Beck (musician)
Beck alias Beck Hansen (born July 8, 1970 in Los Angeles as Bek David Campbell ) is an American musician , singer , multi-instrumentalist , record producer and seven-time Grammy award winner.
Beck's early music is often viewed as a typical example of popular alternative music of the 1990s due to its disregard for genre conventions, ironic texts and the combination of samples with instruments being played . She brought together elements from rock , folk , country , beatnik and modern hip-hop including turntablism .
From the 2000s, however, albums such as Sea Change , Guero and Morning Phase were created , which offer classic songwriting, sophisticated arrangements and sophisticated lyrics.
Beck plays guitar , bass , piano , synthesizer , drums , harmonica and other instruments.
Life
Beck is the son of David Campbell , a sought-after conductor and studio musician, and Bibbe Hansen , an actress and artist from Andy Warhol's Factory . When his parents divorced, he took his mother's name and changed his first name to Beck. He stayed with his mother and brother Channing in Los Angeles, where he grew up in an unconventional artistic environment and was influenced by the city's various musical offerings. These influences can also be found in his later recorded and published work.
Beck publicly admitted to being a member of Scientology in early 2005 . In November 2019, he distanced himself from this statement and spoke of a misunderstanding.
The beginnings
After dropping out of high school at the age of 14, Beck trained himself further by reading books and listening to old blues , folk and country records . A little later he appeared as a street musician with blues and folk pieces and tried his hand at the poetry slam scene. This led to the recording of his first album, The Banjo Story , in 1988 , a home-recorded cassette that was never officially released and was only later distributed to its fans on the Internet. In the late 1980s and early 1990s he traveled to his maternal grandfather, the Fluxus artist Al Hansen to Cologne . This taught him a lot about his art, which was to inspire Beck later. In 1989 he moved to New York and tried in vain to make a name for himself in the anti-folk music scene influenced by punk . Here he met John S. Hall of King Missile , Michelle Shocked and Roger Manning .
Around 1990 Beck returned to Los Angeles penniless but motivated. As he continued to develop his music, he took on a number of odd jobs to make a living. Some of his recordings were made while working with Tom Grimley at Poop Alley Studios , part of WIN Records .
Beck's debut
During this time Beck was discovered by the founders of Bong Load Custom Records . His 12 "vinyl single Loser , which was released on this label in 1993 and had an initial edition of 500 copies, became a sensation on alternative radio and led to a bidding war between record labels who wanted to sign Beck. Ultimately, Beck decided on Geffen Records , because they did not require an exclusive contract.
The 1994 Geffen album Mellow Gold brought Beck a mainstream success and led to his iconic status as a representative of the " slacker movement" within the alternative rock scene. In interviews, Beck insisted that the term Slacker was meant ironically , just like Loser , the song she was inspired by.
At the same time, Beck released One Foot in the Grave with Scott Plouf as drummer, who now plays with Built to Spill , on the independent K Records and Stereopathetic Soul Manure on Flipside Records . He brought his music to his audience in 1995 with the Lollapalooza Tour.
Career since 1996
After Beck had long been regarded as a one-hit wonder , he was able to get rid of that label in 1996 with the release of the album Odelay , a collaboration with the Dust Brothers , the producers of the Beastie Boys' Paul's Boutique album . The inaugural single Where It's At hit high airplay numbers and the video was in constant rotation on MTV . That year, Odelay received good reviews from Rolling Stone and Spin magazines , was featured on many best-of lists, achieved double platinum status, and received numerous awards, including two Grammys .
The album Mutations followed in 1998 . The album produced by Nigel Godrich , known for his work with Radiohead , was planned as a gap filler before the next decent album. The recordings extended over two weeks, during which a song was recorded every day, so that in the end 14 songs were produced. Mutations was a farewell to the electronic density and playfulness of Odelay , showed Beck for the first time as a classic songwriter and was influenced by folk and blues. There are also some older songs on the album; the oldest are from 1994. Song 10, Sing It Again , was written for Johnny Cash , but Beck never sent this song to Cash because he thought it was "garbage". Instead, Cash recorded Rowboat , a song that originally appeared on Beck's album Stereopathetic Soul Manure .
