DISGRACELAND - The Beach Boys Pt. 2: Endless Bummer, Hollywood Paranoia, Onstage Fist Fights, Incest, and Cocaine

Episode Date: December 19, 2019

In the aftermath of the Manson Family murders, Hollywood was gripped with fear. Various investigations stitched together a deluded White Album-inspired explanation of the killing spree. But Dennis Wilson knew the truth—that he had made a terrible, irreversible mistake and that now, the sunny dream of the '60s was over. The nightmare it brought about haunted him to his final days. For a full list of contributors, see the show notes at ⁠disgracelandpod.com.⁠ This episode was originally published on December 19, 2019. To listen to Disgraceland ad free and get access to a monthly exclusive episode, weekly bonus content and more, become a Disgraceland All Access member at ⁠disgracelandpod.com/membership⁠. Sign up for our newsletter and get the inside dirt on events, merch and other awesomeness - ⁠GET THE NEWSLETTER⁠ Follow Jake and DISGRACELAND: ⁠Instagram⁠ ⁠YouTube⁠ ⁠X⁠ (formerly Twitter)  ⁠Facebook Fan Group⁠ ⁠TikTok  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is exactly right. Double Elvis. Disgraceland is a production of Double Elvis. Dennis Wilson, his relationship to Charles Manson, his state of mind in the wild ups and downs of the Beach Boys, is a story that is so complex that two episodes are needed to properly tell it. If you're just getting hip to this now, I suggest you hit pause and go back to Disgraceland, episode 47,

or part one of the Beach Boys saga, where we discuss the band's creative rivalry with the Beatles. Drummer Dennis Wilson's falling in with the Manson family and the gruesome murders of Sharon Tate, Jay Sebring, and others unlucky enough to be hanging out at 1050 CLO Drive on the night of August 8, 1969. In this episode, we get into the Beach Boys coming apart in a very public way and the truly great music made by their rivals, the Beatles.

Unlike the music played at the top of the show, that wasn't great music. That was a preset loop from My Melotron called Three Rural, Sousa Magic MK2. I played you that loop because I can't afford the rights to say, say, say by Paul McCartney and Michael Jackson. And why would I play you that specific slice of tearful con man cheese could I afford it? Because that was the number one song in America on December 28, 1983, and that was the day

the Beach Boys Dennis Wilson went for a swim in the Pacific Ocean and never came back. On this episode, Conman Cheese, the demise of the Beach Boys, a dead surfer in Charles Manson's long shadow. I'm Jake Brennan, and this is Disgraceland. Saturday morning, early, Hollywood was still asleep. Birds were singing, sprinklers were sprinkling. It was hot, real hot, even for August. There was a sense of hope, like always. It was, after all, Hollywoodland, 1969.

A different kind of place, a different kind of time. Who knew what this day or the next night would bring? The party was on, the party was endless, it was all innocent, it was all free love, nearly free drugs, new ideas, a noticeable shift in the establishment paradigm. The hippies were on the ascent. The squares were positioning themselves to not let the door hit them in the ass, but no matter the cut of the bell bottoms, the width of one's lapel, or the opulent design and fabric of one's ascot, the rich, the powerful.

The famous, they ran this town. This was a company town, where you were only as relevant as your last picture, which meant that Roman Polansky and Sharon Tate were about as relevant as you could be on August 9, 1969. The telephones started ringing almost as soon as the morning tennis lessons wrapped up, just as the early bird coffee carass were being wheeled out in place of the late morning Bloody Mary's and early afternoon Tom Collins. Steve McQueen could have used any and all of the above. He was late to rise and hung over, and there was a sharp ringing in his head. He peeled off the sheet he was naked, and so was the beautiful dancer lying next to him.

He took note of her tropicana body. His eyes, bleary, scanned his bedroom for the phone, and that ringing like an axe to his skull. He leaned over to the bottom of the bed, on all fours like a dog. The sun blasting through the windows, blinding and annoying him at the same time. Where the fuck was that phone? He saw the coiled cord on the floor half hidden from the clothes. His, jeans, t-shirt, belt, big-ass buckle, leather moccasins. Hers, miniskirt, halter top, Pocahontas vest, go-go boots.

