BECK’S NEW CD MODERN GUILT
BECK’S brand new CD MODERN GUILT was released yesterday, July 8, on his 38th birthday.
EW has a largely positive review.
To take a look, please go here
BECK’S brand new CD MODERN GUILT was released yesterday, July 8, on his 38th birthday.
EW has a largely positive review.
To take a look, please go here
July 10, 2008 at 5:19 am
Thought I could come here for a little Beck love.
I’m still processing it on early listens. My immediate impression is that the songs sound somewhat more similar than I would have expected, but I’ll give it a number of spins to find the little quirks and gems in each. Sometimes it takes the fifth listen to a song before you’re blown away.
July 10, 2008 at 10:11 am
Oh, you most assuredly can, good sir. CP is the ultimate place for BECK love. 24/7…
I’m going to pick up MODERN GUILT myself within the next few days. Most critics are digging it to a degree but some are saying that it’s not a big departure from anything that he’s done previously and that our boy may finally have run short of his bag of tricks.
NONSENSE….
He’s a bloody genius and, unlike most people, I don’t overuse that word.
I do concur with you about needing time for a CD to settle in. It does take time. Sometimes a considerable sit.
Just to give you an example, I watched the first couple eps of Gossip Girl when they first aired. I liked the show to a degree but I knew – then and there – that it would never be something that I would prioritize my schedule around so I just quit on it. During one scene, I heard a song playing and immediately fell in love with it. Knew (from that moment) that I had to find out what it was and purchase the damn CD. No matter what.
Guess what it was? (I’m dying laughing as I type this.) It was BACK TO BLACK by AMY WINEHOUSE. I’d had that CD for months on end and loved it passionately. But that song had never hit me in quite that way before.
That’s an extreme example but similar things happen consistently when you’re dealing with new music. You may adore a CD but you don’t dig it in all in the same way. There are different songs all over the map. It all goes in stages.
But, as always, lovely to discuss music with someone who genuinely knows it and appreciates it, Danny.
Especially another BECK aficionado…
July 10, 2008 at 4:18 pm
I’m a big fan of Mutations — it was perfect music for when I lived in Texas. And Sea Change is great, although pretty heavy. Good break-up music, yes?
July 10, 2008 at 10:16 pm
Hmmm…
I didn’t even know that you liked BECK, Christian. I’ve talked about him to you. But you’ve never discussed him with me.
I guess you really want an honest opinion…?
All right. I’ll try to keep it clean for the kids.
MUTATIONS I adore. (That’s #2. ODELAY is #1. MIDNITE VULTURES is #3.)
But Sea Change…not so much.
I know that BECK came up with SC as he was working through the emotional upheaval that he had after separating from Leigh Limon. He was with her for close to ten years. They lived together but they never married. I own it but I was never really able to get into it. I don’t think I’ve pulled it out and played anything from it since the day I first listened to it. It has no real resonance for me.
So is it good break up music…? I’m sure it is for some individuals. But I don’t wallow or get that upset over people. Not like I did when I was a teenager. I’m a grown woman now and I’ve been having relationships for over ten years.
There’s been A LOT of water under the bridge. I’ve weathered lots of disappointments. When it gets to a particular point (and that’s very different in each individual case), I walk. I can name on the fingers of one hand the guys that have left me – and they all wanted to come back. So I’m the one that goes. ALWAYS.
But I’m a realist about all this. Always have been. There is no “one true love”. That’s a fairy tale. Depending on the sort of people you go for – the characteristics and qualities you dig, the physicality that turns you on – most of us will meet MANY individuals in the course of our lifetimes that we could be happy with long term.
It’s important to me while it’s going on but it’s surprising how fast it can fade. My life doesn’t stand or fall on whether I have a romantic relationship, whether I’m dating more than one guy or whether I’m by myself. Plus I have a short attention span. There’s always a lot that I have to do and so much running through my mind.
I’ve never worried about it anyway. Not to be shallow. But I DO look a certain way, have a particular type of sex appeal, am reasonably witty, stylish, intelligent and a decent human being.
So if someone lets me down or doesn’t come through for me, well…
I hate to say there will always be another boy. (Some time. Somewhere.)
BUT there’s always another boy….
July 11, 2008 at 2:35 pm
Can I join the cool Beck Loving club? You realize Miranda we’re in the minority for liking Midnite Vultures? Loved Sea Change too. I haven’t had a breakup in ages, but I dug the melancholy mood.
How have his CDs been since then? I don’t have any of them.
I’ve been slacking on the new music front lately. I’d say the last year. It’s been all movie all the time, though I have been listening to a lot of my old stuff lately. Recently went through a Beatles kick. Before that it was The Kinks.
