I agree with Rachel Aroesti that Brian Wilson was a gift to humanity, and I love his music (Brian Wilson was a musical genius. Are there any left?, 14 June). But musical genius should not be equated with mainstream success – music exists to be appreciated by whomever it reaches. And I could name many lesser-known musicians who still push the boundaries of sound: Anna Meredith’s marrying of electronic and classical springs to mind, for example, or Anna B Savage’s mix of intimate pop vocals with soaring folk arrangements.
Beyond that, Aroesti seems to be working from a very narrow frame of cultural reference. Her article says Wilson was “lyrically radical” in transforming pop into an “emotional autobiography”, in the words of Wilson’s biographer David Leaf. What about French chansons that dominated Europe in the 1940s and 1950s and brought autobiographical lyrics into the mainstream?
