Ten years of Beck

[imomus]

There's a big celebration going on! Well, at least there is over at www.beck.com, where a three part documentary entitled Ten Years of Mellow Gold has been posted. And very interesting it is too.



The documentary is a bit weird, because all the talking heads speak about Beck in the past tense, as if he were dead. And, watching it, I have a similar feeling. I haven't bought anything by Beck since 'Midnite Vultures'.

I remember the first time I heard 'Loser'. I was in a tour van with my 'band', Neill Martin (keyboards) and James Harrison (bongos, video), driving down a very long, straight road in Finland. There were pine trees and snow. It was rather boring. We were listening to student radio, possibly from the University of Tampere. Suddenly, on came this crunky, freaky rap track with a Spanish chorus and lyrics about spraypainting vegetables and getting parking violations. I instantly knew it was something special. It did ironic breakdancing all over the van. 'That's Beck,' said James.

'Loser' took me to the same place that Richard Linklater's movie 'Slacker' had done when I'd seen it a couple of years before at the Edinburgh Film Festival. It had some sense of the 'art school primal' about it, some echo of Captain Beefheart. When I got back to London I went out and bought the EP, and then 'Mellow Gold' when it came out. These records influenced my work immediately. Tracks like 'Yokohama Chinatown' on my 1995 album 'The Philosophy of Momus' or 'The Hippy Analog Portapak Video Revolution' ('Was It Him Or His Music' compilation) are me coming to terms with Beck. And Beck's unabashedly ironic, postmodern take on folk music undoubtedly influenced my 'Folktronic' direction.

In 1995 I saw Beck at a crazy, intimate show at the Arapaho in Paris. Me and Shazna paid the scalps $50 each for tickets. Inside it was a tiny sweatbox. People were writhing about, stagediving. Beck had a hardcore band and held modified Casios above his head. It was fantastic. My watch got ripped off my wrist, and at the end of the evening there were several people like me all hunting around, and on the floor a harvest of lost watches! The next time I saw Beck live, also in Paris, I was with Kahimi Karie. It was at a much bigger venue, an elegant baroque theatre in Pigalle. Beck's show had become more theatrical but less exciting. It climaxed with an encore in which Beck wore a white suit and a white horse's head. Kahimi told me Beck was a fan of the work she and I had done together, so we went backstage and Beck, although tired, suggested we come back with him to the whiskey bar of the Hotel du Nord, where he was staying. I ended up sitting alone with him for about half an hour, just talking. We talked about Nirvana, about the Eels, about how he'd changed my work, about the meaning of pastiching black music, about Genet's play 'The Blacks', about his grandfather, and about folk music. I quoted the line from 'Pay No Mind' about giving the finger to the rock singer who's dancing on your paycheck. 'Oh, that feels like a long time ago now,' Beck said.

Next time I saw Beck was at the Kentish Town Ballroom. Things were even bigger and more theatrical. London rockistocracy was there, Primal Scream and all the usual suspects were 'big fans'. By this time I'd sampled a bit of harmonica playing off a Beck bootleg and stuck it in Kahimi Karie's 'Lolitapop Dollhouse', and Beck's management had told us to say that Beck himself had played on the record, because they'd rather Beck be seen endorsing Shibuya-kei than have attention drawn to bootlegs. I toured the US a lot in the late 90s, and each time we played LA there were rumours that Beck was coming to the shows. His management even reserved six places for a show we played at House of Blues, but Beck never showed. Every time I'd play Spaceland in Silverlake I'd meet his brother, though, and hear rumours about the new 'more aggressive', more rock Beck record that's supposed to be coming out (and has been for about four years).



