Beck

For other uses, see the musician.

Beck

Beck Hansen (born Bek David Campbell, July 8, 1970) is an American musician, singer-songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist, known by his simple stage name of Beck. With his pop collage of musical styles, oblique, ironic lyrics, and post-modern arrangements incorporating samples, drum machines, live instrumentation and sound effects, Beck has been hailed by critics and the public throughout his musical career as being amongst the most idiosyncratic artists of 1990s alternative rock.

Beck rose to underground popularity with his earliest works, which combined social criticism (as in "MTV Makes Me Want to Smoke Crack" and "Deep Fried Love") with musical and lyrical experimentalism. He first came to wider public attention with his breakthrough single "Loser", a hit in 1994, which was dismissed by some as a novelty. However, Beck was not easily categorized into a single genre. Some likened his absurd, free-flowing lyrical style and the lo-fi folk songs of his early career to Bob Dylan, while the Beastie Boys were notable templates for his embrace of hip hop influences, and his later eclecticism sparked comparisons with Prince.

In several albums beginning in the late 1990s, Beck developed a slower, more melancholy sound, merging his trademark style with psychedelic rock, electronic, Brazilian Tropicalia, and the music of English folk icon Nick Drake and French avant pop star Serge Gainsbourg. He has also cited The Cars, Mantronix, Gary Wilson, Pussy Galore, Willie Dixon, Bill Broonzy, and Sonic Youth as among his influences. To most listeners, Odelay (1996) and Sea Change (2002), two of Beck's most popular and acclaimed recordings, represented polar opposites in style.

Background

Beck was born in Los Angeles, California to David Campbell, a Canadian musician, and Bibbe Hansen, a visual artist. His maternal grandfather was Al Hansen, a visual collage artist of the Fluxus school of art. His paternal grandfather was a Presbyterian minister, while his maternal great-grandmother was Jewish; although Beck says he was raised partially in the Jewish religion, he is a Scientologist, as are both his parents. Beck's mother also has Norwegian and Swedish ancestry. When his parents separated, Beck stayed with his mother and brother in Los Angeles, where he was influenced by that city's diverse musical offerings—everything from hip hop to Latin music and his mother's art scene—all of which would later reappear in his recorded and published work.

After dropping out of high school in the mid-1980s, Beck traveled and educated himself. During this period, he developed his musical talent through the art of busking. In Germany, he spent time with his grandfather Al Hansen. The late 1980s found him in New York City, involved in the punk-influenced anti-folk music movement.

Recording career

(1988–1993) Independent releases

In 1988, Beck recorded a cassette entitled Banjo Story, which has since become available in bootleg form.

Beck returned to Los Angeles at the turn of the decade. To support himself, he took a variety of low-paying, dead-end jobs, and even lived in a shed, all the while continuing to develop his music. During this time, Beck sought out (or sneaked onto) stages at venues all over Los Angeles, from punk clubs to coffee shops and busking on the streets. This is also when he met Chris Ballew (founder of The Presidents of the United States of America). They even performed on the streets as a duo for a while. Some of his earliest recordings were achieved by working with Tom Grimley at Poop Alley Studios, a part of WIN Records.

The founders of Bong Load Custom Records, Tom Rothrock, Rob Schnapf and Bradshaw Lambert discovered Beck, signing him to their fledgling label. "Loser", a collaboration between hip hop nuance producer Carl Stephenson and Beck, created a sensation on alternative radio stations like KXLU that led to a bidding war between labels to sign Beck. Eventually, he chose Geffen Records, who offered him terms that included an allowance for the release of independent albums while under contract. Of all the record labels to offer Beck a contract, Geffen offered him the least amount of money, but the greatest amount of creative freedom.

(1994–1997) Mellow Gold and Odelay

In 1994, Geffen's official debut release of Mellow Gold, culled from sessions with Rothrock, Schnapf, and Stephenson, made Beck a mainstream smash success.

At the same time, he released Stereopathetic Soulmanure on Flipside Records and One Foot in the Grave on independent K Records. Beck took his act on the road in 1994 with a worldwide tour, followed by a spot on the main stage of the 1995 Lollapalooza tour. Still, some critics panned him as a one-hit wonder. Audiences' (especially at Lollapalooza) familiarity with "Loser," and their general disinterest in his other work only reinforced his image as such.