The sight of it all had him horny again. And he went to grab the telephone cord and toppled off the end of the bed head first onto the floor. Fuck. More ringing. More pain. But he had the cord in his hand now and began spooling it toward him with two hands like some third world fisherman. Finally, the damn phone was in reach. He clutched the receiver, picked it up off its handle,

and on the other end heard a dial tone. He had Sharon and Roman's Cello Drive phone number committed to memory and began dialing furiously. Steve hung up and tried again. Same thing. He tried a third time, eager to connect with his buddy Jay Sebring, who he knew would be at his friend Sharon's house on that morning, knowing, of course, that Roman was out of town

and that Jay was haplessly holding out for sure. Sharon to get hip and dumped the too short A-list director for him hairdresser to the stars. Steve knew his buddy Jay was a sap for Sharon, but still, Steve needed to apologize for blowing them both off the night before. He was supposed to join them at Cello Drive for a little party, but wound up in bed with Pocahontas instead. Jay would understand. Sharon would roll her eyes. All the same. Steve wanted to explain himself. But Jay Sebring wasn't available. Quite the contrary. His body was in the process of being bagged, zipped, and sent off to the city morgue. Elsewhere throughout Hollywood on that morning, the telephones kept ringing.

The news was fresh and spreading. Bob Evans got the news from George Hamilton, who got the news from Joan Diddy, and who heard it from Lenny Dunn. Lenny, whose husband Dominic, was on the other coast producing a film, got all the news first. Bob called Warren, who called Jack, who called Noah, but went into the next room with the Playboy Mansion you woke up in, to tell anyone who would listen. Dennis Hopper wasn't shocked. He knew something like this was coming. It further fueled his paranoia. He told Peter Fondo, of course, who got word to Casavetes, who called Mia, who told Frank.

Frank blew a gasket, went all alpha, and called the boys in Chicago, who shook their heads and dismissed the whole thing as hippie-dippy bullshit. The Sinatra sisters told Big Nancy, who told Frank Jr., who hid in his room and pissed himself a little. His father would kill him if he found out. So he told his mom about his pissed jeans, and Big Nancy had the maid take care of it, and then called Lenny, who, of course, already had the news, hours ago, and hung up, annoyed. On Mrs. Frank Sinatra to call Mr. Patricia Kennedy, aka Peter Laffer, down in Palm Springs,

he was trying to get through to Rona Barrett to find out what the hell was happening up in Hollywood. Rona's phone was ringing off the hook, of course, and when it wasn't, she was dialing everyone in a Rolodex for answers. Paul Newman had none. He was shook. His friend Jay Sebring was murdered with his friend Sharon Tate. Why? Paul picked up the phone to try to get some answers of his own. He dialed. The phone rang and rang and rang some more, and finally it was answered. On the other end, Jay Sebring and Paul Newman's mutual friend, Steve McQueen spoke. What? Paul could tell by the Vinegar and Steve's voice that he said he, He just rusted McQueen from a thick drunken sleep.

Steve, wake up. It's Paul. Jay's dead, murdered, with Sharon. Steve McQueen, convinced he was in the middle of a bad dream, quickly hung up the phone. He blinked his eyes as his cobweb mind snapped two. Fuck, wait, wait a minute. What the hell is that all about?

Was that Newman? Steve didn't have Paul Newman's number, so he couldn't call him back. He then tried Jay again. McQueen slammed the receiver down into its handle. Pocahontas spoke up, asked her one night leading man what the matter was. He promptly told her to shut up and go back to bed.

She got hip and took the direction. Steve then picked up the phone and dialed the number of his one other friend who might know what the hell was going on up at C.L. Drive. His acid buddy, his fellow skirt chaser, and gearhead. His friend with the gonorrhea and the twitchy guru. The Beach Boys. Dennis Wilson could feel the paranoia everywhere he went in Hollywood. Everyone was paranoid.

