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Post by o on Nov 2, 2014 17:22:33 GMT 1
My turn again, considered the Rolling Stones as we've not had one of their albums, also considered another Beatles album, but in the end went for Radiohead - Ok Computer.
No. Title Length 1. "Airbag" 4:44 2. "Paranoid Android" 6:23 3. "Subterranean Homesick Alien" 4:27 4. "Exit Music (For a Film)" 4:24 5. "Let Down" 4:59 6. "Karma Police" 4:21 7. "Fitter Happier" 1:57 8. "Electioneering" 3:50 9. "Climbing Up the Walls" 4:45 10. "No Surprises" 3:48 11. "Lucky" 4:19 12. "The Tourist" 5:24
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Post by o on Nov 10, 2014 14:03:33 GMT 1
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Post by Shireblogger on Nov 10, 2014 23:10:51 GMT 1
The CD is in my car, so I'll be listening soon, and starting to prepare my review. No spoilers from me yet.
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Post by Whitneyfan on Nov 15, 2014 21:10:48 GMT 1
I tried a few times to get into this album after it topped so many best album polls, but I have to say that apart from a couple of tracks it was a real struggle to listen to.
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vastar iner
Member
I am the poster on your wall
Posts: 17,404
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Post by vastar iner on Nov 16, 2014 17:28:33 GMT 1
So, here we go. Spindly guitars bespatter the blank canvas. Whiny vocals. It reminds me a bit of Beck. There’s also something of the freakbeat about “Airbag”. Sitar heroes. It’s all rather interesting, until it turns into a 1970s television theme. Not Weekend World. Something a bit Wildtracky. Then it goes all whiny. Oh God, I’m so depressed, everything sucks, this new jumper is too small, I’ve run out of Doritos. Waaaa. Then it turns into the Thunderclap Newman parts that don’t involve Andy Newman. Meanders all over the place before they turn it up to 11 and jump around in a conventionally restrained way. Then they put the brakes on and they turn into choirboys. It’s like “Bohemian Rhapsody” gone dark. I’m losing track as to whether this is the same song. Jazz. Only the bass keeps the indulgence together.
OK, now it’s finished and we’ve got something else warped and in a minor key. And more whiny vocals. It’s much ado about nothing. Some more over-indulgent guitar twirling, imitating Jonathan Livingston Seagull. I suppose I ought to be paying attention to the vocals but Yorke’s voice is like silver paper on fillings. The mark of a great singer is that they can stir up buried emotions. On that basis Yorke is indeed a great singer. I’ve thought up 27 different ways to kill him just so he shuts the eff up. The thing is, I get the feeling I’ve heard all this before. Jamiroquai taking on prog rock. It’s all very retro.
Then it goes all quiet again, Acoustic works if someone has a good voice. Yorke does not have a good voice. Yet again it comes across as self-pityingly indulgent. They seem to be trying for something ecclesiastical over the top, like church choirs synthed over the top. And now seaside noises. Before it goes into the crescendo bit. And, guess what, it fades away back to the quiet end. It’s a bit expected.
“Let Down”. Sounds more like a regular pop record. Is missing something though. Needs more guitar overdub. It’s incomplete. Then it does the crescendo thing and then it fades out. Quelle surprise.
And we start again with something acoustic and quiet. Christ alive, it’s got to the point that I desperately want an instrumental. One thing that does strike me; I am half-way through the album and can’t remember ANY of it. It’s not sticking one iota. Because it’s all so unfocused, so meandery, so nebulous. The weird thing is it’s not unstructured, because it’s all rather conventional in form; regular structures and ethos. They just go everywhere within it.
OK, is this Stephen Hawking? OMD used a speak and spell machine back when it was innovative. This is just intercoursingly annoying. Oh, now they are seeming to rock out, with the same rhythm as one of the tracks beforehand. It’s rather NWOBHM. Worryingly it’s the best one so far. Until it goes into a never-ending coda. Oh God.
35 minutes and we’re still four songs from the end? Christ on a bike. Same rhythm again. Voice distorted, thank Buddah. But it’s going nowhere again, no focus again, just boring as wotsit. And now they’re doing the Creep/Street Spirit thing again. Bloody hell. Talk about formulaic.
“No Surprises” is finally something different, with that staccato synth opening. And, guess what? It crescendoes to a peak and then fades away to a fading closure. Before we get to “Lucky”, which I will be if I don’t dropkick the vasmac. OH FOR GOD’S SAKE YORKE SHUT UP WITH YOUR CRETINOUS WARBLING! You know, when you had bands like, oh, I don’t know, say, Angelic Upstarts, with caustically incoherent lyrics, at least they put a bit of effort and passion into things. This is just student self-pity. Oh, it’s a new song, and it’s just the same as the last one.