The artistic collaboration between Beck and his grandfather Al Hansen , who died in Cologne in 1995, was the subject of an exhibition in 1998 entitled Beck & Al Hansen: Playing With Matches , the solo and joint works in the areas of collage , assemblage, drawings and poems showed. The show moved from the Santa Monica Museum of Art to galleries in New York and Winnipeg, Canada.
In 1999 Beck released the long-awaited album Midnight Vultures at Geffen's , an orgy of sexual and culinary personalities supported by a worldwide tour. For Beck, this meant a return to the energetic, extravagant performances that were his trademark in Lollapalooza times - from the stage set with a red bed that was lowered from the ceiling for Debra to the tour band, which was complemented by brass.
On the 2001 album 10 000 Hz Legend by the French combo Air , he contributed the title "The Vagabond" (vocals, guitar, harmonica), which has clear echoes of some songs from Midnight Vultures .
Beck then released the album Sea Change in 2002 , a calm, emotional album that was created in collaboration with producer Nigel Godrich. Sea Change , recorded after the end of a longstanding relationship with Leigh Limon, was conceived as an album with a unifying theme: the phases that follow the end of a love affair. The album doesn't contain any samples, but rather string arrangements from Beck's father David Campbell and an acoustically dense mix that is reminiscent of mutations and some elements from Midnite Vultures . Although some radio singles have been released, including Lonesome tears, no commercial singles have been released to the public. Beck nevertheless earned great critical acclaim for the album.
Beck has also released a number of B-sides and songs that are only featured on soundtracks, including Midnite Vultures (surprisingly not on the album of the same name), a cover of Korgis ' Everybody's Got to Learn Sometimes , which appeared on the 2004 soundtrack for Movie Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and David Bowie's Diamond Dogs from Moulin Rouge! . The song Feel Good Time , written by Beck in coproduction with William Orbit , was later recorded by singer Pink and used for the soundtrack of the film Charlie's Angels - Full Throttle .
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In late 2004 Beck returned to the studio to work on his sixth album on a major label: the record Guero , produced by the Dust Brothers and Tony Hoffer . The video of the first single E-Pro was presented to the public on MSN . As with many commercial artists, Beck's album surfaced in mid-January 2005 before its official release on the Internet . Rather than push for an earlier release of the album, it was released on March 29, 2005 with a variety of bonus tracks, including remixes from Boards of Canada and Dizzee Rascal. In December 2005, a remix album followed with Guerolito , which contained arrangements of the Guero tracks by artists such as Air , Ad-Rock and others. The album was again strongly influenced by electronics and showed Beck from his extroverted side again.
The follow-up album The Information was released in 2006 . It was produced by Nigel Godrich , who had already been responsible for several Beck albums (e.g. Sea Change). The album was released with a blank cover, but with a sticker to personalize the cover, and a DVD with low-budget videos for all the pieces included, e.g. B. Show people jumping around in teddy bear costumes. In the UK it was not featured on the music charts because of the distortion of competition from the bonus material.
On July 7, 2008 the album Modern Guilt was finally released in Europe and the following day in North America. Beck worked here with producer DJ Danger Mouse . Cat Power acted as a guest singer on one title.
In December 2009, an album by Charlotte Gainsbourg was released with IRM , on which Beck participated as a songwriter, composer and producer.
Two years later, Beck released his twelfth album in a special form: Song Reader is only available as a book with sheet music for 20 songs. Everyone can upload their own interpretation of the songs on the associated website. The accompanying album was released in August 2014, on which each song is interpreted by a different artist, only one song is played by Beck himself.
Beck announced two new albums for 2013, but both projects have been postponed. At the end of 2013, the release of Morning Phase was set for the end of February 2014; another acoustic album was initially announced for September of the same year. Ultimately, however, only Morning Phase appeared in 2014 , which was clearly stylistically based on Sea Change and was positively received by the critics. In February 2015, Beck won two Grammys for Morning Phase for album / rock album of the year. It was also awarded for album production. The song Blue Moon was nominated twice.
