Tony Asher
Anthony D. Asher is an American songwriter and advertising copywriter who is notable for his collaborations with Brian Wilson and Roger Nichols in the 1960s. Asher co-wrote eight songs on the Beach Boys' 1966 album Pet Sounds, including the singles "God Only Knows", "Wouldn't It Be Nice", and "Caroline, No". According to Asher, he mainly served as a lyricist for Wilson's songs, but in some cases also contributed musical ideas. Asher also composed jingles, such as Mattel's slogan "You can tell it's Mattel—it's swell!", and contributed songs to The Partridge Family.
Background
Tony Asher was born in London on May 2, 1939, to American actress Laura La Plante and film producer Irving Asher. He relocated to Los Angeles with his mother before the age of six months, while his father remained in England during World War II as a member of the U.S. Army. As a child, he played piano and began composing.He earned a degree in journalism from UCLA and worked at the Carson/Roberts/Inc. advertising agency, where he created the slogan "You can tell it's Mattel—it's swell!" for Mattel; its success led to additional work writing advertisements and jingles for Barbie and Chatty Cathy dolls. Among his colleagues at the firm were Terry Gilliam and Joel Siegel. He also collaborated on songwriting with Van Dyke Parks.
''Pet Sounds''
According to most sources, Asher met Brian Wilson while recording at United Western Recorders in 1965. At the time, Asher was a 26-year-old copywriter working on advertising jingles who regarded the Beach Boys as distinct from other artists, having released a sequence of hits where "you wouldn't even know, necessarily, that it was gonna be a Beach Boys record from the first bar or something." Although a fan, he stated: "I didn't own any of their albums. I had Bill Evans albums."Asher recounted that he was working on music or voice-overs for a commercial when he learned that the Beach Boys were in another studio. During a break, he and others lingered in the hallway before entering the booth, where Wilson was alone in the studio. This encounter led to their meeting. Seeking a departure from the band's established themes of surfing and cars, and opting not to work with his previous songwriting partners, Wilson contacted Asher around December 1965. Within ten days, the two began writing the majority of the material that would appear on Pet Sounds.
Wilson and Asher collaborated for about three weeks. Asher contributed minimally to the music itself, primarily serving as a second opinion while Wilson developed melodies and chord progressions. The two traded ideas as the songs evolved. He later characterized the process as "writing an autobiography", though he "wouldn't limit it to Brian's autobiography." Asher contended that his most significant musical contributions were to "I Just Wasn't Made for These Times", "Caroline, No", and "That's Not Me". He stated that he conceived the title and subject matter for three of their eight songs. Regarding royalties, Asher accepted a 25 percent share of the publishing, which he felt undervalued his input; he described the deal as "a screw", but added, "Until you consider that I was a nothing who had never done shit, and I had a chance to write with a guy who had something like nine million-selling records in a row. Well, then it doesn't seem so bad."
In later years, Asher described his time with Wilson and the bandmates as an "embarrassing" experience. He later called Wilson a "genius musician but an amateur human being". Referencing this remark in a 2013 interview, Asher said that he "didn't mean that in the way it came out", explaining, "We all have areas of things we're good at and things we're not so good at, but his is so zeroed-in on music."
After their songs were completed, Asher visited a few of the recording sessions, most of which were string overdub dates. He did not have a favorable reaction when he learned of the album's title, recalling that Wilson showed him zoo-themed photo proofs and mentioned the title Pet Sounds, which Asher felt "trivialized what we had accomplished", though he acknowledged that many of Wilson's unconventional ideas had proven effective. Asher was not invited to contribute to another Beach Boys album; he stated that he was unsurprised, citing the perception that Pet Sounds had been a commercial failure and that other band members had opposed Wilson's decision to collaborate with him. Mike Love said that he thought "Asher's lyrics were great. I found no fault whatsoever with his lyrical contributions."