This review is being rewritten at the moment, and will reappear when I'm happy with it. I'm currently rewriting all of my old reviews to make them better and more in line with 'proper' reviews like you see on the liks of Pitchfork or Stylus, and naturally that's going to take a bit of work. ... Read review
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The Information - Beck
Old-school Beck fans rejoice - The Information finds Beck Hansen in goofy mood for the
... more
first time since Midnite Vultures, chucking out inspired wisecracks and surrealist couplets like the sombre, acoustic-tinged moods of 2002's Sea Change never happene...
The Information -
Old-school Beck fans rejoice -The Informationfinds Beck Hansen in goofy mood for the first
... more
time sinceMidnite Vultures, chucking out inspired wisecracks and surrealist couplets like the sombre, acoustic-tinged moods of 2002'sSea Changenever happened. Pr...
The Information - Beck
Old-school Beck fans rejoice - The Information finds Beck Hansen in goofy mood for the
... more
first time since Midnite Vultures, chucking out inspired wisecracks and surrealist couplets like the sombre, acoustic-tinged moods of 2002's Sea Change never happened. Produced by sometime Beck collaborator Nigel Godrich, last seen working on Thom Yorke's The Eraser, The Information is a strange mix of bluesy Americana rootsiness, wonky hip-hop beats and cosmic synthesiser, all wound together in accordance with Beck's fried, futuristic, utterly individual vision. Most importantly, it's enjoyable and instantly accessible. The opening "Elevator Music" recalls the free-wheeling spirit of "Where It's At", all rolling beats, clacking Tropicalia scraper and distant melodica, while the excellent "Cellphone's Dead" imagines "Voodoo curses, Bible tongues/Voices coming from the mangled lungs" atop a track that veers between squelchy hip hop and Screamadelica-style acoustic strum. And sure, it gets weird - see the broiling, funky cyberpunk narrative "1000 BPM" ("Telemarketing people with cellular headsets on their skulls/Selling you wisdom from a plexiglass prism,") or the 12-minute finale "Horrible Fanfare/Landslide/Exoskeleton", which ends with a hushed conversation about travelling into space, possibly born of Beck's membership of Hollywood celeb-religion Scientology - but the out-there moments bookend some of Beck's finest, funnest material in years. If you lost him for a bit there, now's time to tune back in. --Louis Pattison
This review is being rewritten at the moment, and will reappear when I'm happy with it. I'm currently rewriting all of my old reviews to make them better and more in line with 'proper' reviews like you see on the liks of Pitchfork or Stylus, and naturally that's going to take a bit of work. Sorry for being massively inconvinient, but that's just how I roll, folks! I'll try to rewrite this review as quickly as possible, but for the moment I've written ...
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Advantages: 5 YEAR CONCEPTION IS OVER FOR BECK & GODRICH Disadvantages: COVERING ACCIDENTLY COVERED GROUND SOMEWHAT
...A trademark Latino-tinged Beck sound is delivered unto us once again.
'Elevator Music' greets us at the outset of 'The Information', the latest offering from the genius that is Beck.
A lax, streetwise opener to what surely will be another great LP.
A less imaginative 'I Think I'm In Love' follows, ambling along repeatedly, until towards the songs close, when we hear the interjection of some sharp strings.
'Cell Phone's Dead' s cold electro pop, accompanies an urgent sounding and on form Beck.
With the odd sample of a boy saying "1 x 1, I'll knock you out", some great scratching from DJ Z trip, taking over from DJ Foodcourt ( Becks pseudonym) and some well placed echo effect, all these things are brought together to set the LP on it's way.
Some ramshackle yet soulful singing alongside some chaotic but more acoustic sounding...
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Advantages: A comprehensive history of one of the greatest guitarists of all time Disadvantages: Hi Ho Silver Lining
...Jeff Beck is one of the most important guitarists of the sixties, and still making excellent music today. He was in the Yardbirds along with Clapton and Page and his work was only eclipsed by the brilliance of Hendrix. This is a brilliantly compiled three CD set which contains a sixty four page booklet with track information and personel listings, as well as "the Jeff Beck story" by Gene Santoro, and a complete (but eye strainingly small) band family tree.
The compilation is arranged chronologically. The first disc kicks of with his work with Tridents, followed by fifteen Yardbirds songs including "Shapes of Things", "Over Under Sideways Down" and "Happenings Ten Years Time Time Ago" as well as various blues standards and variousslices of pscychedelia. These are followed by fpour tracks live at the BBC which are standard R...
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Advantages: It's totally different from anything he's done before. Disadvantages: It's just under 35 minutes long.
...Beck has now released so many albums that I'm beginning to lose count. Modern Guilt is his 13th. Every Beck release sounds completely different from the previous one. He is so versatile. Whereas 2006's The Information had an electro/hip hop feel to it, Modern Guilt pays tribute to 1960's British beat groups and in keeping with its influences the album contains only 10 songs and is only 35 minutes in length.
Another notable fact about Modern Guilt is that it was produced by Danger Mouse, the critically acclaimed producer who released a record called The Grey Album which mixed capella versions of Jay Z's The Black Album over samples from The Beatles' White Album. Beck has also hired Cat Power to provide backing vocals on a some of the tracks.
Chemtrails and the title track are two of the album's highlights and Gamma Ray is my...
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Album Notes: Over a decade of criss-crossing genres makes it easy to forget that Beck's first big hit was, essentially, a rap song. It's not surprising, then, that about half of the songs on 2006's THE INFORMATION are some shade of hip-hop dance-floor funk. And while no one's going to mistake Beck for Young Buck, he brings his own brand of intelligent, laid-back confidence to every track, from the stuttering brilliance of "1000 BPM" to the lolling funk of "Elevator Music" to the lo-fi breakbeat grooves of "Cellphone's Dead" to the 10 minutes of atmospheric chill-out that close the album.
Titles on disc 1
1.: Elevator Music
2.: Think I'm In Love
3.: Cellphone's Dead
4.: Strange Apparition
5.: Soldier Jane
6.: Nausea
7.: New Round
8.: Dark Star
9.: We Dance Alone
10.: No Complaints
11.: 1000BPM
12.: Motorcade
13.: Information
14.: Movie Theme
15.: Horrible Fanfare/Landslide/Exoskeleton
16.: Inside Out
17.: This Girl That I Know
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