Who Innovated Beck's "Innovations?" A Mix-CD Challenge

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I have an acquaintance that loves Beck. She asked me what I think of the new album and I said I wasn't impressed. Then she insisted he was one of the most innovative artists in the world, to which I replied "what makes him innovative?" She responded by asking "what makes him not innovative?"

I was too tired to argue with such circular logic, and for that matter think she was confusing the objective or at least sort of provable "innovative" with the more subjective "interesting," but when asked to name all the acts his music piggybacks, I blanked. Also, I was losing my voice and didn't want to be "that guy" talking over the Grizzly Bear set.

So ILM: who are the innovators whose ideas Beck copped, and could you help me cobble together a told-you-so mix CD of some of their best-known tracks? I'm thinking she won't be impressed by more abstract, indirect selections, and would better be served/swerved with a disc of acts that sounded like Beck before Beck.

(This all assumes, on her dubious rhetorical turf, that Beck's so-called "innovations" go beyond savvy appropriation, of course. So someone like, say, Prince doesn’t count, unless the aspect of Prince being ripped off is clearly innovative and not just cool.)

― Josh in Chicago (Josh in Chicago), Wednesday, 11 October 2006 23:44 (nineteen years ago)

The Beastie Boys, of course. Without "Paul's Boutique" there's no "Odelay", and not just cause they share producers.

― Emily B (Emily B), Wednesday, 11 October 2006 23:46 (nineteen years ago)

beck is innovative if your knowledge of music is puddle-deep. he's still pretty good at his best, though. i think he's "eclectic" in style, not innovative.

― gear (gear), Wednesday, 11 October 2006 23:48 (nineteen years ago)

x-post Good suggestion and the first/most obvious one that came to mind at the time, but she claimed it was too clearly rap (I disagreed).

I tried to argue with her that eclectic is not the same as innovative, too. But she was being dense about it. "But each album he puts is so different from the last you just don't know what to expect!" was the regular retort that eventually made me clam up.

Hey, I didn't say she could be convinced by anything reasonable! Otherwise, where's the challenge?

― Josh in Chicago (Josh in Chicago), Wednesday, 11 October 2006 23:51 (nineteen years ago)

Perhaps the thread is difficult because he actually is innovative. Certainly his influences are clear: Dylan, Beasties, Nick Drake, Kraftwerk, Circle Jerks, Prince...put in a blender and voila! However he puts them all together and comes up with something fresh as far as I'm concerned, even if you don't like each album equally.

― Radio Free Albemuth (DocMartensBoots), Wednesday, 11 October 2006 23:56 (nineteen years ago)

the hombres - let it out (let it all hang out)
bob dylan - subterranean homesick blues
timbuk 3 - the future's so bright (i gotta wear shades)
allman brothers - midnight rider
dr. john - i walk on gilded splinters
gordon lightfoot - sundown
harry nilson - everybody's talkin'
david bowie - golden years

then again, i haven't care about beck for years, so what do i know?

― xhuxk (xheddy), Wednesday, 11 October 2006 23:59 (nineteen years ago)

If she's talking about Beck's first couple of albums, he's stole that style note for note of some NYC singer-songwriter called Paleface.

― Sadly, he will be the next Alexis Petridish. (Dom Passantino), Thursday, 12 October 2006 00:00 (nineteen years ago)

Radio Free Albemuth

dude you should change your user name

― chaki (chaki), Thursday, 12 October 2006 00:01 (nineteen years ago)

xp
haven't cared, i mean.

and oh yeah, sure, why not:

prince - gotta stop messin' about
os mutantes - um...just pick some song by os mutantes

― Charles Joseph Tarcisius Eddy (xheddy), Thursday, 12 October 2006 00:02 (nineteen years ago)

Sonic Youth, maybe?

― Curt1s St3ph3ns, Thursday, 12 October 2006 00:08 (nineteen years ago)

the scene is now
mofungo
camper van beethoven
de la soul

― xhuxk (xheddy), Thursday, 12 October 2006 00:12 (nineteen years ago)

woody guthrie
tom ze'
the mekons

― xhuxk (xheddy), Thursday, 12 October 2006 00:15 (nineteen years ago)

lou reed--"vicious"

― Hoosteen (Hoosteen), Thursday, 12 October 2006 00:19 (nineteen years ago)

the beatles - i am the walrus
falco
mothers of invention
was (not was)
m/a/r/r/s
laurie anderson
malcolm mclaren
pavement
thinking fellers union local 282

― xhuxk (xheddy), Thursday, 12 October 2006 00:22 (nineteen years ago)

Basehead - "Not Over You"
Caetano Veloso - i dunno, something

― Whiney G. Weingarten (whineyg), Thursday, 12 October 2006 00:24 (nineteen years ago)

Was (Not Was) = O(TM)

― Whiney G. Weingarten (whineyg), Thursday, 12 October 2006 00:24 (nineteen years ago)

"Innovative" is not always such a useful term. The first person to do something is not necessarily the one you end up wanting to listen to. Does anyone own any Kool Herc records? Yeah, I know. He didn't make any. But that just supports my point. Eddie Durham made the first electric guitar recording but Charlie Christian is better known, and Wes Montgomery is probably even better known (granted they both innovated in a certain sense).