The whole thing is coming across as someone getting a tattoo because they’re a sign of being unique, and everyone else does it as well. It’s trying too hard. It’s also far too long. It’s a common critique of these albums - everything sounds the same. There is no variation as such. Most of the tracks start quiet, build up, and fade away. They’re similarly paced, they’re similarly instrumented, they’re just amoebic blobs of tune and I cannot assimilate to any of them.
And I go onto allmusic or the music mags and it gets constant top marks and top ratings. Why? What are they seeing? Am I missing out? Or is it Emperor’s New Clothes? Once a critical momentum builds up, nobody wants to stand aside and say “actually, it’s gash”?
It got on my bristols so much I can’t give it anything substantive. I note I gave Everything Must Go 2 out of 10 and that had “Design For Life” on it. I gave Thriller 1 and its tracks are more memorable than this one. I gave Damien Rice 1, which, in retrospect, was being grotesquely generous. This is far more in the Rice mould. I will therefore give it 0.5 out of 10 and curse myself for being so kind to Ms Hannigan.
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Post by -Big Dan- on Nov 16, 2014 23:55:49 GMT 1
Thank goodness I didn't have to rely on this review before I listened to the album.
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vastar iner
Member
I am the poster on your wall
Posts: 17,404
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Post by vastar iner on Nov 17, 2014 9:35:36 GMT 1
I never read reviews before listening. I only glanced at the OK Computer reviews after I finished drafting up mine for some context.
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Post by Shireblogger on Nov 17, 2014 11:40:28 GMT 1
Radiohead – OK Computer
Context I’ve never succeeded in getting into Radiohead, whereas Shirebloggess loves them. So their CDS are filed in our house next to Rush, Midlake and Leonard Cohen in the “not to my liking” section. From time to time, on a long car journey, she’ll try to persuade me of their merits, but so far it hasn’t worked. But hundreds of music critics can’t be wrong, can they ? Time to give “OK Computer” another try. 1/10
General Overview This is ludicrously over-rated rubbish. I’ve listened to 9 tracks and I haven’t yet found a melody or a lyric I can decipher. And then, finally, we get “No Surprises”, which is a beautiful song. At which point I realise that it reminds me of one of my favourite late 90s albums – “Beautiful Freak” by the Eels. A little investigation reveals the recording of “OK Computer” started in July 1996, and “Beautiful Freak” was released in August 1996. So, by far and away the best track on Radiohead’s most acclaimed album, sounds uncannily like one of the best albums released just as the band had gone into the studio. I’m not going to accuse Thom Yorke of plagiarism, but the coincidences are remarkable. 0/10
Intro & Outro Admittedly they had a lot to choose from, but Radiohead seem to have put the two worst tracks on the album first and last. “Airbag” and “The Tourist” are both self-indulgent, pointless and tuneless. 0/10
Music The more I listened to “OK Computer” (five times this month before writing this review), the more I found in it that was just about bearable. It certainly did grow on me. But to find anything interesting to say about the music has been nearly impossible. The band seem to be there to provide some sort of accompaniment to Yorke’s wailing. However, in “Paranoid Android”, I liked a couple of changes of pace which livened up the track. And “Let Down” and “Electioneering” might just qualify as possessing tunes. 3/10
Lyrics The maximum this album could score for lyrics is 5/10 because the only way I have of knowing what they are is by reading the sleeve notes. I needn’t have bothered. Yorke has nothing interesting to say, and no finesse with words. Take “Electioneering” – “I will stop at nothing to say the right thing when electioneering; I trust I can rely on your vote; Riot shields, voodoo economics, its just business…” Neither profound, nor poetry. Just some banal words delivered in a drone. 0/10
Production & Sound “Fitter Happier” is quite interesting. I wonder if they’d heard OMD’s “Dazzle Ships” album from 14 years earlier, which used a primitive speak and spell machine ? Elsewhere, the production is dull as dishwater. 2/10
High Points I do like “No Surprises”, even though I’m reluctant to give Thom Yorke much credit for originality. And that’s it. I certainly can’t see why “Karma Police” or “Paranoid Android” were so successful. 5/10
Low Points I’m conscious that I’m getting boring now. 0/10
Packaging At last, I find something to like. OK Computer comes with a really interesting cover – a clean white sleeve, a nice font for the title, and a collage of images, many of them abstract, which wouldn’t look out of place at the Tate Modern. The illustrations inside the CD booklet are also diverting. One point knocked off for the pretentious credits – Nigel Godrich wasn’t the producer, he “committed [it] to tape” and “balanced [the] audio levels”. “Performing monkey bookings taken by Charlie Myatt”, “Cash dealings…” by Big Al. And so the irreverent bonhomie goes on. 9/10
On balance The one recurring thought I had whilst listening to “OK Computer” was how much more I like Muse, who seem to have built a career by adding bombast and hooks to the format. By the 5th listen, I was finding a few things not to detest about the album, but I remain bewildered as to why it is so highly regarded by rock critics. Perhaps a case of the emperor’s new clothes – once gilded, it becomes very hard to break ranks from the cognescenti. 3/10
TOTAL SCORE Please could you stop the noise…it’s full up like a landfill. 23/100.