In 2016 he presented the song Wow and announced the release of his new album on his website that same year. However , it was only published under the title Colors in autumn 2017; stylistically it marked a departure from the elegiac morning phase and instead offered danceable pop music again.
On the occasion of the Grammy Awards 2020 a tribute concert for Prince took place on January 28, 2020 in the Los Angeles Convention Center in Los Angeles under the motto "Let's Go Crazy: The Grammy Salute to Prince", at which Beck sang Raspberry Beret . The concert aired on U.S. television on April 21, 2020, the fourth anniversary of Prince's death.
Trivia
Beck made a guest appearance on Matt Groening's animated series Futurama , in which he played himself. In line with Beck's humor, the contribution contains a lot of self-irony ( " Odelay is a word! Just look it up in the Becktionary. " ). Beck also appeared as a guest on the animated series Space Ghost: Coast to Coast . Beck contributed the title Youthless to the episode Dream a little dream of me ( once upon a time ) of the Grey's Anatomy series .
According to Rolling Stone Magazine (German edition), the album Mellow Gold ranks 461 among the 500 best albums of all time ; the album Odelay is at number 301 (Rolling Stone, US edition) and Sea Change at number 432. The song Loser was ranked 203 in the US edition among the 500 best songs of all time (2007 + 2003 [albums] ) listed.
Beck has been married to actress and screenwriter Marissa Ribisi since 2004 . Both are members of Scientology . His brother-in-law is the actor Giovanni Ribisi .
Discography
Studio albums
| year | title |
Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placements (Year, title, rankings, weeks, awards, notes) |
Remarks | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 DE
|
 AT
|
 CH
|
 UK
|
 US
|
|||
| 1994 | Mellow gold |
DE41 (11 weeks) DE |
AT25 (9 weeks) AT |
CH33 (6 weeks) CH |
UK41  (5 weeks)UK |
US13  (24 weeks)US |
First published: March 1, 1994
|
| 1996 | Odelay |
DE30 (13 weeks) DE |
AT30 (9 weeks) AT |
CH14 (13 weeks) CH |
UK17th (61 weeks)UK |
US16 × 2
(88 weeks)US |
First published: June 18, 1996
|
| 1998 | Mutations |
DE49 (3 weeks) DE |
- |
CH46 (1 week) CH |
UK24 (14 weeks)UK |
US13 (14 weeks)US |
First published: November 3, 1998
|
| 1999 | Midnite Vultures |
DE46 (4 weeks) DE |
AT41 (3 weeks) AT |
CH42 (5 weeks) CH |
UK19th (16 weeks)UK |
US34 (18 weeks)US |
First published: November 16, 1999
|
| 2002 | Sea change |
DE38 (5 weeks) DE |
AT34 (5 weeks) AT |
CH30 (5 weeks) CH |
UK20th  (4 weeks)UK |
US8th (26 weeks)US |
First published: September 24, 2002
|
| 2005 | Guero |
DE33 (5 weeks) DE |
AT23 (5 weeks) AT |
CH20 (7 weeks) CH |
UK15th (5 weeks)UK |
US2 (26 weeks)US |
First published: March 18, 2005
|
| 2006 | The information |
DE78 (1 week) DE |
AT56 (2 weeks) AT |
CH32 (5 weeks) CH |
- |
US7th (23 weeks)US |
First published: October 3, 2006
|
| 2008 | Modern guilt |
DE63 (2 weeks) DE |
AT42 (3 weeks) AT |
CH14 (9 weeks) CH |
UK9 (4 weeks) UK |
US4 (15 weeks) US |
First published: July 8, 2008
|
| 2014 | Morning phase |
DE13 (3 weeks) DE |
AT11 (3 weeks) AT |
CH5 (6 weeks) CH |
UK4th (13 weeks)UK |
US3 (35 weeks)US |
First published: February 21, 2014
|
| 2017 | Colors |
DE32 (1 week) DE |
AT25 (1 week) AT |
CH9 (2 weeks) CH |
UK5 (3 weeks) UK |
US3 (7 weeks) US |
First published: October 13, 2017
|
| 2019 | Hyperspace | - | - |