If Beck "innovated" anything, it was just the particular way in which he combined a bunch of stuff that had, in fact, been done before but never all together on one record that had a hit single. The first few Beck records sounded pretty fresh when they came out, and I still think parts of them are good. That's about all that matters to me.

― A-ron Hubbard (Hurting), Thursday, 12 October 2006 00:27 (nineteen years ago)

I don't give a damn who's innovative or not. Beck writes great and catchy songs (melodies) and manages to spice them with interesting and detailed arrangements that are fun to listen to in headphones. That is a lot more important than "innovation" anyway.

― Geir Hongro (GeirHong), Thursday, 12 October 2006 00:32 (nineteen years ago)

brian eno
david byrne
brian eno and david byrne together
charley patton
art ensemble of chicago (maybe).

― xhuxk (xheddy), Thursday, 12 October 2006 00:32 (nineteen years ago)

I like all of Chuck's suggestions. And I don't disagree that Beck's prime innovation was the way he put all those disparate influences into a blender and hit pulse a few times. But is that really any innovation? There's the paradox.

Maybe his biggest attribute is not that he is innovative but that he is clever. Just clever to varying and inconsistent degrees, I suppose.

This is not to place too much weight on innovation, mind. Recall from my first post it was she, the acquaintance, that introduced such a loaded term in defense of Beck. If she just said he was catchy and melodic that would have been that.

― Josh in Chicago (Josh in Chicago), Thursday, 12 October 2006 00:47 (nineteen years ago)

What was Bob Dylan's innovation, really? He didn't invent folk music, he wasn't the first popular folk musician, he didn't invent the idea of having sophisticated and poetic lyrics, he wasn't the first political singer, and I doubt he was the first person to write surrealistic lyrics.

― A-ron Hubbard (Hurting), Thursday, 12 October 2006 00:55 (nineteen years ago)

anyone who can come up with antecedents for 'diamond bollocks' or 'runners dial zero' before i wake up tomorrow and check ILX has earnt my undying respect.

― You've Got Scourage On Your Breath (Haberdager), Thursday, 12 October 2006 00:59 (nineteen years ago)

What was Bob Dylan's innovation, really?

He made rock music seem "important" (but he was joking)!

also:

Captain Beefheart
and maybe the Fall
etc.

― xhuxk (xheddy), Thursday, 12 October 2006 01:04 (nineteen years ago)

Why would I want to change my user name...?

― Still Radio Free Albemuth (DocMartensBoots), Thursday, 12 October 2006 01:37 (nineteen years ago)

Certainly his influences are clear: Dylan, Beasties, Nick Drake, Kraftwerk, Circle Jerks, Prince...put in a blender and voila!

Add Beatles and Bowie among his most obvious influences. In the 90s, he did roughly the same thing Prince did in the 80s and Bowie did in the 70s, just it sounded different because of a different time and because of his background being different from those of Prince and Bowie.

― Geir Hongro (GeirHong), Thursday, 12 October 2006 08:04 (nineteen years ago)

When I first heard Mellow Gold I thought it sounded like a cross between Safe As Milk & 3 Feet High & Rising.

I haven't heard anything he's done since Sea Change, which was basically Skip Spence with some Gainsbourg decoration.

― bham (bham), Thursday, 12 October 2006 08:12 (nineteen years ago)

omc 'how bizarre'

― dave q (listerine), Thursday, 12 October 2006 09:25 (nineteen years ago)

Also Ween.

Of all the artists people compare to Beck, Nick Drake puzzles me the most. Guy sounds nothing like Nick Drake. Yes, he has used an acoustic guitar and been backed by strings, but that doesn't make him Nick Drake. Nick Drake sounds old, soulful, his voice has mystery; Beck sounds like a surfer with a mouth full of jawbreakers.

― Mark (MarkR), Thursday, 12 October 2006 10:14 (nineteen years ago)

I've never heard it, but Gary Wilson's You Think You Really Know Me gets mentioned with regard to Beck's style on occasion.

― LC (Damian), Thursday, 12 October 2006 10:46 (nineteen years ago)

If I hadn't heard Beck before reading this thread, I would now think he was the best thing ever.

