Jeff Beck - Guitar, Arranger
Aidan Love - Programming, Engineer, Mixing
Andy Wright - Keyboards, Programming
Jennifer Batten - Guitar, Midi Guitar
Steve Alexander - Drums
Randy Hope-Taylor - Bass
Imogen Heap - Vocals on [3], [4]
Chris Jarrett - Vocals
James Brown - Vocals
Matt Tait - Vocals
Kevin Metcalfe - Mastreing
David Coleman - Art Direction, Design
Kevin Westernberg - Photography
Jeff Beck proves once more why he is so highly rated amongst his peers.
This CD shows off his skills in a variety of styles, sometimes very
modern, sometimes classic blues and sometimes something completely
different. The standout track is "Nadia" with an unbelieveably smooth
legato technique and a melody to die for. This is the sort of tune that
separates Mr. Beck from most of the others in his elite class. He uses
his awsome technical ability to make great music. He hardly ever shows
off but rather just plays what is right for the occasion. But, if you
want a little bit of shred, just listen to the end of "Left Hook". And
after the barrage of "Earthquake", "Loose Cannon" and "Left Hook" and
the fun of "Dirty Mind", "Rollin and Tumblin'" and "Rosebud" the CD
ends with "Suspension" THE most gorgeous sound painting of the lot.
dacenterp from San Jose, CA United States, January 15, 2001
I'm so glad I had this coming !
A great album for Jeff Beck fans. Most of the songs establish a groove
and then work it from there. The guitar playing from Beck is very
entertaining and heavy. This album was easy to get used to right out of
the box and on repeated plays it gets better and better. Some of the
interplay reminds me of Miles Davis at his funky best. I think this
album is even better than the previous "Who Else ?". I'm so glad Jeff
Beck made this CD.
Greg Nikiel from Tallahassee, FL USA, January 8, 2001
Great!
I just got "You Had It Coming" for Christmas, and I must say it is
great! It sounds a bit strange at first, but before you know it, you're
hooked on the album. Jeff Beck has always been my fave guitarist, and
still is. "You Had It Coming" is a sure classic! "You Had It Coming" is
definatly a step up from "Who Else!", and I think is almost right up
there with "Blow by Blow." "You Had It Coming" is one of Jeff Beck's
best albums.
Track Analysis:
Earthquake- This track is a very good opening track, and is even more rock then "Who Else!" was. Very nice song.
Roy's Toy- Car sounds are at the beginning of this track, and the beat really gets you hooked on this song.
Dirty Mind- A very interesting track, with good guitar wizardry!
Rollin' and Tumblin'- I was surprised to hear that there was vocals on
this track, but nonetheless, Jeff does a good job on this track.
Nadia- Nadia is probably one of the best songs on the album. Jeff does magnificantly switching from bottleneck to fingers.
Loose Cannon- Great track. A bit long, but a pleasure to listen to.
Rosebud- A fun track to listen to. Jeff seems to have fun with this one.
Left Hook- Nice track, great guitar.
Blackbird- Great sounds from Jeff's guitar on this track. Very impressive.
Suspension- Similar to "Another Place" on "Who Else!" Very nice track though, and very pleastant to listen to.
BJ from CT, USA, December 25, 2000
guitarists must dream...
imagine snippets of past and future guitar riffs, pasted together by
electronic wizardry and laid over techno percussion and you have some
idea. electric guitarists must dream like this.
michael fowler from cincinnati, ohio USA, December 5, 2000
Jeff Beck is a name synonymous with the electric guitar.
With YOU HAD IT COMING, Beck's latest album during his three-and-a-half
decades as an Epic recording artist, his name becomes tantamount to
innovation, as the guitarist continues to experiment with modern,
cutting-edge music.
YOU HAD IT COMING finds the legendary British musician further
enthralled by the nature of sound. "It's almost a chosen path for me by
someone else, because I was never a singer," Beck says of his
songwriting. "Without a vocal, you've got to concentrate on what people
hear. Sound is everything." The predominantly instrumental album is
bounded by a collage of drum loops and digital-age wizardry, all at the
service of Beck's signature guitar playing. "I view technology as a
friend -- there's no use messing around with enemies," he says. I first
ran across some electronic music 30 years ago, and I assumed it would
be coming along much sooner than it did. I thought, 'If only you could
get that sound on a guitar.'"
The outcome of his prolonged interest is YOU HAD IT COMING, a project
that combines the tones and technology of the new millennium with the
skill and credibility of experienced hands.
After releasing last year's Grammy-nominated Who Else!, Beck's first
album of original music in a decade, the musician spent much of 1999 on
tour with his newly assembled band. This was quite an about face for
the celebrated guitarist, who hadn't been particularly prolific during
the previous two decades, instead consuming time through his other
passion of tinkering with vintage cars. But a subtle revelation paved
the route for back-to-back recordings.
