There Is No Other

08/03/1999 9:00 PM, LAUNCH
Mac Randall

Let's get this out of the way right at the start: Jeff Beck is the world's best electric guitarist. Sure, there's a lot of competition on this front, but Beck beats 'em all, and he does so not because he's speedy or flashy (though he's quite capable of being both), but because he's a master of phrasing. Plenty of other guitarists can technically achieve what Beck does on six strings, but no one can make a guitar sound the same way. For the last 35 years, the man's playing has offered an inimitable, unmistakable blend of wacky humor, brute aggression, and heart-on-sleeve tenderness. Listen to his raging Indian-flavored solo on the Yardbirds' 1966 hit "Shapes Of Things," or his loopy call-and-response act with Rod Stewart on "Let Me Love You" (from the first Jeff Beck Group album, 1968's Truth), or the way he coaxes several dozen layers of meaning from the melody of Stevie Wonder's "'Cause We've Ended As Lovers" (off 1975's Blow By Blow), or the stunning combination of harmonics and whammy-bar manipulation that he uses to sculpt the tune of "Where Were You" (a standout track on 1989's Guitar Shop). These career highlights are evidence of a man who's reached the pinnacle of expression on his chosen instrument. Case closed.

Another thing about Jeff Beck: He doesn't record much. His latest album, joshingly titled Who Else!, is his first collection of original material in 10 years. (His only other '90s release, Crazy Legs, was a tribute to rockabilly legend Gene Vincent, whose guitarist Cliff Gallup was a seminal influence on Beck.) Though he practices guitar just about every day--you'd have to if you wanted to do what he does--Beck has been notoriously reluctant to enter a recording studio during the last two decades, preferring instead to tend to his English country home and indulge his other great passion, for automobiles; he's a hot-rodding fanatic. Which makes Who Else! that much more of an event. The new album's not exactly a treasure house of timeless melodies, and the techno veneer on several tracks seems a bit contrived, but Beck's riveting, take-no-prisoners performance on "Brush With The Blues" makes up for a lot. And on a couple of cuts, the trashy "Space For The Papa" and the gorgeous "Angel (Footsteps)," he takes the art of slide guitar to a new level. Then again, what else would you expect from the world's best guitarist?

One last thing about Mr. Beck: There's no question that he was the primary basis for the character of Nigel Tufnel in This Is Spinal Tap. The shock of raven hair, the suburban London accent, the conversational mannerisms--Christopher Guest, the comedian who played Nigel, got it all from Beck, and he got it all perfectly, except of course for the instrumental virtuosity. Sipping a Bloody Mary at a midtown Manhattan hotel bar in the middle of a whirlwind press tour, this living legend is an engaging talker, albeit one who seems more than a little amused by all the attention he's getting.

LAUNCH:
Your schedule looks pretty busy. So many interviews, meetings, and photo shoots. Aren't you getting worn out?

BECK:
Water off a duck's back, really. After a while, the deja vu sets in because we always start with "Why have you been away so long?" But that's okay. It's better than "Oh no, not another album!"

LAUNCH:
It's a little surprising that people ask that question. You'd figure they'd know that you only make records when you feel like making records.

BECK:
Yeah, that's pretty much the way it is. It sounds a bit lazy the way you said it, but that's true. I have to feel as if I could do something. I always feel like making records, but there's not always enough creative drive to do it. Plus, being the keeper of a large house, your whole day's gone in a flash just doing errands. [Laughs] It was better in the early days when I didn't have a house--any excuse to go somewhere so I could get a warm room.

LAUNCH:
So what happened to make you want to get back into it now?

