"OK Computer": Classic Or Dud?

I think I lie closer to Dan than Nick on this issue.

i dont have a problem with MOR records at all. "Some of my best friends are MOR." But a lot of the talk around this record, whatever Mel W wants to pretend, is about how forward thinking and exceptional and sui generis it is, which imo is pretty bullshit

xxp, I thought this when Drift came out

I don't subscribe to deej's viewpoint at all.

Although I'd like to make it plain that I believe these guys NEVER stopped catering for a popular rock audience, and didn't perhaps do anything that elevated them to the position of revelatory sonic pioneers. They're great songwriters above everything else.

I'm not talking about things that distinguish Radiohead from Coldplay; I'm talking about things that make them sound similar.

Scott Walker, when asked around the time of The Drift, if he liked Radiohead, said "they're alright, but they use too much compression on their records, they sound like everyone else".

re: music being "remote": this is not an insult imo

I really can't get as worked up about that as you

xp

OK Computer was a giant curveball after The Bends, which I would say still stands as their most "traditional" album (followed closely by In Rainbows). No one was expecting the budding darlings of modern rock radio to prog out.

I'm not saying RADIOHEAD are boring; I'm saying "they records sound like records, which is a sound I do not like".

yeah but like, remote from my imagination too, remote from being excited about it, it just feels like it has nothing to do with me.

I'm not talking about things that distinguish Radiohead from Coldplay; I'm talking about things that make them sound similar

And you can see why, logically speaking, someone who likes one band but not the other would bring up where they feel the similarity breaks down, yes?

Several of my friends' first reaction on hearing Paranoid Android's debut radio play in 1997 - "it's alright, it sounds just lie Radiohead though". ======== PEOPLE ARE MENTAL BUT IT ILLUSTRATES MY POINT.

X-posts - yes, Dan, of course, but I don't disagree that thet similarity breaks down there, I agree it does - I think Radiohead are MASSIVELY better than Coldplay, in a different universe of talent and ability and ideas, BUT they're still, at the same time, just another big modern rock band.

i dont have a problem with MOR records at all... But a lot of the talk around this record ... is about how forward thinking and exceptional and sui generis it is...

-- deej

I'm not going to argue that they aren't a big modern rock band! That would be ludicrous. I feel like you're being overly reductive here.

Nick, speaking of big modern rock bands, you prefer Elbow to Radiohead, dontcha? Although Radiohead might be more ingenious innovators and songwriters, Elbow have a certain feel for sound and ambience that you kinda dig.

Me, I love both.

But it's my point, Dan, I have to be reductive towards it because it's the thing that bothers me - Louis' kind of got it there. I prefer Elbow to Radiohead on a sensual sonic level, the songs to me are about the same (maybe Elbow's more emotive to me personally but that's a subjective thing).

i feel more or less the same about this album as i do Dark Side Of The Moon, maybe a bit more supportive just thru being able to identify with it more directly. bear in mind i appreciate both OKC and DSOTM now more than i ever have before.

Actually Exit Music is probably the most Elbow-ey song radiohead have, on Ok Computer at least.

hmm maybe I should pay attention to Elbow

Can't something be forward thinking, exceptional and (to some extent) sui generis while also being catchy, radio-friendly, anthemic, family-pleasing? If not, why not? I think you can fairly compare O.K. computer to Dark Side of the Moon and Sgt. Pepper's without denying the MOR qualities they all share, and also without faulting them for those qualities.

-- contenderizer, Tuesday, August 19, 2008 12:20 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Link
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i think saying that ok computer is a 'bit of a curveball after the bends' is fine, but the sort of omg album of a generation changed the way i listen to music in the halls of valhalla with the beatles and pink floyd-type shit is very unfair to pretty much every non-rock album that was even more radically changing the face of pop music around this time, never mind unfair to radiohead themselves

its a little bit of a twist on a long rock tradition, but its really not that much of one. i dont see it being that much more 'radical' than dr dre switching styles from the chronic to the chronic 2001, for example

radiohead >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> pink floyd

btw

pretty much every non-rock album that was even more radically changing the face of pop music around this time

Do we have to talk about Oval? Oh, go on then.

The problem, deej, is that regardless of the actual quantitative difference of OK Computer to the music around it, enough people reacted to it as if it was a full-on sea change to the music scene (a reaction that was magnified with Kid A) that that became the historical context. You can't divorce the music from the context in which it appeared and "get" why people say what they say about it; it would be like hearing Nevermind for the first time in 1998.

this is why people shouldn't listen to the press bullshit because really, ok computer is just a really excellent example of a particular type of album and and might only be groundbreaking to the band themselves and not music overall. music writers like to make grandiose statements about albums and exaggerate all of these interesting qualities into something not just interesting, but universe-changing. i don't think that ok computer is much different in terms of pushing boundaries than U2's music in the '90s, but then again U2 was moving in a dance/rock direction at this time and radiohead was going proggy and one of them is more critic and core audience-friendly. i always liked both moves just about the same.

whoa

was this album any more important or effective an attempt to bridge gaps between the cutting edge and stadium rock as U2's 3 90s albums?

