Beck’s fifth studio album, 2002’s Sea Change, remains his finest achievement, and I consider it one of the best albums I own. It’s up there with Blood On the Tracks and The Road to Ensenada as one of the greatest break-up albums of all-time.
Stylistically, Sea Change see-sawed back to the somber acoustic mood of Mutations, the polar opposite of the frenzied eclecticism of Midnite Vultures. Both musically and (especially) lyrically, Beck is at his most straight-forward on this album. It’s as if all the genre blending and cryptic lyrics on his previous records were a mask and he’s finally allowing his listeners to look him directly in the eye. And what we see there can best be described as beautiful heartbreak.
Meet Me In Montauk 