The killings at Roman and Sharon's, along with the disturbingly similar stabbing murders of upper middle class Los Felas residents. Lino and Rosemary La Bianca, the very next night, had Hollywood stars on edge. Without any arrests, without any real suspects, anyone who is anyone, along with everyone who wasn't, couldn't help but wonder if they were next, especially Dennis Wilson. The rumors about the Cello Drive crime scene had more than just a little freaked out. While the press, the public, and Hollywood Illuminati focused on the rumors, a drug deal gone wrong.

There were, of course, drugs found in Jay's Porsche, or was it an orgy that went off the rail, with too much LSD, or perhaps a real-life satanic interpretation of Rosemary's baby. Whatever it was, the darkness was real, and Dennis had good reason to believe that he may have stirred it, and that the demonic boomerang may have just headed straight back toward him. As such, the whole saga was infinitely chilling. The stabbings, the needless, excessive stabbings, dozens and dozens of cuts, many post-mortem.

Why? It was sadistic, for pleasure or practice. Training? It felt like ritual. Dennis remembered Charlie's rituals. At Cello Drive, the word pig had been scrawled in blood on the door. At the Labianca crime scene in Los Felas the next night, the word war had been carved in Alina Labianca's belly and misspelled on the wall in blood, Helter Skelter. Dennis remembered Charlie's obsession with the white album. Helter Skelter was on the white album. And then, of course, there was the address.

It was Roman and Sharon's place, sure, but it was also Terry and Candy's place before that. Dennis remembered being there just seven months ago with Charlie. So, while the paranoia drove the Mamas and Pappas Michelle Phillips to shop for handguns and Warren Beatty to install an elaborate security system, Dennis Wilson doubled down on cocaine. Helter Skelter. Paul McCartney heard the criticism and said the song was about a roller coaster. Charles Manson heard the song and said it was a secret message to him from the Beatles, telling him to start a race war.

Dennis Wilson heard the song and was reminded of the wild ups and downs of a cocaine binge, which is where his head was at lately. The sprawling opus, known as the White album, was full of tracks just as eclectic and inscrutable as Helter Skelter. A psychedelic oral diorama of obscure meaning

recorded by the biggest band of the planet, the Beatles, for the biggest mass market audience in the history of the world to be interpreted in as many ways as they had listeners, which is to say, millions. The White album was the fading promise of the 60s, Revolution 1 and 9, Blackbird, back in the USSR.

The latter song, a little bit of a piss take on the Beach Boys themselves, and a song that Mike Love claimed to help his friend Paul McCartney write the lyrics to. These tunes rubbed up against the foreshadowed nihilism of the coming decade with songs like, Happiness is a Warm Gun. I'm So Tired, Piggy's and Year Blues. It was a newfound cynicism for the Beatles, one that had always been there, but never quite so pronounced. announced on record, and Charles Manson bit down hard. Piggy's was the gutting of the pigs in the establishment,

thus Pig and Sharon Tate's blood on the door. Blackbird was the coming race wars called to arms where the blacks would rise up against their white oppressors, wipe them out, and create a power vacuum for Charlie's charm to fill and to eventually rule the world. Thus, war carved into Lena La Bianca's belly. Sexy Sadie was about Manson family member Susan Atkins, Thus the name Sadie Mae Glutz.

Revolution 1 and 9, happiness is a warm gun, where anthems compelling Charlie to rise up and kick off the race war, get down to the business of ruling the world once and for all and exact some revenge on the pigs and the establishment who ignored and ridiculed him. And of course, Helter Skelter, the catch-all lyrical messaging that encapsulated Charlie's entirely fucked up worldview. All of it was right there on wax for anyone to hear, plain as day. Of course, you had to be a complete sense.

psychopath to hear in the Beatles songs what Charles Manson heard. The rest of the world heard one of the greatest albums of all time, most definitely the greatest double album of all time. The record was a smash hit, selling more than 3.3 million copies in the U.S. alone during its first four days of release. The mid-60s friendly competition between the Beatles and the Beach Boys ended with a decisive victor, and it was hard for the Beach Boys, facing a four-album critical and commercial slum, Not to glance silently at their own frontman Brian and feel that if it weren't for his mental health problems, it could have been them, and not the Beatles who defined what was clearly an important moment in time. It could have been Smile, not the White Album.