U2 were going in a really shitty, obvious direction, and radiohead were incorporating subtle uses of electronic instrumentation and post-production into a genuinely explorative new means of producing popular rock, the two aren't even comparable IMO

hey louis what does what you just posted actually mean in concrete terms

What U2 was doing was perfectly fine, IMO. The only album of theirs that I understand people disliking is Rattle And Hum, and that's because they make a horrible blues band.

omar beat me to u2 comparison

there was nothing particularly obvious about 'Numb' at the time. it was probably as big a curveball as they could throw while still maintaining some semblance of their established aesthetic.

Making it pop counts for a lot, and that's why invoking Oval doesn't diminish what Radiohead's accomplishments. Radiohead changed the way a generation heard and made music not by inventing every single sound they produced, but by incorporating a lot of interesting ideas (both their own and those of others) into compelling, successful, radio-friendly pop.

(that aesthetic having only been established with the previous album mind you) xpost

i don't think passengers or zooropa were obvious at all! pop maybe a little more but even then only on a couple of tunes. regardless we're talking about two different bands with two different styles attempting to embrace what were at the time so-called "modern" sounds and i don't actually think they were trying to do the same thing at all.

The problem, deej, is that regardless of the actual quantitative difference of OK Computer to the music around it, enough people reacted to it as if it was a full-on sea change to the music scene (a reaction that was magnified with Kid A) that that became the historical context. You can't divorce the music from the context in which it appeared and "get" why people say what they say about it; it would be like hearing Nevermind for the first time in 1998.

-- HI DERE, Tuesday, August 19, 2008 12:29 PM (6 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

yah but something has to actually come from that for it to mean something; like from the velvet underground came a whole vein of rock that existed in parallel to mainstream, but what did radiohead produce? I'm not sure I see their existence being so key to how fans interact with music today

whatever, I just love 94 Diskont

They weren't going for the same thing. But Radiohead's thing was more original and fluid IMO. Many of U2's songs from the Passengers/Zooropa period come off as genre exercises. Not that there aren't some good'uns; "Your Blue Room" and "United Colors of Plutonium" are the best things they ever did IMO

how were they being more original?

i don't think that ok computer is much different in terms of pushing boundaries than U2's music in the '90s, but then again U2 was moving in a dance/rock direction at this time and radiohead was going proggy and one of them is more critic and core audience-friendly.

more inventive, subtle, wide-ranging use of sound! i can't go into every example ffs, we'd be here all night xpost

lol and what do you have to do on a Tuesday night?

i really have to question the idea that radiohead's cultural influence was larger than U2's in the 90s - never mind how you could even measure such a thing, it just seems to defy logic

"music writers like to make grandiose statements about albums and exaggerate all of these interesting qualities into something not just interesting, but universe-changing"

from the velvet underground came a whole vein of rock that existed in parallel to mainstream, but what did radiohead produce?

-- deej

many many xposts

I understand what Nick is saying about the production - obvs he's not saying that Coldplay = Radiohead. For lack of better terms, Radiohead records sound too slick, too radio-ready even if the songs themselves will never be played on pop radio. fwiw, the band admits as much but acknowledge that they can't help themselves - it's a result of their tendency to overthink and rework their music until it's completely perfect and flawless, which dulls the spontaneous energy of their songs. all those interesting rhythms and melodies - they're still there and they're why Radiohead remain interesting but it comes out on record sort of... muted, I guess? like, Kid A didn't make sense to me at all until I saw them live and was all WHOA and it wasn't like they fucked with the arrangements or anything. I sometimes wish they'd switch producers once in a while but their one attempt to do so failed so Godrich will prob be producing their albums forever.

anyway, production isn't really a big deal for me as it is for Nick but I get where he's coming from.

i mean im trying to get an idea of what exactly it is that radiohead's impact meant in a real sense - musically, what did they do differently, what was the big sea change they caused, what did the bands that follow do differently as a result, or what DIDNT they do, or why is OK Computer's 'subtle' use of electronics such a big deal? isnt it a bigger deal that other artists were less subtle with it? or that U2 was willing/unafraid to embrace the hedonistic/dancefloor/populist aspects of 'electronic music' while still being all detached and pomo about it?

now when did i say radiohead was universe-changing ffs, they made some good albums, that's all! i'm not saying they did anything to music except enrich it with their own contributions

perfect and flawless is a good idea and i wish bands did it more, you can still sound fresh and spontaneous if you get it right

we should set up a poll or something of "OK Computers"

ill go along with the idea that this album is 'classic' but i cant get behind the notion that they changed the game in any significant way

'set the stage for coldplay' is about the best i can come up with

i really have to question the idea that radiohead's cultural influence was larger than U2's in the 90s