifically to play folk music. When the seminal Beach Boys formed at Brian Wilson's home, Al says, he pushed the band toward folk, but was overruled by the move to rock n' roll. An all-rounder on string instruments, Al played stand-up bass on The Beach Boys' first recording, the 1961 song "Surfin'." Following his brief departure from the band in early 1962, he dabbled with a career in the air industry in Los Angeles. Popular belief suggests he was replaced by David Marks, but in fact the two guitarists worked more or less concurrently with the evolving Beach Boys and the confusion arises from Al's temporary abandonment of the band. Al fully rejoined the Beach Boys in the summer of 1963 at the request of Brian Wilson. Al worked alongside Marks with the band until October 1963, when Marks quit the Beach Boys after an altercation with the band's manager, Murry Wilson.

Jardine was the band's rhythm guitarist and middle-range harmony vocalist. He sang lead on the Number 1 hit "Help Me, Rhonda," and thereafter regularly sang leads on tracks including "Christmas Day," "Then I Kissed Her," "Wake the World", "Cotton Fields," "TM Song," "Take a Load off Your Feet," "Lookin' at Tomorrow (A Welfare Song)," "Peggy Sue," "Lady Lynda", "Come Go With Me", "Good Time," "Honkin' Down The Highway" and "Crack at Your Love." He is significantly the co-lead singer on other notable tracks, including "Break Away," "Winds of Change," "California Calling," "Somewhere Near Japan and "I Know There's an Answer." Of the latter track, producer-writer Brian Wilson has stated that he preferred Al's vocal to his own. During the Pet Sounds sessions, it was Al Jardine who suggested to Brian Wilson that the group record "Sloop John B," a lovingly remembered song from his folk days.

Beginning with his contributions to the Friends album, Jardine wrote or co-wrote a number of songs for the Beach Boys, varying in style from straight-ahead rockers like "Susie Cincinnati" to Wilsonesque mid-tempo harmony efforts like "Island Girl." The prominence of Brian Wilson's influence on his compositions was clear on "California Saga: California" from the Holland album, which charted in early 1973. On the same album Jardine utilised the Big Sur poet Robinson Jeffers' poem, The Beaks of Eagles, as part of the so-called "California Suite." Jardine's song for his first wife, "Lady Lynda" (1978) proved a considerable success for the band beyond the US, scoring a Top Ten chart entry in the UK. After Jardine's divorce, the song was re-titled "Lady Liberty" in honor of the centennial of the Statue Of Liberty, which was celebrated in 1986.

Increasingly from the time of the Surf's Up album Al became involved alongside Carl in production duties for the Beach Boys. He shared production credits with Ron Altbach on 1978's M.I.U. Album and was a significant architect (with Mike Love) of the concept and content of the album. As with "Lady Lynda" and his 1969 rewrite of Leadbelly's "Cotton Fields," "Come Go with Me" on the M.I.U. Album was a Jardine production - and a measurable hit in the UK.

In 1986 Al Jardine instigated the recording by The Beach Boys of a cover of The Mamas And The Papas' biggest hit, California Dreamin'. The song was a major success for the band, reaching Number 8 on the Billboard adult contemporary chart. The music video for the song featured in heavy rotation on MTV, securing extensive international airplay. The video featured all the surviving Beach Boys and two of the three surviving members of the Mamas And The Papas, John Phillips and Michelle Phillips (Denny Doherty was on the East coast and declined), along with former Byrds guitarist Roger McGuinn.

On December 16, 2011 it was announced that Brian Wilson, Mike Love, Al Jardine, Bruce Johnston and David Marks would reunite for a new Beach Boys album and 50th anniversary tour in 2012.^[1]. Within the industry word circulated that the reunited band was recording at Brian's favoured Western Studios in Los Angeles, aided by Joe Thomas, Brian's collaborator on his 1999 solo album, Imagination. Duly, as the promised worldwide reunion kicked off with a Grammy event performance in February 2012, the new album, That's Why God Made the Radio, was released on June 4, 2012. The album features prominent vocals by Al Jardine, especially on the tracks "Spring Vacation" and "There to Back Again".

Jardine left the touring line-up of the Beach Boys in 1998 after Carl Wilson died, but remained a member of the Beach Boys corporation Brother Records. Resident in the South Bay area of Los Angeles during the touring heyday of the Beach Boys, Jardine moved to Big Sur in Northern California in the seventies where, for a time, he bred Arabian horses and studied local environmental protection. It is notable that his self-penned songs often center on welfare or environmental issues. Don't Go Near the Water (co-written with Mike Love), Lookin' At Tomorrow, P.T.Cruiser and Lookin' Down the Coast are all social commentaries and Jardine professes continued interest in enviornmental causes. In the late seventies he began building Red Barn Studios on his Big Sur estate, and tracks like his Santa Ana Winds (which would appear on the Beach Boys' "Keepin' the Summer Alive album") was first taped there.

From the late nineties, Al Jardine toured and recorded with his Endless Summer Band, in a line-up that comprised several musicians who toured with The Beach Boys, including Billy Hinsche of Dino, Desi and Billy, Ed Carter, Bobby Figueroa, and Jardine's sons, Matt and Adam. Despite rarely singing high leads since the early 1980s, Al returned to singing falsetto on his live cover of Del Shannon's Runaway.

In the fall of 2006, Jardine joined the Brian Wilson Band for a short tour celebrating the 40th anniversary of Pet Sounds.

In March 2008, Jardine settled a suit brought against him by Mike Love and the estate of Carl Wilson regarding use of the "Beach Boys" name. Mike Love had leased the Beach Boys' name and it was deemed that Al's band, called the Beach Boys Family & Friends (featuring sons Matt and Adam Jardine, Carnie and Wendy Wilson, Daryl Dragon, Billy Hinsche and others), was a breach of title use.^[2]

In August 2010, the Red Hot Chili Peppers rehearsed their album I'm With You (released 2011) at Red Barn Studio. ^[3]. Other established artists, including the Fleet Foxes and Steve Miller, have also used Jardine's state-of-the-art studios in recent years, and it was here Jardine began taping his long-promised first solo album.

Jardine released A Postcard from California, in June 2010 (re-released with extra track in January 2012). The album featured contributions from Brian Wilson, Carl Wilson (a posthumous track), Bruce Johnston, David Marks, and Mike Love – along with guest appearances from Glen Campbell, Neil Young, Steve Miller, Scott Mathews, Gerry Beckley, Dewey Bunnell (members of America), Alec Baldwin and Flea.^[3]

The album was released digitally on June 29, 2010. The tracks are:

1. A Postcard From California – 4:59
2. California Feelin' – 2:03
3. Looking Down The Coast – 3
4. Don't Fight The Sea – 3:23
5. Tide Pool Interlude – 1:38
6. Campfire Scene – 0:44
7. A California Saga – 2:52
8. Help Me Rhonda – 3:47
9. San Simeon – 2:48
10. Drivin' – 3:12
11. Honkin' Down The Highway – 2:34
12. And I Always Will – 4:19

• Al Jardine's official site

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