Watch Beck Play “Where It’s At” With Father John Misty & Este Haim In Surprise Wildfires Benefit Appearance
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There’s a destination a little up the road from the habitations and the towns you know. It’s called the Ace Hotel Los Angeles. It is probably the most Los Angeles place in all of Los Angeles. It’s hard to fall asleep at the Ace Hotel Los Angeles because people keep partying at the rooftop bar, which also has a swimming pool. The Ace Hotel Los Angeles is a block away from a weed dispensary that looks like an Apple Store. It is impossible to be at the Ace Hotel Los Angeles and to think you are anywhere other than Los Angeles. And last night, Father John Misty brought an all-star lineup to the theater attached to the hotel, putting on a benefit that raised money for victims of the recent California wildfires.
The show had an all-star lineup that included HAIM, Weezer frontman Rivers Cuomo, Mac DeMarco, Rostam, Weyes Blood, Tim Heidecker, Jeff Bhasker, Jonathan Wilson, Nate Ruess, and Lucius. A very LA lineup! And it also featured Los Angeles patron saint Beck, a surprise guest who showed up to lead an impromptu all-star band through his 1996 mega-hit “Where It’s At.”
To help Beck out on “Where It’s At,” Father John Misty played drums, the position he used to hold down in Fleet Foxes. (It’s not Father John Misty’s first time working with Beck. Back in 2014, the Mist sang backup for Beck on SNL.) Este Haim joined in on bass, and Jeff Bhasker and Jonathan Wilson also joined in. Nobody had two turntables, at least that I could see, but Beck did have a microphone. Watch a few fan-made videos of the performance below.
In another of the night’s highlights, Mac DeMarco sang an ironically schmaltzy but honestly vocally impressive version of the old holiday chestnut “The Christmas Song,” the one about chestnuts roasting on an open fire.
And Rivers Cuomo’s Weezer bandmates joined him for an acoustic version of their infamous rendition of Weezer’s “Africa.”
Just months ago, Beck played a different benefit and led a different all-star band, one that featured Dave Grohl and the Bird And The Bee. That’s a thing that he does now.
