As I wander the roads and rivers of South America sorely regretting not bringing more minidiscs, this album has been my saviour and shining light. Undoubtedly Beck´s masterpiece, it sounds as refreshing and ear-bending as when I first heard it in 1994. 'Loser' put Beck on the map, mashing country overtones with trailer trash lyrics and a leftfield hip hop approach that draws parallels with the experimental and avant garde works of contemporary off-beat merchants like the Anticon collective. Ironically, for me 'Loser' is perhaps the weakest track on the album (but nevertheless it has stood the test of time and is by no means a 'bad' track), what follows 'Loser' is an aural journey into a fucked up mind that rips the shit out of a world that is 'wild at heart and weird on top', but in such a musically diverse way that no single track sounds like the previous, it is more like a collage of country, blues, garage (in the punk sense), electronica and hip hop glued together with great humour and tongue in cheek observations.
'Pay No Mind' parodies the popular rock and roll star image with a mixture of abstract and hilarious lyrics, whilst the strumming guitars and mouth organ solo are reminiscent of Neil Young albeit with a rawer edge.
The standout track though has to be 'Steal My Body Home' compromising of low frequency feedback hums, Middle eastern wails, sitars and Beck spewing lyrics like a mantra, before the whole tune erupts into a calamitous red neck sing along complete with pots and pans and kazoos!!!
Everywhere on this album is a noise or lyric that will delight the listener. I could write a comment pages long about each track, but it would be better for people to get off their arses and buy one of the greatest debut albums of the last century.