B E C K

Bek David Campbell was born on July 8, 1970 at 11:59 pm to teenage parents David Campbell (a string arranger for such bands and artists as James Taylor, Aerosmith, and Green Day, and one of the musicians on Marvin Gaye's infamous "Let's Get It On") and Bibbe Hansen (a former member of the punk group Black Fag, a band fronted by a crossdressing black guy) in Hollywood (Los Angeles), California.

Bibbe was a Warhol (Andy) Girl at the age of fourteen, who hung at the Factory with artists, film-makers, and musicians. She was a Warholian Dancer until she tired of the lifestyle at age sixteen and coincidentally met David Campbell.

Beck changed his name from Bek to Beck because his teachers often misspelled it. However, he still goes by Bek at times. He changed his last name, Campbell, to Hansen after his parents divorced. Beck’s parents split when he was thirteen years old, shortly after the birth of his brother, Channing. Bibbe retained custody of Beck and Channing, but the two boys bounced around from relative to relative. During this time, Beck came to know and admire his grandfather, Al Hansen, the man who taught him how to rhyme ("pull down your pants and do the hotdog dance").

Beck and Channing were fascinated by and adored their grandfather. Al Hansen was a renowned collage and performance artist, who came to prominence in the 60s. He was also associated with Andy Warhol and was active in the Fluxus art movement. Al turned their garage into an art studio. He convinced Beck to sell his rocking horse to him for $5. The next time Beck saw it, it was decapitated and covered with silver paint and cigarette butts. Beck and Channing tripped over Al's artwork on a daily basis.

Bibbe remarried and moved the family to East LA. Beck was one of the only non-Latinos in the neighborhood (his stepfather, Sean Carillo, was even Mexican). Hardcore gangs ruled the area. Beck was known as the "weird white kid." At age fourteen, Beck attended Belmont Junior High, the only school in the area with metal detectors at the doors, located in the most violent area of LA. Everyday he was chased five blocks to the bus stop by kids with lead pipes. Consequently, he dropped out of high school in the tenth grade for fear of his safety. Beck admits to regretting not getting a college education, but he doesn't exactly need one and seems to have turned out okay.

It is a bit surprising that Beck favored country music over punk, considering the influence that punk music had on his life. Both Al and Bibbe Hansen were big fans. Al was probably the oldest punk music lover, while Bibbe opened up her home as "crashing" quarters for local punks, including Germs singer Darby Crash (the Los Angeles equivalent of Sid Vicious).

Instead, Beck went the country/blues way when he discovered such musical greats as Mississippi John Hurt (Beck covers Hurt's "He's a Might Good Leader" on One Foot in the Grave) and Woodie Guthrie.

Beck started spending his time in the Los Angeles Public Library. He valued the library album section and took some records home and played them. He bought a Gibson and taught himself how to play in six months. And, it wasn't just any guitar, it was acoustic blues guitar. Once he learned enough songs, he would board the local transport buses and sing for the passengers. Beck later moved his gig to a local park.

In the meantime, Al moved to Cologne, Germany. After visiting his grandfather in 1987, Beck, at age seventeen, decided to move to the town that inspired his grandfather - New York City. Beck and this then girlfriend boarded a Greyhound bus headed cross-country. They eventually ditched the bus and started hitch-hiking and sneaking onto other buses. Beck made it to New York with $8, his guitar, and girlfriend-less.

He had to fight to stay alive. He hung out with the homeless street rappers in Thompkins Square Park. Beck found a part time job at the YMCA laminating IDs. He began playing folk songs on street corners, in parks, and at open-mic nights in clubs. Within weeks, Beck was offered his first steady gig at a coffee house. But, he had to perform his own material, not covers, so he started writing his own songs.

The music scene in New York was a mix of folk and punk or hip hop, called "anti-folk." Beck fit in very well. Thus, the birth of Banjo Stories, named for one of the two instruments used in the making (the other being an acoustic guitar).

Obviously, Banjo Stories went nowhere in supporting the fame of which we know Beck today, as well as two other nowhere albums, Golden Feelings and Fresh Meat and Old Slabs. However, Fresh Meat and Old Slabs is a hard-to-find collector's dream; it contains very early additions of "Loser," "Steve Threw Up," and "Satan Gave Me A Taco." This was also a time of a shortlived trademark, in which Beck acquired and wore on stage a Star Wars Stormtrooper mask. George Lucas himself quickly ended that fashion statement.

