POLLD LIKE SARDINES IN A CRUSHD TIN BOX - ILM Artist Poll #56 - RADIOHEAD

I'm voting for it, but it won't make my top 10.

But then, "Fitter, Happier" will make my top 10, so don't listen to me.

Literally every single one of Airbag's B-sides is better than Airbag.

I love Airbag, it was about fourth on my list.

There are not many songs more thrilling than Airbag. It pulls me in (and into the album) every single time.

I like Airbag. There are 20+ other Radiohead songs I like more though.

the rest of Airbag/How am I Driving does very little for me. the tracks are either awkwardly sitting in between the bends and okc (well apart from polyethylene which sits there quite nicely) or else they're just kinda halfbaked.

lull will probably be the only okc b-side to make my ballot.

As long as we're repping for Pablo Honey cuts, allow me to point out:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rag8gqdOBJ4

There are not many songs more thrilling than Airbag. It pulls me in (and into the album) every single time.

When I had OK Computer in heavy rotation, I started skipping "Airbag" after about two weeks and probably haven't heard it more than a handful of times since.

The jingle bells ruin Airbag in my opinion.

i often find myself doubting ok computer and am compelled to re-listen and re-evaluate. and everytime i do this, the drums kick in on airbag and i feel like a heathen for ever doubting it.

but then the album peters out with the last couple of tracks and i'm doomed to repeat this process forever

I'll often skip to SHA, which is (spoiler alert) the number one Radiohead song, and end up listening from there, but Airbag is indispensable.

The jingle bells ruin Airbag in my opinion.

― alanbatman (abanana)

Nah, I think they work.

Yeah love those bells.

9 ballots in and a few songs are showing themselves as frontrunners.

As long as we're repping for Pablo Honey cuts, allow me to point out literally the worst song on the album

Ok "You" is pretty bad too. I would say that almost every song on it has at least a faint echo of what they would go on to do, even if it's just of the "street spirit" coldplay's second cousin type rubbish. But "How Do You" just sounds like horrible splintery 90s guitars and adolescent yelping.

btw if High And Dry reaches the countdown I reserve the right to call y'all earless

I love High and Dry. That (by way of the music video) was definitely my first exposure to Radiohead. I was 11 or so. I remember because, not long later, at my cousin's house, I found his copy of The Bends, and really wanted to hear that song again. The CD actually in the case was Downward Spiral, so instead my virgin ears got to hear that God is dead and no one cares.

High and Dry more like coldplay's first cousin, sibling even.

sibling? it is coldplay's stone-cold benighted parent

and yet it's still better than every single song Coldplay did, largely by dint of having a competent rhythm section and a singer capable of singing

well yeah

jeez I'm gonna have to vote aren't I. ok, thinking cap on

even if it's just of the "street spirit" coldplay's second cousin type rubbish

oof, extremely harsh (on street spirit obviously, not the pablo honey rubbish)

just sent my ballot. oddly enough, i found it more difficult to rank the albums than the tracks. the ballot for the tracks is always kind of weird because they're not a true ranking of my favorites since i want to give more points to tracks that i think belong in the rundown but are unlikely to get many votes. so it ends up being a hodgepodge of a true ranking and a strategic vote.

albums are just my faves in order, though, and i'm still not sure about what i really think. i know that i like amnesiac more than hail to the thief, even though there are more songs on HTTT that made my ballot than amnesiac. amnesiac just flows better as an album for some reason (perhaps those talking about the need to cut the worst songs off of HTTT have a point, although no one can agree on what the worst songs are (personally i'd cut scatterbrain, backdrifts, sail to the moon, and replace the studio version of gloaming with a more recent live version, which kicks ass)).

i also think that the king of limbs deserves a spot. i think that, like HTTT, it will be more appreciated as time goes on. i think i got a little high once and wrote one of my worst posts ever (and that's saying a lot), but the From the Basement version of the TKOL songs really altered my opinion. i still prefer the basement versions (i described the studio versions, shittily, as "like an airbrushed senior yearbook photo of your friend where his acne is removed from the image using photoshop, where the live performance is like a candid Instagram shot of the same guy hanging out in your kitchen"), but now i hear control and maturity in TKOL where i only heard dullness before. i dunno. i had a similar progression over time with sonic youth's later albums.

are ppl bothering with the live album?

putting together a list, going through stuff I've not heard for years & quite charmed by nonsense like india rubber

'True Love Waits' will presumably pick up a vote or two.

I'd rather we waited another ten years or so to do this poll, as The Bends and OKC both still seem locked in a very specific time for me, both personally and 'objectively', so it's hard to listen to them as the me of 2014. More distance and I think I'll be able to put together a ballot.

might do a troll ballot that's just 'Pop is Dead' at #1 tho

The Bends came out, like, 20 years ago! How much longer do you want us to wait? Until everybody involved is dead?

