The dilemma facing the Beach Boys today is created simply by their audience's expectations. Those who throng to their concerts do so in anticipation of swooning to "Surfer Girl" and bopping to "Fun, Fun, Fun", and would be mightily put out were these demands denied.

On the other hand, critics and old-time aficionados approach each new album with an equally understandable lust for the exploratory daring enshrined in the likes of "Wendy", "Caroline No", "Wind Chimes" and "Surf's Up".

"15 Big Ones", the 1976 album which featured Brian Wilson's first wholehearted studio participation in several years, suffered a cruel backlash from the latter camp, whose members refuse to acknowledge that although former heights may one day be scaled and even surpassed, now is not the time.

"Pet Sounds" and "Smile" were conceived in an era (immediately after Kennedy) conducive to experimentation; by contrast, the post-Nixon age encourages the flippant, the...