Blogarhythms

I spend so much of my time digging through obscurities that I often don’t hear about what’s going on well-established artists until the last minute. My underground fetish withstanding, this may have something to do with general skepticism of the things people in the entertainment industry say about their future products. I guess I’d just rather be surprised when an artist I like releases a record than upset when the incredible record they said they were making (Zach de la Rocha, Raekwon, Portishead, I’m talking to you) never comes out.

Then there’s the speed with which many artists are putting together projects, producing them and putting them on the market these days. Such is the case with Modern Guilt, the new Danger Mouse-produced album from Beck, which hit stores this week. It feels like I just heard the lanky Los Angeleno was in the studio working on a record (his last for mega-major Interscope Records) and yet, here it is, rocking my headphones already.

His first “not Rap” album since 2002’s sterling Sea Change, Beck spends the 33 and a half minute duration of Modern Guilt rocking. Sonically, the album fills the gap between ’60s Chamber-Pop, Psyche & Blues-Rock, the Alt-Rock and Grunge of his ’90s contemporaries and the Electronica-tinged alternative Rock sound that’s dominated much of the last decade. And while some tracks — like the Shuggie Otis-meets-The Beatles-esque “Walls,” “Replica,” “Orphans,” which sounds like Kurt Cobain fronting a British Invasion band, and the Surf-Rock-inspired “Gamma Ray” — could conceivably fit in on another Danger Mouse project like Gorillaz or Gnarls Barkley, the psychedelic textures are mossier and the guitar licks fuzzier & bluesier throughout.

Tunes like “Chemtrails,” with it’s angelic vocal over winding piano and bass, the fuzzy New Wave/Garage/Punk number “Profanity Prayers,” and “Replica,” a reverb-drenched concoction of grainy double-time beats & layered keys, make me wish Radiohead would tap the rodent-monikered producer for a project. Or at least that he and Cee Lo would get even crazier next time they team up. The ever-eclectic Beck on the other hand just proves that his metaphors and non-sequiturs sound fly no matter how he delivers them, or what producer provides the backdrop.

Beck “Replica”

Having heard nor seen nothing (save a trailer for what I thought was a movie he directed called Brown Punk featuring a half-naked Elliot Gould) from him since 2003’s Vulnerable (which I wasn’t a huge fan of), I was even more surprised when I found out groundbreaking Trip-Hop artist Tricky had a new record — Knowle West Boy, which also dropped this week — in the pipeline. I got the news quite simply, by stumbling upon the video for the first single “Council Estate.”

That single, a paranoiac Punk-influenced thrash with choppy edits, clattering beats and electronic bleeps, mashed up “Sabotage”-era Beastie Boys, post-modern urban pop-art clusterfuckery a-la M.I.A. and the genre-be-damned ethos of the aforementioned Gnarls Barkley, and got me amped for the impending album. And while Tricky may have been at the fore of grinding Hip-Hop, Rock and Electronica up into languorously dubbed-out “Trip-Hop,” and songs like “C’Mon Baby,” “Coalition,” “Slow,” “Balgaga,” “Far Away,” “School Gates” and “Puppy Toy” prominently feature the guitar, Knowle West Boy isn’t all manic tempos and headbanging riffage. As might be expected there are a number of slower, decidedly more “trippy” selections on the disc.

Even his downtempo numbers are drenched in fuzz, as on “Coalition,” one of the tunes on which Tricky is the sole vocalist, delivering stream-of-consciousness spoken word in the tradition of Gil Scott-Heron, The Last Poets and Lee Perry over thunderous 808s, growling guitar and squealing feedback. The same goes for “Puppy Toy,” a rollicking honky-tonk Blues jam where he’s joined by vocalist Alex Mills, that stands out as the album’s “hit.” While “Past Mistake” featuring Lubna and “Cross to Bear” with Hadis are classic downtempo; all dark atmosphere and gut-churning emotion.

Tricky “Coalition”

Oh, and yeah, I know Zach de la Rocha is finally gearing up to release his first real post-Rage Against the Machine product as One Day As a Lion alongside former Mars Volta member Jon Theodore later this month. But that’s not the solo album produced by El-P, ?uestlove, DJ Shadow, DJ Premier, et al, that was reported on years ago, or the joint he and Trent Reznor recorded together. It is something though. Maybe that means some version of Only Built 4 Cuban Linx Pt. 2 is on it’s way as well?