When the time came to record his follow-up to Mellow Gold, he enlisted Rothrock and Schnapf as producers and began recording an album of moody, low-key acoustic numbers to showcase his songwriting. The songs were melancholy due to several close deaths in Beck's life, including one of his greatest inspirations, his grandfather. Eventually, Beck shelved the album and pursued a more upbeat approach. Beck was introduced to the Dust Brothers, producers of the Beastie Boys' album Paul's Boutique, whose cut-and-paste, sample-heavy production suited Beck's vision of a more fun, accessible album.

What resulted, 1996's Odelay, would finally put the one-hit wonder label to rest. The lead single, "Where It's At," received heavy airplay, and its video was in constant rotation on MTV. Within the year, Odelay had received good reviews in Rolling Stone and Spin magazines, having been listed on countless "Best of" lists (it topped the Pazz & Jop Critics Poll for 'Album of the Year'), receiving double-platinum status and earning a number of industry awards, including two Grammys.

Also, beginning in 1993, "Loser" co-writer and Mellow Gold co-producer Carl Stephenson embarked on a experimental trip hop project which eventually resulted in Forest for the Trees, releasing a self-titled album in 1997, followed by an EP in 1999. Beck contributed to both records, providing spoken word, harmonica, and assorted instruments.

(1998–2000) Mutations and Midnite Vultures

Odelay was followed in 1998 by Mutations. Though the album was originally supposed to be released on Bong Load Records, Geffen intervened and issued the record against Beck's wishes. The artist then sought to void his contracts with both record labels, and in turn the labels sued him for breach of contract. The litigation went on for years and it remains unclear to this day if it was ever completely resolved. [3] Produced by Beck and Nigel Godrich of Radiohead fame, it was intended as a stopgap measure before the next album proper. Recorded over two weeks, during which Beck recorded one song a day, the sessions produced fourteen songs. Mutations was a departure from the electronic density of Odelay, and was filled with folk and blues influences. Songs on the album consisted of older tracks, some even dating back as far as 1994. Track 10, "Sing It Again", was written for Johnny Cash, but Beck never submitted it, considering it "rubbish." Cash would go on to record "Rowboat," a song that originally appeared on Beck's Stereopathetic Soulmanure.

During 1998, Beck's art collaborations with his grandfather Al Hansen were featured in an exhibition entitled 'Beck & Al Hansen: Playing With Matches' and showcased solo and collaborative collage, assemblage, drawing and poetry works. The show toured from the Santa Monica Museum of Art to galleries in New York City and Winnipeg, Canada. A catalogue of the show was published by Plug In Editions/Smart Art Press.

In 1999, Geffen released the much-anticipated Midnite Vultures, an orgy of sexual and culinary innuendo supported by a world tour. For Beck, it was a return to the high-energy performances that had been his trademark as far back as Lollapalooza. The live stage set included a red bed that descended from the ceiling for the song "Debra" and the touring band was supplemented by a brass section. Midnite Vultures was nominated for Best Album at the Grammys.

Beck has a number of B-sides and soundtrack-only songs as well, including "Midnite Vultures" (curiously, not on the album of the same name), a cover of The Korgis' "Everybody's Got to Learn Sometime" which appeared in the 2004 movie Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and David Bowie's "Diamond Dogs" from Moulin Rouge!. He is also credited on the French band Air’s 2001 album 10 000 Hz Legend for vocals on the songs "Don't Be Light" and "The Vagabond" (as well as harmonica on the latter).

(2001–2003) Sea Change

After Midnite Vultures, Beck released Sea Change (2002), another airy and emotional album with Godrich, which became Beck's first U.S. Top 10 album, reaching #8. The album was also met with critical acclaim, earning five stars from Rolling Stone, the magazine's rarely awarded highest-rating and later placing second in the Pazz & Jop Critics Poll for 2002. Sea Change was conceptualized as an album with one unifying theme—the stages following the end of a relationship. The album also featured string arrangements by Beck's father David Campbell and a sonically dense mix reminiscent of Mutations. Although some radio singles were released, no commercial singles were made available to the public. Beck embarked on a solo acoustic tour of small theaters and halls prior to the release of Sea Change, during which he played several songs from the forthcoming album. The post-album release Sea Change electric tour featured The Flaming Lips as Beck's opening and backing band. Since then Wayne Coyne, their lead singer, has criticized Beck for his behavior on the tour.

A song Beck co-wrote with William Orbit, "Feel Good Time", was recorded by pop singer Pink and included on the soundtrack of the 2003 film Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle.

