It was hard (so tough) to be a Beach Boy in the early 1970s. Shunned by the cognoscenti as musical Methuselahs, the greatest beards in all of rock watched their albums languish in stores. The members themselves felt stifled by the business and that warm California sun, so in the summer of 1972 they relocated to Amsterdam hoping to find inspiration as they recorded their next LP. They were joined by Blondie Chaplin and Ricky Fataar of The Flames, and band Svengali Brian Wilson, who arrived after only three attempts to coax him onto a plane. This act of creative cleansing turned into an eight-month ordeal, capped by then-label Warner Bros.’ dismissal of the finished release as weak. In retrospect, perhaps that’s a tad harsh. The aspects may not have been right, but as “Funky Pretty” proves, there were gems amid Holland’s gloomy murk.

Recommended by: Cory Frye