― Marcel Post (Marcel Post), Thursday, 12 October 2006 10:55 (nineteen years ago)

antecedents for 'diamond bollocks'

The United States of America + Mudhoney?

'runners dial zero'

Brian Eno + Brian Wilson?

― nate p. (natepatrin), Thursday, 12 October 2006 13:03 (nineteen years ago)

paper tiger borrows really heavily from the sound serge gainsbourg immortalised on melody nelson

― Charlie Howard (the sphinx), Thursday, 12 October 2006 13:05 (nineteen years ago)

He doesn't so much innovate as he tries to find interesting shit to splice together in fairly unexpected ways; sometimes it works (Mellow Gold); sometimes it kind of goes splat against a big marble floor of meta (Guero).

xp And he wasn't even the first to do that; refer to David Holmes' "Don't Die Just Yet" (but I actually like both songs anyways)

― nate p. (natepatrin), Thursday, 12 October 2006 13:07 (nineteen years ago)

"Of all the artists people compare to Beck, Nick Drake puzzles me the most"

You are right that vocally they sound totally different. Musically however a lot of the soundscapes on Mutations and especially Sea Change sound like some of Drake's more lush songs.

― Radio Free Albemuth (DocMartensBoots), Thursday, 12 October 2006 13:57 (nineteen years ago)

"big marble floor of meta"?

x-post

― Hoosteen (Hoosteen), Thursday, 12 October 2006 13:57 (nineteen years ago)

"In the 90s, he did roughly the same thing Prince did in the 80s and Bowie did in the 70s, just it sounded different because of a different time and because of his background being different from those of Prince and Bowie. "

Geir I totally agree...I also thought that Midnight Vultures on it's first few tracks had the same relationship to Stax soul as the Stones did to classic blues idioms...

― Radio Free Albemuth (DocMartensBoots), Thursday, 12 October 2006 14:02 (nineteen years ago)

"big marble floor of meta"?

Shitty simile, and sorry about that, but Guero was trying way too hard to be Beck, pretty much.

― nate p. (natepatrin), Thursday, 12 October 2006 15:01 (nineteen years ago)

I was underwhelmed by Guero at first but the songs are really strong. I think The Information and Guero are Beck in his "Blood on the Tracks Phase", kind of playing to his strengths if no longer throwing stylistic shifts out with each album.

― Radio Free Albemuth (DocMartensBoots), Thursday, 12 October 2006 16:10 (nineteen years ago)

I downloaded all the originals that were sampled on "Odelay" and it made for some really good listening. Rasputin's Stash in particular made a huge impression on me!

― Adam Bruneau (oliver8bit), Friday, 13 October 2006 02:31 (nineteen years ago)

Velvet Underground - Countess From Hong Kong

― Zwan (miccio), Friday, 13 October 2006 03:10 (nineteen years ago)

"Taxman"

― Zwan (miccio), Friday, 13 October 2006 03:11 (nineteen years ago)

Os Mutantes, especially on Mutations, especially on "tropicalia"

Try their first album, self titled, wicked stuff

― Erock Lazron (Erock Zombie), Friday, 13 October 2006 03:42 (nineteen years ago)

The extensive and frequentl killer list of models being compiled here is inspiring me with respect for the guy that I never knew he deserved.

― These Robust Cookies (Robust Cookies), Friday, 13 October 2006 04:30 (nineteen years ago)

I downloaded all the originals that were sampled on "Odelay" and it made for some really good listening. Rasputin's Stash in particular made a huge impression on me!

Schubert's Unfinished Symphony rules at least :)

― Geir Hongro (GeirHong), Friday, 13 October 2006 09:46 (nineteen years ago)

The extensive and frequentl killer list of models being compiled here is inspiring me with respect for the guy that I never knew he deserved

It's less impressive when you realized what he DID with them.

― Zwan (miccio), Friday, 13 October 2006 14:26 (nineteen years ago)

Fritz made a great point on the Cornelius thread. Beck takes those influences and sythesizes them into something different, whether you enjoy what he does with them or not. Someone like Cornelius just regurgitates each influence without really stamping his own mark on them...

― Radio Free Albemuth (DocMartensBoots), Friday, 13 October 2006 15:19 (nineteen years ago)

The Beastie Boys, of course. Without "Paul's Boutique" there's no "Odelay", and not just cause they share producers.
-- Emily B (emily.burnha...), October 12th, 2006.

― Badrock Example (Barima), Friday, 13 October 2006 15:48 (nineteen years ago)

Re Nick Drake -- what was the Beck song on Sea Change that was pretty much a direct rip of "River Man"?

― jaymc (jaymc), Friday, 13 October 2006 15:59 (nineteen years ago)

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