And had it been, what, if any, messages would Charlie Manson have vibed on? Where, how would the Beach Boys' lyrics compel others? Toward darkness or toward light? Why, how had it gone so wrong? What if, aside, Helter Skelter, on everyone's mind. Seven dead. So much blood. So many questions. No arrests. No suspects. Hollywood Land, USA 1969. Creep City. Fall was settling in around Tinsletown and with it a chill alongside the knowledge that the killers were still out there. Dennis was at his friend Greg's place. It was a small gathering.

Greg and his wife had just lost their baby. It was a miscarriage. Nowhere near as gruesome a loss as their friend Romans, but a shared grief. Dennis was trying to cheer them up, but the mood was somber. He decided to play the piano, sing a song or two, try to take everybody's minds off of the rampant paranoia that had consumed their little community for the past several weeks. Drinks flowed, and glasses clinked, grass was passed, piano keys tapped out soft melodies, sorrows were on the verge of drowning, and then the door burst open and threw it. None other than the man Dennis Wilson feared most, Charles Manson. Charlie was in rare form, even for him.

It was clear to all in attendance that he'd been on a tear, tweaked out to the max, processing the paranoia in his own way, clearly showing the effects of coping through endless tabs of acid and hippie death cult sex or whatever the hell it was Charlie got up to on his own with his family out at Spawn Ranch. He was wearing a giant sombrero and his eyes were doing that crazy shithouse rat trick again, rolling around endlessly in his sockets. He lapped the party spewing random hippie bullshit. He smelled like shit. He looked like shit. And he scared shitless most everyone he got close to.

He approached Dennis and got right up in his face. Neil Armstrong had been the first American to walk on the moon only a month earlier. It wasn't surprising to anybody that Charlie would try bending history to prop himself up, kept his head down, kept playing the piano. Charlie's eyes somersaulted and he got up quick and bounced, leaving the party almost as quickly as he'd arrived. Everyone was freaked the fuck out. And they were even more freaked out a month or so later when they learned Charlie had been arrested, out in Death Valley. He was brought in by the county sheriff's department on grand theft auto and minor arson charges related to the family squatting in caves along the valley's edge, ripping and repainting cars

to doom buggy through the desert with and to sometimes sell for quick cash. But once the authorities had Charlie in custody, it was only a matter of time before the pieces of the puzzle started clicking together. Just who was Charles Manson, and who were the members of his so-called family, and what in the hell were they doing out in the desert, and what was with that unexplained murder, the one where the drug deal went bad a couple months back, where political piggy was written in blood on the wall, the murder that led to the arrest of Manson family member Bobby Boselais. That scene sure felt a lot like the Tate-Labianca crime scenes. California law enforcement had a hunch that they had their man.

Charles Manson was charged with conspiracy and seven charges of murder for the Tate La Bianca Killsprees, and it resulted in a nationwide media circus of a trial, the longest trial ever in California at the time, one where prosecutors hoped to prove that Charles Manson orchestrated and ordered the gruesome murders but did not commit them himself. When the news broke in December of 69 about the charges against Charlie, Dennis Wilson's heart sank. Dennis showed Charlie the house on C.L. Drive.

Dennis introduced Charlie to Terry Melcher when he lived there. Dennis got Charlie's hopes up. Dennis opened up a new world to Charlie, a world that closed itself off to him and stoked his rage. Of course, it all made sense. Dennis believed it before the newsmen even said it. So he drank. So he did more and more drugs in an effort to not feel,

in an effort to outrun the guilt and the paranoia. And the fear was real. Even with Charlie Behind bars, along with most of his family members, their real names exposed. Susan Atkins, a.k.a. Sadie Mae Gluts, aka. Sexy. Patricia Crenwinkle, a.k.a. Big Patty, aka. Yellow, aka. Katie. Charles Watson, aka. Tex. Lynette Fromm, aka Squeaky. Catherine Cher, aka. Gypsy. Sandra Good, aka Blue. Bobby Bolsalay. Leslie Van Houten. Mary Brunner. and future informants and star witnesses Paul Watkins and Linda Kasabian.

