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

1. Rank your top 20 Radiohead tracks. There’s a list of songs by Radiohead on Wikipedia which I’ve pasted below, it’s looks pretty comprehensive to me but I’ve added the live piano version of Like Spinning Plates.

Normal scoring: 1:40, 2:36, 3:33, 4:30, 5:28, 6:26, 7:25, 8:24, 9:23, 10:22, 11:21, 12:20, 13:19, 14:18, 15:17, 16:16, 17:15, 18:14, 19:13, 20:12

2. Albums: rank your top five Radiohead albums/EPs.

Send your ballots to me at nathanwoolls AT gmail.com.

Deadline is midnight UK time on Sunday September 7th 2014.

The songs:

(Nice Dream)
15 Step
2 + 2 = 5
4 Minute Warning
A Punchup at a Wedding
A Reminder
A Wolf at the Door
Airbag
All I Need
Anyone Can Play Guitar
Backdrifts
Banana Co.
Bangers + Mash
Bishop's Robes
Black Star
Bloom
Blow Out
Bodysnatchers
Bones
Bullet Proof..I Wish I Was
Climbing Up the Walls
Codex
Coke Babies
Creep
Cut a Hole
Cuttooth
Dollars and Cents
Down Is the New Up
Electioneering
Everything in Its Right Place
Exit Music (For a Film)
Faithless, the Wonder Boy
Fake Plastic Trees
Fast-Track
Faust Arp
Feral
Fitter Happier
Fog
Follow Me Around
Full Stop
Gagging Order
Give Up the Ghost
Go Slowly
Go to Sleep
Harry Patch (In Memory Of)
High and Dry
House of Cards
How Can You Be Sure?
How Do You?
How I Made My Millions
How to Disappear Completely
Hunting Bears
I Am a Wicked Child
I Am Citizen Insane
I Can't
I Froze Up
I Might Be Wrong
I Promise
I Want None of This
I Will
Identikit
Idioteque
In Limbo
India Rubber
Inside My Head
Jigsaw Falling into Place
Just
Karma Police
Kid A
Killer Cars
Kinetic
Knives Out
Last Flowers
Let Down
Lewis (Mistreated)
Life in a Glasshouse
Lift
Like Spinning Plates
Like Spinning Plates (live piano version)
Little by Little
Lotus Flower
Lozenge of Love
Lucky
Lull
Lurgee
Man O' War (Big Boots)
Maquiladora
Meeting in the Aisle
Melatonin
Million Dollar Question
MK 1
MK 2
Molasses
Morning Bell
Morning Bell/Amnesiac
Morning Mr Magpie
Motion Picture Soundtrack
My Iron Lung
Myxomatosis
No Surprises
Nothing Touches Me
Nude
Open The Floodgates
Optimistic
Packt Like Sardines in a Crushd Tin Box
Palo Alto
Paperbag Writer
Paranoid Android
Pearly*
Permanent Daylight
Phillipa Chicken
Planet Telex
Polyethylene (Parts 1 & 2)
Pop Is Dead
Prove Yourself
Pulk/Pull Revolving Doors
Punchdrunk Lovesick Singalong
Pyramid Song
Reckoner
Ripcord
Sail to the Moon
Scatterbrain
Separator
Sit Down. Stand Up
Skirting on the Surface
Spooks
Staircase
Stop Whispering
Street Spirit (Fade Out)
Stupid Car
Subterranean Homesick Alien
Sulk
Supercollider
Talk Show Host
The Amazing Sounds of Orgy
The Bends
The Butcher
The Daily Mail
The Gloaming
The National Anthem
The Present Tense
The Tourist
The Trickster
There There
These Are My Twisted Words
Thinking About You
Trans-Atlantic Drawl
Treefingers
True Love Waits
Up on the Ladder
Vegetable
Videotape
We Suck Young Blood
Weird Fishes/Arpeggi
Where Bluebirds Fly
Where I End and You Begin
Worrywort
Yes I Am
You
You and Whose Army?
You Never Wash Up After Yourself

the bends in any order you like, creep, fin

pretty sure that nothing from The Bends (or Creep) will make my ballot.

Cutting to 20 won't be too hard, but ranking is going to impossible. I have four or five that absolutely have to be my #1.

pretty sure that nothing from The Bends (or Creep) will make my ballot.

― charlie h, Sunday, August 24, 2014 8:04 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

This will be interesting. I don't care about anything post-Kid A, so I'm curious to see how the results will look.

Been looking up a few of the songs I didn't recognize from that list - "Identikit" (which has no studio version so far, I don't think?) is a cool tune.

Yeah there's a few unreleased songs on that list but they have been played live quite a few times so people may want to vote for them.

never heard "worrywort" before today. tune.

