Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Artist: Beck
Label: Capitol Records
Release: 2014
Runtime: 47:00
Rating: 4.5/5
The twelfth studio album from American singer-songwriter, composer, multi-instrumentalist, arranger and producer Beck Hansen, titled »Morning Phase«, closes a circle. It’s the closing act in the enviable musical saga of this much-respected artist. It’s another deeply personal document, where the master of sonic and stylistic fusion serves up 11 relaxed songs leaning heavily on acoustic sounds, which takes him back (sonically and even stylistically!) to one of the best records of his career, »Sea Change« (2002). While Beck’s earlier work was marked by a string of albums on which he always thrilled audiences with a provocative, shock-tinged streak as he went about mashing genres together in his own way, the new album is above all a cautious, lightly measured step in his creative path! With it, Beck doesn’t push his restless, ever-changing musical vocabulary up to a new rung of development, but sails safely through tried-and-tested waters he’s already visited. Only now with new production and arranging levers and tricks that, in terms of maturity, definitely go beyond the reach of »Sea Change«.
That doesn’t mean »Morning Phase« somehow brings Beck any kind of artistic suicide. Far from it. As the album’s name itself hints, »Morning Phase« was written and made “from bed”. In fact, »Morning Phase« feels like a refreshed, revitalized »Sea Change« for a new era. A whole bunch of musicians play with Beck on the new album, and, since we’re already mentioning »Sea Change«, it’s interesting that the crew includes four musicians who already worked with Beck on »Sea Change«: Justin Meldal-Johnsen, Joey Waronker, Roger Joseph Manning Jr and Smokey Hormel. They’ve also been part of Beck’s touring band for years. The sensible parallels and link to »Sea Change« are rounded out by the fact that Beck used songs on the new album that he wrote back in 2005 in Nashville! He used the old recordings for three tracks that later became Blackbird Chain, Country Down and Waking Light. Beck recorded most of the album back in early 2013, in just three days, and then over the next half of that year the material went through sonic and arrangement finalization and upgrades.
There’s no trace of depression or mourning on the new album. Both are replaced by a feeling of melancholy, which is intensified atmospherically by the melody of the backing as well as by Beck’s vocal expression. The new album offers some (no longer new for Beck) tricks of blending country and folk elements into the musical character, as heard in Say Goodbye, the opening stretch of Blue Moon and Country Down. The standout moments are captured in Morning (with its instrumental intro Cycle), plus Unforgiven, Don’t Let It Go, Wave, Blackbird Chain and Waking Light, which literally float on soft-spun curtains of sonic layers stacked one on top of another. Beck’s vocal is set into this richly defined backdrop, and this time it’s heavily produced through “echo” effects. It feels as if his voice were coming from the beyond, or like a blissful voice speaking to you in dreams. These very songs carry a touch of psychedelia and cerebral-ness in those moments, and they work wonderfully if you let them lead you, by switching off your ratio (then the sincerity of the music’s message might even give you goosebumps, that crawling ants-on-the-skin feeling). And because this time Beck builds the soundscape on the completely natural tone of the sonic timbres he uses, certain moments of the album can even be tied to the pioneering bands of the late-sixties-into-seventies era. Two such moments are Blackbird Chain and Waking Light, which can be linked to Pink Floyd in their period of making the music for the film »Obscured By Clouds«.
Even though the songs are defined very simply at their core, the structuring of the overall sonic architecture is remarkably deep. As I mentioned earlier, Beck this time loves to lay a new sonic layer over the existing one through repetitions of a given motif, gradually thickening the musical picture. It’s a step-by-step pile-up of many sounds, like synthesizers, Hammond organ, dulcimer, and on top of that strings. And since Beck’s vocal melodies still sit in the center, this element of the arranging works “from the background”, yet it’s also hugely important, because with it Beck achieves the album’s distinct sonic dynamics and sharp contrasts between individual moods! The album’s special deviation is Turn Away, where a hint of the melody and composing style (vocal harmonies, melodic lines, use of acoustic guitars) of Simon & Garfunkel sneaks in, while Country Down can be tied to the gentler moments of Neil Young’s musical gospel. The album’s whole sonic dossier is broken by just one “rough” sound. It’s parked at the tail end of the album! In the outgoing tone of Waking Light. Over it Beck lays a raw, overdistorted electric guitar sound that closes the album. In fact, this is a revitalization of »Sea Change«, the link between the two albums is impossible to overlook, and Beck proves that over the years, through his self-made artistic growth, he has also developed into one of the most refined sound masters and producers around, and compared to »Sea Change« he has even left Nigel Godrich behind.
It’s an album that’s extremely listenable, deeply heartfelt and confessional, and despite its psychedelic feel, remarkably down-to-earth and grounded. The organic sonic structures that build it are gentle, fragile, “soft”. Even though the album’s melody is weighed down with a sense of melancholy, the record plays like a kind of personal redemption for Beck, an enlightenment. You can’t sense even a speck of depression or personal despondency on it. It’s an easygoing album, with relaxed yet sonically tightly held arranging strokes, with Beck throughout following, concisely and with great elegance, the fine mechanics of compatibly thickening sonic pastels. Although this isn’t an album that, as expected, should once again “shake up” and “shock” the listener through the levers of Beck’s familiar formula of eclectic fusion, this time Beck has delivered a relaxed yet musically rich album, full of dreamy psychedelic atmosphere, seasoned here and there with country and folk elements. A document that perhaps surprises precisely because, unlike all of Beck’s past albums, it doesn’t surprise.
Lineup
Beck Hansen – vocals, acoustic guitar (tracks 2, 3, 4, 5, 8, 9, 11 and 12), electric guitar (tracks 9 and 13), keyboards (track 2), piano (tracks 3, 5, 6 and 13), synthesizer (track 13), organ (track 13), bass guitar (tracks 5 and 11), sound collage (track 3), tambourine (track 4), ukulele (track 5), charango (track 5), celeste (track 9), dulcimer (track 11), harmonica (track 12), xylophone (track 13)
GUEST MUSICIANS:
Joey Waronker – drums (tracks 2, 3, 5, 8, 12 and 13), percussion (tracks 2, 3, 5 and 9)
Roger Joseph Manning, Jr. – piano, synthesizers, Rhodes piano, clavinet, Hammond B3 organ, backing vocals
Stanley Clarke – double bass (track 2), bass guitar (track 3)
James Gadson – drums (tracks 4 and 6)
Cody Kilby – guitar (track 4)
Bram Inscore – bass guitar (track 4)
Fats Kaplin – banjo (track 4)
Justin Meldal-Johnsen – bass guitar (tracks 6, 8, 9 and 13)
Smokey Hormel – acoustic guitar (tracks 6 and 8), electric guitar (tracks 9 and 12), electronic bow (track 6)
Stephanie Bennett – harp (tracks 6 and 11)
Steve Richards – cello (tracks 7 and 8)
Roger Waronker – piano (track 8)
Jason Falkner – guitar (tracks 9, 12 and 13)
Matt Mahaffey – organ (tracks 9 and 13)
Greg Liesz – “pedal steel” guitar (tracks 9 and 12)
Matt Sherrod – drums (track 9)
Production
Beck
Tracklist
1. Cycle (0:40)
2. Morning (5:19)
3. Heart Is a Drum (4:31)
4. Say Goodbye (3:29)
5. Blue Moon (4:02)
6. Unforgiven (4:34)
7. Wave (3:40)
8. Don’t Let It Go (3:09)
9. Blackbird Chain (4:26)
10. Phase (1:03)
11. Turn Away (3:05)
12. Country Down (4:00)
13. Waking Light (5:02)
