Brian Wilson

Born in California in 1942, Brian Wilson formed the Beach Boys in 1961 and had a long string of hit singles and albums, helping to establish the "California sound" along the way. By the mid-60s, however, Wilson looked to move beyond the cheery, simple, teen-based formula that characterized much of the Beach Boys' early music. The result was 1966's Pet Sounds, which is ranked by many as one of the greatest albums of all time. But at the peak of his creative powers, substance abuse and mental illness took their toll on Wilson, who lived in seclusion for much of the next 25 years. After breaking free from psychologist Eugene Landy, who exerted an excessive amount of control over Wilson's life during the 1980s, Wilson revived his career and released several solo albums in the 1990s. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1988, remarried in 1995, and was honored by the Kennedy Center in 2007 for lifetime contribution to the performing arts. Since that time, he has continued to tour and record albums and was also the subject of the 2014 biopic Love & Mercy.