BECK:
Well, part of it was contractual, obviously. I mean, the pressure was ridiculous. I'd broken the contract 10 times over and money started to change hands. But without wanting to put too much of a cynical overtone to it, I just felt, "Bloody hell, it's time to do something. At least do it for the people who have been so patient and so loyal to me." It's unbelievable how [the fans] still keep me going, and it wasn't fair to them to piss them about any longer, after the Santana promise. I wanted to use that [1995 tour with Santana] as a springboard to carry on, and we never did. That isn't strictly my fault, you know; I really wanted to carry on with that band. But [drummer] Terry Bozzio's got a family to look after--he can't stop working for six weeks and have no money coming in. The bass player's got a family. It's all these old gaffers, you know. You've got to get the younger boys. At 16, they don't give a sh-t. [Grins]

LAUNCH:
I must confess I'm a little surprised to hear how, for want of a better word, modern-sounding Who Else! is.

BECK:
Yeah. I could have gone completely porno-techno, quadruple-X. But I think there's just enough of that to let people know that I'm aware of what's going on and can use it as a vehicle for guitar pieces. The next album may or may not contain more. I don't really want to have to answer to purists--if we all sat around and played what everybody wanted, we'd be bored sh-tless in a couple of weeks, so there has to be a certain gauntlet of challenge thrown down. I hope that it's not received too one-sidedly, that people can come to it with open minds and not get too precious about how the music's presented. Doing that would be like complaining about the box the chocolates are in. If the chocolates taste good, that's all that matters.

LAUNCH:
How did you end up going in that techno direction?

BECK:
It was a natural chain of events. We had attempted at first to record the album live on tour. That first track, "What Mama Said," came out of a live performance, but it had a large chunk of what I would call rather unsuitable melody attached to it. After a while, we realized that the tapes were not going to make it without lots of surgery. So I just put everything in ProTools [digital editing system], and I kind of liked the way it was edited down. From there it just automatically progressed into the land of techno, but the solo was kept the same. It's just a striking piece that leads you right into it. Then comes another one ["Psycho Sam"] based around a digital bass riff. And then, all of a sudden, the barefaced cheek of going into a live, unedited blues ["Brush With The Blues"] is surreal in itself.

LAUNCH:
Where was that blues track recorded?

BECK:
A big music hall in Munich. We played there late summer '98. We had already done a sneaky tour of Italy, bizarre gigs, very well-wrapped, hardly anyone knew about it. From there we drove up through Germany, and out came the mobile [recording unit] from London to meet us. When we got back home, I listened to the tapes and I just wanted to throw them all in the river. It wasn't that they were bad, but it wasn't what I wanted--too dry, too jazz-sounding, not nearly enough upfront aggression in it. So I spent the next two or three months trying to debug it. During that time, [keyboardist] Tony Hymas came up with some really nice pieces, which we also worked on in the studio and which also made it on. In hindsight, it would have been a better plan to do a studio album with a keyboard player and programmers, then bring the other players in later. Instead, we did it the other way 'round. But at least it got done. Thank God for that. It's been fraught with trauma and fights and all that, but that's the way art has to be sometimes. Art's not all about laying back and playing luscious melodies and making millions of dollars, it's about suffering and squabbling and bloodshed. I wish it wasn't quite as often. [Laughs]

LAUNCH:
As usual, there are plenty of wild sounds on the new album. How are you doing those high notes on "Space For The Papa," which sound like harmonics bent upwards? Is there a slide involved?

BECK:
That's right. It's an open harmonic, and then the bottleneck [slide] is laid onto the string very gently, which keeps the note going. You can just about hear the slide go onto the string, but that's it. Pretty sneaky, huh? [Chuckles]

LAUNCH:
How about "Angel (Footsteps)"? Some of the notes you play sound too high to be played on a normal guitar.

