I'm tired of fighting
Fighting for a lost cause
—Beck,
Lost Cause (Sea Change, 2002)
Prologue
I used to love Beck and
I would love him after Midnight Vultures.
But I did not love Midnight Vultures.
Who am I to not love
something? Well, no one. Or someone. I don’t know. I’m not trying to convince you to hate it. By all means,
love it. So read on, or don’t.
Maybe you want to get your Midnight
Vultures CD ready. If you still have CDs. Which you don’t. But I do.
I purchased Midnight Vultures the day it came out in
1999 from an HMV at St Vital mall in Winnipeg. I got in my car, put the CD in
the Discman, plugged the tape convertor in, put the tape part of it in the tape
deck, and then pressed play on the Discman. After the first song was over, I
began to feel disappointment after disappointment. My Beck blues were alleviated
in 2002 by the amazing Sea Change and
then returned in 2005 with Guero. Bad
bad, Guero.
The actual CD in question
Recently, half a dozen
people have questioned my dislike for Midnight
Vultures. Most people who have questioned me possess what I would call, “good
taste” in music, so I sat down to give Midnight
Vultures another shot; thinking, okay, I’ve been wrong before.
Just some other picture of the back of the CD
So listen I did, to Beck
Hansen’s Midnight Vultures, thinking about
my original 1999 reaction and my revised
2013 reaction and writing the
following track by track reaction all
within the time span it took to listen to the album. Hey, if Beck Hansen wasn’t
going edit his work, why should I? So as not to upset people who actually
review things, I shant call the following a review, merely a bunch of pith in real time on a blog...but this is important, people.
1. Sexx Laws
1999: I remember liking this song when I
heard Beck Hansen do it on a talk show, and remember liking the song when I put
the CD in. I like trumpets. And I
like falsetto like when Ween does it. Like this...
Don't click on this if you clicked on the Beck album. Oh, now I've messed things up.
2013: Why was everyone saying that this was
Beck’s “Prince” album? Prince never had a song that sounded like this, did he?
Was Prince this intentionally cheesy? If anything, Sexx Laws is like a Tower of
Power song or something. There’s a cool little country guitar and banjo at the
end, which sounds cooler now that I have a better stereo than I did in 2013,
which flirts with Cotton Eyed-Joe.
Rating: 4 Beck Hansens
2. Nicotine &Gravy
1999: This song reminds me of Fun Lovin’ Criminals or that Crazy
Town song Butterfly. I like the big solo bellow at the end. Huaaaaaghhhh!
2013: Beck bought a rhyming
dictionary for this song: “I think we're
going crazy//Her left eye is lazy//She looks so Israeli//Nicotine and gravy.”
and then half the song repeats this fun little pointless rhyme. I still like
the big solo bellow at the end. Actually, the whole end is great—the part where
he stops singing. This last two minutes would be a cool instrumental track to
play if I ever open a vodka lounge and need mood.
Rating: 2.5 Beck Hansens
3. Mixed Bizness
1999: Sounds like extra bits from
Sexx Laws. Parts the producer didn’t
like. His falsetto is getting pretty high. Careful, buddy.
2013: Sounds like Pink’s Get this Party Started at the beginning
and a Mr. Bungle song at the end. Oh, this is the one where he sings “make all the lesbians scream.” You
know what song about lesbians is fantastic: Weezer's Pink Triangle.
Rating: 2.5 Beck Hansens
Pause the Beck...listen to this. Then resume the Beck.
4. Get Real Paid
1999: Robot sound effects are
terrible soundtrack to driving a 1989 Pontiac Grand Am. Oh, and that vocal
effect thingy….. ‘We like to ride
on executive planes// we like to sit around and get real paid.” Enough. I’m skipping
to five. [note: don’t think I ever made it through this whole song in 1999].
2013: Remember Get in the Ring on Guns n’ Roses’s Use Your Illusion II where Axl sings a
lot using some sort of terrible deep vocal effect? Now that I’ve heard the
whole of Get Real Paid for the first
time, it feels like a sythnpop version of Get
in the Ring and this is not a compliment. Get Real Lost.
Rating: 1 Beck Hansen
5. Hollywood Freaks
1999: Is Beck taking anything seriously on
this album? Is he making fun of rap? I don’t get it. What are you gonna do with your life, Beck?!
