The best track on In My Head (1999), the third solo album by Chicago singer/keyboardist Robert Lamm, was Watching the Time Go By, a song on which he was joined by Gerry Beckley of America (who wrote it) and Carl Wilson of the Beach Boys. The tune suggested a potential partnership by these three rock veterans that comes to fruition on Like a Brother. The teaming frees the performers to explore unusually personal topics; the songs are full of reminiscences and reflections on past experiences that give way to observations on the present characterized by determination and benevolence. Beckley's Watching the Time (a new version of Watching the Time Go By) and Lamm's Life in Motion both look back on youthful illusions in the light of later wisdom. But it is Wilson who has a disproportionate presence on the record, with four co-compositions (to Lamm and Beckley's two each) and five lead vocals (to Beckley's three and Lamm's two). This is far and away Wilson's best non-Beach Boys work, and some of the best work of his career. His songs are full of a sense of a generous love, the kind one feels for family rather than a romantic partner. I Wish for You might be written for a child, while They're Only Words warns that love must be acted on, not just spoken about. The album's most striking song is Like a Brother, Wilson's tribute to his brother Brian, in which he discusses the oddity of earning applause every night for performing music written by his usually absent sibling. Like a Brother deserves a place in any Beach Boys fan's collection.

1		Today
2		Feel the Spirit
3		I Wish for You
4		Run Don't Walk
5		Watching the Time
6		Life In Motion
7		Sheltering Sky
8		They're Only Words
9		Without Her
10		Like a Brother
11		Standing At Your Door
12		Blue After All
13		In the Dark