Nardwuar: You are Beck!

Beck: Uh. Who are you?

Nardwuar: I'm Nardwuar the Human Serviette!

Beck: Uh. Okay

Nardwuar: And you're Beck, live on the Nardwuar the Human Serviette Show and Beck, where are you phoning from now
because earlier your manager said you were..... Sleeping!

Beck: Ummm, I'm in San Francisco.

Nardwuar: Your Manager actually thought you were in Nevada!

Beck: They thought i was in Nirv... in Nevada?

Nardwuar: Yeah!

Beck: Okay. Well, I was.

Nardwuar: And now you're back in San Francisco!

Beck: Now I'm in San Fransico.

Nardwuar: Your manager has a 1-800 number! That seems pretty interesting.

Beck: Yeah. I don't know about that.

Nardwuar: That's pretty crazy eh? Having a 1-800 number!

Beck: Yeah that's nuts.

Nardwuar: What exactly, Beck, did Woodie Guthrie do?

Beck: He sort of wandered around and watched how people were taking out their garbage and they were putting it and he would bang on his guitar and uh make people look backwards and uh....

Nardwuar: Why was he so great? Why do really like him? I don't know very much about him. What's so great about him?

Beck: Well he was bringing out some honest human natural communication and you know in a time when a lot of that kind of stuff was supressed.

Nardwuar: Was he a one-man band?

Beck: Uh yeah, but he played with other people. He played in bluegrass bands and he played in different folk combos and all sorts of stuff.

Nardwuar: What about Hasil Atkins?

Beck: He's the guy who does that Hot dog song.

Nardwuar: Now he seems to be the ultimate performer with that total Pussy Galore sound! Isn't he better than Woody Guthrie?

Beck: Um, well he's different, you know. Hasil Atkins is a genius in his own way. You know, Woody was more "for the people". He had a socialist agenda. I think Hasil is more into flinging pianos into swamps and stuff like that.

Nardwuar: Have you ever seen him before or heard his live albums on Pravda or Norton Records?

Beck: Yeah, I've heard his stuff. Actually a good friend of mine made a documentary about him and showed me all this footage. There is this amazing scene where he is playing on this Honkytonk - this was made about a year ago and he's an older man now - and he's playing and as he does this one-man band thing. He plays the drums with his feet, and harmonica, and he's playing the guitar. And he lets a girl sit next to him on stage and in the middle of the set a big brawl breaks out between al these
women over who is goin' to sit on stage and they're all grabbing each other's hair. It's kinda strange and he's just looking on playing his music.

Nardwuar: Is the guy who made this movie from Olympia?

Beck: Yes well no, he went to school in Olympia.

Nardwuar: Just like that Hole song!

Beck: Yeah actually his name is "Hasil" Atkins not "Hazel".

Nardwuar: Oh in Canada we like calling him "Hazel". Did your friend make a Beat Happening Video too?

Beck: Yeah, he sure did.

Nardwuar: What's his name and can people get a hold of that movie? The Hasil Atkins one?

Beck: Yeah. I have no idea. I don't if it's been released.

Nardwuar: And what's your friend's name?

Beck: What?

Nardwuar: What's your friend's name who made the movie?

Beck: Oh, his name's Julian.

Nardwuar: Beck, do you get booed much?

Beck: Umm I don't think so.

Nardwuar: I mean, are people expecting your type of show when you get on stage. Like the media portrays you as "born to be weird".

Beck: Um I think it's a little of both, you know it's like each person in the audience has their own expectations and all that stuff so, you know, it's different.

Nardwuar: But do you ever feel like when you get up on stage and you finish and maybe you don't play "Loser", everbody loves it cus you are rebelling. Like the record execs are like, "I just love that guy cus he's so wacky cus he won't play his hits when people want it". Doesn't that make you feel weird?

Beck: Um, wow. I mean I don't what to say. Can you repeat that? You've got some fire in your groin or something.

Nardwuar: No, no. I'm just curious. Alot of the industry execs signed you cus they thought you'd be wild. And you are. You're crazy. You're way out there. You're wacky. You're nuts. You're off the wall. But sometimes when you get off stage from doing some off the wall stunt with Thurston on MTV or something. The record execs are back stage and they're like "yes!" he's nuts we can use that as a marketing scam. Like on MTV when they do outakes of live performances and they show
Alice Cooper and he's like so embarassed about his outake of eating some chicken or whatever. But all the execs love it when you have a wacky outake cus it helps them with marketing. Does that ever want to make you go normal?

