September 18 Marks the Release of Beck's 'Ride Lonesome': A Vulnerability Thirty Years in the Making

Speaking to NME from his studio in London, Beck joked he was still running on "jet lag mode" — a state that oddly matches the tone of his new album, 'Ride Lonesome.' He describes the record himself as "slow motion, dusk, Mojave Desert, acoustic guitars, a kind of trance woven from sound and emotion." The album drops September 18 via Capitol Records, with the North American tour kicking off September 22.

Seven years have passed since his last album, 'Hyperspace,' but Beck hasn't exactly been idle. Beyond the pandemic-forced pause, he wrapped up a widely acclaimed orchestral theater tour last year, all while continuing to fine-tune the songs on 'Ride Lonesome.' "By my old pace, this album should've come out about a year and a half ago," he says. "I originally planned to finish and release it in 2023, but I ended up shelving it for two years. I wasn't sure the songs were strong enough, and I wasn't ready to figure out how to really bring them to life." Asked if he's being too hard on himself, he replies: "I'm being realistic. The older you get, the clearer you can see what a song is capable of becoming."

This album's lineage traces closer to 'Sea Change' and his Grammy-winning 'Morning Phase' than to the genre-collage party rock of 'Mellow Gold,' 'Odelay,' or 'Midnite Vultures.' Beck reunited with the original touring band that recorded 'Sea Change' and 'Morning Phase,' with Nigel Godrich — who produced 'Sea Change' — handling the mix. He calls this longtime crew of collaborators his "Wrecking Crew." "There's a musical chemistry here that's something we've built together," he says. "This relationship has spanned decades now, and time has given it more layers, more color, more nuance." Drummer Joey Waronker also joined the recording sessions — last year, he stepped away from Oasis's touring schedule specifically to perform with Beck at the Royal Albert Hall.

From Getting Booed Offstage to Daring to Speak of Heartbreak Directly

Beck describes 'Ride Lonesome' as "obviously a heartbreak record," centered on themes of loss and letting go — lost love, the loss of a close friend, and the transitions of life's chapters. He admits that this kind of direct, intimate songwriting is something he wanted to do as a young man but never dared to. "The musical climate I came up in was pretty hostile to that kind of thing. It took a long time to build up the courage for that kind of directness, that kind of emotion." He recalls playing acoustic ballads in bars or all-ages coffee shops back then, only to be met with boos and thrown objects — "I had to step aside, or just hide myself away." He mentions friends like Elliott Smith and Lou Barlow, who were writing similarly quiet, introspective songs at the time: "I felt anxious for them, because I was going through the same kind of post-traumatic stuff myself." He remembers that after playing a heartfelt fingerpicked acoustic number, he'd have to scream "MTV MAKES ME WANT TO SMOKE CRACK" just to get the crowd to raise their fists.

He also looks back on the contradictory demands of the '90s — wanting authenticity while being unable to stomach sincerity: "Sincerity made people recoil, yeah. I don't think other generations had to deal with that." As for being tagged a "slacker rock" figure back then, he sets the record straight — he actually came from a family where you had to work constantly just to get by. "I wish I'd had that 'slacker' life, living in my parents' garage without having to work." As for his deliberate genre-collage approach back then — smashing together rap, country, noise, and symbolist poetry — he describes it as his own version of "post-punk": "Volume or lyrical content alone couldn't shock people anymore. For me, the only thing that still felt punk was blatantly crashing these things together and seeing what happened." He also notes that in today's musical climate, the audience exodus that 'Odelay' or 'Sea Change' triggered back then probably wouldn't happen anymore — "Those records are actually more popular at my shows now than the ones that sold better at the time."

On the topic of AI, Beck comes down firmly on the side of human effort. He describes most of the songs on 'Ride Lonesome' as the result of five people improvising together in the same room — "no fixes, no edits, that's just the sound of us playing together." He doesn't dismiss computer-assisted arrangement outright, but admits he simply prefers human effort, and he's spent a lot of time recently sitting in on orchestra rehearsals. "Eighty people sitting together to play one piece — it's completely out of step with a world obsessed with efficiency, but it's also deeply human and satisfying in a way I can't quite explain." He also mentions he didn't get an iPhone until five or six years ago — "I put it off for a long time." Asked if he was happier back then, he simply says: "Life was better back then. My eyes were better too." As for the upcoming tour, he previews it as "slow and dark" — "I don't want it to feel like a rock show. What I'm going for is closer to a Robert Wilson theater piece."