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RADIOHEAD

“Faith, you’re driving me away
You do it everyday
You don’t mean it
But it hurts like hell…”
 

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"B"

Main Decade: 90's and 00's

Main Eras:

Alternative II: The Big Bang (1990-1999)

(Post)-alternative III: The Dispersion (2000-???)

 

Key Members:

Thom Yorke, Vocalist

Jonny Greenwood, Lead Guitar

Ed O'Brien, Second Guitar

Colin Greenwood, Bass

Phil Selway, Drums

 

Key Songs:
Paranoid Android, Karma Police, My Iron Lung, No Surprises, Videotape, How To Disspear Completely, High & Dry, Fake Plastic Trees, Street Spirit (Fade Out), Exit Music For a Film, Just, Optimistic, Nude, Pyramid Song, Climbing Up The Walls, Knives Out, Lucky, There There, Everything In Its Right Place, Like Spinnig Plates, Jigsaw, Burn The Witch, Optimistic, Reckoner, Airbag, I Might Be Wrong, Bodysnatchers, Daydreaming, Lotus Flower, Sail to the Moon, Life in  a Glasshouse, True Love Waits,, The National Anthem, You, (Nice Dream), Stop Whispering, A Punchup at a Wedding, Jigsaw Falling Into Place 
 

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The days of rock have slowly faded. Long gone are those days of supergroups when almost every musician was a virtuoso and there was also a lyrical genius at some point. The supergroups slowly died out along with the true spirit of rock, becoming a mere individual artistic expression—perfectly valid, but the opposite of the universally spirited rock that predominated in the sixties and seventies. In other words, music used to reflect a social atmosphere and was a direct expression of it; they went hand in hand. With the death of rock in the early 80s (I'd venture to say even earlier), rock became an individual art form, part of the mainstream against which it was born, and thus lost its original, mass appeal, becoming a personal and individualistic expression. To put it more simply, let's say it ceased to be progressive and became hedonistic/masochistic.

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With no causes to attack, watching its heroes kill themselves en masse with overdoses, slowly, without anyone noticing, rock ceased to be a true political and social weapon and became a solitary expression. I won't deny that many times this solitary expression coalesced within a generation and created idols. Just ask the ghost of Cobain, who wasn't a great musician, but managed to encapsulate the frustrated feeling of his time, even with his final act of pulling the trigger. But the truth is that the only thing rock has had in common since then is generational anguish and dissatisfaction.

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It is precisely from this confluence that unites us as the so-called "Generation X" that bands emerge that become giants, transmitting, through personal anguish, the feelings of all their listeners who identify with that desolation. Thus, grunge became the most solid musical movement since the punk of the seventies, and produced legendary bands, although completely removed in form and substance from the giants of classic rock. The bands of this nineties generation, without necessarily belonging to grunge, achieved their own style: depressive, with powerful guitars, incisive lyrics about personal pain and society, and angry vocals. Virtuoso musicians are rarely found (the last semi-virtuoso is Slash, and he doesn't belong to this genre at all), but they share a common artistic intention and achieve a cohesion as a group that the supergroups of the past lacked. It's not that there's no talent left, but there's no one left on the level of Hendrix, Page, Moon, Baker… Well, there's one band left, the last B in MY catalog, but I'll talk about them later, and they don't really fit into this genre either. The point is that the '90s bands I'm referring to—Blur, Pearl Jam, Collective Soul, Alice in Chains, among others—know how to compensate for their lack of virtuosity with tremendous intelligence and teamwork. They create atmospheres that complement the lyrics.

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Of this group of bands, one stands out for pushing rock to the limits of progressive rock without actually entering the genre, achieving catchy tunes without making them pop, writing melancholic lyrics without being condescending (except for their biggest hit), fearlessly venturing into diverse genres, becoming a living legend on par with the classic giants, never ceasing to be played on the radio despite their experimentation and pretensions, constantly reinventing themselves, and releasing one of the 20 best albums in the history of rock. Can you guess?

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What's the point of all this? It's simple. You can't appreciate Radiohead and their contribution to music without also appreciating their entire context. Radiohead is a band that stands out from other bands of its era because its members, without reaching the heights of virtuosity and unparalleled technical prowess, manage to cohere quite intelligently, with Thom Yorke leading the lyrical and spiritual side of the band and Jonny Greenwood guiding the musical side and the dense atmospheres the group created to support the message conveyed through vocals and lyrics.

