THE NOW MUTATION
Bloodied yet unbowed, Beck hits the stage in London and Manchester, talks darkness, dining and chemical reactions. “I’VE HAD A DINING ROOM TABLE, WITH DINNER, SET UP ON STAGE BEFORE.”
“I’ve always liked shows where there’s some physicality to it, like the person is inhabiting the music,” says Beck Hansen. Asked for examples, he reels off Devo, Prince, James Brown, “early” Nick Cave and Sonic Youth. Bowie too? “Oh, yes. And The Clash and punk bands like The Screamers and Black Flag… the bands that light something up in you.” Given Beck’s fragile presence in his dressing room, compared to the energy unleashed three hours later on London’s Brixton Academy stage, it’s clear that he too is lit up by the process of performance. But there are mitigating circumstances. For one, he’s soft-spoken, even borderline-shy, by nature. Second, on top of the spinal injury that temporarily rendered him unable to properly sing or play – which set the pensive, aching mood of the Grammy-winning MOJO album of 2014, Morning Phase – there’s a recurrence of an old knee injury (hit by a car in the ’90s, a recent “accidental kick” last year dislodged the kneecap). Third, he says he, “hasn’t had a break in about five years.” Serial workaholic Beck’s currently on a summer tour based around European festivals, with a forthcoming quick dash through Asia and the US. “We’re always playing shows, pretty non-stop,” he says. “And there’s so many other things going on. The Grammy opened some doors.” Namely, the Lou Reed tribute at 2015’s Rock and Roll Hall of Fame shindig, co-writes with Chemical Brothers, Flume and M83, and covers projects with Jakob Dylan and The Strokes. It’s meant that his most important commitment of all, completing Morning Phase’s follow-up – already heralded by singles Dreams and Wow, which both suggest a reprise of the hooky, eclectic grooviness of Odelay – has been delayed (see panel opposite). So, mindful of his knee, Beck at Brixton is a dialled-down version of his usual Princely stage persona, but the music is no less supercharged, courtesy of his cracking band: guitarist Jason Falkner and keyboard/ percussionist Roger Manning (both ex-Jellyfish), drummer Joey Waronker and new bassist Dwayne Moore, former groovy low-end provider for Pharrell Williams. Odelay provides the show’s bookends, opening with Devil’s Haircut and encoring with Where It’s At, while The New Pollution drops in seventh place, at the end of a whirlwind 20 minutes. Yet it’s 2005’s vastly underrated Guero – also an influence on Dreams and Wow – that dominates, with six songs, including the blues-hop of Go It Alone and a crunching E-Pro. Both songs, with their “nah-nah-nah!” hooks, and Dreams (“oh-oh-oh-ey-oh!”), proffer ample evidence that Beck is as much a practitioner of the chant-proof manoeuvre as Coldplay. He also has no issue with playing Loser, unlike, say, Radiohead have traditionally done with Creep, Beck’s payback being 3,500 people bellowing “why don’t you kill me!” amid a blaze of iPhones. He readily encourages clap-alongs, and in Dreams’ case, a sing-along, presumably to encourage the crowd to enjoy an unfamiliar track. Crowd-pleasing clearly rates high on Beck’s agenda. “We don’t play new songs until they’re out, I usually give it four or five years before I really start playing a record, I think it takes a while for people to catch up,” he avers. “I don’t want the show to die halfway through, you know what I mean? Like, I get a much better response on Midnite Vultures and Sea Change [songs] now than when we toured them. We do a good show, and people come back. They don’t just blindly come every time we roll into town.” The Prince-emulating Midnite Vultures donates a jubilant Sexx Laws
and Mixed Bizness, while fans of Sea Change and Morning Phase are rewarded with a mid-set mellow lasting six songs, beginning with Paper Tiger (albeit given a tempestuous climax around Falkner’s blitzing guitar solo) and peaking on Wave’s synth-string symphonia. The following afternoon, MOJO meets Beck in his tour bus, parked outside Manchester’s Albert Hall, where the early-bird queue snakes down the street. Is he ever up for meet’n’greets? “We do that all the time,” he responds. “You know, if I’d had a little more sleep…” Post-Brixton show, Beck was out on the tiles, post-sunrise, with friends including former producers Nigel Godrich and Danger Mouse, and Natasha Khan. Tonight, though, he still periodically impersonates Tigger, and he’s even more garrulous than in London during the encore set piece, where he Interrupts Where It’s At, and sits down on the drum riser for band introductions via a short instrumental showcase: Falkner and Waronker choose Bowie’s China Girl and Prince’s 1999 respectively (both timely), while Manning and Moore respectively take on Kraftwerk’s Computer World and Chic’s Good Times. Then it’s time for Beck’s consciousness-raising spiel: “I feel like I know everyone here tonight… Let’s take a moment to take all of this in… I’m here for you, is all I’m saying,” like a gospel preacher – though few zealots also offer their audience a rubdown with cucumber-apricot exfoliating cream. “I’ve had a dining room table, with dinner, set up on-stage before,” says the grandson of the Fluxus member Al Hansen. “You’re putting on a performance and then you’re suddenly breaking to being with the audience, it’s like reversing the dynamic…” For all the activity, physical strains and audience participation, Beck’s not planning on taking any breaks. “There’s a lot of music to make,” he says, before elaborating: “It’s about distilling and encapsulating the intangible, chemical reaction that happens with a bunch of sounds you make, and the connections they make with people. It’s elusive and maddening, but every once in a while you stumble on something interesting. And then playing live… it keeps you honest in some ways. It’s the real world, you know? You have to see if what you’ve made actually works. If you build a plane, you have to see if it flies.”