(2004–present) Guero and The Information

In 2004, Beck returned to the studio to work on his sixth major-label album. The record, Guero, was produced by the Dust Brothers and Tony Hoffer and features a collaboration with Jack White of The White Stripes; it marked a return to Odelay-era sound. The album was released in March 2005 and enjoyed critical acclaim from most mainstream press, earning four stars from Playboy and Rolling Stone, as well as a "Critic's Choice" recognition from The New York Times. However, the album received a less enthusiastic response from Beck's indie-oriented fanbase and a relatively low 6.6 (out of 10) score given by Pitchfork. Nonetheless, the album debuted at #2 on the Billboard charts, pushing 162,000 copies in the first week and giving Beck his best week ever in terms of commercial sales and chart position. Since the release of Guero, the first single, "E-Pro", has been well received by the mainstream rock community, and has seen a large amount of play time. The second single, titled simply "Girl", is a bright, upbeat song appearing at first to be about summer love; however, a closer look at the lyrics reveals a darker side to the song. "Girl" received heavy airplay on various college radio stations. The third and final single was "Hell Yes".

On February 1, 2005, Beck released an EP featuring four remixes of songs from Guero by independent artists who use sounds from various video game devices like the Nintendo GameBoy. The EP, titled GameBoy Variations, featured "Ghettochip Malfunction" [Hell Yes] and "GameBoy/Homeboy" [Que' Onda Guero], both remixed by the band 8-Bit, and also had "Bad Cartridge" [E-Pro] and "Bit Rate Variation in B-Flat" [Girl], the last two being remixed by Paza {The X-Dump}. The EP cover art shows a long-haired person headbanging to his GameBoy, which is plugged into an amplifier like an electric guitar. This EP was featured in an issue of Nintendo Power. Also, a music video for "Gameboy/Homeboy" was also produced by Wyld File.

Beck plays at the Sasquatch Music Festival in George, Washington. The screens show puppets that emulated the band throughout the show.

Beck performed at the music and arts festival Bonnaroo in Manchester, Tennessee on June 17, 2006. He performed many songs from his album Guero. In addition to his band, Beck was accompanied onstage by a group of puppets, dressed as him and members of his band. Live video feed of the puppets' performance was broadcast on video screens to the audience. The puppets were part of his 2006 world tour.

Beck's 7th major label studio album, The Information, which again reunited him with Nigel Godrich, was released on October 3, 2006. The album reportedly took more than three years to make and was described as "quasi hip-hop." It came with a sheet of stickers, which were to be used to "make your own album cover." The lead US single, "Nausea", officially went to radio on September 5, 2006. In the UK, the first single was "Cellphone's Dead". The Information in its entirety was leaked onto the Internet in late September. On September 27, 2006, Beck released a Yahoo! Music Unlimited exclusive track before the album was released, titled "Think I'm In Love". Customers who purchased at Best Buy were treated to an exclusive download of an outtake track titled "This Girl That I Know", whereas Target shoppers received "Inside Out", both of which were on European versions of the disc. Some US stores also included a bonus disc, featuring the track "O Menina", which was also included in the Japanese release, along with the other two bonus tracks. Some copies of the album include a bonus DVD of "homemade" (by Beck and Godrich) music videos for each song. Because of its inclusion of free stickers, The Information was disqualified by the Official Chart Company from entering the UK albums chart, but in the US the album gave Beck his third straight Top 10 studio album peak on the Billboard 200, reaching #7.

Personal life

Beck married Marissa Ribisi, the twin sister of actor Giovanni Ribisi, in April 2004, shortly before the birth of their son, Cosimo Henri Hansen. Ribisi is pregnant with the couple's second child, due in April 2007. [4]

Scientology

Beck has been involved in Scientology for most of his life.

His name appears in Scientology literature in 2003, showing that he is a member and a donor. His wife, Marissa, is also a second-generation Scientologist.

Beck publicly acknowledged his affiliation with the Church of Scientology for the first time in an interview published in the New York Times Magazine on March 6, 2005. Further confirmation came in an interview with the Irish Sunday Tribune newspaper's i Magazine on June 11, 2005, where he was quoted as saying, "Yeah, I'm a Scientologist. My father has been a Scientologist for about 35 years, so I grew up in and around it." When questioned by the interviewer about Scientology's core beliefs, he replied, "What it actually is is just sort of, uh, you know, I think it's about philosophy and sort of, uh, all these kinds of, you know, ideals that are common to a lot of religions."

