Updated October 9, 2026 at 3:34 PM EDT
Beck wrote "Beyond The Light" dozens of different ways, but he just couldn't get the words and melody to match what he envisioned for the song. And just as he was about to give up for good, he found inspiration on a dreary winter day in New York.
It was snowing outside and in a small Brooklyn studio, he started improvising at the mic. "I just kept singing it and just letting the words come out on their own," the singer-songwriter told Morning Edition host A Martínez.
"Sometimes that happens with songs. When you try it, that's when it's not going to work. You have to get to a place where you're not trying anymore."
The hymn-like song closes Ride Lonesome, Beck's first full-length studio album of all-new material since the Pharell-produced Hyperspace in 2019. While the song is a peaceful one, Beck describes it as "the calm inside a storm."
He divorced actress Marissa Ribisi in 2021, and themes of loss and loneliness permeate the album.
"When you're letting go of something, you're mourning it, you're honoring it, like a prayer," he said.
Since his breakout album Odelay 30 years ago, Beck has taken his music in all kinds of different directions, from hip-hop, rap and rock to folk, country and quiet, expansive soundscapes.
It's that latter side of Beck that's found in Ride Lonesome, which shares the acoustic-filled heartache of Sea Change (2002) and Morning Phase (2014).
He partnered with some of the same collaborators as for those two earlier albums: Jason Falkner and Smokey Hormel on guitar, Justin Meldal-Johnsen on bass, Joey Waronker on drums and Roger Joseph Manning Jr. on keyboards. The group also collaborated on Mutations (1998).
"We've played together for over 30 years and we sort of speak this musical language together," Beck said. Producer Nigel Godrich, who had joined the group on Sea Change and Mutations, mixed the songs.
Some of the instrumental material in Ride Lonesome was initially recorded in 2022 before Beck shelved it for a while. He then spent about a year working on the record around 2024 and 2025.
"I was just maybe waiting until I was in the right place to really make these songs. Some songs require a certain amount of patience and time and care," he said.
Right now, he says, he's working on material that probably won't reach listeners until 2030.
"When you're aiming for something that you haven't quite done, but you can hear it in your mind, it's very palpable. It's something you can almost touch, but you can't quite get to it. And the trick of it is that it's not always the most obvious way to get there," said Beck, describing the process as similar to safe-cracking.
"I feel like each time I'm going to work on a record or make new songs, I'm starting over, I'm learning. I'm like, How do you do this? It's like building a house with no blueprints and God help you if you try to build the roof first."
The broadcast version of this story was produced by Kaity Kline.
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