Beck: Yeah sometimes I'll dust off the old hymnal and play a few organ songs,"Nearer my God to thee" and a few other classics, "Rock me Amadeus". And you know somtimes wackiness just implodes on it's self and you end up doing some Jon Denver covers by accident.

Nardwuar: Have you ever listened to early They Might Be Giants at all?

Beck: No, I'm not into that stuff.

Nardwuar: Cus They Might Be Giants had the initals "TMBG" which is like 4 letters and so is the name Beck. I think you and They Might Be Giants have something goin' down here!

Beck: Yeah, it's probably like some kind spiritually bankrupt circle jerk or something. I don't know

Nardwuar: Have you heard of Senor Amour and the Molotov Cocktail Hour at all?

Beck: Yeah he was over at my house last week as a matter of fact.

Nardwuar: What type of show is it?

Beck: Yeah he just plays all that way faraway tropicalismo, you know, lounge Martin Denny Exotica.

Nardwuar: And he hangs with Joey Cheeze as well.

Beck: Yeah.

Nardwuar: A friend of mine dropped by KXLU and saw a letter you had written to the station and it seemed you were upset that the station weren't playing you because they said you were getting played on KROQ which I guess is the big commercial station, Explain that letter.
Beck: Well, you know I've playin' on KXLU for a long time. I played all their fundraisers, and listening to the station since I was fourteen years old. Cus the music they play is the music I'm into. As far as KROQ they played my song by themselves it's not like I begged them to play it. I mean KXLU was the first to play "Loser".

Nardwuar: So they didn't want to play it cus it got played on KROQ.

Beck: I guess so. I don't know.

Nardwuar: So they banned you in some sense.

Beck: Yeah but they took that down. They play me now.

Nardwuar: How many college stations were aware of you before DGC?

Beck: Probably not that many because we only put it out locally around L.A. There were only four hundred copies made.

Nardwuar: You were a local phenomenon like Dick Dale was in the 60's and then you just exploded.

Beck: Yeah, or imploded. I don't know.

Nardwuar: Well in Canada it's sort of the opposite. Your label is trying to push you from commercial radio -where you are being played right now- to campus stations where you have never been played before. But in the states your label is trying to push you to commercial radio instead of campus.
Beck: That's kind of weird. Well, you know it's like a weird thing. It's like I never got to put out anything, you know. Krecords was goin' to put out my record two years ago, but nobody ever got around to it. And then stuff just started happening too fast.

Nardwuar: But K Record is gonna put something out for you right now, right?

Beck: Yeah they're putting out an L.P. for me.

Nardwuar: And you're going to to be playing the Yo Yo A Go Go Rock Fest up in Olympia?

Beck: Yeah. Sure am.

Nardwuar: I think people adore you on comercial T.V. and radio. They all seem to love you Mr. Hansen. You're last name is Hansen isn't it?

Beck: Yes.

Nardwuar: They seem to love your hair number one

Beck: I don't give a shit about my hair.

Nardwuar: It's got a nice part down the middle though.

Beck: I have no.... you know, I don't care.

Nardwuar: And the second reason people like you Mr. Beck Hansen is that you say "Why don't you kill me " in your song. They love that catch phrase in commercial radio and the third thing is that you have a coffin and a squeegee in your video.

Beck: Those are pretty foul reasons I guess.

Nardwuar: Speak up Beck! You're the voice of a generation! Heh. heh. Rock me Amadeus.

Beck: You know, I don't.... What the fuck?

Nardwuar: So Beck you are coming to Canada soon. Who is the prime minister of Canada?

Beck: How is the prime minister of Canada?

Nardwuar: Who is the Prime Minister of Canada?

Beck: I don't know

Nardwuar: Should you be allowed to play in Canada if you don't even know who the Prime Minister is?
Beck: Probably not. You should all ban me. I shouldn't even be allowed to......breathe.

Nardwuar: His name is John Cretch... Can you name any Prime Ministers of Canada? Do you have any Canadian friends?

Beck: No.

Nardwuar: Beck why should people care.....

Beck: Except for you.

Nardwuar: Why shold people care....

Beck: Your my only friend.

Nardwuar: Me Nardwuar the Human Serviette!? Thank you Beck. Why should people care about you?

Beck: I don't know. I have no idea.

Nardwuar: Beck, come on speak up you are the voice of a generation! Why should people care about you? It certainly isn't cus of you're hair or the squeegee and coffin in your video is it?

Beck: I have no reason.

Nardwuar: Hopefully it's not according to the "Why don't you kill me" line in your song.

Beck: Oh man.... you're just fucking..... you're just......Oh, just fuck off.