Beck - Devils Haircut

JUL 01 1996 · 12:00

Beck - Devils Haircut (1996) Director: Mark Romanek Era: Mid-90s Alternative Boom (1996) - Peak MTV alternative rock era; Beck's Odelay propels sample-collage aesthetics into mainstream, bridging indie irreverence with major-label production and street-level NYC cinematography. Tier 1 archival priority. A defining artefact of mid-1990s alternative rock visual culture, this video represents the intersection of auteur music video direction, cinephile citation, and the sample-era eclecticism of Beck's Odelay period. Its production history, documented accidents, canonical cinematic influences, and award recognition, makes it essential source material for scholarship on 1990s MTV aesthetics and the elevation of music video to legitimate artistic medium. Context: Released November 1996 as the second single from Beck's landmark album Odelay, 'Devils Haircut' arrived at the precise moment alternative rock had absorbed hip-hop's sample culture into its vocabulary. Romanek's video translates this cultural hybridity visually: a lone eccentric in cowboy attire navigating contemporary New York City streets collapses the mythology of the American West, the urban alienation of New Hollywood cinema, and the Beat Generation's flaneur tradition into a single three-minute vignette. The fast editing pace (avg. 2.54s/shot) mirrors the track's Dust Brothers production density, while the warm-toned, low-brightness palette evokes both 1970s New Hollywood film stock and the era's lo-fi zine aesthetic. The video's cinephile DNA, overt homages to Truffaut and Schlesinger, signals Beck and Romanek's mutual elevation of the music video to a medium of genuine artistic citation. Director notes: Directed in 1996, filmed entirely on location in New York City. Romanek cited Midnight Cowboy and François Truffaut's The 400 Blows as primary inspirations: Beck's cowboy-hat-and-boombox wanderer was conceived as a modern-day Joe Buck, while the freeze-frame technique references the final shot of The 400 Blows. Two celebrated moments were unplanned: a car that failed to brake in time actually struck Beck and injured his leg (a reference to the 'I'm walking here!' scene from Midnight Cowboy), and a flock of pigeons that took spontaneous flight as Beck approached. The video was edited by Hank Corwin. It won Best Editing and Best Male Video at the 1997 MTV VMAs.