Beck ProfileBeck’s divorce from actor Marissa Ribisi was finalised in 2021. This record suggests he’s been a lonely boy ever since “the sun set on [their] love and [they] drove into the night”.
Ride Lonesome caps off Beck’s acoustic heartbreak trilogy, which commenced with Sea Change (2002) and Morning Phase (2014). For his latest set, Beck reunited with musicians who played on both of those previous albums, including drummer Joey Waronker, bassist Justin Meldal-Johnsen, guitarist Smokey Hormel and keyboard player Roger Joseph Manning Jr.
Another regular contributor, David Campbell – Beck’s 78-year-old father and string/orchestral arranger to the stars (eg. The Stones, Streisand, Radiohead, Metallica, Beyoncé) – also returns to intensify the sorrow.
Beck’s 15th studio album is a sensory slowdown with robust sonic identity. Like a murmuration of starlings, shifting in formation and resembling dancing clouds, sounds wash over serenely. It’s music for solo nocturnal drives while struggling to make sense of it all.
1. Ride Lonesome
“Yesterday/ Paper roses, they forgot to bloom/ So walk away/ Hang your head upon the hollow moon…” – elegant, poetic lyrics usher in the opening title track, which is underscored by vibrant strumming, sighing pedal steel and soaring campfire harmonies.
Choosing to ride solo is one thing, but riding lonesome suggests yearning for an absent sidekick in the shotgun position.
“She is gone/ And you can't put your arms 'round a memory…” – bingo!
Jangly tambourine enters like a meteor shower, lighting the way.
Ride Lonesome is timeless in a Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young kinda way. If Grandpa turned this one up on his transistor radio, the kiddies would flock to his side.
2. Run Away
Desolate and crestfallen, Run Away finds Beck driving “through the city with the headlights off” at night.
“Please don’t run away,” he begs, before acquiescing, “There’s nothing left to say/ On desolation day.”
Joey Waronker’s sparse drumming adds exasperation around the halfway mark, before settling upon a walking pace. Instrumentation swells, then abates. Brief guitar strumming signals the song's end.
3. In The Night
Gently pulsing rhythms and sustained strings underscore wonky, disorienting chord progressions over. Bass oozes beneath. Fingerpicked sections enter like sleep, inviting some much-needed temporary respite. Strings flutter in and out like courting butterflies. The exquisite beauty of this one makes our eyes leak.
4. Failed Words
Insistent piano chords maintain a treading-water pace. “When the words they fail you… Don’t know what to say” – Failed Words sits at the precise intersection where love and loss collide. Strings swell, and harmonies offer some comfort. If only he could find the right words, things could be different. Then, “She’s gone”.
5. Bleed
Instrumentally, this song calms the nervous system. Sung with a cry in his voice, Beck unleashes throughout Bleed. “I don’t know where I’m going/ But it feels like I’ve been here before” – his falsetto reads as inconsolable. Post-breakup epiphanies can cut so deep. “I don’t KNOW how to feel!” – we imagine Beck dropping to his knees like a ragdoll here. He’s come undone.
6. Disappearing Act
“The road out of here leads to nowhere” – Disappearing Act introduces cruisy Western vibes à la Ry Cooder’s Paris Texas. We picture a snoozing cowboy, propped up against a saloon wall – hat pulled down to obscure his face.
“I heard a voice from another room/ Thought maybe it was you.” One foot in front of the other, although absence is keenly felt here. Finding weather patterns to match your mood always helps: “Ride right into the storm/ Like a beast waiting to be born.”
7. For Your Love
With its dramatic intro drone, the molecule-shifting For Your Love bleeds pathos (think Björk’s Jóga). This one culminates in choir vocals that’ll make you wanna join in and partake of the communal rush.
8. Slow Canyon
Pensive, picked acoustic guitars. “I want you/ Yes, I do” – the choruses speak so plainly. But then Beck really shows off his lyrical majesty: “The way the fireworks congratulate the sky/ Just meet me there/ Inside the hurricane.” Spellcasting woodwind further elevates Slow Canyon.
9. It Ends Right Here
“All this time it took to find you/ It ends right here” – how romcom-sync ready is that? Hypnotic chords spill forth like they’re taking shape in real time. Beck showcases his immaculate, emotive upper register again here, leaping octaves. This arrangement escalates gradually, sneakily.
10. Falling Through My Hands
Twinkly, pretty melodies fit for a county fair offset the reality of Beck’s love slipping away (or “falling through my hands”, as he puts it). Distant harmonica adds a whiff of pining to the song’s conclusion.
11. If You Don’t Know What Love Is
Echoing pedal steel permeates the penultimate track, which culminates in a surprise guitar solo and bursts of harmonica. Twisting the title’s question into a statement, Beck concludes, “I don’t know what love is/ I don’t know nothing at all”.
12. Beyond The Light
You’ll lean into Beyond The Light’s melodic allure. Despite its downtrodden pace, this closing number evokes Procol Harum’s A Whiter Shade Of Pale. Occasional maraca shakes add texture. Keys/triangle pings offer hope.
Whereas Morning Phase’s closing track was Waking Light, Ride Lonesome concludes with Beck moving Beyond The Light – on his lonesome.
Loss may be deep love’s inescapable shadow, but Ride Lonesome isn’t devoid of hope. The heart will heal, eventually.
American author Jandy Nelson nailed it when she wrote, “What is bad for the heart is good for art”.
Ride Lonesome is out now via Universal.
