(Credits: Far Out / Alamy)
Tue 2 September 2025 19:30, UK
Like most of his peers, Graham Nash believes in the value of artistic integrity. If someone has commercial success in mind, there’s just no use in it at all.
When Far Out spoke to Nash back in June, never had this been clearer. But what was even more eye-opening than that simple fact was the person he first learned it from.
In the 1960s, Nash already had a good grasp on what made good music, before even the formation of CSNY. These lessons came together as part of The Hollies, alongside the usual studious efforts most were susceptible to at the time as musicians finding their way beside the global force that was The Beatles.
But more than that, Nash became charmed by the sheer force of musical excellence that was Brian Wilson, and how his songs often seemed so simple in melody, arrangements and even themes, but which struck a chord and earned an immediate shelf life. “Brian Wilson is a genius,” Nash once said, praising ‘God Only Knows’ as one of the “best songs ever written.”
When Far Out approached the subject of Wilson shortly after his death back in June, Nash reiterated his undying love, revealing that he was the person who taught him his most valuable lesson when it came to making an album. “One of the things I’ve learned from Brian, of course, was that an album should be a journey,” he said. “You realise that it has to be a musical journey, and I think that affected people like The Beatles a great deal with Revolver and particularly Sgt Pepper.”
This joins a long list of previous endorsements from Nash, including another when he said there was truly nobody like him because of his “unique” voice and unparalleled talent with arrangements. Specifically, he said it was his ability to “communicate on every level” that makes him so great. With feelings, thoughts, emotions – Wilson was someone who could do all of it with every piece of an arrangement in such an effortless way.
Of course, Nash isn’t special in his appreciation, as Wilson has also been commended by massive names like Paul McCartney, most of them also agreeing that ‘God Only Knows’ is one of (if not the) best songs ever made. For people like them, it introduced a new way of telling a story, one that didn’t immediately hinge on the familiar features of the British Invasion to pull it off.
But what’s perhaps the most interesting thing about the love the greats have for Wilson, The Beach Boys and specifically Pet Sounds is that it all reaches another level. It’s untouchable. And yet so completely inexplicably effortless. Like McCartney once said, its magic just is. And until you’ve come across it and you get it, you don’t really get music.
In his words, “I figure no one is educated musically ’til they’ve heard Pet Sounds.”
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