Beck: Beautiful Monstrosity - Softcover

Palacios, Julian

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0752271431 ISBN 13: 9780752271439

Publisher: Boxtree Ltd, 2000

Synopsis

Beck Hansen is one of the most influential musicians in the world. His fans include everyone from Bjork and Damon Albarn to Bono and Noel Gallagher, who describes him as his hero. His single 'Loser' was the anthem of the slacker generation and since then he has had two million-selling albums, Mellow Gold, and Odelay, both considered to be amongst the best albums of the 90s, and won a handful of Grammys and Brits. A brilliant live performer, his concerts are always sell-outs.Beck's life story is as extraordinary and fascinating as the records he produces. His grandfather was one of the leaders of the 60s avante-garde movement Fluxus, his mother was a Warhol starlet and his father a bluegrass musician. His childhood and adolescence spent in LA, Bible-belt Kansas, and the bohemian scene of Cologne led to the huge range of influences in his music, from hip-hop and punk to blues and spirituals.Beautiful Monstrosity, the first serious biography of Beck, will tell the full story and explore the mythology that already surrounds this young man. Palacios, will have access to Beck during the recording of his new album and to his family and those who work with him.

About this title

From the Author

Mystic Regulation at the Grand Ole Opry, Nashville
'YOU KNOW THAT FEAR, WHEN YOU GET UP IN THE MORNING, THAT'S ONE FOOT IN THE GRAVE, BABY. YOU KNOW WHAT YOU GOT TO DO TO GET OVER THAT FEAR, YOU GOT TO REGULATE!' he exhorts, getting half the audience to respond to his shouted plea. Beck's regulation seems something almost mystic, a means by which to decode the puzzles he is presenting, urging his audience to work their way into a new mode of thinking. To submit to flux and turn off the static; the static that pervades modern culture.

The magic moment that encapsulates Beck's performance comes during an incendiary 'High 5 (Rock The Catskills)' as Beck shouts out the verses with all the maniacal fervour of Luigi Russolo winding his Futurist noise machines. He is dancing like a Jajoukan Pan at the height of his ecstasy, rubbing a soft-shoe at the lip of the stage. He shakes his slight hips with such vigour you pray he won't fall into the pit. Then comes the Zen moment – a low-lying bank of monitors jut out from the stage at an angle, directly in the line of Beck's gyrations. Beck leaps backwards over the monitors, as nimble as Nijinsky, without a glance, chicken-scratching riffs Jimmy Nolan-style on his guitar.

That strikes me like nothing else in his performance. I'm amazed at how sure-footed he is, how he doesn't trip and how he is up there with all the confidence, humour and aplomb so conspicuous by its absence in so much of our generation. It is liberating to see someone shake off the cloak of apathy, the numbness of cynicism. It isn't that he is infallible, but just that he is human, talented and doing it, not just thinking or talking about it. And most importantly, he is succeeding. In Beck's phrase, they were 'doing it to it'.

Synopsis

Beck Hansen's single "Loser" was the anthem of the slacker generation and since then he has had two million-selling albums "Mellow Gold", and "Odelay", both considered to be amongst the best albums of the 90s, and won a handful of Grammys and Brits. His concerts are always sell-outs. Beck's life story is as extraordinary as the records he produces. His grandfather was one of the leaders of the 1960s avante-garde movement Fluxus, his mother was a Warhol starlet and his father a bluegrass musician. His childhood and adolescence spent in LA, Bible-belt Kansas, and the bohemian scene of Cologne led to the huge range of influences in his music, from hip-hop and punk to blues and spirituals. "Beautiful Monstrosity" tells the full story of Beck Hansen and explores the mythology that already surrounds this young man.

Edition details

• Publisher: Boxtree Ltd
• Publication date: 2000
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0752271431
• ISBN 13: 9780752271439
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 240