19/20 of the tracks on my ballot are probably gonna be boringly predictable, so allow me to rep for this OK Computer-era b-side/EP track:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=21TmsT1qsPo

absolutely gobsmacked this hasn't been done before

think my policy nowadays is 'hate Radiohead, like (some of) their music'

don't think I should contribute

it's been a while so i guess i'll have to listen to everything again. it'll be nice to listen to kid a/amnesiac again but i'm not looking forward to the prospect of, say, the in rainbows bonus disc.

actually i'll be interested to see how i feel about some of the albums because my dislike of in rainbows seems to constantly intensify despite not listening to it for years.

might be worth voting in this to do 'in rainbows' down, yeah

think my policy nowadays is 'hate Radiohead, like (some of) their music'

don't think I should contribute

― imago, Sunday, August 24, 2014 10:49 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah that's kind of feel and i'm definitely voting, getting my perspective on the group, standing up for the songs that i think could use it.

I'm pedaling backwards, starting my listening with The King of Limbs. Hmmm...yeah, this is definitely just as dull as I remember.

people who think TKOL is dull but unquestioningly rep for In Rainbows basically defy my comprehension

tempted to send a ballot with just "Faust Arp"

I stand by having no use for studio TKOL, but digging the From the Basement recordings quite a bit

this will be fun, have no idea how to cut it to just 20 tracks.

i'm curious if any thom yorke/jonny greenwood solo tracks would make the cut if they were included

probably not, i guess. i've always been a big fan of the bodysong soundtrack, but it's tough to vote for one standout song from it that makes sense in isolation

rip phil selway

Through together a quick ballot without any relistening - quite tough to get it down to 20 tracks, and the ordering felt pretty random, but feel like the top half of the songs ballot chose itself pretty easily.

Threw together, even.

Why only 20 votes? I feel like I'm murdering my own children.

At least 10 of the songs I don't want to leave off are b-sides but pragmatically speaking they are the ones that have the least chance of making it.

Staircase, Worrywort, Fog, 4 minute warning, Talk Show Host, A Reminder.... this is too hard.

Why only 20 votes? I feel like I'm murdering my own children.

― Moka, Sunday, August 24, 2014 3:15 PM (9 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

are there any Radiohead songs about murdering your own children? there's gotta be, like, at least 6, right? subpoll?

Fog will def be on my ballot

"Cut the kids in half" (morning bell)

Looking forward to this one

Why only 20 votes? I feel like I'm murdering my own children.

― Moka, Sunday, August 24, 2014 3:15 PM (9 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

are there any Radiohead songs about murdering your own children? there's gotta be, like, at least 6, right? subpoll?

― birdman junior dad (some dude),

I think only Fog and Morning Bell can qualify, but they're more about divorce and child neglect than murder.

I voted for a few b-sides, hoping others will too...

I definitely will; some of the OKC b-sides are among their best work.

I'm voting for How I Made My Millions, which remains one of the best unrealesed tracks I've heard.

There's Wolf At The Door and I Will, but I think those are more other people murdering your children.

I'm going to have to vote in this, aren't I, to stop all these people who ~don't even liiiiike~ Radiohead from fucking this up?

people who think TKOL is dull but unquestioningly rep for In Rainbows basically defy my comprehension

This is pretty much my opinion. Why is it incomprehensible? The two albums are pretty different.

Having just re-listened to both, yeah, they're definitely different. But they also strike me as being the same degree of meh: on IR, their approach to the standard guitar-bass-drums instrumentation shows a complete lack of character, while on TKOL said lack of character/personality is applied to electronics. And on both, Yorke stays in his comfort zone and can't/won't challenge himself (or his/their audience).

Working my way through at the moment. 'Knives Out' is possibly the most miserable song ever.

That's one of my favourites, will probably be in my top 10.

The Captain Of Her Heart is my obvious #1, but I'll have to go back and listen to the rest to fill my ballot.

good time for this poll, the end of summer and all that.

...Coming after a band who famously covered "Surfin' Bird"

did Lift ever come out proper?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y3-4fK8h8ig

Shit, this is going to be hard.

Lift never got a release, no.

MaudAddam, my first thought was that Palo Alto was going to be the only non-album track to place in my list - and then I saw your post. Awesome. That song is massive!

Amnesiac was the jump-the-shark moment for me

or Hail to the Thief maybe, Amnesiac had "Pyramid Song" at least

don't think i'll be re-listening to anything for the purposes of this poll, because these days i'm kinda permanently all Radiohead-ed out, but i'm still super excited about voting in this and suspect it'll be a fairly painless process given that i've already heard all the music and can recall how pretty much all of it sounds.

most of the way through pablo honey, god this drum sound is so bad, it's driving me mental. also thom yorke just talked about playing with himself and it was very uncomfortable.
creep will probably sneak into my ballot, i was suprised how much i still enjoyed it (maybe being surrounded by awful post-grunge and post-u2 helped)

also is anything on the bonus disc of pablo honey worth listening to
i think i already know the answer but i thought i should ask

*bonus disc of the collectors edition that is

you missed their best album, imo.

