'Loser' takes all. (Beck Hansen's hit song 'Loser')
Entertainment Weekly
April 8, 1994
n217 p14(1)
Mark Lewman
Beck's flaky rock has inspired a whole new way to create a star. Do
nothing.
BEING A LOSER isn't what it used to be. Just ask Beck Hansen, Generation
X's latest Pied Piper. On the strength of "Loser," his rap/folk/blues ode
to disenfranchisement, he has, much to his own dazed bemusement, become
a pop star without even trying. With his incoherent ramblings about Pop-Tarts
and Star Wars, he's an unlikely candidate for stardom in the land of the
savvy sound bite. But that's exactly what appeals to his target audience,
those most desirable and much-diagnosed Xers. One fan at a recent Beck
show in Houston summed it up: "He's just a kid who wrote a song that
makes
no sense at all, the he made a video that looks like it was done in his
backyard, and he probably didn't even think it would get on MTV, but it
did, and now he's making a bunch of money. It's pretty funny."
The L.A.-based Beck, 23, is the first to suggest that his meteoric rise
is a fluke. But that fluke had Geffen Records muscle behind it, even if
the muscle wasn't flexed very hard. The label was one of three majors that
heavily courted Beck after "Loser," released by the indie label Bong Load
in March 1993, became a surprise radio hit in L.A. What made mainstream-shy
Beck sign with Geffen? The astonishing freedom they offered: A non-exclusive
contract, which allows him to continue to release songs through small indies
like Bong Load, and little creative interference--basically, he writes
the songs and Geffen presses them. "Ours wasn't even the biggest offer,"
says a Geffen Staffer. "For Beck, it wasn't about money, it was about
freedoms."
Equally appealing to slacker Beck Was Geffen's laissez-faire approach
to promotion. "There is no plan, that's the plan," says Beck of Geffen's
marketing strategy for his just-released debut CD, Mellow Gold. "It's just
not taking it too serious, it's just music. For me, it's [always been]
make a tape for a friend to listen to. How I got to put it out as a whole
record." A record that entered Billboard's pop charts at No. 15, a remarkable
feat for a debut with little more than street buzz behind it.
Jason Linn, the national college marketing coordinator at Atlantic Records,
agrees it's all in the hands-off approach. "Geffen's letting the music
speak for and sell itself, which compliments Beck's unpretentious, goofy,
and take-it-or-leave-it music. Kids can sense bulls--- a mile away--a
hard sell would repel the audience they're after."
Of course, as with any Next Big Thing, there is the inevitable backlash--skeptics
who see Beck as a self-indulgent fake and the latest marketing
opportunity.
"East Coast critics are pissed off because they had nothing to do with
it," says Beastie Boy and Beck fan Mike D. "It's only once in, like, every
couple of years that somebody's gonna make something in a home studio and
it somehow becomes a hit. Whenever that happens, it's a pretty beautiful thing."
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