CH33 (1 week) CH |
UK33 (1 week) UK |
US40 (2 weeks) US |
First published: November 22, 2019
|
More albums
- 1993: Golden Feelings (first published March 1993)
- 1994: Stereopathetic Soulmanure (First published: February 22, 1994)
- 1994: One Foot in the Grave (First published June 27, 1994)
Remix albums
| year | title |
Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placements (Year, title, rankings, weeks, awards, notes) |
Remarks | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
DE
|
AT
|
CH
|
UK
|
US
|
|||
| 2005 | Guerolito | - | - | - | - |
US191 (1 week) US |
First published: December 13, 2005
|
Compilations
- 2000: Stray Blues (first published June 1, 2000)
EPs
- 1994: A Western Harvest Field by Moonlight (first published January 1994)
- 2001: Beck (first published February 12, 2001)
- 2005: Hell Yes (first published February 1, 2005)
- 2019: The Paisley Park Sessions (First published November 11, 2019)
Singles
| year | Title album |
Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placements (Year, title, album , rankings, weeks, awards, notes) |
Remarks | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
DE
|
AT
|
CH
|
UK
|
US
|
|||
| 1993 | Loose Mellow Gold |
DE18 (21 weeks) DE |
AT10 (12 weeks) AT |
CH19 (12 weeks) CH |
UK15th (7 weeks)UK |
US10 (24 weeks)US |
First published: March 8, 1993
|
| 1996 | Where It's At Odelay |
- | - | - |
UK35 (2 weeks) UK |
US61 (19 weeks) US |
First published: June 1996
|
| Devils Haircut Odelay |
- | - | - |
UK22 (2 weeks) UK |
US94 (4 weeks) US |
First published: October 1996
|
|
| 1997 | The New Pollution Odelay |
- | - | - |
UK14 (5 weeks) UK |
US78 (7 weeks) US |
First published: February 1997
|
| Sissyneck Odelay |
- | - | - |
UK30 (2 weeks) UK |
- |
First published: May 1997
|
|
| Jack ace Odelay |
- | - | - | - |
US73 (10 weeks) US |
First published: August 1997
|
|
| Deadweight Odelay |
- | - | - |
UK23 (4 weeks) UK |
- |
First published: October 1997
|
|
| 1998 | Tropicalia mutations |
- | - | - |
UK39 (2 weeks) UK |
- |
First published: December 1998
|
| 1999 | Sexx Laws Midnite Vultures |
- | - | - |
UK27 (5 weeks) UK |
- |
First published: November 1999
|
| 2000 | Mixed Bizness Midnite Vultures |
- | - | - |
UK34 (2 weeks) UK |
- |
First published: March 2000
|
| 2005 | E-Pro Guero |
- | - | - |
UK38 (2 weeks) UK |
US65 (10 weeks) US |
First published: March 2005
|
| Girl guero |
- | - | - |
UK45 (4 weeks) UK |
US100 (1 week) US |
First published: July 2005
|
|
More singles
- 1993: MTV Makes Me Want to Smoke Crack
- 1994: Steve Threw Up
- 1994: Pay No Mind (Snoozer)
- 1994: Beercan
- 1995: It's All in Your Mind
- 1999: Cold Brains
- 1999: Nobody's Fault but My Own
- 2000: Nicotine & Gravy
- 2002: Lost Cause
- 2002: Guess I'm Doing Fine
- 2005: Hell Yes
- 2006: Nausea
- 2006: Cellphone's Dead
- 2006: Think I'm in Love
- 2007: Timebomb
- 2008: chemtrails
- 2008: Gamma Ray
- 2008: Youthless
- 2011: Let's Get Lost (with Bat for Lashes )
- 2012: Looking for a Sign
- 2012: I Just Started Hating Some People Today
- 2013: Defriended
- 2013: I Won't Be Long
- 2013: Gimme
- 2014: Blue Moon
- 2014: Waking Light
- 2014: Say Goodbye
- 2014: Heart Is a Drum
- 2015: Dreams
- 2016: Wow
- 2017: Dear Life
- 2017: Up All Night
- 2018: Colors
- 2019: Super Cool (feat. Robyn & The Lonely Island )
- 2019: Saw Lightning
Awards for music sales
|
Note: Awards in countries from the chart tables or chart boxes can be found in these.
