Beck- Morning Phase (2014)

Beck- Morning Phase (2014)

Beck Hansen has crafted for himself some disparate costumes for his musical persona, the lo fi sonic experimentalist, the moody acoustic crooner, the postmodernist, the folkie guy, the loser-slacker hip hopper and the Tropicalia revivalist, perhaps the two most incompatible of them might be the moody crooner and the loser-slacker hip hopper, although you can somehow throw them into the postmodernist tag, but analyzing both worlds are so incompatible that Beck has nearly isolated one form each other, so much that a record like Sea Change is a world apart from Mellow Gold, and for the 2014, Beck is presenting a similar approach issuing Morning Phase, a beautiful acoustic moody record and he is promising a hip hop influenced record for the late part of the year, trying to reconcile his two sides and his two audiences, a young and a more mature one.

Morning Phase is without a doubt a beautiful honest record, one that brings back the placid sounds from Sea Change, but while Sea Change was a mournful record, Morning Phase is a more luminous one, one that shines in a subtle way, just like the early rays of sunlight, and one that make us shakes like the cold that starts to fade away in the morning.

Morning Phase starts with Morning, a song that features acoustic guitars, gentle keyboards and sparse drumming, a record that recalls the shiny beauty of those singer songwriter 70s Californian records, kind of David Crosby, kind of Dennis Wilson, kind of Gram Parsons, kind of Lindsey Buckingham, languid, warm and sunny sounding, good to the heart, with a beautiful melody and a soul embracing chorus, with no doubt one of Hansen best songs, although definitely one that will not score big with his “Loser” or “Devil`s Haircut” fans, but if you are into seventies things like Big Star, Fleetwood Mac or the Beach Boys, it definitely hits home.

Heart Is Drum has beautiful guitar strings and soft synth washes, a more upbeat tempo and kind of in tune with that good and surprising record Beck produced for Thurston Moore, showing both men appreciation for the California sounds they might listen as kids, Say Goodbye reminds me of that old band named America, another pretty song with gentle west acoustic guitars and a fading vocal line, Beck displaying fully his tenor vocals and showing impressive skills as a great soft rocker, a term that I haven’t remembered since the time of Bread, but that somehow Beck manages to handle quite well.

Blue Moon is a center piece to this album, a great structured composition, more fully orchestrated than the previous songs, and again a great addition to Beck`s curriculum as songwriter while Unforgiven has powerful drums, phased keyboards and a somber tone, Beck sounds heavily affected emotionally and he transmits that thru his voice, this time heavily processed for a dreamy effect, that reflects how heartbroken one can be and the enormous turmoil it brings to one inner self, in fully seventies lush mode.

Beck sounds like the lost son of Scott Walker on Wave, on the kind of heavy strings texture, heavy vocal based type of song Bjork would be proud of, it is a curious theme than links two of the most prominent postmodernists and why not, I would love to see them both cranking this tune live, while Don’t Let It Go and Country Down have that country vibe that’s both well rooted and modern at the same time, once again, showing Beck talent to jump thru genres and creating something new out of pieces form the past, Blackbird Chain is a bass heavy tune with a certain  Neil Young flavor, a good indication of the timeless and enormous influence Mr. Young has casted on newer generations.

Morning Phase might not score big with hipster audiences, but it would make a very nice impressions with serious fans of music, just the way Sea Change did, MP is not a better record than Sea Change, but it reunites very good compositions by Beck, who seems worried this days in achieving two almost impossible and incompatible things, making a big mark as a serious songwriter, and scoring hit songs with the young masses.

A good company to the latest Crosby record, it seems that sunny California is rising again and quiet is the new loud.