Midnite Vultures

I'm so happy! This is one of the first cd's I've ever bought, I love everything about this album

One of his best. Musical genre straddling like no other artist can accomplish, this album has songs that are groovy, driven, funky and utterly unique. From beginning to end, this is an album that begs to be heard in its entirety, rather like some of Air's albums (10,000 Hertz Legend, for example). Prior to the song "Sexx Laws," I don't think anyone would ever have expected to hear a banjo break in the middle of a synth-pop-muzak alt-rock hit song on Top 40 radio.That's the kind of thing Beck can not only get away with, but succeed at. I think it's because all the songs on this album, and the album as a whole, manage to replicate &/or sample and then combine sonic bits of several decades of popular music. And if you've been a fan of wildly different genres of popular music across that span of time, you will hear it in his songs, but combined to beautiful effect like never before, almost as an homage. Everything from girl-group harmonies, Prince-like R&B falsetto, disco synth and hooks, hard rock guitars, brass sections, Stevie Wonder-like keyboards, Zappa-like jazzrock bits, R&B groove, Pink-Floyd-Wish-You-Were-Here acoustic guitar, Neil Young-ish country rock melancholia, Parliament/Clinton-esque funk and sax, Air-like synths, 80s/early 90s video game synth sounds, Steely Dan-session jazz-pop musician perfection, electronica, synthpop, blues harmonica, and country twang is represented here. Beck and his producer are the maestros conducting a fabulous orchestra made up of the last 40-50 years of American music. It will move your feet and your soul and make you think -- and parts are absolutely gorgeous. The electro-trip-hop-country-rock-pop combination of musical genres is a pastiche that is rich and satisfying, lyrically compelling, with a nearly non-stop SERIOUS GROOVE from beginning to end. The sampling, the instrumentation, the combination of old school analog instruments (including brass and strings) with 21st century synths, technology, and sampling -- it's utter genius. The songs and the production, when you listen to the entire thing all the way through, may make you feel like you just had a few puffs off a bong packed with high quality medicinal... even though you haven't.Track listing (*** are my faves -- there are a lot):Sexx Laws <--the hit single: pop, synth, muzak, and a strangely perfect banjo-synthesizer break in the middleNicotine & Gravy*** <--lovely funk hereMixed Bizness*** <--fun, funny, funky and groovingGet Real Paid <-- electronica with drum machines and video-game synth soundsHollywood Freaks*** <---dystopian groove with Beck's rhyming and rappingPeaches & Cream*** <---AMAZING, hilarious TRIP-HOP GROOVE (w/tiny bits of Pink-Floyd Wish-You-Were-Here-like acoustic guitar)Broken Train*** <--psychedelic. The bass and dropped-in sax funk it up (& the ascending "sha-la la-la la-la-laaaah" refrain)Milk & Honey <--strangely hard rock edge here with Zappa & the Mothers jazzy instrumentation -- yet groovyBeautiful Way*** <--SIMPLY GORGEOUS melancholic trip-hop with country twang, harmonica, beautiful harmoniesPressure Zone <---catchy synth-pop with fuzzy guitar and fantastic chorus that slips in and out of a grooveDebra*** <--a gorgeous, sexy, silly groove with horns, string bass, Moog, and Beck's falsettoThere's also an Untitled track following Debra that seems to start KMFDM-ish industrial, go through Zappa-influenced muzak, back to 90s Ministry industrial.Some of Beck's song lyrics here describe a near-future fascinated-but-angry trappings-of-wealth-and-celebrity-obsessed contemporary society with dystopian cyberpunk scifi poetry -- a cross between a Cronenberg film like Crash (the *other* Crash that erotified car accidents and their brace-wearing, crutch-using survivors), Bruce Wagner (screenwriter of Cronenberg's viciously satirical film Maps To The Stars) and William Gibson or Paulo Bacigalupi. Lyrics such as: "Wearing hepatitis contact lens" . . . "I'll feed you fruit that don't exist" . . . "we drop lobotomy beats evaporated meats on hi-tech streets...neon mamacita eat at taqueria pop lockin' beats from Korea" . . . "You look good in that sweater and that aluminum crutch" . . . "the snipers are passed out in the bushes again. . . . there's only rehashed faces on the bread line tonight, soon you'll be a figment of some infamous life; billionaires smile like weapons passing out platinum pensions". . . "in the aluminum sunset drinking from a drain. . . .No it isn't funny living in a garden of sleaze Bangkok athletes in the biosphere Arkansas wet dreams we all disappear Kremlin mistress she slips me roofies". . .Seriously. Buy this. If you like Beck, you will LOVE THIS. Even if you are kind of "meh" about Beck except for his hits -- you'll probably still really like this, because it's just that good.

Part techno, part rock, part funk. Beck continues to construct collages of sound that almost always wind up sounding extremely good. "Midnite Vultures" is very funny at times and very scary at other times. It's certainly not an album you can sleep through. Fascinating jingles and sound effects keep you alert. Furthermore, I like the art. It goes along with the music very well and is fun to look at. I would gladly give this album 4.5 stars but I can't give it 5 because "Beautiful Way" is a very weak track and some of the other tracks can get a bit overly redundant at times. Overall though, another excellent Beck album worthy of your purchase.

great item

OK, so I didn't read all 78 reviews. But of the many reviews I read, it seems to me that NOBODY UNDERSTANDS THIS ALBUM. This album is awesome... groovy and hilarious. People either like the princiness/old school funk of it or complain that he copies Prince and either don't like prince and therefore don't like this or like prince and would just listen to Prince instead of this album. What people don't understand is that Beck is both biting off Prince and making fun of him. It's a little post-modern concept called appropriation. Beck is both paying homage to these musicians and mocking them. He is both poking fun at a genre of music and in doing so making you want to shake your booty. It points out the good and the bad of it at the same time... and I think it's ingenious, the end product makes me want to laugh and dance. Laugh at the overt sexuality with which he makes fun of the genre and dance to the beats he stole from it. Also, has anyone noticed the Guns'n'Roses parody in it? To summarize, I think this is some great music, and there's more depth to it than people think.

Whew! There's a lot of energy in this album, imagine a Prince, Lenny Kravitz, Radiohead, Chemical Brothers, Burt Baccarach mutation having a good time with Beck's Dylan-for-the-post-millenium lyrics to sharpen the mix. The brass section were having a blast playing along with the rolling, squelchy bass lines. This time on the lyrical agenda there's more about love and money (or at least lust) with less time in the bizarro trailer park. Its funky and it makes me wanna dance. I initially thought Beck had friends do guest vocals, for example, in "Peaches and Cream" but then I reconsidered... "Cos we're on the good ship, menage a trois" could only really sound good straight from Beck. The same syncopated, usually snappy, sometimes dappy, lyrics frame the music and that's where we're at "Brief encounters in Mercedes Benz, Wearing hepatitis contact lens", "I'll feed you fruit that don't exist, I'll leave graffiti where you've never been kissed". I could go on but you gotta listen to it. Thanks Beck... err, is her left eye really lazy?

I LOVE this album!! Bought it at the same time as his Morning Phase album, and they are my 2 faves of his, with Midnite Vultures taking top spot. Funky Beck is my favorite Beck💙Great driving music!