Personally, I never followed Beck's 'sea change'. I don't like the production of Nigel Godrich. I don't like it when artists are rumoured to have 'got religion' (Nick Cave was outed as a Christian in a recent Salon interview, and Beck is supposedly a Scientologist). I also haven't bought any David Bowie albums since 'Earthling' because he's embraced the same rather self-sorry 'straight songwriting' and mainstream rock production values that Nick Cave and Beck have in his 'late period'. What the 'Ten Years of Mellow Gold' documentary reveals is that young Beck had something amazing about him. He was crazy way beyond the call of duty. He was tied into a network of creative people (the makers of his sleeves and videos are interviewed extensively) and they were all making do with very minimal means, cameraderie, and sheer Fluxus fuck-you attitude. Beck would walk out of the club where he was performing and keep singing the vocals through a loudhailer in the forecourt of the gas station across the road. The later Beck who sings about the woes of dating Winona Ryder is no more sympathetic than the later David Bowie moaning about life with Iman.

Irony is real and rooted and sincerity is rich and fake. Surrealism is more real than realism. Get unreal, my dear artists! Once you were so crazy and so great!

Then again, maybe I shouldn't wait for people like Beck, Bowie and Cave to 'return to form'. Maybe I should just go out and buy the new record by Ariel Pink.



'Recording at home with a guitar, bass, keyboard, and 8-track (the drum sounds are all unbelievably created with his mouth), Ariel Pink blends Lite FM and warped lo-fi pop into something beautiful and confusing, yet highly addictive. After years of recording in relative seclusion in the hills of Los Angeles, Ariel Pink (the first non-Animal Collective member on the Paw Tracks roster) makes his official Paw Tracks debut with “The Doldrums”. Originally a handmade CD-R release a couple years back, “The Doldrums” by Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti was discovered by the Animal Collective during one of their west coast tours and became an immediate favorite...'

That glitzy thrifty arty rootsy hobo spirit is still out there, still a-roaming...

Comments

[verlaine.livejournal.com]

I thought everything by Nick Cave ever was hugely informed by religiosity; I can't imagine what his work would be like if he wasn't obviously steeped in Christian upbringing.

Then again, maybe he's now finally made his peace with his religion, and that's what you find most objectionable?

[imomus.livejournal.com]

I think talent is oftentimes a lot to do with lots of contradictory things being held in a kind of dynamic tension, and fame is about the moment when the whole culture catches up with those tensions and agrees that they're important.

[freddster.livejournal.com]

i love beck's version of "everybody's gotta learn sometimes" which i heard on the "eternal sunshine of the spotless mind" soundtrack this weekend..

[twoheaded-boy.livejournal.com]

I saw Ariel Pink a couple weeks ago, and while his live show is shaky at best, he was a fascinating man to talk to (and desperate to talk to anyone). I'm absolutely, fully and completely in love with his music. I ended up interviewing him for the local arts rag and got lots of interesting details out of him. Apparently, he records non-stop and has dozens of CDrR's of his stuff available for unofficial purchase.

I highly recommend his House Arrest/Loverboy album. It's actually an improvement on the Doldrums, but loses none of the ramshackle, fucked-up flavour of the earlier release.

You can mail-order any of his CDs by sending to:

ariel rosenberg
1501 s. beverly dr. #2
los angeles ca. 90035

or email him at passingpetals@hotmail.com

I know I sound like a street-teamer, but I would really like people to hear this guy. Moreover, I really want to see what he'd do if he got enough money to record with different equipment. It might suck all the wonderfulness out, but it might also be the best thing ever.

[klasensjo.livejournal.com]

Thank you twoheaded_boy and Momus for bringing this artist to my attention. "For Kate I wait" (http://www.paw-tracks.com/arielpink.mp3) is just one of those euphoric moments of pop excellence that only comes around every 8 1/2 months. I'm vibrating still.

[(Anonymous)]

Nick, that's an unusually mealy-mouthed piece of hackism. 'I was there first and then they betrayed me': 'I liked his stuff until he went all mawkish on Voyager...'

It makes it sound like you never want to listen to anything that doesn't reflect your values. It is quite possible to enjoy a 'craftsman' like Nick Cave (who was never 'outed' as a christian) and listen to free-former like Black Dice or anyone else for that matter. Your ideas are beginning to sound very much like an orthodoxy.

[imomus.livejournal.com]

I like artists before they turn to God and Nigel Godrich. If that's an orthodoxy, burn my church down.