Beck's time in New York was worth it, overall, in the sense that he seemed to have discovered the Beck we all know and love today. However, this time in his life, much like his junior high years, was rocky and everything but easy. Carrying his guitar around New York City made Beck a target for harrassment and muggings. Even so bad one time that he ended up in the hospital.

Beck's three first albums, as we all know, never really went anywhere. After one year, no one cared for his music, he was broke and homeless and in a city that is very cold in the wintertime. In 1989, Beck moved back to LA. He took any job that he could get - leafblower, signpainter, dishwasher, a hotdog man at kids' parties, alphabetizing the porn section of a video store (you know, the usual). He jumped on stages to perform while bands were setting up. In the world famous Viper Room (owned by actor Johnny Depp), the electricity was shut off to get Beck off the stage.

He asked his friends to help him find gigs. One friend, in particular, would be a true friend for Beck. This friend was Steve Hanft (inspiration for "Steve Threw Up"), future video collaborator. Beck would sit in during Steve's band's (coincidentally named Loser) performances. Part of his stint was to rise from a coffin playing guitar badly. Within three months, Beck began booking his own gigs in local clubs.

In 1991, he was approached by a recording engineer from Bongload Records (then called Bong Load Custom) during a performance at the Sunset Junction Street Fair in LA. A week later, Beck was approached once again at a club by another recording engineer, coincidentally from Bongload also. The two producers discussed their finding and came to the realization that they had discovered the same artist. Beck was promptly set up to record in one of the producer's, Carl Stephenson, home. Stephenson became unimpressed with Beck and left for lunch while Beck was recording tracks. When the producer returned, Beck had written a new song - "Loser." The guitar riff impressed the producer. Bongload recorded 500 copies of "Loser" and sent them to college and alternative radio stations. Beck temporarily left the folk scene.

"Loser" is the only independent track ever to be in the top ten in the United States. Despite launching Beck's career, "Loser" leaves a bit of a sour spot in Beck's heart. Labeled as the slacker song of the decade by every music industry media, Beck came to dislike his song because of the negative message everyone seemed to get from it. Beck never meant "Loser" to become the slacker theme or to make himself the slacker king, as did happen. He wrote and named "Loser" on one notion - making fun of the way he raps. "Loser" will forever haunt him.

Around this time was when Beck started dating his long-time girlfriend, Leigh Limon (pronounced Lamoan). Not surprisingly, the two met in a second-hand clothing shop. It seemed to be destiny. Beck's trademark funky style might possibly be accredited to Leigh since she became his own personal clothing designer. She was very special to Beck, in that she knew him before he was famous. She really knew Beck and not the celebrity Beck.

Beck soon went into the commercial market. Not voluntarily, mind you. Budweiser offered Beck one hundred thousand dollars for the rights to use "Loser" in advertisements. This also foreshadows the equivalent offer from Miller beer to us "Where It's At" from Odelay in 1997. Being the modest man he is and going on the fact that the circumstances that led to "Loser" were pure luck, Beck declined and, instead of pursuing material and media wealth, backtracked to his roots, persay, and spent a week recording the folky One Foot in the Grave.

In 1993, recording labels had a bidding war over Beck. At age twenty-three, he signed with the label that offered the least money but gave him the most artistic freedom, Geffen Records.

In March 1994, his debut album Mellow Gold was released and "Loser" was reissued to the public. Touring commenced. Then, back to the studio to record the less recognized Stereopathic Soul Manure, which received mixed reviews and let everyone know that Beck was versatile. Perhaps the greatest entity of the new album was the re-release of such Beck oldies as "Satan Gave Me A Taco."

The touring continued, and Beck produced another album. A 10-inch vinyl this time (meaning all CD versions are ripped copies) - A Western Harvest Field By Moonlight. Beck was officially famous, but he wasn't happy with the image he was given as a middle class sitting duck who sang folk-rap.

As Beck was receiving increasing recognition he suffered many a loss. Within a six-month time span, six of Beck’s friends died due to cancer, AIDS, and car accidents. Then, as if things couldn't get worse, on June 21, 1995, Al Hansen passed away. At the same time, Beck’s label was pressuring him for his next album. He was forced to return to the studio and record. Beck spent nine months writing new song, inspired by the ones he had lost. Results included "Dead Melodies," "Canceled Check," and "Cold Brains" - obvious nods to his recent losses. However, these songs were shelved, at least for a period, when Beck met producers Mike Simpson and John King, the Dust Brothers.

