By Ryan Reed, eMusic Contributor more »

How does Beck still look this young?

By Andrew Parks, eMusic ContributorBeck has emerged from hiding with news of an brief east coast trek that's split between solo sets and "fully electric big band blow-outs." While the latter includes stops in Boston and Brooklyn, the singer/multi-instrumentalist… more »

By Annie Zaleski, eMusic ContributorJohnny Marr is best known as the guitarist of '80s icons the Smiths, but in the quarter-century-plus since he left the group, the 49-year-old Manchester, England, native has carved out a diverse career as a… more »

Beck

By Andrew Parks, eMusic ContributorBeck paid a rare visit to Sydney's radio waves this week, speaking to Triple J about his Song Reader project for McSweeney's, what it's been like playing with his old Odelay-era band, and whether we… more »

By Chris Nickson, eMusic ContributorWhen John Martyn died aged 60 in 2009, he left a legacy of 20 studio albums from a career that spanned more than four decades. Some were superb (particularly those from 1971-1980) and some veered… more »

By Sean Fennessey, eMusic ContributorThe ol' bait-and-switch move here. Many expected Beck's encore after Odelay's critical and commercial triumph would be something dangerous and indescribable. Instead, he subverted one more time by recruiting Radiohead producer Nigel Godrich for a… more »

By Sean Fennessey, eMusic ContributorBeck Hansen has always projected a wayward confusion. He is handsomely blank-faced, talented but never effortful, obscurantist but impossibly pop. In the early '90s, to think that this Los Angeles County dust bum would become… more »

By Sean Fennessey, eMusic ContributorThe first song on the first album of Beck's life as a famous musician is "Loser" and that was a fascinating decision. Not only did it immediately get it out of the way, allowing people… more »

By Sean Fennessey, eMusic ContributorThe first song on the first album of Beck's life as a famous musician is "Loser" and that was a fascinating decision. Not only did it immediately get it out of the way, allowing people… more »

By Sean Fennessey, eMusic ContributorThe ol' bait-and-switch move here. Many expected Beck's encore after Odelay's critical and commercial triumph would be something dangerous and indescribable. Instead, he subverted one more time by recruiting Radiohead producer Nigel Godrich for a… more »

By Sean Fennessey, eMusic ContributorThis brief, ghostly collaboration with producer Danger Mouse is the least incendiary album Beck has ever recorded — not a knock necessarily, but there's clearly something ordinary about it all. Danger Mouse's obsession with '60s… more »

By Sean Fennessey, eMusic ContributorThree years passed between the bonhomie bonanza of Sea Change and 2005's spirited Guero, and the time off made many wonder if Beck could regain the same manic brilliance he'd held for so many years… more »

By Sean Fennessey, eMusic ContributorIf Odelay was Beck's thrilling ego laid bare, and Mutations the critical, considered superego, then Midnite Vultures was the id run rampant. Inspired by Prince and James Brown, mostly, this folk bum-cum-alt-dum-dum somehow morphed into… more »

By Sean Fennessey, eMusic ContributorArguably Beck's last great album, and also his mopiest, Sea Change was feted at the time of its release as a mature turnabout for the man who had crooned about bedding a JC Penny clerk… more »

By Sean Fennessey, eMusic ContributorIn 1995, written off as a one-hit wonder with a frat boy base and, as SPIN once put it, "a generation's consolation prize after the death of Kurt Cobain," newly minted slacker avatar Beck was… more »

By Douglas Wolk, eMusic ContributorBeck's darkest, sparest and purest album, from its opening rewrite of Skip James '"Jesus Is a Mighty Good Leader" to its slow-crawling sickbed blues, recorded before almost anyone had heard of him (and backed up… more »