Beach Boys 50th Anniversary Audio Magazine

[Kentucky Surfer]

In this recent release to promote the Beach Boys' 50th anniversary tour, David Marks claims that he played guitar on Jan & Dean's recording of "Surf City".

First I've heard of that one...

Mark, is there any documentation to either support or refute this claim?

I do recall , according to Dean's liner notes for the Anthology Album, that the Beach Boys provided some uncredited assistance on "Surfin", "Surfin' Safari", and "Little Deuce Coupe".

Any thoughts, anyone?

[Mark A. Moore]

Hmmm . . . As far as documentation, David Marks is a documented musician on Jan & Dean's versions of "Surfin'" and "Surfin' Safari."

David is not documented for "Surf City" or any other Jan & Dean recordings. Only the two mentioned above.

If David played on any other J&D recordings, he was not documented through the musicians union.

M.

[jdman]

Also, there were a lot of recordings of Surf City, especially in the 70's. Maybe he was on those. As far as 1963, I'll go with Mark's documentation on that. I'm sure if Jan had Glenn Campbell and Billy Strange, he didn't need David Marks.

[Kentucky Surfer]

Mark, thanks for your reply. 

I'm actually surprised that the Beach Boys' musical assistance on "Surfin" and "Surfin Safari" was documented.  However, if one thinks back to early 1963, the Beach Boys were still an up and coming group and it probably paid pretty well (better than a local dance) to play on a session. 

I agree with jdman that Jan had Glen Campbell and Billy Strange playing on the sessions for the "Surf City" LP, as documented on the back cover, and probably didn't ask David Marks to play.

Of course, as I recall, "Surf City" led to hard feelings toward Jan Berry by Murry Wilson, who accused Jan of pirating "Surf City" from his boys.  That is probably why any possible involvement the Beach Boys may have had with J&D's recording of "Little Deuce Coupe" was under the radar.

Thanks again for your responses.

[Mark A. Moore]

Yeah, the musicians are well documented for "Little Deuce Coupe" . . . and no members Beach Boys were documented on that session. Jan's usual players were on guitar, bass, etc.

It's possible, but I don't think the Beach Boys were on "Little Deuce Coupe." Possibly on backing vocals, but those sound like the Matadors to me.