Very excited to hear that The Beach Boys new CD, That’s Why God Made The Radio is debuting at the highest position ever for a Beach Boys album of original material on the Billboard charts:

The Beach Boys’ 50th Anniversary reunion celebration is well underway with a major international tour, and the iconic band has another big reason to celebrate this week with their highest-ever Billboard albums chart debut. Their 29th studio album, That’s Why God Made The Radio, debuts today at number 3 on Billboard’s Top 200 Albums chart. The acclaimed new album, released June 5th by Capitol/BRI, sold 61,000 copies in the U.S. during its first week.

While The Beach Boys have achieved Top 10 chart success with several albums, they have never had an album debut in Billboard’s Top 10 until now. The band’s last new studio album to peak in Billboard’s Top 5 was 1965’s Summer Days (And Summer Nights!!!), which climbed to number two after its release, and their most recent Top 5 Billboard Albums chart hit was in 1974 for their Endless Summer hits compilation, which topped the chart at number one.

I can’t imagine how pleased the band must be feeling about this, most especially their leader, Brian Wilson, who must really be feeling jazzed about being at the top of the charts again. As a long-time and die-hard fan it’s really wonderful to, in some small way, be able to share in the excitement of not just a new Beach Boys release, but a successful one at that. I can honestly say I never thought I’d see this ever happen again!

I have to admit that, probably like most fans, I was a bit apprehensive when the news of a new album being recorded was first announced; I was afraid what we’d get was some mish-mash of sub-par material sung by a band sounding long past its prime and missing the essential sound of Carl Wilson’s voice in the mix. Turns out those fears were unfounded – the new CD is, even if uneven in spots, a fine mix of happy summer sounds to kick the album off and some gorgeous, albeit melancholy selections to close it out.

My own mix of the album is even better sounding than the formal release, as I’ve added the re-recording of “Do It Again” (which deserved to be on the album) and two selections from Al Jardine’s recently-released “A Postcard From California” CD featuring Carl Wilson, Brian Wilson, and David Marks that really fit nicely into the TWGMTR mix. Frequent commenter Jana and my old Top Priority band mate Jerry “Keys” Palma will soon find out just how good this mix sounds!!

After listening to “That’s Why God Made The Radio” for the better part of a week now, I have to say I like it even more than I did upon my initial review. The title track has a grunting Moog bass buried down in the mix which is cool, “The Private Life Of Bill And Sue” is my second favorite tune on the album (who else but Brian Wilson could come up with a “bom, badda yadda yo, badda yadda yay” background for the chorus!), and the Mike Love selections are not nearly as tepid as I thought they were. It’s a perfect summer album for 2012, and even without Carl’s voice the band sounds both fresh and modern. It’s a great coda to a wonderful career, and I’m glad the remaining guys were able to pull it all together for one last blast.