I stayed out of the Kanye/Beck Grammy fracas from earlier this year. After all, I like Beck. I like Kanye. I like Beyonce. Sure, Mr. West was a bit off-base in his assessment that Beck’s win was a blow against “artistry” (whatever that is) but some of Beck’s defenders were also off-base in their assessment that Beyonce’s vocal acuity doesn’t equal artistry.
At any rate, that was four months ago–water under the bridge. Back to Beck.
While I enjoyed Morning Phase immensely upon the first couple of listens-I will say that Beck’s most recent album wore off of me fairly quickly. Not to the point that I didn’t like it, I just don’t like it as much as I thought I did initially. While part of my initial enjoyment of it had to do with its similarity to 2002’s Sea Change, the fact that it wasn’t as good as that excellent album (and the fact that it seemed to be a somewhat calculated replication of it) took the bloom off the rose a little bit.
“Dreams”, Beck’s new single, finds the singer/songwriter at his most pop-shiny. It’s the first song of his in a decade that I can picture being played on Top 40 radio (take that with a grain of salt, however, as it’s been almost a decade since I listened to top 40 radio willingly). It’s a nice change of pace from the somber Morning Phase, even if it’s not as wickedly offbeat as some of his previous/best-known work. To make what’s becoming a really long story short, I dig this song-a lot. Is there a new album coming? Hopefully, there is. In the meantime, you can listen below.