For Haven: 2.5/10
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Post by Shireblogger on Nov 17, 2014 11:44:37 GMT 1
In my defence, I should state that I hadn't read vastar iner's review before posting mine. So the "emperor's new clothes" statement is coincidence. And we're both big OMD fans, so both of us spotting the link there is no surprise.
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Post by o on Nov 17, 2014 13:19:40 GMT 1
I'd like to hear what Shireblogess makes of it
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Post by greendemon on Nov 17, 2014 14:26:34 GMT 1
I should really review this one, as I actually rather like it...
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Post by Shireblogger on Nov 17, 2014 14:33:16 GMT 1
I should really review this one, as I actually rather like it... I'm sure I've heard you say that before about other Haven Classic Albums.
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Post by greendemon on Nov 17, 2014 16:43:48 GMT 1
I know Aside from being quite a bit busier than I used to be these days, I just find writing reviews to be really quite difficult. Doesn't make much sense as I'm generally a good writer, but it doesn't come naturally to me at all. I'll decide whether or not I like something and often not be able to articulate clearly why I love or hate it. But seeing one of my favourite albums get a pasting in here is making me reconsider
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Post by Shireblogger on Nov 18, 2014 11:14:51 GMT 1
I know Aside from being quite a bit busier than I used to be these days, I just find writing reviews to be really quite difficult. Doesn't make much sense as I'm generally a good writer, but it doesn't come naturally to me at all. I'll decide whether or not I like something and often not be able to articulate clearly why I love or hate it. But seeing one of my favourite albums get a pasting in here is making me reconsider How about writing a point-by-point rebuttal ? You might find it morphs quite quickly into a review.
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Post by o on Dec 2, 2014 15:30:35 GMT 1
I guess I should get my review up to improve it's overall score We also need someone for December, not sure who it is...
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Post by o on Dec 6, 2014 17:07:16 GMT 1
I chose this Radiohead album over the Bends, as I thought this was the album where Radiohead took a step sideways into experimenting. Interesting that it has had bad reviews so far. You cant really criticise what Thom Yorke sounds like though, he’s always sounded like this, it’s a bit like saying Joy Division sound a bit depressing, that was the point wasn’t it? Anyway.
1. "Airbag" 4:44 – Great opening, sets the tone, love the whipping sound. Sounds amazing on headphones! 7/10 2. "Paranoid Android" - 6:23 Still remember this getting it’s first airplay on Radio 1, and being blown away by the epicness of it, 3 songs stuck together, but it works so well. 7/10 3. "Subterranean Homesick Alien" 4:27 – Can take or leave this. 5/10 4. "Exit Music (For a Film)" 4:24 – Absolutely adore this, just love the darkness and moodiness of it, and I’m sure they’re saying “f*** me” in the background. 9/10 5. "Let Down" 4:59 – Bit of filler, but it is the middle of the album. 6/10 6. "Karma Police" 4:21 – Another very recognisable Radiohead single. Excellent video with a man being chased by a car down a lane. Love the feedback ending, 7/10 7. "Fitter Happier" 1:57 – Only track I skip. 0/10 8. "Electioneering" 3:50 – So good after the weird Fitter, Happier, kickass. 7/10 9. "Climbing Up the Walls" 4:45 – Another favourite track on the album, slowing things down, dark, snarling and brooding, love it. 9/10 10. "No Surprises" 3:48 – After the darkness of the previous track, you have the plinky plonky No surprises with the excellent video where Thom Yorke slowly drowns inside a helmet! 8/10 11. "Lucky" 4:19 – Not sure, I liked this when the album first came out, but I think it is magnificent now, and would have been a perfect ending for the album. Great to rediscover this track. 8/10 12. "The Tourist" 5:24 – Bit dull and feels like it’s been tacked onto the end of the album. 5/10 Total = 78/120-7/10
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Post by -Big Dan- on Dec 18, 2014 22:30:24 GMT 1
The Bends is my favourite album of theirs by some way. There are some truly incredible songs on that album.
