Stream: Beck: "Nausea", "Strange Apparition"
Album art contest announced

Beck is the new Sufjan, at least in terms of Pitchfork news stories about the progress of his new album. We've told you the title and release date of the album and hipped you to all kinds of YouTube goodies and audio ephemera; now the man is streaming two new tracks from The Information (out October 3 on Interscope) on his website.

"Nausea", with its shuffling drums and funky bass line, is something of a standard Beck song, a perfect soundtrack to cruising L.A. at sunset. "Strange Apparition", on the other hand, sounds like Sea Change as played by Elton John. It's an upbeat, gospel-inflected tune that gives way to measured acoustic downstrokes by its end. Two pleasant little songs that are definitely worth your time, and apparently all of ours, considering how often we write about the guy.

The other big news in Beckland comes from Billboard.com, who report that the sticker sheets we told you would comprise the artwork for The Information are now part of a contest. Details are fuzzy, but the gist is that Beck will determine the winner based on the quality of his/her customized album cover.

What does that person win? What are Beck's plans for that special cover? We don't know, but we can tell you there are plans to display the sticker designs at a few art galleries. Stay tuned, because even if he doesn't clear the contest issue up, Beck is sure to take out the garbage or "make a toilet" sometime soon. And you can be sure that we'll report it.

Video: Beck: Motorcade