Beck
Mutations
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Decrease Font SizeEditor's Review:
Beck is back with a new album and he’s gonna serve you up a
big plate of musical grits and verbal gravy. For Mutations, Beck mutated his band.
He left DJ Swamp at home and brought along Roger Manning, keyboard extraordinaire and
musical God, in this writer’s humble opinion.
Beck checks his hip-hop at the door and instead throws down a mix of psychedelic twang.
It’s like a mix of Johnny Cash, Donovan, Burt Bacharach and The Beatles. "Cold
Brains" kicks off the album with it’s somber acoustic guitar countered by a
‘60s fuzz and a ‘70s synthesizer. The third song, "Lazy Flies" could
have been done by Donovan Leitch himself, with it’s melodies and nutty lyrics.
"Canceled Check" is straight honky-tonk from top to bottom, including lap steel
guitar and parlor piano. The single on the album, "Tropicalia," absolutely
shouts Burt Bacharach or Herb Alpert. This is a song to listen to in the frozen food aisle
in the grocery store at 4 AM while you’re hopped up on a handful of pills.
The last tune, located at 5:18 on track 11, straight up whoops ass. It combines Beach
Boys harmonies with a ‘60s Brit pop mentality (sounds a bit like Roger Manning’s
old band Jellyfish), while throwing standard arrangement out the window. This one song is
worth the price of admission.
Though Mutations is a departure from previous Beck work, it takes him in a new
direction, one that is full of grand pop musical schemes and retro-fitted rhythms.
-J.J. Bromstead
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 Record Label Geffen / Bong Load Records Released June 1996 |
Tracks1. Cold Brains2. Nobody's Fault But My Own 3. Lazy Flies 4. Canceled Check 5. We Live Again 6. Tropicalia 7. Dead Melodies 8. Bottle of Blues 9. O Maria 10. Sing It Again 11. Static/Diamond Bollocks |
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Beck
Bio[+]Born in Los Angeles in 1970 to a highly artistic family, Beck has often been referred to as the King of the Slacker movement due to his 1994 break-through single, “Loser,” although he was quick to decline this title. After his musical upbringing in New York’s anti-folk scene, Beck relocated back to L.A. to pursue his original amalgam of folk, hip-hop, avant-garde and punk music. When “Loser” became the next hottest thing on the charts, Beck signed a record deal with DGC in 1994 that allowed him to release material on other labels as well: and along with the Mellow Gold DGC release, Beck released Stereopathetic Soul Manure on Flipside and the Calvin Johnson/Beck collaboration, One Foot in the Grave, on K Records — all in the same year. The prolific artist received a Grammy for 1996’s Odelay. Other releases include 1998’s Mutations, 1999’s Midnite Vultures and Sea Change, which was released in the Summer of 2002.
– Maurice S. Teilmann (October, 2002)
Merch
– Maurice S. Teilmann (October, 2002)