Pop music has never been sweeter and the rock 'n' roll life has never been darker. Brian Wilson, the genius of The Beach Boys whose soaring falsetto gave the world Good Vibrations, endured a life of horrific mental torment.
From his brutal childhood – beaten so badly by his monstrous father that he was deaf in one ear – to his decades of paranoid, drug-addled seclusion, he fought a constant battle against the world.
Yet few songwriters have created a greater catalogue of timeless music. Paul McCartney, who with The Beatles were the only group that could ever match The Beach Boys for melodic perfection, regarded him as an inspiration.
It was Wilson's creative high point, the album Pet Sounds, that galvanised Macca into writing much of Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.
Unlike McCartney, Wilson – who died yesterday aged 82 – was unable to keep hold of his talent and his sanity in the maelstrom of 1960s pop excess. He spiralled into a vortex of drug-induced mental illness and alcoholism that left him a suicidal wreck, and saw his weight bloat to 24st.