July 11, 2008 at 5:36 pm
Well, nice to see you back again, my lovely little crabcake….
You can certainly join this ultracool BECK loving club. Any time anywhere. But I wasn’t even aware that you liked him. Danny and I have some similarities in our musical tastes. So that didn’t surprise me.
BUT I DIDN’T HAVE A CLUE ABOUT YOU, Craig honey. Or Christian…
I guess we’ve never talked about BECK then. So I never told you my BECK story? OK. When I e-mail you later on tonight/this morning you’ll get all the details. Christian’s known for a while.
Are we really in the minority for liking MIDNITE VULTURES??? I mean, SEXX LAWS is audacious (a banjo solo?), NICOTINE AND GRAVY rocks in a hot and dirty way.
AND DEBRA….
Whenever I hear DEBRA I don’t know whether to laugh for five minutes straight or lay in the bathtub for hours. The hipster slut in the song is typical of a lot of dudes that think they’re too cool for school. In reality, they’re just horny jackasses. I think guys like that should just drill a hole in the wall and…or find a clothespeg and put it, well, you know…
It’s very, VERY rare that these walking hormone cases ever make passes at me. THEY KNOW BETTER. But every once in a while I’ll catch one on the slow end. They’re in for the ride of their lives. Only it won’t be the kind of ride they were looking for. Once I’ve finished wiping the floor with them, they won’t ever have the nerve to even speak to a decent woman again for YEARS.
GAME. SET. MATCH.
Sleazeballs….
Since Sea Change, BECK’S put out GUERO and THE INFORMATION. BECK grew up in a part of LA that had a large Mexican population. So that greatly influenced GUERO. TI has a lot of techno and loops on it. They’re both solid efforts. I liked them more than Sea Change, which was simply him confronting his pain. Very personal exploration of romantic grief. But I couldn’t get into it. I just found it sad, dreamy and unfocused.
Everything that BECK does is at a particular level of excellence. But I don’t personally think that Sea Change is one of his best efforts.
He’s also remastered and reworked some of his CDs. I know GUERO got a new treatment shortly after the first one debuted. Lately there’s a new version of ODELAY. He’s just experimenting with different sounds, fresh backing tracks etc. If I were a teenager, then I’d likely buy them all and follow him anywhere.
But I’m a seen it all, done it all, jaded sophisticate. If my precious boy MR. HANSEN all ready has a definitive collection of these songs out there in the marketplace then I don’t need another. But that’s just me….
Well, I’ve adored THE BEATLES and THE KINKS since I learned how to breathe, my darling man. Once you’re in, there’s no getting out. Both those bands are iconic for a reason. They are the best that rock & roll has ever offered.
They’ll be saying that a hundred years from now as well.
But I am exceptionally happy that you have returned, my knight in shining armour. I miss your ideas and marvelous POVs.
Thanks for visiting, Craig…
July 12, 2008 at 12:21 pm
Really funny about Back in Black!
Craig, we’re in two different places. I missed SC and MV but loved Guero and The Information.
New one is growing on me. Dang it’s short, though – only like 30 minutes.
Debra is an awesome song for karaoke…
July 13, 2008 at 2:38 am
DEBRA is an awesome song for karaoke…?
Oh my lord. You must be a thoroughly accomplished singer, Danny. Those high notes are a bitch.
Knowing you as I do, I think you would LOVE MV. It’s got a real funky vibe to it.
Just picked up MODERN GUILT yesterday. But now I’m buried under a bloody stack of CDs. I have to finish that large scale writing project I was working on so I can dig into these. I picked up that, THE RHEOSTATICS and a HELEN REDDY compilation. I hate the 70s. I’m glad I wasn’t born yet. But HELEN was the bomb…
I am in heaven. YOU & ME AGAINST THE WORLD. I DON’T KNOW HOW TO LOVE HIM.
I AM WOMAN. HEAR ME ROAR.
Hell yeah….
July 15, 2008 at 12:08 pm
Daniel, we’ll both have to make a point of filling in our respective Beck gaps. Weird how things work out that way. My excuse is that I’ve been so focused on movies lately, I haven’t been paying too much attention to music even from my favored acts.
Miranda, my impression has always been that MV is his least highly rated work, at least as far as critical consensus goes….but then what do critics know?
July 16, 2008 at 12:46 am
I never heard that about MV, Craig.
As far as critics go. there will always be some that not only write beautifully but have some specific ideas about media and/or the arts that are truly intelligent.
I do suspect that those individuals will always be in the minority, though.
Lots of them haven’t got a fricking clue. What do they pay those people for?