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Let me be clear. I don't rank Radiohead so highly based on a single album. I discovered Radiohead like most people my age: through the radio saturation caused by "Creep" back in '93. I was just beginning to pay attention to contemporary rock, swept up by the music created during that magical year. The little song was undoubtedly one of the most depressing I'd ever heard, but it got under my skin despite being possibly the WORST (let's just say "least representative") song in Radiohead's repertoire. That song overshadowed much better things on the band's debut album, like "Stop Whispering," but we should be grateful that it brought the band to a massive audience. It's a proven fact that, after Extreme's "More Than Words," "Creep" is the most played song on rock stations during that decade. And many have been left with the idea that Radiohead is just one song or one album. Wrong. It's impossible to listen to the band's entire discography without getting a headache, but definitely not because they all sound the same, like The Who, but because of the incredibly dense atmospheres they create with even the simplest song. The band is perhaps, without quite reaching the heights of the White Album, the most diverse band around today. They started with a powerful Britpop sound, based on two or three guitars on their first two albums. Then they moved to the exact point where progressive and pop meet on their masterpiece. After that, they shifted to extreme experimental electronica on their next two albums, without ever losing their signature sound. They finally combined electronic experimentation with powerful guitar riffs on "Hail to the Thief" and "In Rainbows." And curiously, after OK!, their best albums are the two live recordings where they perform songs from their electronic albums with a more human and rock-oriented feel. Throughout their career, without abandoning rock, they've explored ballads, Britpop, acoustic and atmospheric rock, lullabies, flirted with metal, experimented with electronic music and its subgenres, dabbled in progressive rock, written grunge-inspired lyrics, launched furious attacks on the system, and, as if that weren't enough, managed to blend all of this into songs of indefinable genre.

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The band was formed by a group of high school friends in Oxford, back in 1985. On a Friday, as they were then called, broke up for a while during their first years at university, but towards the end of their studies, they reunited, more mature and skilled on their instruments, and possessing a style that didn't quite fit in with the rest of the regional music scene of the early nineties. Because of this, they began to build a growing fanbase, filling every venue they played and achieving strong sales of their demos at these gigs. Record labels started taking notice, and several were vying to sign them, with EMI ultimately winning the contract. They signed them to a six-album deal on the condition that they change their name to one of the songs by their influential band, Talking Heads. And so Yorke and company became Radiohead.

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Although there were some internal conflicts during the recording of their first album, their debut with Pablo Honey is flawless. It's an album with a certain Britpop influence, but more melancholic, full of atmospheres created from rhythmic guitar riffs and dreamy, precise, haunting, and melancholic arrangements by Jonny Greenwood. Yorke's voice, from then on, was characterized by its tremendous nostalgia, capable of expressing feelings, playing across the entire scale and generally reaching very high notes with falsetto. The album is generally melancholic, but it's the most rhythmic and upbeat of all their LPs, with a greater 80s influence from bands like The Smiths, Joy Division, R.E.M., etc. His lyrics begin to stand out. The album is very good, but curiously, it took a long time to make an impact on the charts. Radiohead was on the verge of breaking up after the failure when one of the singles, "Creep," began to gain traction mid-year. It timidly entered radio programming. Little by little, radio listeners began requesting it more and more, and by August it was already at the top of radio charts worldwide, eclipsing songs like "What's Up" by Four Non Blondes, "November Rain" by Guns N' Roses, "Nothing Else Matters" by Metallica, "Losing My Religion" by R.E.M., and "Heart Shaped Box" by Nirvana. Thus, almost by chance, Radiohead reached the top of the world with one of their most uninspired songs, one that even Jonny Greenwood detested so much that he tried to sabotage it with the guitar riffs heard before each chorus, actually giving the song more power.

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The song isn't bad in itself, but I maintain that it's one of the most generic things the band has ever created, and it was so overrated—I listened to it so many times in my teens—that now I can barely stand it. Unfortunately, the rest of the album didn't receive much attention, but Creep alone made the LP a commercial success, and after a tour that even took them to Guadalajara, Radiohead went into the studio to prepare their second album.

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The Bends was released in 1995, featuring a more evolved and mature sound, somewhat removed from their 80s influences. It was the era when grunge was at its peak following Cobain's death, and Radiohead wisely resisted the temptation to embrace a genre that promised immediate success. On the contrary, they remained true to themselves. If one thing is clear to me, it's that this band, despite any differences they may have, shares a very clear musical objective. They all have the same sound in mind when writing songs, and they achieve it seemingly effortlessly. The Bends is a denser album with darker atmospheres. While remaining rhythmic and featuring guitar riffs, Jonny gives himself more freedom to experiment with his pedalboard, achieving effects that lend a unique texture and ambience to the songs. The album received little promotion and, consequently, no commercial success. Fortunately, I got to hear it in its entirety on the now-defunct Stereosoul, and ever since, I've found it superior to Pablo Honey. The band was at its peak; Yorke had fully mastered his vocal style, and they created songs that are now timeless classics, such as "High & Dry," "Fake Plastic Trees," "Just," and "Street Spirit." "My Iron Lung" deserves special mention, with its incisive lyrics and the band's signature bipolar harmonies, shifting from ballad-like arpeggios to a powerful and hypnotic chaos in a matter of seconds.

