Some time ago, I dug out
\nMellow Gold<\/i>, the major-label debut from Beck, and discovered
\nthe tape wasn’t nearly as bad as I thought it was when I bought it.
\nHad I not given the album a second shot in front of the stereo, I
\nnever would have given Beck Hansen a second thought, and I never
\nwould have considered picking up
\nOdelay<\/i>, his 1996 follow-up.<\/p>\n
Something happened in between the two albums (besides Beck’s
\npermitted experimentation with other smaller labels – albums I
\nstill have to pick up). Somehow, Beck became cool… something that
\ncomes through in the music (as well as the production assistance
\nfrom the Dust Brothers). For the most part, gone was the “slacker”
\nsound that made up a lot of the songs on
\nMellow Gold<\/i> like “Pay No Mind” and “Loser”. Now, Beck was
\nsinging with some confidence behind him, as well as a sound that
\npaid tribute to both the early days of hip-hop and to the
\npsychedelic ’60s. (Memo to Mike Myers: it’s probably too late for
\nthe upcoming movie, but if you ever do a third
\nAustin Powers<\/i> film, you’ve got to consider Beck’s music and
\nBeck himself for the film.)<\/p>\n
The lead-off single, “Where It’s At,” delivers a one-two punch
\nof this new-found confidence. The delivery of the rap vocal by Beck
\nand the overall groove of the track let you know that he has
\nlearned a lot in his few short years in the limelight. But,
\nsurprisingly, “Where It’s At” isn’t the best track on
\nOdelay<\/i> – though it was a solid lead-off track.<\/p>\n
“Jack-Ass” is a more relaxed vocal delivery, but it fits the
\ndreamy sound of the first part of the song. I didn’t hear this song
\nuntil recently – that, along with the opportunity to buy this tape
\nand three others for a buck in an eBay auction, convinced me to
\nfinally add this tape to my collection. “The New Pollution” is a
\ntrack that has a “Laugh-In”-type ’60s chic to it, and is an
\nincredible track. But even these are not the best on the album.<\/p>\n
That honor I reserve for the opening track, “Devil’s Haircut,”
\nanother song that captures the ’60s vibe and turns it into a tour
\nde force. Beck knows that he’s firing on all cylinders for most of
\nOdelay<\/i>, and this song is early proof that he’s going to
\nenjoy this moment of glory.<\/p>\n
In fact, the whole first half of
\nOdelay<\/i> is beyond reproach; tracks like “Hotwax” and
\n“Novacane” all shine. The second half of the album is decent
\nenough, but by the time you get to tracks like “Readymade” and
\n“Ramshackle,” it’s almost as if the energy level is wearing the
\nlistener down. Had these tracks been scattered anywhere else on the
\nalbum, I’m willing to bet my opinion of them would be higher – and
\nI don’t have a bad opinion of the songs as it is.<\/p>\n
\nOdelay<\/i> is the album that silenced many of Beck’s critics –
\nincluding myself – and showed that not every artist suffered from
\nthe “sophomore slump”. While I have yet to pick up
\nMutations<\/i>, I feel confident in saying that
\nOdelay<\/i> is Beck’s masterpiece.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":25009,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[5717],"rating":[5613],"class_list":["post-36214","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-beck","rating-rating-a-minus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/36214","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36214"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/36214\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25009"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36214"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36214"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=36214"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=36214"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}