Beck, now on tour, mulls return to recording

CLEVELAND - New Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Jeff Beck - hitting the Electric Factory tomorrow - hopes to take his current touring band into the studio this fall to work on his first album of fresh material since 2003's Grammy Award-winning "Jeff."

But he's not sure what to do with it yet. "We can do more or less anything from ambient trance to thuggery and just about any kind of jazz fusion to almost kitsch," Beck said before his induction on Saturday in Cleveland. "It's great, but how do you forge the very first kind of casting?"

Beck says he and the troupe - keyboardist Jason Rebello, bassist Tal Wilkenfeld and drummer Vinnie Colaiuta - did some recording last April in California, and while that material "is in a hard drive at the moment," he's of a mind to start over again.

"There may be some fruit in there," Beck said. "But I'd rather just start again with the four of us, the way we work together, and start hacking together some things."

He doesn't, however, expect the band to do much writing while on its current North American tour to promote Beck's new concert DVD, "Performing This Week

. . . Live at Ronnie Scotts."

"We always think that's a great idea," Beck said. "But lo and behold, when you get off a bus you don't want to get together and hold hands and start rehearsing. But things do happen at sound checks. Intensive playing and intensive sound checks usually produce some little bud of an idea. That's my ideal way of making a record, organic."

Beck said he was pleased to be inducted into the Hall of Fame, especially as a solo artist (he's already there as a member of the Yardbirds).

"I didn't really enjoy the first one. I felt kind of frustrated that I had to go back and be part of a band," said Beck. He added that it "means a whole lot when you're recognized for your playing alone and not just [as] part of a successful pop band." *

Jeff Beck with Davy Knowles, Electric Factory, 7th and Willow streets, 8 p.m. tomorrow, $39.50, 215-336-2000, www.livenation.com.