Jail or no jail, Dennis was still freaked. Charlie's reach was long and legit, and there were still other members of the Manson family on the outside, and who knew what Charlie was capable of compelling them to do. It was December, 1969, in those cold days between Christmas and New Year's when Dennis started finding stray bullets in and around his front door. And there were also little notes left on his doorstep and in his mailbox.

The one that simply said, you can't get away from me. That one cut Dennis good. And of course, there was the creepy crawling. Charlie's girls, those still on the outside, would sneak into Dennis' home while he was sleeping and move his furniture around to fuck with him. One morning he woke up to find his piano in a different part of his house. But nothing chilled Dennis Wilson more than waking up in the dead of night next to his girlfriend, with two dark figures hovering above his bed, knives drawn, pointing.

straight at Dennis' neck. He said nothing. Neither did the two women standing above him. They just grinned demonically, giggled softly, and creepily crawled out into the night. We'll be right back after this word, word, word. Dennis Wilson couldn't see straight. Something was off. This is supposed to be the part of the set where he shined, where he emerged from behind the drum kit to take center stage and sing lead on the tune as brother Carl wrote. angel come home. And usually that was the case. Dennis, no matter how high or drunk during their sets, always nailed this tune. In fact, the drugs and alcohol usually contributed to his vulnerability and thus his on-stage appeal. Cruining into the mic like Veniserra Jim Morrison

crossed with some imaginary hippie version of Dean Martin, Dennis Wilson was in control when he had the song rolling over his lips. But not tonight. He literally couldn't see straight. His focus was off and his focus was being pulled sideward toward the direction of his cousin, Mike Love, singing backing vocals staged left into Dennis's estimation, not doing a very good job. Was he sabotaging Dennis's moment? That's all he could think about. He loved Mike, but he also hated Mike. Mike Love was everything Dennis was not, straight, focused, determined. Dennis was a shabby drug and alcohol-addicted mess. And they both wanted the same thing for the Beach Boys to remain relevant and successful, but both came at it from opposite angles and thus believed the other's efforts to salvage the band were actually

efforts to sabotage the band. Dennis with his self-destruction and Mike with his determination. Plus, Dennis knew Mike never forgave him for tearing off with his wife, Suzanne, back during the whole Charlie era. Not only that, Mike was especially pissed that Dennis and Suzanne left Mike's kids alone to be babysat by Manson family member Susan Atkins, aka the notorious Sadie Mae Gluts, the one directly responsible, along with Tex Watson, for viciously murdering Sharon Tate, along with the others at Cello Drive on that night, now 10 years in the rear view. Charlie was eventually sentenced to death for the Tate-Labianca murders, but that was commuted to life when California banned the death penalty a year after his conviction.

In the name of mercy, Charlie fucking Manson would live to a ripe old age. But Dennis would never forget that time. He was always with him, the madness of it, the guilt, the grief. He would never talk about it, though, not to anyone, but he thought about it often. It always came back to Charlie. When the family was arrested en masse for the car robbery scam in Death Valley, it was Susan Adkins, Sadie Mae,

already under suspicion of a different murder who gossiped two jailbirds about the Tate La Bianca murders. The jailbirds ratted Sadie out, and the dominoes began to fall. With each brick laid in the dark mythology of the Manson family, the knot in Dennis Wilson's gut tightened. That other murder that Sadie Mae had been involved with, a mescaline dealer named Gary Hinman. Manson family member Bobby Bolsillay made a deal to sell a batch of Gary's drugs to a biker gang,

the straight Satan's, who came back demanding a refund for what they claimed was actually a bad batch of strychnine. Bobby, Sadie Mae, and other family member, Mary Bruner, confronted Hinman and ended up stabbing him through the heart and using his blood to make the scene nice and witchy, just the way Charlie liked it. This was the run-up murder to the Tate La Bianca murders. Soon enough, investigators connected the witchy blood on the wall of the Hinman scene

with the blood on the wall at the Tate-Labianca scenes and connected to Charlie through Sadie Mae. The DA had their suspect, Charles Manson, hippie death cult leader, and Dennis Wilson watched in shock as prosecutors moved quick to try his one-time friend for the most gruesome murders in recent American history. Hinman, Tate, La Bianca, and even the dead son. stuntman, Shorty Shea, the one they dug up out at Spawn Ranch. It all made sense. Dennis could certainly believe it. To him, Charlie was a phantom, everywhere, haunting him. How close had he come? How far had he gone astray? He wasn't in danger, but he never felt safe.