BECK:
Yeah. They're past the fretboard. That's done with the right [picking] hand and a piece of steel, and it's not easy. Because the higher you go on a string, the less distance between notes. You're talking about an almost immeasurable distance to get a semitone or half-step. But it's not done out of impishness or to be clever, it just sounded nice--almost too high, but not quite. To do it right, you have to block off all the strings by clasping the neck with your left hand. Otherwise you'll get extraneous ringing from the strings you're not playing. Once you've done that, you can just touch the string with the slide in the higher register and it'll sound. Just that action of pressing metal to metal will give you an attack and a decay. Blown that trick, haven't I? [Laughs] That'll be $35,000, thank you. That track was originally called "La Varonese," but I didn't really like the title. It seemed a bit Victorian. Jimmy Page helped come up with the new name. I gave a copy of the CD to him for a 55th birthday present. It wasn't even finished yet--the titles and the credits weren't on it--and he went absolutely apesh-t over it. When he heard that song, he asked, "What's that called?" I didn't want to tell him "La Varonese," so I said it didn't have a title yet. He said, "Call it 'Angel Footsteps.'" Because he came up with it, I decided that's what it would be called. The sheer fact that it's Jim makes it special to me.

LAUNCH:
Have you spent more time away from the guitar these last few years?

BECK:
I practice for an average of about two hours a day, usually just exercises. Especially in the crap weather in England, there's not much else to do. I always have a guitar lying around. I can't ever go a week without playing; if I went on holiday, I'd have to take one with me. Obviously, the lack of album product gives people the thought that I don't do anything, but I can tell when I'm getting rusty and it's time to practice. As long as I keep a balance. Too much practice, you get finger diarrhea. We all know what that sounds like. Too little practice, you get the honesty and the bare bones but also a lot of unacceptable mistakes. But when you've got the inspiration and it's executed nicely, then you've got it.

LAUNCH:
In my opinion, the most striking thing about your playing after all these years is the ability you have to find so many ways to phrase a simple melody.

BECK:
Well, I do need a song. I can't just rattle that stuff off willy-nilly. I've got to hear the melody, and I've got to hear the writing skill that's gone into that. I just listen, and I won't attempt to play it till it becomes my favorite of that week or whatever. Then I adopt it, and it's got to settle in my head. Then I'll pick out the notes without having to refer to the tape. The least attachment I have to the original, the better I like it. Then I start to stand on my own two feet and develop it my own way. Even the stupidest three notes can go somewhere if they're played effectively.

LAUNCH:
Before 1975, you played in rock bands with singers. Since 1975, your music has been predominantly all-instrumental. Why the change?

BECK:
I got tired of trying to find someone to replace Rod [Stewart], to be honest. You can't do that. It's a joke. He's unique. I'm very sore that we didn't follow through, because that band [the original 1968-69 Jeff Beck Group featuring Stewart and Ron Wood] was unbelievable. When I look back, nothing that's happened [in rock] has been even close to that, except for Robert [Plant, in Led Zeppelin]. I would have chosen Robert as a replacement probably, but Jimmy bagged him. So I realized that I'd be chasing an impossibility forever. I'd lost my confidence. After Hendrix had gone away and Eric [Clapton] sprouted wings and became famous, I suddenly felt left alone. Then I saw John [McLaughlin] do the Mahavishnu Orchestra thing and it was thrilling, and [Billy Cobham's] Spectrum [featuring guitarist Tommy Bolin] came along and hit me on the back of the head. I thought, "Well, if I'm going to be singer-less, I might as well do it right." That's when I felt I didn't have to miss Rod anymore. You could print the tickets with my name on them, I didn't have to be lost in a predictable rock band. Thank God I had [producer] George Martin there to put that mess [Blow By Blow] together.

LAUNCH:
Have you ever been happy with a recording you've made?

BECK:
No. It takes me a good month after finishing an album to even listen to it like a normal person, without knowing exactly what my fingers were doing. If I listen straight off to a piece that's been freshly mixed, I don't like it because I can still feel the fingers doing it, I know everything that's coming. It's also the time of rude awakening--you know it's gone to be pressed, and there's nothing more you can do about it, which can be pretty traumatic. There's some mild contentment about the new record because it's got some nice stuff on it, but I know there's much more excitement around the corner, so I just keep looking ahead.