There are, as so often in life, about two good reasons to listen to this album – and one bad one. What a nice relationship. The good reasons have to do with Jeff Beck’s guitar playing and, to a lesser extent, with the attitude of it all. The bad reason is Johnny Depp’s voice.
Take, as an example for everything, something like “Venus in Furs”, in the original by The Velvet Underground and there in its kikeriki-raspy arrangement maybe a little bit annoying in the smartass review of today. And here’s the relatively exact opposite: a rock beast hung on anabolic steroids and muscles. Who happens to be pictures of the initially quite disturbing cattle breed “Belgian White and Blue” in mind: That’s pretty much what it sounds like.
Also vocally. There’s a bit of a lack of natural power, and instead there’s a more chubby grumble – not unlike the sound of Depp’s moody testimony at the Amber Heard trial. You could see the duo Beck/Depp was last seen live in Germany and those who did that also got a small impression of how much they help Depp with the singing on the joint album they just released, “18”. With many duplications. With a lot of compression. And probably with everything else that the digital magic boxes give away.
And in between, this guitar, in the many, many solos and the often splendid instrumental pieces. A few of even the greatest guitarists still shiver in awe when they talk about Beck’s playing, which shredded the blues in its early years and has changed radically with each creative period since, without losing its distinctiveness. To check that, put on the album “You Had It Coming” from 2000, for example. Kind of an industrial ambient blues collection and really crazy good. In the song “Blackbird” Beck’s guitar, no joke, converses with a blackbird and the two seem to get along really well.
That would then possibly also be the access to this work. Perhaps “18” should be heard less as genuine teamwork in the strictly musical sense. And rather than spiritual fertilization: the voodoo priest of instrumental specialization – and his spirit animal, his spirit animal named Johnny Depp. Ultimately it doesn’t matter, that’s how you see it, with whom Beck plays. The main thing is that he plays.