"It was trying to come to terms with the fact that I didn't want to
stop playing," he admits. "The thing looking me in the face was, 'If
you don't play Jeff, you're not going to play.' After 120-odd gigs,
including people's back gardens in Italy, I didn't want to go all
through that for nothing -- to lose track of the band and go into
recession again."
Quite the opposite happened, with Beck holing up in London's Metropolis
Recording Studio with his band (guitarist Jennifer Batten, bassist
Randy Hope-Taylor and drummer Steve Alexander) programmer Aiden Love
and producer Andy Wright. ("Andy, we call him 'the trawler,' Beck
quips. "Because everything I play he trawls through, like a fishing
boat, to get all the good bits.") The collaboration resulted in a
record that joins the distinguished pantheon of his prior milestones:
Truth, Blow By Blow and Wired -- still among the best selling guitar
albums of all time.
Opening YOU HAD IT COMING is "Earthquake," a tune emblematic of Beck's
new approach, fueled by a hammering distorted riff that alternates time
signatures between 6/4 and 5/4. The tumultuous tune is so named because
"an earthquake represents the opening up of a new world, whilst giving
the old one a good shaking "
Beck returns to his roots with "Rollin' and Tumblin'," a swampy blues
gem that has inspired previous interpretations by Muddy Waters, Cream
and Canned Heat. "Rollin' and Tumblin' is something which has been
lurking in my cupboard for 25 years," Beck says. "I've wanted to do a
hot-rod version of that, but the drummers were never right and the
singers weren't there." Beck found his ideal vocalist in Imogen Heap, a
young Londoner whose scorching take on the tune was recorded in one
pass.
Perhaps the quirkiest cut is "Blackbird," which finds the ex-Yardbird
collaborating with an unnamed feathered friend. "Round about spring, a
blackbird sings loudly up on my roof," he says. "Although I didn't
record that bird, I got a tape of a blackbird and started jamming with
him. If you listen, the notes the bird is singing are almost beyond
human hearing, but the actual punctuation and tonal things are there. I
aped the bird as close as I could, and we all had a good laugh with
that one."
The guitarist considers YOU HAD IT COMING’s standout track to be
"Nadia," written by Indian musician Nitin Sawhney, whom Beck describes
as "a genius -- like an Asian Stevie Wonder." Beck remembers first
shuffling through Sawhney's CD while driving home. "I couldn't believe
the diversity of the tracks. I stopped on 'Nadia' and I almost crashed
the car, because it was such a refreshing, almost commercial, Indian
song. I started whistling bits of it, then I thought, 'What am I
waiting for? This is custom made for me.'"
Not one to employ an arsenal of custom-made gear, Beck stuck with a
single guitar and amp (a modified white Fender Stratocaster and a
Marshall JCM 2000) for the majority of the recording. It's still a
mystery how he can pull so many sonic elements out of such a limited
setup. But that is an enigma that has applied to the guitarist for
decades.
Beck has been credited with inventing techniques and sounds that are so
common within the rock lexicon that it's difficult to envision the
style without it. He is regarded as the first rock guitarist to use
distortion and Eastern-influenced droning riffs, as well as the
earliest to popularize the talk box (called a mouth bag in England),
years prior to Peter Frampton's "Do You Feel Like We Do." Has Beck ever
invented something he didn't get credit for?
"I suppose the most unnoticed in my style, and probably the best
things, were some of those slippery licks," he says. "The illusions
that I can do with some triplet scales, people have sort of brushed
them aside for something more gimmicky -- which is something people
will do. Jimi Hendrix gets remembered for setting fire to his guitar
almost more than for playing it."
So is Beck the world's greatest living rock guitarist? "Nope," he says
emphatically. "That's the most ridiculous thing to start those kind of
sweeping titles. I don't see why everybody has to make everything the
best. 'Is it the best? Is it the fastest? How fast does this car go,
mate?' It's not a contest. We're all different. It's like asking which
is the best breakfast. It's not a question of that; it's what you
fancy. I'm not in the business of making self-appraisals. As long as
there's something original going on, that's all that really matters."