I meant IMBW as an album. seems repetitious to put it in. I definitely found it weird re-listening to radiohead initially but I think I'm over it now

maybe what I'm really saying is that I can't listen to Radiohead properly because they make me feel old, so if we just wait till I'm young again then we'll be good to go

True Love Waits is one of their best song IMO

generally radiohead's live stuff stays close to the studio version (and the I Might be Wrong live disc documents that) so it's not something i listen to frequently. there are some songs, though, that are better live imo. unprompted, here's my list:

i might be wrong (the live version benefits from the faster tempo)
everything in its right place (the last song of the set/encore version with the extended ending)
the gloaming (i don't know why they didn't include the live version on the HTTT collector's edition bonus disc. it gets a subtle rearrangement that immensely improves it)
idioteque (some versions, at least, particularly the 2000/2001 era when they occasionally used an alternate electronic snare sound that POPPED)
and as mentioned earlier, pretty much all of TKOL is better live

Kid A is really interesting live, taken out of the crèche and given some real some acoustic space.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2MOCH_SIDE

i had a similar progression over time with sonic youth's later albums.

yeah, there's a comfort and confidence to both that i find appealing, they became more modestly themselves, the songs are more lived-in. don't feel the need to revisit much pre-HTTT radiohead for this reason and feel the inventiveness of the kid a/amnesiac era is overstated. KoL was a season's running album for me; it's the perfect length for it. "in bloom" will be in my top 10, it's a stunner imo.

a stunner about the planet dying ;_;

generally radiohead's live stuff stays close to the studio version (and the I Might be Wrong live disc documents that) so it's not something i listen to frequently. there are some songs, though, that are better live imo. unprompted, here's my list:

i might be wrong (the live version benefits from the faster tempo)
everything in its right place (the last song of the set/encore version with the extended ending)
the gloaming (i don't know why they didn't include the live version on the HTTT collector's edition bonus disc. it gets a subtle rearrangement that immensely improves it)
idioteque (some versions, at least, particularly the 2000/2001 era when they occasionally used an alternate electronic snare sound that POPPED)
and as mentioned earlier, pretty much all of TKOL is better live

― Karl Malone, Tuesday, August 26, 2014 4:00 PM (23 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

That was something I found disappointing about their shows; they stuck so close to the studio arrangements that the songs didn't get a chance to really lift off. But those examples (although I never saw them do any TKOL or HTTT stuff, as I last saw them in 2001) are otm. I'd add "National Anthem" to the list, but yeah, "Everything" and "Idiotheque" were brilliant live.

That said, I Might Be Wrong was a huge disappointment. The mix/recording sounded awful, not even as good as the 2000/2001 MTV concert broadcasts (or, for that matter, their 2000 SNL appearance).

the i might be wrong release was kinda baffling. only 8 songs, only one song that was unreleased (true love waits, a song i never really liked but i suppose its inclusion satisfied the longstanding pleas of lots of radiohead fans at the time), a mix that was worse than several widely available bootlegs at the time, etc. in retrospect i guess it just fulfilled part of their contract with EMI/Capitol and presumably they didn't spend more than an hour thinking about it

They should release their FTB sessions as a live double album at one point. They sound 100x times better than the IMBW album and they're actually worth hearing as the KoL ones sound like a whole different beast live.

i'm not sure how much clarity there is on this, but did Clive Deamer (the portishead/radiohead second drummer) join up with them after TKOL had been recorded, or before? and is he purely a tour musician or is he now part of the songwriting process?

20 tracks seems overkill to me, but I'll do it.

listening to "Airbag" for the first time in a long time; this is a decent song but I remembered why I always skipped it (I was and remain obsessed with Paranoid Android)

I missed the National Anthem off my ballot. Dang.

I listen to the Easy Star All stars version of OKc more these days than the original.
Also had trouble ranking the albums whereas picking songs was fairly easy.

'let down' might win this

Nah I don't like it.

Although I like the easy star version loads which is weird.

National Anthem and Karma Police are two tracks I never want to hear again. Too many high school bands covered KP.

Planet Telex (Hexidecimal Dub) is ridiculously great. Unfortunately something like three people have ever heard it. Even the song labelled that way on the "Towering Above the Rest" bootleg is actually just another copy of Planet Telex (Hexidecimal Mix).

Identikit is a tune.

Although I like the easy star version loads which is weird.

― Scary Darey (dog latin)

Yeah the Easy Stars version of Let Down is great! Totally sounds like a really good lost Toots classic. Other cuts off Radiodread I really enjoy are Airbag and Electioneering.

Yeah Def sounds like a toots song. Is it him guesting? Can't remember. Always find it's the tracks I like least off the original that I enjoy most on the easy star version.