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Post by raliverpool on Dec 29, 2014 17:06:48 GMT 1
OK Computer is a big album. Like, really big. It's seriously almost too big that it's all too easy to hate. Radiohead is a band that is very easy to loathe. And I completely understand that because they started off as Oxford grunge also-rans with a one hit "Creep" wonder as ghastly as Bush "Swallowed"; and Stilskin "Inside". The people who liked "Creep" probably liked their second album "The Bends" which showed an improvement in songwriting, but musically was not that adventurous until the great leap forward sonically which they made with "OK Computer" before starting to head into challenging music for the sake of it thereafter with melodies a more frequently secondary thought process. So they'll probably hate "OK Computer" let alone "Kid A" and beyond, and are better off sticking with their blandified Radiohead-lite tribute acts Travis; Coldplay & Keane or their more bombastic equivalents Muse. They are a tough band to listen to, with their intellectually post modern progressive electronic rock sound and Thom Yorke's frequently awkward Charlie Brooker/Chris Morris/Armando Iannucci surreal, sarcastic, flippant, smart-arse lyrics.. This is a dense album. Doesn't mean it's bad, but it's very dense. And this album also shows that this band sticks together; it all looks and sounds like a team effort thanks not least to "The Bends" sound engineer Nigel Godrich coming on board as co-producer and his electronic box of tricks and soundscapes which opened up a whole raft of possibilities. Upon the album's delivery to their record company, label representatives significantly lowered their sales estimates (one unnamed Capitol record executive said after a listening party "....now I know how those Warners Brothers executives must have felt after hearing Fleetwood Mac's "Tusk" album for the first time ...."), deeming the record uncommercial due to the band's deliberate attempt to distance themselves from the guitar-oriented, lyrically introspective style of their previous album. Whilst its abstract lyrics, densely layered sound and wide range of influences from 1970s progressive rock to electronica to avant garde classical and jazz fusion music and its modern social commentary coherent concept of a disaffected and depressed adult's views on rampant consumerism, social alienation, emotional isolation, and political malaise was not going to be an easy sell in the age of the post grunge BritPop rock landscape.. Hence we come to this album (#. "Track" length - Rating out of 10):
1. "Airbag" 4:44 – 9.5 Great drum sampling choppy opening inspired by DJ Shadow lyrically references to a car accidents and reincarnation &/or dream-like state due being in a coma because of said accident 2. "Paranoid Android" - 6:23 - 10.0 Apparently it was Alanis Morissette's idea (whom they supported whilst promoting The Bends) to stick 4 disparate bits of music together. It lyrics are a reference to Marvin the Paranoid Android from Douglas Adams's The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series seeing a violent argument and its emotional aftermath. 3. "Subterranean Homesick Alien" 4:27 – 7.5 This electronic jazz fusion track was a Bob Dylan-esque take on an isolated narrator who being abducted by aliens, whom when he tells his friends no one believes him, so he fantasises he could be back and travel with the aliens! 4. "Exit Music (For a Film)" 4:24 – 9.0 This was a deliberate "Johnny Cash collaborating with Portishead" inspired track for a (non existent) remake of William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. When recording the album Radiohead fan comedy writer Graham Linehan asked bass player Colin Greenwood whether the band had anything appropriately depressing and doom-laden to use in a scene in a forthcoming Father Ted episode. The band obliged with this track to create an hilarious scene as Tommy Tiernan's manic depressive Priest gets on a bus on a horrible rainy day to take him home from Craggy Island when the DJ announces "and here's the latest one from Radiohead...." 5. "Let Down" 4:59 – 9.5 Sonically this was an attempt at creating an electronica version of Phil Spector's Wall Of Sound. Lyrically it is the realisation of the depressed narrator that "Feeling every emotion is fake" and that everyone is insincere. 6. "Karma Police" 4:21 – 9.0 Musically inspired by the same chord sequence as The Beatles' Sexy Sadie (like their good friends REM's "Endgame"). The lyrics are the most self explanatory on the album.