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The album was triumphantly ignored at the time and barely received a mention in year-end lists. The band was then labeled a "One Hit Wonder" for their only hit up to that point: the commercially successful "Creep," which was still constantly playing on the radio.

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With the pressure to achieve another hit lessened, the band returned to the studio to work on an ambitious, conceptual project. To do so, they retreated to a country house to escape the noise of the city and find inspiration. They bought their own recording equipment to produce themselves and locked themselves away to record with the sole aim of creating something that had never been done before. The result is the legendary OK Computer. The album surprised everyone. Radiohead had completely reinvented themselves without ceasing to sound like Radiohead, achieving the best album of the decade. Critics unanimously praised it. Fans also sold out copies, which is curious, since the sound is much further removed from the commercial sound of their previous work. Perhaps it was divine justice, but the fact is that the album propelled them from being one-hit wonders to generational icons. The album shows much more care in the construction of atmospheres, generally bittersweet, and darker than their previous work. From the beautiful ballad "No Surprises" to the delightful "Karma Police," and including what could be considered the equivalent of Bohemian Rhapsody, "Paranoid Android," which contains tremendous harmonic diversity and complexity. From that moment on, the band would set a precedent, influencing various groups that would try to follow their style, from Coldplay to Muse. They even won several Grammys with it, and many dared to say it was their best album since Dark Side of the Moon. Sure, that's an exaggeration, but I can't quite say if it's truly overrated or if all the praise is genuine, because the truth is, it's an iconic album that marked a turning point in music. 1997 was a year of excellent rock, almost reaching the quality of 1993. But from then on, everything started to take on a more electronic tone, relegating the electric guitar to a secondary role, which, in my opinion, seriously damaged rock. Just like Dark Side of the Moon did, paving the way for progressive saturation and leading to disco and punk. I know this wasn't Radiohead's intention and that most of the blame actually lies with the record labels, but this is what happens when such an important album eventually appears: a breaking point.

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The band's only intention was to experiment, yet they became trendsetters, demigods or something like that. The OK tour stretched on for a couple of years, and after it ended, Yorke, the Greenwoods, O'Brien, and Selway were fed up and tired of fame and success. Who understands rock stars?

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After a long break, the band reunited to record their next album. They all agreed that they should continue exploring new directions and decided to drastically move away from the sound that had characterized them up to that point. They really wanted to distance themselves from fame, but this was already impossible. Thus, in 2000, they released an album where the typical guitar riffs are conspicuously absent, and a tremendous influence of electronic music and overproduction is evident. The album is more minimalist, the lyrics more enigmatic, and the vocals more poignant. Kid A initially broke sales records, as everyone expected something similar to OK. But the fans who lined up at the stores were in for a tremendous surprise. Some were fascinated. Others, the majority, were horrified. Both Kid A and Amnesiac (2001), twin albums, reveal a previously unknown side of the band. The atmospheres are heavier and more elaborate, but with less instrumentation, prioritizing instead the tremendous harmonic and conceptual complexity. There isn't a single song that could be considered a radio single, as this time they really push the boundaries of experimentation, and their plan to distance themselves from the radio charts is fully realized. Incidentally, there's a legend that Kid A, if played on two different players 17 seconds apart, produces a different sound. That is, if you put the record on one player and 17 seconds later start it on another, the overlap of the two results in a different album, both in rhythms and lyrics. I haven't been able to verify this, but there are versions of Kid 17 circulating where the two records are already layered.

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Both Kid A and Amnesiac are very, very difficult albums to digest. I already mentioned that I was horrified by them on first listen. But the more I listen to them, the more I realize the artistry and genius contained in each of the songs. They're not mere noise. Nor is it the kind of electronic music any DJ would make. Radiohead is flirting with 21st-century progressive rock, changing direction, and these albums are becoming increasingly valued, as happened with The Bends, which is now a cult classic.

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Their two live albums, I Might Be Wrong and Earls Court, date from this period. Both concerts base their repertoire on the electronic albums, but reinterpreted with a much greater presence of rock guitars. They sound like the Radiohead of OK, and demonstrate that the sounds they captured on the album were intended to distance them from the mainstream, although live they remained true to their essence. In my opinion, these live performances are among the band's best, truly giving another dimension and rawness, more humanity, to the studio's electronic sounds. Interestingly, at that time, rock music worldwide was turning towards electronic music.