[(Anonymous)]

That stuff about real/fake will never make sense. If something is really sincere, it's moving; if it's ironic, you can smirk perhaps but it doesn't matter. Maybe the problem is more one of musical paedophilia?

[mcgazz.livejournal.com]

> If something is really sincere, it's moving;
So you can always tell?

[insomnia.livejournal.com]

"Irony is real and rooted and sincerity is rich and fake. Surrealism is more real than realism."

Hm... not sure this applies to everyone. U2, for instance, is far more surreal today than at their beginning, and yet they come off as annoyingly contrived.

artsy hobo

[(Anonymous)]

where does this term hobo come from actually?
I always thought it means HOmosexual BOhemian.
but then english is not my first language.

erik
rotterdam
the netherlands

Re: artsy hobo

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Etymology online (http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?l=h&p=9) says:

'hobo
1889, Western Amer.Eng., of unknown origin, perhaps related to early 19c. Eng. dial. hawbuck "lout, clumsy fellow, country bumpkin." Or from ho, boy, a workers' call on late 19c. western U.S. railroads. Hence facetious formation hobohemia "community or life of hobos," 1923 (see bohemia).'

Ho boy does sound kinda gay...

[(Anonymous)]

Well, I see a slightly sour-grapes message here, which is that a limited amount of success - just enough to keep one going in a lean, mean kind of way - is good, whereas too much of it turns you into a bore.

The real/fake binary is in danger of becoming the key rockist convention of the Momus genre (membership: 1)!

I think you're wrong to see the rockism as a proxy for platonism. If you asked Cave why he now prefers unironic to ironic guitar-playing, he'd probably talk about tradition, rather than one being more real than the other. Tradition and authenticity aren't the same thing - you can prefer the traditional without getting into an ontological debate about your preference. Ultimately, rockists aren't crypto-platonists, metaphysicists or apologists for Judeo-Christian ideology. They are, more simply, conservatives. And all that means is a stronger-than-average adherence to the conventions of a genre. Not only might such conservatism not always be a bad thing, it might be a necessary thing. After all, if everyone were ironic, all the time, then everything would end up totally unironic.

[imomus.livejournal.com]

I take your point that tradition and authenticity aren't the same thing. Nick Cave, explaining the jettisoning of Blixa (an artist I like a lot, by the way, to this day, and an artist who will never 'get God' or call on Nigel Godrich), used the word 'real', but to qualify a love of tradition rather than to claim authenticity:

'We were moving towards something that was less ironic in nature, and he was very much about playing the guitar in a non-guitar way. You know, that I have this sort of foreign instrument in my hands, and I'll make the best of it that I can. Whereas, if, in a way, Warren has replaced Blixa to a degree, and filled that hole, Warren doesn't play music in that way. He plays it in the opposite way, without any irony, and with a real love of rock 'n' roll and noise.'

But I'd argue that Blixa was also playing in a tradition, the non-player tradition that includes 'non-musician musicians' like Brian Eno, Arto Lindsay, John Cage, Lamonte Young, and lots of punk rockers. It's a more arty tradition. It draws on art school rather than music school. It celebrates artifice.

I do think these musicians in the 'non-music' tradition have been less likely to be Platonists and theists. Perhaps they're the kind of person who finds shadows cast on the wall of a cave just as real as the sun. In other words, people in love with culture and artifice and irony as much as nature and cosmic order and sincerity.



The 'non-musicians' are people keen to tamper and innovate rather than accept and worship. The music of the future is going to sound like the 'jarring' and artificial sounds they make. Then again, music does require some tautology, and some reference to its past, to signify and to move people, and I don't advocate the immediate and total destruction of that. I just think it's a siren song that audiences are all too willing to listen to, and artists all too willing to supply. And it leads to dull, conservative, formulaic records that are emotionally manipulative and artistically dead, like a Hollywood score by John Williams.