Charlie was in jail, forever, and forever on Dennis's mind. Even right now in front of a sold-out crowd at L.A.'s Universal Amphitheater, looking for some of those endless summer beach boys vibes. But Dennis Wilson couldn't deliver. He couldn't get Charlie out of his head, so he focused on Mike Love. Why was Mike staring at him? Why was Mike singing out of key? Why was Charlie staring at him? And why was Charlie singing out of key?

Why did Charlie have to botched the audition with Terry? Mike never would have done that. Mike would have shown up and nailed his part. That was the thing about Mike, always on time, always in tune. But Charlie, no, Charlie was a fuck-up. Charlie was never in tune. Unlike Mike, but wait, why wasn't Mike in tune right now? now. Was it Mike? It must have been. He was too tall, too bald to be Charlie. Besides, Charlie was in jail.

Dennis rapped the song to polite applause and he hated Mike for it. He headed back to take his seat behind the drums, stopping at the piano to climb up on top of it to rant at the audience. The audience didn't know what the hell was going on. Neither did his bandmates. Mike was grinning. Dennis was embarrassing himself and Mike, it seemed, was celebrating his failure. Dennis knew it. Who the fuck did this guy think he was anyway? Dennis was detained by his own security and pulled backstage. Mike Love laughed and got back into the next song. The band was cooking now.

Dennis re-emerged and began shouting. Mike kept singing, doing his job, a prose pro. Dennis tried to follow suit, sat down at his kit and readyed himself for the next song. Mike was talking into the mic between tunes. Dennis couldn't make out what he was saying, but he was sure Mike was fucking with him, goading him on, poking fun. Dennis always feared Mike resented him For sleeping with his wife

For his relationship with his brother Brian The creative leader of the band For Dennis's obvious appeal with their female fans And most recently for the creative success Of Dennis's solo album Pacific Ocean Blue Dennis knew it got Mike's goat It was an honest, tender An emotionally raw creative statement

That established Dennis as a serious artist In the minds of critics It was something Dennis knew Mike could never achieve On his own An angel come home, though a Beach Boy song, was performed live in the style of most of the tunes on Dennis's solo record. And that's partly why Dennis loved performing it. It reminded the audience of who he was outside of the shadow of his brothers and his cousin Mike. And that, to Dennis's mind anyway, was why Mike had sabotaged the tune and fucked with him on stage.

Dennis snapped, kicked the drums off the riser, leaped up from behind them and charged his cousin at the front of the stage. When Mike saw Dennis coming, he laughed at first. but when he saw the manic look in his little cousin's eyes, he knew shit was real. Mike bolted for the side stage. The audience could not believe what they were seeing. Was this some kind of joke, some stage, playful, family feud?

Dennis caught up with Mike at the side of the stage and began to pummel him. Mike fought back, hard. The two tussled, pounding each other with a pent-up aggression of jealous teenage boys. Security pulled them apart and detained Dennis for a second time backstage.

A brief intermission was called for, and the audience, all six thousand of them, shared the same look, the one that said, what the fuck? Shortly, the band reappeared on stage with four smiles. Dennis stumbled to a mic and started repeating the mantra, I love Mike love, I love Mike love, I love Mike kept his distance for the rest of the set. His little cousin Dennis had appeared, was finally gone. It wasn't revenge so much as it was a giant fuck you. To whom exactly Dennis Wilson wasn't sure, but Dennis' life at the dawn of the 1980s

was like some elaborate performance art piece gone wrong. The once handsome avatar for Southern California's surf culture and the promise of the 1960s had descended into a drugged out zombie roaming the Venice boardwalk in search of his next score and his next lay. Ousted from his own band in the late 70s until he proved himself clean enough to return to the stage and frankly to not kill himself. Dennis Wilson, by 1981, was 36 years old and on a mission it seemed to snort all of the cocaine in Southern California, while at the same time drinking all of the alcohol he could get his hands on and doing it in the company of a 16-year-old. She was a friend of his teenage daughter, and her name was Sean Love. And if that last name sounds familiar, it's because Sean Love

