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Los Angeles (November 13, 1997) – As the Beach Boys’ long-awaited Pet Sounds Box Set was released on Capitol/EMI Records last week and the 20th anniversary of The Who’s drummer Keith Moon’s death approaches, Bruce Johnston of The Beach Boys has released from his personal archive, this never published photo of he and Moon in London. The frame of the duo was shot outside of Rediffusion Studios in May 1966, as they arrived for a walk-on on the famed television show “Ready, Steady, Go,” (considered The American Bandstand of the UK).

Good rock and roll stories never die; this one portends that the Beatles were inspired to create their Sgt. Pepper’s album after hearing The Beach Boys’ Pet Sounds. That fateful meeting was inadvertently orchestrated by Keith Moon in London on the day this photo was shot.

That month, the original recording of Pet Sounds had just been released in the United States. Without foreign distribution of the album, one of the cuts, “Sloop John B” topped the music charts in the UK. During a break from their U.S. tour, Beach Boy (then 23 year old bassist/vocalist) Bruce Johnston, flew to England with a few copies of Pet Sounds under his arm to see if he could light a bigger Beach Boys bon fire in England. The idea was to inspire the record company to spring for foreign distribution. During his stay, Johnston received a phone call from Keith Moon. Just nineteen at the time, Moon professed himself an avid fan of surf music and confessed to tracking down Johnston to hear the new album. The two agreed to meet at the Waldorf Hotel in Aldwych. When Moon showed up, he had John Lennon and Paul McCartney in tow. According to Johnston, they spent the entire evening together playing cards and listening to the album over and over again. Before parting in the “wee hours of the morning,” Johnston had Lennon and McCartney autograph the deck of cards, a momento he still has in his possession.

“There I was with Brian’s masterpiece (with my squeaky voice on the tracks) and Lennon and McCartney were just eating it up. They were absolutely amazed. It was a pretty memorable moment,” remarks Johnston. “You know the old saying about shooting the messenger? Well, when I got home, I became the messenger that was coronated instead.”
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