[loveskull.livejournal.com]

everyone always bitches about the sell out.
they either sell out, get religious, or just regurgitate their old shit for newer generations of listeners.
all i can say is.. GET IGGY.
he's started sold out, and then made a hole career out of being sold out.

From MTV to VH1

[(Anonymous)]

I remember Beck's first appearance on television with Thurston Moore on 120 Minutes. He would not answer questions but would just throw his shoe and playback crazy stuff on a pocket dictaphone.

I turned on the television two years later, and he was talking seriously about "The Year in Music" on VH1.

Re: From MTV to VH1

[(Anonymous)]

Hahah Beck is a funny case. Cos if you like Beck for real, if you like his crazy 4-track tapes and folk albums and all that, you know for a fact that old Beck was good Beck and it all went downhill after he started messing about with lounge.

Then again, isn't that a very backwards/rockist way of looking at things? With Beck the lines are blurred cos he appears to mean more now than he used to, yet the general consensus among 'real Beck fans' is that he means less.

[(Anonymous)]

I love "Sea change" more than I do the ironic-post-moderm-thing. The violins are so intense sometimes!

http://beautifulposes.blogspot.com

[imomus.livejournal.com]

I heard those violins. Yes, they were intense -- intensely reminiscent of the string arrangements on 'L'Histoire de Melody Nelson' by Serge Gainsbourg! A bit too reminiscent. And used in a less complex way than Gainsbourg originally used them (as beautiful decorations around a somewhat ambiguous tale of fatal seduction).

Mythology 101: End-of-the-book Questions for Further Study

[xyzedd.livejournal.com]

Which is more real: the history or the myth?
Which is more interesting: the history or the myth?
And which column should Art steal from? Both? Neither? Should Art be arrested for stealing?

True or false:
The myth of Beck is realer than the "real" Beck.
If the above is true, the Beck of myth is better than the real "Beck".
Momus's "Toothbrushhead" is more like the myth of Beck's"Mellow Gold" than the real "Mellow Gold."

If the last statement above is true, is "Toothbrushhead" more interesting/better than "Mellow Gold"?
Does "interesting" equal "better"?
Is "better" more "real"?

Is Beck more a myth than a man?
Is Momus more a man than a myth?
Which is god and which is good?

"Excuse me, isn't God just an exceptionally well-advertised meme?"
(Sorry--off topic! Back to your book, class!)

[transient-poet.livejournal.com]

Fantastic piece.

Your words are always inspiring, I enjoy immensely.

[cheetofish.livejournal.com]

Since my name is Ariel, I must check this out.

ariel pink

[thegroupie.livejournal.com]

ariel pink is my buddy so i have to leave props. he is one of the 2 or 3 truly interesting people i have met in the course of a year in los angeles. though, i don't really know what to say other than "listen to the record and see if you like it."

[subbes]

Beck became less 'indie' the moment he appeared on Futurama, alerting millions of 'geeks' to his presence. They all promptly downloaded his songs from the internet, listened twice, and forgot all about it.
Now he's in that liminal space between 'indie,' 'cool,' and 'wait, who?' I'm not quite sure where the irony is in that, except maybe as some postmodern comment on consumer culture and the power of buying versus downloading.

[warhooligan.livejournal.com]

thanks for putting it into words so I know Im not the only one to feel that way. Its always hard to watch someone go from fluxus-fuck-you-mentality-wild-and-crazy-guy to polished, machines, well-oiled monster. Not that he's a monster. yet.

[turkishb.livejournal.com]

Have you run into this? http://www.kempa.com/blog/archives/000716.html

The curse of fame

[(Anonymous)]

Beck lost something, but for me that was more to do with the songwriting than the delivery. Creativity doesn't have to be permanently heated up, nothing wrong with cooling down for a bit, and better than trying to harness a burst of energy you don't have, I guess. Parts of Midnight Vultures felt a little like this, although I like it. Dunno what he expected to happen once he became famous, but he has sounded a little crestfallen ever since! Regardless of sincerity, can you ever fake that delirious curiousity once you've crossed that bridge?