claimed she was the daughter of Dennis Wilson's cousin and bandmate, Mike Love, making her her Dennis's niece, and when the 16-year-old Sean gave birth to Dennis Wilson's son, which meant that Dennis Wilson, lifelong pain in the ass to his cousin Mike, was now Mike's fucked-up drug-addicted son-in-law. For all intents and purposes, it certainly seemed like there was an intent there. As for Dennis and Sean's son's relationship to his father and grandfather, I can't even do the incest math that's so messed up. It should also be noted that Mike Love is denied that Sean is his daughter, but Dennis seemed to accept, if not relish, the connection. The vindictiveness was a distraction, and so was fatherhood. Dennis loved his new son, but otherwise

his life was a mess. Everywhere he looked, he saw the ghost of Charles Manson. Cruising the boardwalk, he saw Charlie everywhere. Charlie was in jail, but he was also in Dennis Wilson's head and messing with him endlessly. The promise and the innocence of the 60s was long gone. So long, endless summer. Hello, endless. The nihilism of the 70s gave way to the greed of the 80s and what was shaping up to be, for Dennis Wilson, at least, a drag of a decade. Charlie don't surf, maybe, sure, but Charlie do kill. And Dennis would never forget. He saw Charlie shoot down that dude out by Spons with an M-16.

The swarm of 22-caliber bullets nearly sawed the dude in half. Charlie and his girls then went to work stat, bawling up the body and stuffing it into a well, or was it a shallow grave? Out by Shorty Shea in the desert, Dennis wasn't sure. All he knew was that Charlie was for real, and he was out there, even when he wasn't, even when he was behind bars. To Dennis, Charlie was everywhere and nowhere all at once. God, the devil, what's the difference? Once you've crossed the line, transcended, there is no salvation.

Dennis's brother Brian knew this was true. He crossed the line. He transcended. He was far from innocent. He was mad. He was a genius. and whatever you called him, Brian had suffered a real and acute mental health crisis at the worst moment when everyone was counting on him. Smile was Brian Wilson's ghost. It was like the 60s had

imploded inside of Brian and taking him down with a decade early on. And when Brian most needed his brother, his original muse, Dennis, the only beach boy who actually surfed, when Brian was stuck or hanging out there on the fragile limbs of creative madness and mental illness, Dennis was distracted, enthralled by the charlatan guru Charles Manson. But that was one of those things for Dennis to feel, not to say. And the results were devastating, because when the 60s curdled inside of Charlie Manson, stewing like they had inside Brian Wilson, Charlie didn't retreat into a sandbox of creative madness. He exploded violently out into the world. The weight of choosing the wrong guru, of choosing Charlie over Brian, became Dennis Wilson's burden to bear forever.

Though Brian held no grudge, Dennis held the grudge against himself just fine. Dennis heard the knock on the door to his Venice apartment and dispatched the kid, the one who just saved his life, the Beach Boys fan, who somehow wrangled his way into Dennis's mid-afternoon Coke party to ultimately smother Dennis in his embrace, literally, after Dennis had lit himself on fire, attempting to light his fireplace with lighter fluid. And the kid was all right. He could stay. Dennis would allow it. Besides, it was a festive time. The new year was once again around the corner, but the kid would have to earn his keep,

fetch more Coke, vodka, and answer the door when necessary. Dennis was at the piano picking out the notes to Old Langs-Ine, and the knocking continued. The door! The kid snapped too and beat his own Coke-fueled beeline to see who was knocking. When he opened it, his shifty, gac-infused jaw nearly hit the floor. There he was, the gentle surfer bear himself, Brian Wilson, all 300-pound. of him. His hair, greasy, his beard, shaggy, full, dripping with spittle, his stench, intense. Dennis was all he said to the boy. The boy said nothing, stood, gobsmacked in the face of his

