Brian Wilson turned 70 yesterday, but he's busier than ever. He's currently zig-zagging across the country on the reunited Beach Boys' world tour, and the band just released their first album in two decades. So how does Wilson feel about turning 70?
"Are you kidding?" he tells Rolling Stone. "I feel great! I don't think I look or act 70. I feel more like I'm in my mid-forties."
Wilson celebrated with a party backstage during a tour stop at Montreal's Bell Centre, where he was gifted with a cake resembling the album cover to the Beach Boys' new LP, That's Why God Made The Radio. As the audience broke into "Happy Birthday," balloons sent by Wilson's wife surrounded him onstage. Earlier that day, Wilson received a call from his old buddy Paul McCartney, who celebrated his own 70th birthday two days earlier. "[Paul] said, 'Happy birthday, friend!" Wilson says. "I said, 'Happy birthday to you, Paul.' He told me he was headed into Abbey Road. I told him we were on our way to Montreal. I think he said something like, 'Can you believe we made it this far?' It was very pleasant and sweet.'
McCartney once said that the Beach Boys' "God Only Knows" is his favorite song of all time. "It's very deep, very emotional, always a bit of a choker for me, that one," he said.
The Beach Boys will tour the U.S. through mid-July – they hit New York's Jones Beach on Sunday – before heading overseas, then wrapping on September 28th in London. "It's been getting better as it goes along," Wilson says. "We needed a lot of practice!"
