Add some Brian to your day

What a pleasant surprise! There's a Brian Wilson interview in Salon today (requires sitting through Flash-based ad for peach-flavoured vodka).

There's not a lot there -- Brian's still about as bad an interview as you would have imagined -- but he does show he's still a little bugged at his old man:

Is that how you got started in music, playing the piano?
Yes, I taught myself to play the piano.
Your father didn't teach you? Wasn't he a musician?
Yeah, he was, but not a very good one. He was a bad musician. I learned nothing from him.

There's at least one completely inexplicable exchange:

Do you listen to much classical music?
Are you Jewish?
No ... Why do you ask?
Just asking! No reason.

And he's pretty confident about his current projects:

Do you think the music you're writing now is as good as "Smile" or "Pet Sounds"?
Yeah, the stuff we're doing is just as good as "Smile," and it's better than "Pet Sounds."

I'll believe that when I hear it, but any new Brian Wilson material is a blessing.