Live Mutations!

from hammerandbeyond.blogspot.com

Today Koopa’s Hideaway celebrates the release of Beck’s “Mutations” album.  Happy 11yr, 2month, 17 day anniversary, Beck!!!  No one has put out an album since then that is any better than Mutations.  Nobody!  Sure, there have been other great albums released in the decade since, but nothing that goes above and beyond this one.  And for being released near the height of the music industry’s selling power, the 600,000 units that have been sold makes Mutations relatively under-appreciated.  Trufax:  8Ball & MJG’s album “Lost” sold more than 2,000,000 units….

Let’s tick off what makes a great album: 

1.  No stinkers:  Check.  This album plays well from start to finish and even has a relic of its time: a hidden track at the end (Diamond Bollocks). 

2.  Great songwriting:  Check.  So many great lines and suggestive images.  These are songs that can be covered in a variety of ways and dressed up in different musical outfits. 

3.  Fresh musical style:  Check.  The Brazilian tropicalia style Beck & Nigel Godrich mixed into some of these songs felt new and different.  Add in the spacy Moog keyboard effects throughout and you’ve got yourself a distinctive musical palette. 

4.  Hasn’t been successfully copied:  Check.  Can you think of a subsequent album that sounds remotely like “Mutations”?

5.  References to underground musical influences:  Check.  It stands to reason that the name “Mutations” is both a comment on the differences from “Odelay” and a reference to Brazilian tropicalia legends Os Mutantes.  Beck would later do a version their song “O Menina”. 

I spent the better part of yesterday on Becktabs.com’s online forum downloading live material from this album.  I had live versions of most of the album from a couple KCRW radio sessions I had downloaded somewhere, but there were a couple holes.  I found out from whiskyclone.net that one of my all-time favorite Beck songs, Static, has only been played live 4 times.  But, I’m very happy with the finished product and I know you will be too.  I give you, “Live Mutations”:

Download:  Sendspace link to the zip file

Tracklist: 

Cold Brains, from KCRW 11.23.1998

Nobody’s Fault But My Own, from KCRW 11.23.1998

Lazy Flies, 2.14.2003

Canceled Check, 1.10.1999

We Live Again, from KCRW 11.03.2000

Tropicalia, from KCRW 11.23.1998

Dead Melodies, from KCRW 11.23.1998

Bottle of Blues, from KCRW 11.23.1998

O Maria, from KCRW 11.23.1998

Sing it Again, from KCRW 11.23.1998

Static, 10.29.2000

Diamond Bollocks (hidden track), 4.19.1999

Bonus, from the 1998 KCRW appearance, an amazing version of "Debra":