Beck and Carl Stephenson did not have the best relationship after the recording of "Loser," and it didn't take much for Beck to befriend and begin working with the Dust Brothers. The rest is history.

In June 1996, Odelay, Beck’s sixth album, was released. He used Al’s collages for the album artwork on his new creation. The album with the famously mistranslated title (being fluent in Spanish, Beck aimed to title the album "orale," a slang term) became the most critically acclaimed album of the year. Promptly following, Beck toured, and the world was introduced to the funky costumes and smooth dance moves that he is still known for today. Since then it has only been uphill for Beck’s successes. His next two albums went in two totally different directions: 1998 - Mutations, an acoustic-Folk album, which used the shelved songs Beck wrote about his lost family and friends, was released and won him a Grammy Award; 1999 - Beck released a funky R&B/Disco album called Midnite Vultures.

Immediately after Beck’s 1999 release, critics deem it "album of the year." In November 1999, Esquire magazine included Beck in their "Genius Issue." Select Magazine named Beck as one the "100 Most Important People In the World." Twelve years after beginning his musical career, Rolling Stones Magazine christened Beck as the "voice of the decade."

On September 24 of 2002, Beck released his mellowest album yet - Sea Change. Inspiration for the album was the breakup of the nine-year relationship he had with "Death Blooms" and personal clothing designer, Leigh Limon. They broke up three days before his 30th birthday. He insisted she move out of their house in Silverlake (Supposedly not allowing her to take any of her things with her, but, hey, she cheated on him. She took the Volvo he had just recently bought her, though.) after he caught sight of a rather intimate e-mail in her "inbox" that suggested she was cheating on him with a member of the L.A. band, Whiskey Biscuit. Of course she denied this and said the e-mail was just from a friend. Beck has also been linked to Gina Gershon and Winona Ryder.

Beck has been seemingly busy since Sea Change. He debuted in the independent film "Southlander: Diary of a Desparate Musician," a movie by his friends Steve Hanft and Ross Harris, in which he plays himself nine years in the future and stars alongside Rory Cochrane as Chance ("Dazed and Confused," "Empire Records"), Ross Harris himself as Ross Angeles, Beth Orton as herself, Hank Williams III as himself, Laura Prepon as Seven=Five ("That 70s Show), and many others. "Southlander" tells the story of Chance, a wannabe musician in search of a stolen synthesizer (Moletron) that plays a vital part in his joining the band Future Pigeon. "Southlander" can be purchased on DVD from various music and movie locations and from the Emporium at Beck.com. To learn more about the movie and watch the trailer go to www.southlander.net.

In other media news: Beck starred on the Simpson-synonomous adult cartoon, Futurama, as himself (only his head was in a goo filled jar and his human body was replaced by a mannequin from the "garbage bin at 92 cent store"). Trying to comfort a robot with a low sense of self-worth after a freak can opener accident (Bender, if you're familiar with the cartoon) he invites him along on tour to play his torn-up stomach (washboard). They travel the country, even playing in West Virginia, where he plays a fourty minute washboard solo and becomes an inspiration for broken robots everywhere. There are a lot of Beck related jokes, including the introduction of the "Becktionary." This episode of Futurama has already aired but is being reran.

Beck recently released a Sea Change DVD featuring the entire Sea Change album and six Sea Change videos. If interested, I suggest making Best Buy your first stop.

Happy news for Beck: Beck married actress and screenwriter Marissa Ribisi (twin sister to Giovanni Ribisi) in a small, private wedding at San Ysidro Ranch in Montecito, California, outside of Santa Barbara (also the site of Chris Martin and Gwyneth Paltrow's wedding) on April 4, 2004. This is both Beck's and Marissa's first marriage. The couple dated a year before tying the knot. The two became parents to a baby boy named Cosimo Henri. No public information has been released yet, but the baby was supposedly born in August of 2004.

Useless and unofficial information: I have heard that Beck, whose mother is Jewish and grandfather on his father's side is a Presbyterian minister, converted to the Church of Scientology, but his father is actually the Scientologist who has been a member the entirety of Beck's life. Sources said the church was encouraging Beck's father to get his famous son to join (many, many famous people are members). But, Beck was quoted saying, "If I have children I'll raise them as Jews, because it's a great religion."

Before they were "Beck," Beck, Ballew, Dave Gomez, and Joey Waronker were known as "After School Special"