hero. Brian pushed past him into the apartment, saw his little brother at the piano, sat down next to him, pulled out an ounce of cocaine, plopped it down on top of the piano, and dove into it side by side with Dennis. Together with cocaine, white-peppering their scraggly beards, they pumped out a talk-choc duet version of God Only Knows. They followed it up with the reprise of Old Langsign. This version, Coke-fueled and slightly out of tune, but decidedly more festive. It was madness, but it was true love, brotherly love. Dennis truly loved his brother Brian. He was a genius, and geniuses can be frail. But Brian also took more abuse than any of his younger brothers from Murray, their disciplinarian father, who was himself a failed musician and jealous of the

boy's success. Brian shielded his younger brothers for Murray's wrath as much as he could, and the abuse wrought havoc on his psyche. Just Google Murray Wilson letter for a glimpse of his fatherly advice. It's eight pages of anything but fun, fun, fun. But despite his father's failings, Dennis Wilson loved his dad, who passed back in 73. Dennis loved him just like he loved Brian, and of course like he loved his brother Carl and their bandmate Al, and if you were being honest with himself deep down. He even loved his cousin Mike. But Dennis Wilson had no agency when it came to showing that love. His life, by the time 1983 rolled around, was a complete and total disgrace. He bounced in and out of the band, in and out of relationships, and in and out of consciousness.

He was completely consumed by cocaine and alcohol and taken to roaming around the Venice boardwalk looking like a common street bomb. As the Beach Boys, with Mike Love at the helm, did their best to remain relevant in their third decade, Dennis descended deeper into oblivion, and Charlie Manson, as usual, was on his mind. Dennis saw him daily, on the boardwalk mostly, struggling to hang on just like he was, panhandling and playing songs out of time on his beat-up acoustic. Dennis would see him. The locals called him Slave and Dave, but Dennis knew it was Charlie, or at least Slave and Dave's busking body have been possessed by Charlie as a means to forever fuck with Dennis.

Dennis joined him in song on the boardwalk frequently. It was the holidays, and they had a halfway decent version of Little St. Nick, but Charlie could never keep time. Dennis wandered. It was December 28, 1983. Again, those in-between holidays days. Festive if you had a family to gather with. Downright bleak if you didn't.

And it was cold on the boardwalk. Dennis ran into some friends, and they were having a little party on a boat in the marina. It was right where Dennis used to dock his bow. but that was a lifetime ago. And Dennis ate, they all did, and of course they drank. Dennis entertained, he was good for that. Always was, ever the smiling entertainer.

He was feeling himself and decided that despite the chill in the air, a swim was in order, right there, in the marina, off of the boat. He dove in and swam down to the ocean floor. He could see his reflection in the port side of the boat docked next to the one he dove off. His underwater image shocked him. He was younger looking. A better version of himself. He swam up for air and dove back down.

Again, his reflection compelled him. Where had this version of himself gone, he wondered. He swam up for air once more and took another dive. His reflection had now changed. It morphed. It was older, longer hair, big hippie beard. Dennis swam up again for air. He could feel himself getting tired but dove back down.

His reflection was there to greet him, waiting. But Dennis swore it was snarling back at him now. In those eyes, he recognized those eyes, rocking back and forth, somersaulting in their sockets, taunting him. Dennis knew it then. It wasn't his reflection. It was Charlie's. Dennis opened his mouth, a shout, to fend off this guru creep once and for all, to get rid of the ghost. His mouth filled with water.

He shouted once more, more water. It ballooned his lungs. Dennis gasped. He tried to break for air, swim to the surface, but his arms were no use to him. He was too tired. He was too drunk. He was too far gone. He looked into Charlie's eyes. He closed his own and transcended the Pacific Ocean Blue. Behind bars when Charles Manson heard of his old friend's drowning, he said of the incident, Dennis Wilson was killed by my shadow because he took my music and changed the words from my soul.

And so, Dennis Wilson ceased to exist. I'm Jake Brennan. Disgraceland was created by yours truly and has produced in partnership with Double Elvis. Credits for this episode can be found on the show notes page at disgracelandpod.com. If you're listening as a Disgraceland All Access member, thank you for supporting the show. We really appreciate it. And if not, you can become a member right now by going to disgracelandpod.com

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