For more than a decade, Beck has dabbled almost exclusively in the surreal. But when it came time to shoot the video for "Nausea," the first single from his October 3 album, The Information, he decided to change things up a bit: he got surreally real.

Because while it's based in reality, nothing is truly what it seems in the "Nausea" clip, which Beck shot with director Patrick Daughters (Yeah Yeah Yeahs' "Maps") recently in Los Angeles. Borrowing a page from "The Truman Show" — and the eerie, cinematic photography of Gregory Crewdson — the video follows Beck as he strolls through the seedy underbelly of L.A., past thugs and assorted riffraff that all look a bit, well, too perfectly cast.

The result is an underlying sense of surrealism that's bolstered by the fact that various street urchins snap into character as Beck approaches — a homeless man goes from standing upright to hunched in just a beat, a couple quickly joins hands when Beck glances their way — and then revert to their former stances as he passes. Clearly, something is amiss.

But it's not just the viewer that's suspicious. As the clip progresses, Beck becomes increasingly aware that this so-called reality might actually be some sort of elaborate stage production. The city skyline wobbles as if to suggest it's merely a backdrop painting, the sidewalk looks like plywood and strangely, the same cast of characters reappears time and time again, seemingly a group of actors playing different roles.

As the video reaches its conclusion, the viewer's vantage point gets wider and wider until it's evident that Beck's entire world is taking place on a gigantic soundstage, complete with massive spotlights and scrambling stagehands. At the clip's end, Beck walks off the stage, toward an unmarked door and into the unknown.

The "Nausea" video is similar in spirit to the reality-folding clip Beck shot last year for "Girl," the second single from his Guero album (see "Beck Takes A Page Out Of Mad Magazine For 'Girl' Video"). And while it's the first proper video from The Information (see "Beck Giving Fans Sticky Fingers With Quasi-Hip-Hop Album"), it's by no means the only one he has filmed.

Just last month, news broke that Beck had been hard at work on a series of homemade clips — one for each song on the album — all of which are included on a DVD that comes packaged with the record (see "Beck Grabs Bears, Wigs, Babies For Homemade Videos From New LP").