Beach Boys singer Brian Wilson dies aged 82, family announces
In a post shared on Instagram on Wednesday (June 11), Wilson's family wrote: 'We are heartbroken to announce that our beloved father Brian Wilson has passed away.
"We are at a loss for words right now. Please respect our privacy at this time as our family is grieving. We realize that we are sharing our grief with the world. Love & Mercy.'
Wilson was considered to be the leading creative force behind the Beach Boys crafting "a variously carefree and melancholy sound", according to The Guardian.
A post shared by Brian Wilson (@brianwilsonlive)
He utilised "ambitious studio techniques" to give the band's music a "thrilling grandeur".
They added: "His songs about surfing, driving, girls and the pep of youth modulated to more reflective and often psychedelic material, resulting in one of the most highly regarded catalogues of American song."
The band's 1966 album Pet Sounds, written and produced almost entirely by Wilson, is seen as one of the best albums ever made.
Wilson was born in Inglewood, southern California, in 1942, and fell in love with R&B, rock'n'roll, doo-wop and pop along with his brothers Carl and Dennis.
Despite going partly deaf in one ear, he and Carl joined their cousin Mike Love to form the high school group Carl and the Passions.
They later brought in Dennis and friend Al Jardine to form the Pendletones.
Brian Wilson, Beach Boys Co-Founder and Architect of Pop, Dead at 82
More on his life and legacy: https://t.co/54KHwb4PJL pic.twitter.com/mrbjplteVx
Wilson's first song for the group, soon renamed the Beach Boys, was 1961's Surfin' – the first in a series of Wilson-penned hits such as Surfin' Safari, Surfer Girl and Surfin' USA.
The Guardian adds: "Wilson graduated to producer, as well as songwriter, for third album Surfer Girl, and powered the group through an astonishingly high work rate, releasing 15 albums before the end of the 1960s."
Wilson suffered with psychiatric issues, alcoholism and drug abuse in his career, ceding control of the Beach Boys to his bandmates in the late 1960s.
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He began to recover in the 1980s and released his self-titled debut solo album in 1988.
He continued to tour and release occasional solo albums, and eventually reunited with the Beach Boys in 2011 for a tour and the album That's Why God Made the Radio.
Last year saw Wilson placed in conservatorship when his family and close friends cited that the icon could no longer care for himself following a dementia diagnosis.
This came after the death of Wilson's wife and longtime manager Melinda Ledbetter Wilson, who had been acting as his caregiver and taking care of his needs after a decline in his health.
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