2013: I don’t hate Beck’s “rap” on this
now, though it’s a bit of verbal diarrhea. Words, words, words….This sort of
comes closest to Where it’s At from Odelay now that I think of it. Chorus is
great, soulful back up singers are great.
I sort of wish Beck Hansen would stop talking over this great Beck
song!
Rating: 3 Beck Hansens
6. Peaches & Cream
1999: Oh, the falsetto is back. “Peaches and Cream//You make a garbage man scream.” Why? What’s she
doing? Is Peaches and Cream a she? Two shes? I’m confused. What the hell is
this song about? Stop screwing around with the garbage man!
2013: Oh, the falsetto is back. I might appreciate Get Real Paid and Hollywood Freaks more, longing for the days when Beck Hansen wasn’t
screaming at me. Is this song about sex?
Rating: 1.5 Beck Hansens
Beck Break
7. Broken Train
1999: Now where’s this Beck
Hansen been for 6 songs? This is the Beck Hansen I graduated high school with.
This is the Odelay Beck Hansen that
we drank Old English on lake docks to three years ago. I wonder what I should
major in in University.
2013: Easily the best song on
this entire album. Call me a foagie, but part of my dislike for this album was
always the sense that none of the songs sounded like Broken Train and all the songs sounded like Get Real Paid and I fear change. I also fear Sea Change because it makes me cry.
Let this one be the 45th song you play at my funeral. Okay yes….if I was making a Beck: Gold album, this would be only track
that would make CD1 or CD2 from Midnight Vultures. “You won't
find a shelter here//Tell me, what's your zip code baby//Did you ever let a
cowboy//Sit on your lap?” is so good, I can’t believe two songs ago the
same writer penned “People look so
snooty//Take pills make them moody//Automatic booty//Zero to tutee fruity.” (Then again, maybe if you’ve gotten
this far, you might be thinking the same thing about what I’m writing here in
comparison to this.)
Rating: 5 Beck Hansens
He wanted us to read these lyrics, so they're fair game.
8. Milk & Honey
1999: Hey some Rock n’ Roll guitars. Then
some funk. Then some words, words, words. Then some lasers. Then some piano.
I’m gonna listen to Jamiroquai after this album is over.
2013: What the hell is this awesome song
doing so late on this album?! This could be a Queen song. Best chorus on the
album. Great ending. I love when Beck slows it down. Mutations and Sea Change
are poking their heads in here.
But why can’t Beck just have some fun, Dave? No. My Beck doesn’t get to
have fun. My Beck needs to be miserable and maudlin and dumped and religious like he's gonna be on Sea Change.
Rating: 4 Beck Hansens
9. Beautiful Way
1999: Good song. But I’ll probably never
hear it again given that it’s so late on the album, and two years ago Live released Secret Samahdi and that album is art, man. ART! Rolling down the windows, blasting
Lakini’s Juice…I’m gonna be young
forever.
2013: Nice little Beach Boys vibe going here. I think Beck ended up
doing another twenty songs like this, some of which ended up on soundtracks for
Ewan McGregor comedies.
Rating: 4 Beck Hansens
10. Pressure Zone
1999: Beck sounds like Elastica
on this one.
2013: Beck totally sounds like Elastica
on this one.
Rating: 3 Beck Hansens
Billy Joel's Pressure Drop, which also sounds like Elastica.
11. Debra
1999: Cool music, but he just couldn’t
resist another falsetto could he? I bet there’s a gal named Debra whose gonna
love this song, sort of like how the teenage version of my mom probably loved
The Rolling Stone’s Angie and my mid
40s dad loved Eminem and Dido’s Stan, and how I love Kids in the Hall Daves I Know.
2013: From the comments on Youtube for this
song, people seem to love it. I suppose of all the falsetto songs on this
album, this is probably the goodest. A nice note to end on, and I’m guessing
that this is probably Beck’s second most karaoke’d song after Loser. Still, a gutless love song.
Rating: 3 Beck Hansens
12. Hidden Track
1999: Well, that’s the end of the
album.
2013: Did anyone know about the
pointless hidden track that you’d never sit through ten minutes of silence to
get to?
Beck.