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In 2003, they released Hail to the Thief, a direct reference to Bush and his "preemptive war." The album is quite unusual. It features more guitar sounds and less electronic experimentation, attempting to find a balance between these sounds. Frankly, I consider it the band's weakest album. It's worth mentioning that it was recorded in just two weeks, which likely played a role. Listening to it, one gets the impression that Radiohead fell short of the radical change they had initiated and the sound with which they began their career. One might think it's quite close to OK Computer, but the atmosphere is very neglected, and harmonically it sounds repetitive. At least it yielded another radio hit, "There There," which gradually gained ground on the charts and once again established Radiohead as a box-office draw for massive concerts.

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After a break during which Thom Yorke and Jonny Greenwood released their respective solo albums, they released a new album in 2007: In Rainbows. This latest LP so far shows a greater adherence to their original sound, a greater distancing from electronic music (though not disappearing entirely), but now with greater care in crafting harmonic structures and atmospheric construction, once again achieving nostalgic environments vaguely reminiscent of OK, though without sounding repetitive. A welcome return when everyone had written the band off, where they achieve a precise and careful balance between their guitar sounds and their computer experiments. What's next? What direction will they take on the next album, if there is one?

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Radiohead is undoubtedly one of the best, if not the best, bands on the planet today. They manage to impose their style, from Yorke's vocals to the meticulous creativity that Greenwood brings to the guitar, or they suddenly shift towards more electronic directions and the whole world embraces that sound, albeit in a more commercial way.

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A curious anecdote, speaking of influences. Coldplay, currently the biggest commercial juggernaut, has never denied their Radiohead influences. And while they've always been mellow, at least their first two albums showed a band that could have inherited the sound of OK Computer, but later they veered towards saccharine pop. The fact is, Chris Martin was once asked about Radiohead's obvious influence on the band's sound, and Martin replied that the intention was to follow in the footsteps of the Oxford band, as they admired their music. When reporters asked Thom Yorke about his famous admirer's comments, Yorke responded by saying that Coldplay were stupid and boring. The jab backfired on the Radiohead frontman shortly after, since during the Kid A and Amnesiac era he was constantly praising Aphex Twin. When Richard James was asked about Thom Yorke's remarks, James replied, "Radiohead sounds stupid and boring, I prefer Coldplay." It's almost impossible that he preferred Coldplay because of their style of music, but it was a good demonstration that he was aware of Yorke's words and a lesson in humility that Thom surely never forgot.

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I can only tip my hat to this band, who never stop reinventing themselves, striving for perfection in their music regardless of the means, the style, the critics, or the success. Although some of their albums can be incredibly difficult to digest, once they finally sink in, they create an addiction to their sound. And it's not that I'm a fan of electronic music, far from it, but listening to Radiohead makes me realize that the future of music truly lies in that direction, and the electric guitar is doomed to extinction. As long as there are people who can create this kind of music or fuse it with traditional rock, I can sleep a little more soundly.

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Geniuses, without a doubt, despite the lack of virtuosos. Perhaps they are the most influential band of the decade, along with Nirvana, but light years ahead in terms of musical concepts; creators, moreover, of a landmark album that has become one of the jewels of rock history, something that is difficult to achieve in recent years. Praised by critics and fans alike, invisible when they choose to be, protagonists when they choose to be, always innovative… Lineup: Thom Yorke, the diva and vocal genius, sometimes seems to be having convulsions, especially when seen live. He created his own style that would later be copied by various vocalists. He frequently plays third guitar and piano, synthesizers, and operates the mixing console.

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Jonny Greenwood: the genius on lead guitar. He started as just another guitarist and gradually took over the musical leadership, creating arrangements and arpeggios that blended with his bandmates' guitar riffs and being largely responsible for the textures and atmospheres of the songs. A master at combining pedal sounds, he also plays piano, the Ondes Martenot, Rhodes keyboards, and uses a computer for electronic loops.

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Ed O’Brien: Rhythm guitar (responsible for those characteristic guitar riffs of the early days), percussion, backing vocals, and sound effects.

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Colin Greenwood: Bassist, also plays sampled double bass and synthesizers. He's not a virtuoso on the bass, but he tries to innovate and navigate the changing rhythms and structures of the songs.

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Phillip Selway: The band's drummer, quite good, dynamic, and sometimes unpredictable. He drives the songs from tremendous energy to hypnotic calm in a matter of seconds. They are all very well-rounded musicians, so changes in their lead roles are common, and you can see them playing with a very different lineup depending on the needs of each song.

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Ladies and gentlemen, the rockstars who refused to be rockstars: Radiohead!!!

 

By Corvan 

Jun/15/2008

 

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