Bonnie "Prince" Billy vs. Beck

[(Anonymous)]

Nick, what do you think of Bonnie "Prince" Billy's work? Harmony Korine just directed his most recent video, and it seemed very up your alley re: what you've just said.

On Bowie:

[nedbalthus.livejournal.com]

Ugh. Wasn't Outside a huge red herring? A tease. It was so exciting, such a sign that Bowie was back in form, even if it was sort of, erm, 'industrial.' Then ... nothing. A series of albums only slightly better than his 1980s drivel. Frustrating.

Future tension

[(Anonymous)]

Beck certainly changed Momus in a positive way. However, I never quite took to his mixing of blues and surrealism, although I am grateful for the effect he had on Momus and that eclecticism then being filtered through a British perspective ( in a chinese whispers kind of way). "The Hippy Analog Portapak Video Revolution" is superb, especially for someone who was an art student that used a portapak).

Most of the artists I like are non-musicians or musicians with a progressive 'art-school' approach. Momus is a not a non-musician but one someone who is keen to unlearn musical conventions and take them into uncharted territory. I need an intellectual stimulus in the music I listen to. Convention bores me and I don't really have any"classic" artists in my collection ( ie Elvis, Beatles etc ). I am always seeking out the contemporary, and the cutting edge artists who have some kind of tension or experiment in their work. It keeps it fresh and maybe moves things closer to a post-post-modern. Franz Ferdinand are 20 years to late as far as I am concerned and are therefore past-tense.

In the case of Beck the art has been subsumed perhaps by wanting to crossover into the mainstream which might be a record company pressure, or more likely a wish to become 'real'. It's always disappointing when artists start using a safety net when walking the tightrope, or just get rid of the rope and art completely. "Summerisle" and "Otto" are proof that this is extremely unlikely to happen here. Keep it unreal.

Richard G

[(Anonymous)]

Its definately refreshing to take a left turn and surprise even yourself (Momus to form balls-out pro-Bush metal combo called Budweiser?) whether it's the next logical step in a post-pre-post-premodern sequence or not; find out why you do things after the fact.

Saturday night vs. Sunday morning

[lord-whimsy.livejournal.com]

The Make-Up used irony, politics and religiosity in a sincerely insincere way, which I've always found very entertaining. Ian's diatribes on the sacred (gospel) versus the profane (blues) always contained an internal logic, and his other treatises contain a sort of ludic insight. I've always derived a great deaql of pleasure out of his constructions; here we seem to have a gent who was a believer playing a non-believer playing a believer. Naturally, I found that quite inspiring.

My Beck pick: Stereopathetic Soulmanure.

W

Re: Saturday night vs. Sunday morning

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Yeah, the Make Up were very much 'art school primal' when I saw them live at the Wag Club. Later I met Ian at an Index magazine party, and what a gent he was, much more dry and academic than anyone who'd seen his show would have any right to expect.

[dorothy-parka.livejournal.com]

Slacker and Beck gave people a pop cultural reference point for folk like me, the over-intellectual bullshitters who masked sincerity with ironic shout-outs to the lie of what the american dream was supposed to be. I always felt like we were the outcasts pointing out the lack of clothes on the emperor, in an air-quote-y way and while dropping names like lacan, lyotard, and def leppard. we had our brief shining moment, we griped that we were being marketed to, and co-opted by mad ave, and then we were dropped for kids who listened to britney! i am still bitter. but i still get that topsy-turvy feeling in my gut when i hear the opening notes of "loser."

he kinda lost me at "sea change," but we all move on.

pastche

[tump.livejournal.com]

I reached a personal epiphany regarding Beck when I first heard "Tropicalia." Here we have a black musical movement of not-too-distant memory that actually went to the front lines against a military dictatorship. Songwriters were actually thrown in jail.

I heard the track as Beck, comfortably living in the US, delivering a phoned-in spit-in-the-face that trivializes what Tropicalia really was, helping USAn listeners to dismiss it. (I've had similar reactions to other white takes on black music, but in this case the political element was way too cruel.)

Causes me to wonder what he said about "the meaning of pastiching black music."