7. "Fitter Happier" 1:57 – 10.0 Keeping the Beatles' White album theme going this was there attempt to come up with their Revolution #9, except for it to be more succinct and not outstay its welcome. Its Stephen Hawking inspired computers vocals provide a checklist of slogans for the 1990s, Which Thom Yorke described as "the materially comfortable, morally empty embodiment of modern, Western humanity, half-salaryman, half-Stepford Wife, destined for the metaphorical farrowing crate, propped up on Prozac, Viagra and anything else his insurance plan can cover." Like a post modern Bob Dylan at his most visceral. 8. "Electioneering" 3:50 – 5.0 Musically it sounds like an outtake from their wretched "Pablo Honey" which it initially was. Thankfully the band improved it musically, over Yorke's socialist savage lyrical attack of Tony Blair's & Gordon Brown's bankrupt "Voodoo Economics" Nu-Labour before they had even won the General Election. Probably the first song released attacking that administration. And people don't think this album was futuristic....... 9. "Climbing Up the Walls" 4:45 – 7.5 Musically inspired by modern classical composer Krzysztof Penderecki's Threnody to the Victims of Hiroshima. Yorke's lyrics drew from his time as an orderly in a mental hospital during the Care in the Community policy of deinstitutionalizing mental health patients. 10. "No Surprises" 3:48 – 10.0 The band's deliberate (& highly successful) attempt at writing "a f***ed up nursery rhyme". It was of course used in a very memorable scene in the kitchen sink comedy The Royle Family where Denise and Dave have a toy which plays the Beach Boy's-esque plinky plonk hook (a gag in itself that Radiohead would do such a commercial thing) to get "little Baby Dave" to sleep. 11. "Lucky" 4:19 – 8.0 Recorded in a single day in September 1995 for the Help!: Warchild Various Artists album, This sounds like it belongs on their previous album The Bends as it is a soft, ballad style song that starts off slowly with guitar strumming and gentle ride ticking before building into an anthem-style chorus. 12. "The Tourist" 5:24 – 10.0 As perfect an end song as you could wish for an album up there with "When The Levee Breaks" and "A Day In The Life", after a frequently dense, intense listening experience, the album finishes with this wonderful spacious, atmospheric Blues-Waltz with Yorke urging himself and the listener ".... Idiot, slow down." As the track draws to a close as the vocals, and guitars drop out, it leaves only drums and bass, and concludes with the sound of a small bell.
Overall 10 (105 / 12 = 87.50% (86%+ category)).OK Computer is often interpreted as the first great album of the 21st Century due to its groundbreaking use of atmospheric Electronic music, chorus free tracks, capturing the ambience and disenfranchised mood of 21st-century life, and many critics have compared it to a similar game changing album released almost 30 years to the day earlier described it as one of the greatest albums of all time (Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band). The truth is however, it is a far far better album. To my ears it is unquestionably the greatest album of the last three decades. I think it tells you everything about the music industry that in his autobiography then Capitol records President Gary Gersh described when he first heard the album he thought "Commercial Suicide". And yet 2.5 years later Pitchfork rated the album at #1 in their albums of the 1990s pitchfork.com/features/staff-lists/5923-top-100-albums-of-the-1990s/10/ & 17.5 years later the number of albums rated above it on Rate Your Music website is ........... zero rateyourmusic.com/customchart.
Seeing as most Haven reviewers dislike the album, then you obviously would prefer the album which beat it to the 1997 Mercury Music Award prize www.youtube.com/watch?v=tQFyMhLzx-c&list=PL42955AA8ED795140 Radiohead studio album rates:
Pablo Honey (1993) 2 The Bends (1995) 8 OK Computer (1997) 10 Kid A (2000) 9 Amnesiac (2001) 6 Hail to the Thief (2003) 5 In Rainbows (2007) 9 The King of Limbs (2011) 5
Any band whom set themselves up as "the anti-U2", who have a great sense of humour to allow themselves and their music to be used in several comedy shows and have members supply music soundtracks/scapes for Charlie Brooker and Chris Morris deserved to be applauded IMHO.
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Post by o on Dec 29, 2014 17:27:16 GMT 1
I wouldn't say most Haven Reviewers dislike it, Vas and Shireb do, I dont, Greend doesn't and I assume Big Dan likes it, along with you. It's good to get different opinions on albums.
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vastar iner
Member
I am the poster on your wall
Posts: 17,404
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Post by vastar iner on Dec 29, 2014 18:03:11 GMT 1
I just looked at the 1997 Mercury nominees. The f***ing Spice Girls were on it.
I was thinking from that it must have been a bad year for music, but looking at the vaspod 1997 saw releases from Cranes, Portishead, HMHB, My Life Story, Tanya Donelly, Sigur Ros, bis and Blonde Redhead, so it appears it was just everyone else who had atrocious taste. Like most years.
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