Beck - Sea Change Review

Posted by Adam Wallis on 09.29.2002

The most un-Beck Beck album there is.

What's going on here? I thought I bought a Beck album! Where's the acoustic hip-hop? Where's the white-boy funk breakdowns? Where's the genre-hopping, the junk culture references, the homages to tropicalia?

Not on Sea Change, that's for sure.

There's a part of me that still, despite all my mental conditioning to do otherwise, sill immediately thinks "That 'Loser' song ruled! Two turntables and a microphone, baby!" whenever I hear the name 'Beck.' Even when it's in reference to Jeff Beck, which only serves to complicate matters further. But there's also a part of me that longs for the days of Odelay and Mellow Gold, when Beck was the great white hope incarnated in a skinny twentysomething hobo-by-choice Indie Rock kid. And frankly, I don't think I'm the only one, given the fact that Beck's only major commercial success came six years ago with "Where It's At." But alas, something began to change inside the young Mr. Hansen when he finally realized he could, you know, spend money during the recording process. It started out innocently enough - some funky beats and processed effects here and there on Odelay, and then getting Nigel Godrich (Radiohead's personal producer) to man the steadily-increasing-in-size boards for Mutations. Then came Midnight Vultures, an album that could by no means be considered lo-fi; it was clear that Beck had abandoned the couch-dwelling, hitchhiker-with-a-four-track persona that brought him to the dance in the first place. Not that there's anything wrong with that; it's just that maybe some of us were getting a little nostalgic for those goofy folk-hop songs that were recorded in the living rooms of his friends as a way to pass the time, that's all. And Midnight Vultures was a pretty good album, too, so all were content.

Three years later: Enter Sea Change. When I first listened to this album, my roommate walked in about halfway through the first song, "The Golden Age," and didn't ask me what was playing until about 20 minutes later. When I told him it was the new Beck album, he didn't believe me. I don't really blame him, because there's absolutely no semblance of the Beck of 1994 or 1996 to be found anywhere on this album. This is an album that owes a debt to 50's Honky-Tonk, Elliott Smith-styled Indie Pop, and British Psychedelic Folk rather than old-school Hip-Hop, Funk, and acoustic guitars. Even the man himself sounds different: "Guess I'm Doing Fine" sounds nothing like the guy that once wore a grubby wool hat in the summertime and sang the words "Soy un perdedor." Most of the songs feature Beck's full touring band, plus background arrangements. Some of his old do influences reveal themselves after repeated listens, but even then they're pushed far out of the spotlight. So what happened to that sardonic hipster doofus we came to know and love? Is this a case of Stevie Wonder-itis? Was he replaced by a pod person? What's going on?

Actually, he got dumped. Beck's longtime girlfriend left him shortly before he began recording this album, and what we're left with is an ethereal, nakedly emotional, and extremely sad album. It does wonders for this album, too - you honestly feel that Beck is in the corner, singing to you, and the sense of pity Sea Change evokes for its world-weary protagonist is remarkable. There's a dense cloud of sadness that hangs over the beautiful melodies found in this album; some of this album is very reminiscent of Nick Drake's melancholy folk.

The album begins with the song "Golden Age," in which the spacey synth and pedal steel add a great atmospheric touch to the song. "Golden Age" is immediately followed by the minimalist and yet Baroque "Paper Tiger," a much sadder take on Beck's trademark Indie-Funk stylings. Then comes "Guess I'm Doing Fine," an orchestrated but country-styled song that recalls Good Old Boys-era Randy Newman, except this song would make even Johnny Cash cry. After this, you're either fed up with the lack of music that actually sounds like Beck wrote it, or you're absolutely entranced by the music regardless of who the artist is. "Sunday Sun" is really the only song on the album that lets out the old Beck, and even then it's in short bursts of wordplay that are almost lost among the Psychedelia-inspired music that's reminiscent of the Kinks' "Tired Of Waiting For You." The song even ends in a cacophony of noisy guitar scrapes that would fit with the material on Beck's forgotten album, the schizophrenic Stereopathetic Soulmanure.

Rolling Stone called this album "Beck's Blood On The Tracks." I tend to disagree; Blood On The Tracks was Bob Dylan's return to the folk, blues, and country influences that shaped his first albums, while Beck is instead expanding his sound while abandoning most of the hallmarks of his past work. That, and Beck is perfectly willing to admit the songs are about him. And he also didn't record the entire album, and then scrap it and re-record the final version. Sea Change will probably instead go down as Beck's Tonight's The Night, for its nakedly emotional, soul-baring content and world-weary heaviness. (Tonight's The Night is a Neil Young album that was recorded after his good friend died of a herion overdose and Neil had just finished an exhausting tour, and he wasn't even sure if he wanted to continue making music. It's also one of the best rock albums ever, and you should make some sort of effort to track it down). It also resembles a more recent album, the Flaming Lips' Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots, and not just in its spacey touches. Both the Lips and Beck have probably put out their best work in the past (The Soft Bulletin and Odelay, respectively), but still continue to grow sonically though they may not achieve such heights again. Unfortunately, there's also a taboo that comes with music like this, and Beck will probably alienate a great deal of the fans that "Loser" won him (if they hadn't been turned off already) with these poignant songs and their moving backing arrangements. This isn't the kind of album that can just be thrown on because you just feel like listening to music; it demands your full attention. But the emotional impact it creates when you do far outweighs getting called a wuss by the metal kids for liking this kind of music.