JeffBeckMusic.com
Saitenhelden wie Mark Knopfler oder Eric Clapton mögen
populärer sein. In puncto Spieltechnik und Innovation ist ihnen
Jeff Beck voraus. Über Jahrzehnte gab der in allen Stilismen
versierte Londoner Gitarrero, Jahrgang 1944, in seiner Zunft mit den
Ton an, ob bei den Blues-Poppern Yardbirds, in seiner prall rockigen
Jeff Beck Group (mit Rod Stewart), als Fusion-Crack mit der Jan Hammer
Group, solo beispielsweise mit Wired oder 1993 auf Crazy Legs, einem
Tribut-Album für Gene Vincent & His Blue Caps. Lange Jahre
gab's nix Neues; 1999 kehrte Beck mit dem Grammy-nominierten Soloalbum
Who Else zurück. You Had It Coming zeigt Beck nun mit
Co-Gitarristin Jennifer Batten, Bassist Randy Hope-Taylor und Drummer
Steve Alexander ganz auf der Höhe der Zeit: Ohne dass der Brite
die Computer Regie führen ließe, nutzt er die Verlockungen
moderner Technik, Loops und Samples, ökonomisch und zielgerichtet,
um seinem Sound futuristische Perspektiven zu eröffnen. Nur den
Blues-Klassiker "Rollin' And Tumblin'", einziges echtes Vokalstück
mit dem Londoner Jungtalent Imogen Heap, frischt Beck fast
konventionell, doch spannend als rumpeligen Remake auf. Daneben bietet
Beck jede Menge wildes Gitarrengetümmel jeglicher Couleur, von
virtuos verzerrt im brachialen Einstieg "Earthquake" bis rasend fix,
meist kombiniert mit nahtlos integrierten, variantenreichen
Rhythmuspatterns. Ähnlich chamäleonhaft demonstriert der
Ausnahmegitarrist sein ausgeprägtes Fingerspitzengefühl im
Mini-Kabinettstückchen "Blackbird", Saitenduett mit einer Amsel,
dem indisch inspirierten "Nadia", inklusive nachemfundenem Sitar-Sound,
oder im sensitiv schwebenden "Suspension" zum Finale. Dieses
Instrumentalalbum zeichnet aus, was den meisten fehlt: Ideen, Vielfalt
und Spannung.
Claus Böhm, Amazon.de
Der Altmeister auf dem Weg in die Zukunft...
Mit "Who Else!" ging es schon einen Schritt in die Richtung, mit dem
neuen Album hat sich Altmeister Jeff Beck endgültig vom
"traditionellen" Gitarrenrock verabschiedet. Und das ist gut so, denn
dieses Feld ist so übermäßig beackert worden, daß
wirklich Innovatives dort nicht mehr wächst. Warum ausgerechnet
jemand, der schon seit den 60er Jahren veröffentlicht, als einer
der Pioniere die die Möglichkeiten der elektronischen Musik mit
der E-Gitarre verknüpft, sollten sich vielleicht mal viele der
jungen Gitarristen fragen, die meinen, seit Hendrix oder meinetwegen
auch E. Van Halen müssten sich E-Gitarristen nicht
weiterentwickeln. Spieltechnisch ist diese CD ein Leckerbissen, doch
die eigentliche Genialität von Jeff Beck zeigt sich in seiner
Phrasierung, in seinem phantastischen Einfallsreichtum, wie sich die
gesamte Ausdrucksstärke der E-Gitarre nutzen läßt. Und
darin, daß er schon immer den guten Geschmack hatte, der ihn
wissen läßt, wann es richtig ist, mal musikalisch die Klappe
zu halten, wodurch sich die Spannung auch wunderbar steigern
läßt. Einziger Kritikpunkt an diesem Album: es ist zu kurz!
Ein(e) Hörer(in) aus Bremen, Deutschland , 5. Februar 2001
Always the guitarist's guitarist, Jeff Beck was as innovative as fellow
one-time Yardbird Jimmy Page and as tastefully tuneful as fellow
one-time Yardbird Eric Clapton, but sadly he was never as commercially
successful. Experts put this down to artistic "idiosyncrasies", but it
could just as easily have been sheer bloody-mindedness, or a horror of
his former colleagues' subsequent excesses. However, Jeff Beck always
kept it nothing if not real and did whatever he liked. In 1975 his
tastes turned out a jazz-fusion album, in 1993 an album of Gene Vincent
covers and in 1999 the public got Who Else! an album which embraced new
progressive percussive techno music and sounded a bit like the Prodigy.
With big guitar on. This is where You Had It Coming (a title addressed
to the long suffering fans and critics?) picks up. We kick off hard
here with Earthquake, which sounds like a Marilyn Manson outtake only
fiddlier around the guitar and we move through the industrial landscape
of Roy's Toy to the wailing wall of sound that is Dirty Mind and the
once swamp-blues classic Rollin' And Tumblin' (both last voiced by
ex-abomination of goth and Alanis wannabe Imogen Heap, here done up as
Polly Harvey). None of these shock tactics detract from Jeff's geetar
wizardry of course. Hell this man can duet with a blackbird (as he does
on, er, Blackbird) and make it triumph. Most of this is magic but works
like Nadia, Rollin' And Tumblin' and Rosebud seem the best here as all
the elements in the music seem in the most perfect noise-harmony. Cum
on feel the noise.