It's been more than a decade since Beck experimented with the lo-fi, junk-shop folk and hip-hop of breakout albums like Mellow Gold and Odelay. But the alt-rock icon has gotten back to his roots with "Fresh Hex," a collaboration he recorded with Pittsburgh-based indie-rock weirdo Tobacco (a.k.a. Tom Fec, leader of Black Moth Super Rainbow).
Over the last few years, Fec has made some of the wildest and most deranged indie-pop around, experimenting with hip-hop beats, heavily vocodered vocals and colorful synthesizer melodies. It's psychedelic stoner music for a generation of scatterbrained text-messagers. And Beck, who collaborated with Fec on the tune via email, fits in the mix perfectly, delivering stream-of-consciousness raps about "color-coordinated cowboys" and "crystal canaries in coal mines." Fec's melodies are equally bizarre and transfixing: In only 95 seconds, he cranks out phantasmagoric, interlocking synth lines (is that a digitized version of a harpsichord?) over liquid blips and a beat that bumps and grinds like classic '80s hip-hop.
This story originally ran on July 2, 2010.
Copyright 2022 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.