I honestly don't understand the In Rainbows hate.

as an album, I find it to be incredibly boring

More like In RainBLOWS, amirite?

i was kind of pleased that it's the one album not on Spotify so i didn't even have the option of easily revisiting it along with the rest of their catalog. still voted for the one song off it that i liked, though.

as an album, I find it to be incredibly boring
― stacked as fuck & imposing (DJP), Sunday, September 7, 2014 8:07 PM (8 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I feel like RH have done those songs better on other albums, or Paul McCartney has (faust arp, obv). I like body snatchers and bangers and mash from the bsides disc a lot tho, on my ballot.

rdio has in rainbows up for free in US btw

DJP, do you like 'A Wolf at the Door '? It seems like it could almost be on In Rainbows to me. A perfect segue.

I do like "A Wolf at the Door", which is helped immensely by not being on a boring album

lol

In Rainbows has "15 Step," "Bodysnatchers," "Nude," "Weird Fishes/Arpeggi," "Reckoner" and "House of Cards." you guys are nuts!

Only two songs on IR I don't outright love are the last two.

reckoner sounds like a fuckin chili peppers song

also some of thom's worst vocals on that record tbh, just lazy meandering falsettos.

I disagree so hard but goddamn I lol'd

There are probably Philip Glass songs that sound more like RHCP

NAME EM

take thom's voice outta reckoner and start singing like scar tissue or something

Songs from liquid days obv glass' most rhcp record

i remember liking reckoner a lot when it came out but after going back and listening to it for this poll last week i gotta say m bison otm

but bodysnatchers is the best track on IR

yall im tellin you theres a reason thom is working with flea now
#ghostwriting

Flea is thom's muse

when flea did voiceover work for the wild thornberrys, he was just told to talk the way thom danced

Kedis is such a nanny

Thom won't keep you on a leash

lso some of thom's worst vocals on that record tbh, just lazy meandering falsettos.

i really like In Rainbows but there's definitely a trend with thom yorke's singing over the last few years where he's relying more and more on just humming and cooing in a falsetto as a replacement for actually singing words or doing something interesting. i'm sure some rh haterz would say he's ALWAYS done that, but it's grown more pronounced and frequent recently. i'm not sure where he started relying on it too much but i feel like it turned a corner in the in rainbows era?

I'm not a hater, but I'd say he turned that corner after The Bends, i.e. when things got really good

but when does he do it on OK Computer?

i feel like I might be the only person who voted for 'jigsaw falling into place' (though it was at #20).

one of two songs of in rainbows i quite like, and somehow it was the song that 'got me into' radiohead.

xp I feel like it's in 'let down' even if he's technically singing words

'bug in the ground' = 'bugginarouuhhahahahaound'

olly, I think you are special for appreaching jigsaw top 20. But I definitely like it. ooooooOOOh weeeee OOOOOH

Is it too late? I cant believe I let this slip my mind again

xxxxxp actually, there's a lot of aahhh-oooohs in Paranoid Android anyway.

so I'd say it started with the instrumental break of Paranoid Android

yeah that. i think thom's voice as an instrument prolly peaked at the bends, i mean he just fucking belts shit out and goes for it, i can see why ppl would be upset about him abandoning it because he had a rock n roll *voice* fw that's w, and i can imagine his years of touring and drinking in the 90s strained it. plus his tendencies for more "introverted" sounding music now have put a damper on those tendencies anyway. i dont mind the moan now, but he uses it so much in plac of an actual musical idea and it signifies nothing to me other than wet bathmat.

haha, 'Nude' was top 10 for me

Is it too late? I cant believe I let this slip my mind again

― a waxing interest in waning (Drugs A. Money), Monday, September 8, 2014 3:08 AM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I'm leaving for work soon so if you (or anyone else) can get a ballot in within the next six hours it'll be counted.

Awesome

Voted!

Ha, regarding Jigsaw - it was one of 4 songs fighting for my number 1 spot

63 ballots in now, is this a record?

haha, 'Nude' was top 10 for me

― post...aftermath (Sufjan Grafton), Monday, September 8, 2014 4:51 AM (6 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

YEah, it's definitely the standout on IR for me. Feels like these last few albums all have at least one world-beating song on them and about 3 which leave absolutely no impression on me whatsoever. It's prob why my tracks ballot and my albums ballot don't really sync up so well because my top ten tracks are skewed towards those few late great songs while the earlier albums win out.

63 ballots in now, is this a record?

― nate woolls, Monday, September 8, 2014 5:56 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Steely Dan poll got 77 ballots. but right now you're tied with Classic Rock, I also got 63 ballots for that one.

Bowie's still the record at 80.

arrrgggh, forgot about this. Sent mine over just now, in case you'll still take it.

Re: Flea etc Paperbag Writer is basically an Atoms For Peace Flea track, surely?

Results thread:

A POLL IN A CAGE ON ANTIBIOTICS - ILM Artist Poll #56 - RADIOHEAD - RESULTS THREAD