Odelay

sounds as if S. Dali painted a desert landscape where men in space suits are wearing cowboy hats mixing 45s.

This album was really fantastic when it came out, and nearly a decade haven't changed my opinion (or that of many others). Beck and The Dust Brothers put together a unique set of tracks that rival those on any other album, EVER.

No, it isn't some contiguous set of related tracks - no album oriented rock here, folks. It is just pure fun an invention, and yet it still works - even with all the different sounds and styles.

It's hard to pick a favorite or least favorite track - they are all consistently great.

That's beautiful, Dad.

I'm in more or less total agreement with Janitor-X's 10/5/04 statement that this is basically a pile of pop culture detritus regurgitated and cut-and-pasted in a nonsensical way. Let me add some of my own thoughts.

I love strange music, but Beck's works are just a mess. Anyone with a substantial record collection and random instruments could throw something like Odelay together in a few days. This is part of Beck's "ironic" and "quirky" shtick (two concepts that are often and pretentiously abused in the world of indie rock) along with his completely nonsensical lyrics and flat, monotonal talk-singing (calling it "rapping," as far as I'm concerned, is an insult to every respectable MC out there). Basically his inspiration is the masterful Dust Brothers production job on the '89 Beastie Boys album Paul's Boutique, which was a thousand times better at achieving the "pop culture thrown in a blender" thing (copyright laws have made any attempt to usurp that album's throne impossible, at least in the sampling realm). Turntablists like DJ Shadow also do similar material, to much better effect.

Odelay comes off as an amateurish and sonically busy copy of that sound, masking any lack of soul and originality, genuine inspiration, and lyrical statement in favor of an unbearable forced irony and weirdness. And then you have the fact that Beck seems to try to "reinvent" himself with every album, but it comes off as an attempt to stay trendy rather than any sort of honest artistic progression.

Nonetheless, Beck is still the darling of indie music critics and media outlets such as Pitchfork, for reasons I still cannot entirely fathom; the existence of musicians like Mr. Bungle (and Mike Patton in general), Secret Chiefs 3, Frank Zappa, Soul Coughing, and the aforementioned hip-hop artists, all of whom blend humor, ecclecticism, innovation, and musical talent seamlessly, render Beck and his entire catalog obsolete.

The is my favorite album ever. Coming from me that means a lot. I have boughten this alubm 3 time now after I've had copies that either got broken or stolen, and each time it makes me so happy to have it again.

bob dylan himself said that everyone rips off but just rip off something good. this record doesn't sound weird to me. it sounds modern. anyone who says it's a ripoff of old music is a moron. yeah. lots of people rapped over harmonicas xylophones tubas acoustic guitars and drum machines in 1974. every six months nowadays i put this record in and get a twelve pack. I got plastic on my mind....