Sad to hear of Jack Rieley’s passing. Unless you were a devotee of The Beach Boys and their vastly underrated work in the early ’70s, you wouldn’t know who Rieley was, but rest assured he was a very important player in the band’s history, guiding their resurgence following their post-SMiLE late ’60s meltdown.

Brought in by the band with the expressed purpose of making the band “hip” again, under Rieley’s tutelage the Beach Boys turned out some amazing progressive rock in those early ’70s / early FM days: albums like Surf’s Up, Carl and the Passions – “So Tough”, and Holland were not just great albums, but the albums that hooked my brother Mark and I on The Beach Boys to begin with. Rieley’s collaboration with Brian Wilson on “A Day in the Life of a Tree” from Surf’s Up stands as one of the band’s understated masterpieces. As Brian Wilson wrote on his Facebook page upon hearing of Reiley’s passing:

I’m sad to hear about Jack Rieley passing away last Friday. Jack was our manager in the early 1970s and helped us a lot. He wrote the lyrics for “A Day in the Life of a Tree” which blew me away. I also had Jack sing the lead on that one because his voice seemed to fit the song. Jack was a real force on our “Surf’s Up” and “Holland” albums and I’ll always remember his kindness.

He also co-wrote a couple of the band’s finest works at that time: Long Promised Road from Surf’s Up, and Marcella, from Carl and The Passions. He might have been a little strange and eccentric, but he played an absolutely critical role in the band’s history. May he rest in peace.