Mike Love Quotes

'Rockaway Beach' is a great song, and so is 'Listen to My Heart.'

The Beach Boys are not a superstar group. The music is the superstar of the group.

We are so blessed that we've had so many great songs that fans have turned into big hits for us.

I think Bridge Over Troubled Water was a very good song. Artie sang it beautifully. The Boxer was a really nice record. But I don't think I've written any great songs.

If you write great songs with meaning and emotion, they will last for ever because songs are the key to everything. Songs will outlast the artist and they will go on for ever if they are good.

We came from the '60s era, when we started and made so many hits. The song value from the '60s was so darn good, you've got The Beatles, The Beach Boys, all of Motown, and plenty of other people, too... amazing records, amazing songs.

You know, I've always said, I've never felt I was a particularly good singer, but I've always thought I had a great knack for picking hit songs.

I like making songs up. Whether or not they're great songs or good songs, whatever. It's something I've always done, and I definitely feel like I've gotten better at it.

I don't care if it's a Cole Porter song, or George Gershwin, or Lennon/McCartney, or Elton John, or you know, whoever, Bob Dylan. Great songs are great songs, and they stand the test of time, and they can be interpreted and recorded with many points of view, but yet still retain the essence of what makes them good songs.

I had the great opportunity to work with some of the greatest artists - the Beach Boys, the Temptations, the Four Tops. Otis Redding. Wilson Pickett. Stevie Wonder. So many great singers. And don't forget Clarence Carter!

I think we've got the tracks that everyone wants to sing along to. A lot of people say, 'God, I've forgotten you've had so many hits!'

They're great songs. How many bands wouldn't like to have a 'Freebird' or 'Sweet Home Alabama' to play every night?

There's so many FM hits that I love. Bob Seger, there's two of his songs that I love. I would probably love more, but I don't sit around listening to Bob Seger records. It's the same thing with Tom Petty; he writes amazing hits, but it's not often that I sit around at home listening to a whole Tom Petty album.

The advice I have for new artists is this - write great songs and play them live as often as possible. Get residencies all over town and crush it.

Ever since our Surfin' Safari' began in the early 1960's, the relations'hip with The Beach Boys and water has been synonymous. 'Surfin', 'Catch a Wave', and 'Surfin' USA' are songs which capture the feelings of being out in the water without a care in the world, living a dream so many long to live no matter where they are from.

The Beach Boys have always been a part of the '60s spectrum, with The Beatles and that kind of thing. They were a part of the music business like everyone else. And they did quite well as a singing group, and I finished a lot of good records, and I'm very proud of them.

There will always be a Beach Boys. Being a Beach Boy is like being in love.

If I want to get a taste of beach culture, I'll fire up my season 2 DVD of 'Beverly Hills, 90210.'

I've been around the surf culture since I was a kid. I grew up in a beach town in Rhode Island. Then eventually I lived in Dana Point, Calif., a real surf hotbed.

Words are important to me, but a song can work and function and be a good song with words that are fairly standard. But really great lyrics can't rescue a dog of a song.

Some of the songs I do once in a while that I kinda... my set list is basically like my hits, there is a good reason why they are there; people really like them.

We teach young kids from 8 to 14 or 15 about their musical heritage through great songs written by American songwriters. We don't do too many modern composers, although we include songs from Billy Joel and other writers like him.

I want a hit. I don't think anybody spends 12 months writing and recording an album, making something cool, and says, 'Great, I hope this doesn't sell.' I don't understand that mind-set. I want hits: a big bunch of them.

Well, obviously I wanted it to sound as original as possible. I suppose the influences that we had were probably from the actual power point of view we wanted to be like the Who. Vocally we wanted to be like the Beach Boys, whatever was good at the time.

Chris Jericho is a great guy. He's beyond hysterical. He's good people. They're really good. Chris wanted me to throw down a solo. He sent it to me and I knocked it out.