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Thursday, February 23, 2006
Computer says "OK"
Radiohead, then. They're up there with all those other "greatest bands of all time", of course. Inauspicious beginnings on that debut album, Pablo Honey. It's got everyone's favourite quiet-loud-quiet-loud-released-in-1992 song - Creep. That's about it, really. The rest of it is OK, but that's about it. Note to self: find out if Creep started the quiet-loud-quiet-loud genre, QL2.
Fast forward a couple of years and we find ourselves at The Difficult Second Album. It would seem Radiohead thrive under pressure, if doing a second album is pressure - they came out with The Bends, which is vastly better than Pablo Honey. I suspect it's so titled because Pablo Honey was at the bottom of a murky pond, and they rose so quickly and so far when it came to doing the second album that they got the bends. Seems like a good title, they thought, and the rest is history. It remains my favourite Radiohead album, but I seem to be in the minority, because...
...the perennial favourite activity of music magazines and Channel 4 is to make lists, and whenever a list such as "100 Greatest Albums Of All Time... Ever!" or "50 Greatest Albums Of The 90s" comes along, invariably in the top ten and often at the very top you'll find Radiohead's third album, OK Computer. It's good, it really is, really really good, but not great. I don't think so, anyway. You can feed me to the kicking squealing gucci little piggies if you disagree.
Anyway, Radiohead then found themselves under more pressure: follow up two really good albums. They managed, Moses-style, to divide opinion pretty well. There are two camps and very little middle ground. They released Kid A - and people said one of two things: "It's a load of crap" or "It's great!". I'm in the latter camp.
Kid A, it turned out, was part one of a two-part album release, although we were told in no uncertain terms not to consider the second one an outtakes album, nor were we to wonder why they didn't just release a double album, oh no no, mustn't think that. Kid B turned out to be called, rather disappointingly, Amnesiac, and it's more an album than the highly experimental predecessor: more a collection of songs than an extended muso-wank. Critics and fans alike generally agreed that while it's still a bit weird, it's at least better than Kid A. I disagree... I prefer Kid A. Maybe I like muso-wanks?
Follow up to Amnesiac was Hail To The Thief. Less said about that one, the better, but I'll limit myself to this: trying to take the best bits of OK Computer and Kid A and making the Ultimate Album (TM), but ending up making Pablo Honey's evil twin. Nary a sniff of QL2, either.
Wonder what the next album will be like...
Fast forward a couple of years and we find ourselves at The Difficult Second Album. It would seem Radiohead thrive under pressure, if doing a second album is pressure - they came out with The Bends, which is vastly better than Pablo Honey. I suspect it's so titled because Pablo Honey was at the bottom of a murky pond, and they rose so quickly and so far when it came to doing the second album that they got the bends. Seems like a good title, they thought, and the rest is history. It remains my favourite Radiohead album, but I seem to be in the minority, because...
...the perennial favourite activity of music magazines and Channel 4 is to make lists, and whenever a list such as "100 Greatest Albums Of All Time... Ever!" or "50 Greatest Albums Of The 90s" comes along, invariably in the top ten and often at the very top you'll find Radiohead's third album, OK Computer. It's good, it really is, really really good, but not great. I don't think so, anyway. You can feed me to the kicking squealing gucci little piggies if you disagree.
Anyway, Radiohead then found themselves under more pressure: follow up two really good albums. They managed, Moses-style, to divide opinion pretty well. There are two camps and very little middle ground. They released Kid A - and people said one of two things: "It's a load of crap" or "It's great!". I'm in the latter camp.
Kid A, it turned out, was part one of a two-part album release, although we were told in no uncertain terms not to consider the second one an outtakes album, nor were we to wonder why they didn't just release a double album, oh no no, mustn't think that. Kid B turned out to be called, rather disappointingly, Amnesiac, and it's more an album than the highly experimental predecessor: more a collection of songs than an extended muso-wank. Critics and fans alike generally agreed that while it's still a bit weird, it's at least better than Kid A. I disagree... I prefer Kid A. Maybe I like muso-wanks?
Follow up to Amnesiac was Hail To The Thief. Less said about that one, the better, but I'll limit myself to this: trying to take the best bits of OK Computer and Kid A and making the Ultimate Album (TM), but ending up making Pablo Honey's evil twin. Nary a sniff of QL2, either.
Wonder what the next album will be like...
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