| Country / Region |
silver |
gold |
platinum
|
Sales | swell |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Awards for music sales (country / region, awards, sales, sources) |
|||||
 Japan (RIAJ)
|
- |
3 × gold3
|
platinum1
|
550,000 | riaj.or.jp |
 Canada (MC)
|
- |
5 × gold5
|
5 × platinum5
|
730,000 | musiccanada.com |
|
United States (RIAA)
|
- |
7 × gold7th
|
3 × platinum3
|
6,500,000 | riaa.com |
|
United Kingdom (BPI)
|
4 × silver4th
|
3 × gold3
|
platinum1
|
980,000 | bpi.co.uk |
| All in all |
4 × silver4th
|
18 × gold18th
|
10 × platinum10
|
||
Artist awards
- 1996: Video Where It's At : MTV Video Music Award for Best Male Video
- 1997: Album Odelay : Grammy Award for Best Alternative Music Album
- 1997: Single Where It's At : Grammy Award for Best Male Rock Vocal Performance
- 1997: Video Devils Haircut : MTV Video Music Award for Best Male Video
- 1997: Video Devils Haircut : MTV Video Music Award for Best Editing in a Video (to Hank Corwin )
- 1997: Video The New Pollution : MTV Video Music Award for Best Direction in a Video
- 1997: Video The New Pollution : MTV Video Music Award for Best Choreography in a Video (to Peggy Hickey)
- 1997: Video The New Pollution : MTV Video Music Award for Best Art Direction in a Video (to KK Barrett )
- 2000: Album Mutations : Grammy Award for Best Alternative Music Album
- 2015: Album Morning Phase : Grammy Award for Album of the Year
- 2015: Album Morning Phase : Grammy Award for Best Rock Album
- 2019: Album Colors : Grammy Award for Best Alternative Music Album
- 2019: Album Colors : Grammy Award for Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical
Filmography
- 1998: Rugrats - The Film (dubbing voice)
- 2003: Southlander
- Futurama (Follow Bender on tour as himself)
- 2004: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (title track Everybody's Gotta Learn Sometimes )
- 2010: Eclipse - Bis (s) zum Abendrot (Soundtrack)
- 2010: Scott Pilgrim vs. the Rest of the World (Soundtrack)
- 2017: The Circle (2017) (as himself)
Individual evidence
- ↑ Notes on Bibbe Hansen. Retrieved April 12, 2017 .
- ↑ Beck: "The Church of Scientology is a humanitarian organization." ( Memento from May 1, 2012 in the Internet Archive )
- ^ Andrew Stafford: Beck reveals he is not a Scientologist. November 21, 2019, accessed April 30, 2020 .
- ^ Review of the album at laut.de.
- ↑ Songreader.net ( Memento of the original from September 26, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Chuck Arnold: Grammy salute 'Let's Go Crazy' proves nothing compares 2 Prince. In: nypost.com. April 21, 2020, accessed April 24, 2020 .
- ↑ admin: The Best Moments From 'Let's Go Crazy: The Grammy Salute To Prince' [Videos]. In: liveforlivemusic.com. April 21, 2020, accessed April 24, 2020 .
- ↑ a b c Chart sources: DE AT CH UK US
Web links
- Official website
- Literature by and about Beck in the catalog of the German National Library
- Beck in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- Beck on MusicBrainz (English)
- Beck at laut.de
- Beck at Discogs (English)
- Further links on Beck in the Open Music Project - MusicMoz (English)
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Beck |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Hansen, Beck; Campbell, Bek David (real name) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | American singer |
| DATE OF BIRTH | July 8, 1970 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Los Angeles , California, USA |