Beck - Odelay

Unlike Stereopathetic Soul Manure and One Foot in the Grave, the indie albums that followed his debut Mellow Gold by a mere matter of months, Odelay was a full-fledged, full-bodied album, released on a major label in the summer of 1996 and bearing an intricate, meticulous production by the Dust Brothers in their first gig since the Beastie Boys' Paul's Boutique. Odelay shared a similar collage structure to that 1989 masterpiece, relying on a blend of found sounds and samples, but instead of lending the album its primary colors, the Dust Brothers provided the accents, highlighting Beck's ever-changing sounds, tying together his stylistic shifts, making the leaps from the dirge-blues of "Jack-Ass" to the hazy party rock of "Where's It's At" seem not so great. Like Mellow Gold, Odelay winds up touching on a number of disparate strands -- folk and country, grungy garage rock, stiff-boned electro, louche exotica, old-school rap, touches of noise rock -- but there's no break-neck snap between sensibilities, everything flows smoothly, the dense sounds suggesting that the songs are a bit more complicated than they actually are. Most of the songs here betray Beck's roots as an anti-folk singer -- he reworks blues structures ("Devil's Haircut"), country ("Lord Only Knows," "Sissyneck"), soul ("Hotwax"), folk ("Ramshackle") and rap ("High 5 [Rock the Catskills]," "Where It's At") -- but each track twists conventions, either in their construction or presentation, giving this a vibrant, electric pulse, surprising in its form and attack. Like a mosaic, all the details add up to a picture greater than its parts, so while some of Beck's best songs are here, Odelay is best appreciated as a recorded whole, with each layered sample enhancing the allusion that came before. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide

Name Credits Al Hansen Artwork, Collage Beck Keyboards, Mixing, Celeste, Piano (Electric), Vocals, Bass, Producer, Drums, Clavinet, Harmonica, Engineer, Design, Organ, Guitar (Acoustic), Guitar (Electric), Percussion, Art Direction, Slide Guitar Bob Ludwig Photography, Mastering Brian Paulson Mixing, Producer Charlie Haden Bass David Brown Saxophone Greg Leisz Pedal Steel Joey Waronker Drums, Percussion Manuel Ocampo Collage, Paintings, Artwork Mario Caldato, Jr. Producer, Mixing Mike Boito Trumpet, Organ Mike Millius Screams Nitin Vadukul Photography Rob Schnapf Mixing, Producer Robert Fisher Art Direction, Design Ross Harris ? Shauna O'Brien Production Coordination, Coordination The Dust Brothers Mixing, Engineer, Producer Tom Rothrock Mixing, Producer Zarim Osborn Artwork, Collage