Discography

Main article: Beck discography

The following are Beck's studio albums.

• 
  Mellow Gold
  March 1, 1994
  US #13; UK #41
  
• 
  Stereopathetic Soulmanure
  April, 1994
  
• One Foot in the Grave June 27, 1994
  One Foot in the Grave
  June 27, 1994
  
• 
  Odelay
  June 18, 1996
  US #16; UK #17
• 
  Mutations
  November 3, 1998
  US #13: UK #24
• 
  Midnite Vultures
  November 23, 1999
  US #34; UK #19
• 
  Sea Change
  September 24, 2002
  US #8; UK #20
• 
  Guero
  March 29, 2005
  US #2; UK #15
• 
  The Information
  October 3, 2006
  US #7

Other media appearances

Television

Beck has performed on Saturday Night Live six times; these shows were respectively hosted by Kevin Spacey, Bill Paxton, Christina Ricci, Jennifer Garner, Tom Brady and Hugh Laurie. He has made two cameo appearances as himself on Saturday Night Live: one in a sketch about medical marijuana, and one in a VH1 Behind the Music parody that featured "Fat Albert & the Junkyard Gang".

He has also performed a guest voice in an episode of Matt Groening's animated show Futurama, playing himself.

He also made a very brief voice appearance in 1998 cartoon feature film, The Rugrats Movie' and guest starred as himself in a 1997 episode of Space Ghost Coast to Coast, entitled "Edelweiss".

In the music of other artists

• Beck has made cameo appearances in music videos for The White Stripes' "The Hardest Button to Button" and The Stone Roses' "Love Spreads".
• He contributed an infamous "phoned-in" rap and appeared in the music video for the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion song "Flavor".
• A version of Windows Media Player comes with a sample of Beck's song "Beautiful Way."
• Beck is featured as one of the artists performing in the North American Halloween Prevention, Inc. song, "Do They Know It's Hallowe'en?"
• Beck contributed vocals to the original version of "I Am Music," a collaboration with the late Aaliyah and Timbaland.
• Beck makes an uncredited cameo on Macy Gray's album The Trouble With Being Myself, on the song "It Ain't the Money."
• Beck performed vocals on the tracks "Don't Be Light" and "The Vagabond" as well as harmonica on the latter, for the third studio album, 10 000 Hz Legend, by the French electro band Air.
• Beck did a remix to Björk's song "Alarm Call", for this song, he put his name as the 'Bjeck Mix'.

Filmography

• Population: 1 (1986), brief appearance playing accordion in a band
• Kill the Moonlight (1994), performed "Leave Me on the Moon", "Last Night I Traded My Souls Innermost for Some Pickled Fish" and "Underwater Music"
• subUrbia (1996), performed "Feather in Your Cap"
• A Life Less Ordinary (1997), performed "Deadweight"
• Bury Me in Kern County (1998), performed "Megaboob"
• The Rugrats Movie (1998), performed "This World Is Something New to Me" with various other artists
• A Room for Romeo Brass (1999), performed "O Maria" and "Dead Melodies"
• Condo Painting (2000), performed "Computer Girls"
• Heartbreakers (2001), performed "Tropicalia"
• Moulin Rouge! (2001), performed "Diamond Dogs"
• Southlander (2001), appeared in speaking role; played and sang "Puttin It Down" and "Broken Train"
• City of Ghosts (2002), performed "Blackhole"
• Adaptation. (2002), performed "Dead Melodies"
• Holes (2003), performed "He's a Mighty Good Leader"
• Along Came Polly (2004), performed "Lost Cause"
• Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004), performed "Everybody's Got to Learn Sometime"
• Just Like Heaven (2005), performed "Strange Invitation"
• Inland Empire (2006), performed "Black Tambourine"
• Nacho Libre (2006), performed "My Heart Is with the Children", "There Is No Place for Me in This World", "Tender Beasts of the Spangled Night", "10,000 Pesos", "Holy Man" and "Return of the Luchador"

See also

• List of alternative music artists
• List of one-word stage names
• List of popular music performers

External links

• Official MySpace
• Official website
• Beck (I) at IMDb
• Beck discography at MusicBrainz
• The Information Reviews at Metacritic
• Comprehensive song information, discography, concert-setlist database