So why is Beck’s Sea Change on this best 1,000 albums ever thing?
When Sea Change came out in 2002, I wouldn’t say I was disappointed by it, but I wasn’t overly enthusiastic about it either.
It’s a “break up” record, and it’s strikingly different than anything Beck had produced previously (though to be fair, many of Beck’s albums fall under “strikingly different than anything Beck had produced previously”).
But Sea Change is also a fully realized and deeply mature album, if you can dig, and maybe I had some more “growing up” or getting hit with some of life’s typical calamities and experiences to fully appreciate it.
These days, I feel like I really do. And, what’s more, Sea Change is also a fully realized album unlike so many others that have been released in this century. For this crazy best 1,000 albums ever project, it deserves to be celebrated for that as well.
Sea Change is a bummer album in some ways, but it’s also a deeply beautiful and soothing and comforting one, too.
In the way that the very best music can be.
I often find Stephen Thomas Erlwine’s music reviews on All Music to be unnecessarily snarky and harsh, but when he’s right on, he’s right on. I appreciate that he refers to Sea Change as “lush” and “somber,” and how it abandons “all of the postmodern pranksterism of its predecessor” (Midnite Vultures, #278 of best 1,000 albums ever). I also fully agree with this:
If, on most albums prior to this, Beck’s music was a sonic kaleidoscope – each song shifting familiar and forgotten sounds into colorful, unpredictable combinations – this discards genre-hopping in favor of focus, and the concentration pays off gloriously, resulting in not just his best album, but one of the greatest late-night, brokenhearted albums in pop.
Sea Change’s opener, “The Golden Age,” sets the tone for everything to come. It’s slow and world-weary, gentle and melancholy. And also: strikingly pretty.
If there’s a masterpiece on Sea Change, it’s “Lost Cause.” It remains one of the best singer-songwriter songs Beck has ever composed. The production – with acoustic guitar enmeshed in a subtle and swirling arrangement – is drop dead gorgeous and somehow sad and wrenching at the same time.
There’s no trademark wordplay here, no wildly imaginative kaleidoscopes of non-sequiturs. Instead, the lyrics are plain and emotional.
There’s no one laughing at your back now
No one standing at your door
Is that what you thought love was for?
I’m always astonished at how “Paper Tiger” builds and morphs and slides across its four and a half minutes. The string arrangement here is also exquisite, as are Beck’s restrained, quiet, and yet deeply affecting vocals.
Quick final note that in 2013, Beck went for a similar-ish tone and mode – if a somewhat warmer sound versus Sea Change – across an entire album with Morning Phase (#788). It’s excellent, but not quite in Sea Change’s class.
Some stats & info about Beck – Sea Change
- What kind of musical stylings does this album represent? Rock Music, Lo-Fi, Indie Rock, Alternative Pop, Singer Songwriter
- Rolling Stone’s greatest 500 albums ranking – not ranked!
- All Music’s rating – 5 out of 5 stars
- When was Sea Change released? 2002
- My ranking, the one you’re reading right now – #259 out of 1,000
Beck’s Sea Change on Spotify
A lyrical snippet from Beck’s Sea Change that’s evocative of the album in some way, maybe
I’m tired of fighting, fighting for a lost cause.
What does the “best 1,000 albums ever” mean and why are you doing this?
Yeah, I know it’s audacious, a little crazy (okay, maybe a lot cray cray), bordering on criminal nerdery.
But here’s what it’s NOT: a definitive list of the Greatest Albums of All-Time. This is 100% my own personal super biased, incredibly subjective review of what my top 1,000 albums are, ranked in painstaking order over the course of doing research for nearly a year, Rob from High Fidelity style. Find out more about why I embarked on a best 1,000 albums ever project.