I also think it's worth noting that, in my opinion, Broken Social Scene's (hahah remember them? No? aw, that's cool) You Forgot it in People kicked the almighty shit out of OKC. It's not even the same breed of album, but something about it makes me think of OKC, and how comparatively basic it sounds.

Radiohead's days of being bullet-proof (haha... eh?) are quite over. For those of us who experiences their "glory days" first hand, their continued existence is going to be a bittersweet thing. We'll watch them repeat themselves, get praise for releasing albums that wouldn't have stirred us from our popcan bubblers if they were released when we were kids. But they are very much of our generation, and I'm rooting for them. I'm willing to allow them to go ahead and make generally mediocre albjms, as long as each one contains 2-3 cuts that just kill it. What more can you expect from a non-Sonic Youth band in their third decade of operation?

I like the new album just fine.

And the more I hear "Burn the Witch" the more I love it. Why is this not a good song exactly? I love that buzz that kicks in after the intro. Love it. Even though it's so Radioheady that I shouldn't even notice it at this point.

Anyway, I'm going with an early score of 4/5. We'll see how it progresses from there.

I think radiohead hype died after Hail to the Thief and while they are obviously "critically acclaimed" i don't think they have been all that hyped.

Please keep us posted.

Haha :)

Btw, that album is (save for a couple of nice moments) boring as fuck. Grandpa music.

I absolutely will.

Well in many respects that has more or less been radiohead for the past 15 years.. you either dig it or you won't but it is what it is..

Update: My refund went through but I forgot the card at home, looking totally forward to downloading the record tonight and listening to it with my post-work celebratory brews :) :) :)

The original single Burn the Witch SUCKS!!! The other single is good.. I hope the album is more the other.. I admit to having been totally disappointed with King of Limbs, having NOT bothered to even pick up a copy for over a year until a friend of mine not only made me listen to he brought me a CDR.. even then I was like.... hmmmmmm.. until I found that Live from the Basement disc!!!!

So I am hoping that this will be better experience otherwise I will have to wait for a live version to circulate like I did last time.. To be sure I can appreciate the studio version of TKOL now but not initially

it's too late for the critics. regardless if you or I like Radiohead or not. they made it into yr conscious long ago and travelling down this worthless digital highway apart of this interconnected popist viewpoint. the evidence is in this thread now, if you take this with a grain of salt. it's just a random observation. which it is. you could say I like their music or that the internet has changed; upset by whether life is linear to you or not.

I do think their Austin City Limits performance is the best Austin City Limits performance.

See you should focus on music when you're drinking after work, much better than your drunk trash talking

Same. All around, same. Except I did buy TKOL when it came out, but I was basically like "uuuuughhghhhhhhh" — it just did nothing for me.

The From the Basement version is just inarguably better. The studio version didn't contain "Staircase" or "The Daily Mail," which I just don't fucking get. If they weren't done with the songs, they should have waited to release the album. And why the hell wasn't "Supercollider" on TKOL? WHY?

Upon release, it was their worst fucking album since Pablo. Had nothing going for it except for "Give up the Ghost."

When I heard From the Basement, I was floored. I think they should just stop printing the studio version and replace it with FTB, even though I too learned to appreciate the studio version after Basement showed me the real strength behind those songs.

I disagree about Burn the Witch. I like it more and more every day. Daydreaming, on the other hand, was glorious at first but now I have a hard time telling when it ends and Decks Dark begins. It's still one of the better songs on the album (a couple of them are just flat out snoozers) but I feel like it's missing something.

"Ful Stop" is my favorite song on the new one, no question. That mother just cranks. Love it.

Wait does "it's too late for the critics" mean?

finally downloading.. on my third beer.. looking forward to this

do you really want me to explain my non-linear thoughts on this? there is no use in getting anything clear out of me ever even when I've explained myself very very clearly.;) my point is, it doesn't matter. Radiohead have moved beyond criticism.

now, if you ask me any more fucking questions I might just.....well, answer them back.:)

First reactions..

Burn the witch is actually a tolerable song when hearing on my stereo instead of my laptop where the layers and nuance didn't come through as much.

On to the next track.. and next beer

Word

Ok that transition from burn the witch into next track totally needed to go together. If you like radiohead this is good shit. Like earthy coffee on a crisp and cold Portland winter morning..
Desert Island comes out of no where like how New Potato Caboose emerges from the sonic chaos of the end of That's It For The Other One on Grateful Dead Anthem to the Sun. And the transition from Decks Dark noise too Desert Island's acoustic guitar creates that same mushroom trip effect, leaving you bewildered but curious..
Ful Stop reminds me of the score from The Terminator (1984).. it could use some guitars but then again it sounds like they might be using them in that swirling noise.. oh wait halfway there's the guitar!!

Alright I'm totally into this record. Sometimes it has that campy feeling that is in vogue in English music lately that totally ruined that new PJ for me but not too the point of killing it yet.

I'm liking this album in immediate sense even more than ln Rainbows. It feels more Hail to the Thief to me. And its weird, this is the album i feared, where they finally just stop using guitars but oddly i still really like it!

Before Hail To TheThief came out i read a Spin review that was hyper critical and said it was too electronic driven and not enough guitar work.. i remember being legitimately nervous that i was not going to like therecord. The day it came out i went and bought it (because this is what folks did in those days) and i remember laughing hysterically to myself at how wrong that review was. Hail to the thief is a guitar driven record and some of theirbest guitar work..

My barometer for radiohead is guitars. I always loved radiohead for their guitars. This record so far epitomizes every thing i potentially don't like about radiohead yet i find myself particularly digging it

This record is very much a composition. These songs would be pointless and even sound bad out of sequence and transition from each other. I miss records like that

And no im not even buzzing it yet (drinking light beer tonight) just totally loving this record even if that makes me lame

Shit!! It just ended and I'm like, "no i want more!" But i don't have time tonight for another go. Tomorrow on the metro is gonna be a great morning

I'm a huge Radiohead fan. This thread is hugely embarrassing. Holy fuck what has happened to this forum?

^ This is really funny, and even funnier because you have no idea why it's funny.

Not necessarily. "In Rainbows", for example, was a masterpiece, a true display of how to blend various Radiohead elements (guitar driven music, Thom's whining, electronics, songwriting) into one highly functional product. TKOL totally blew and the new one is not bad, it actually works, it's just bland and boring. It's the first Radiohead record ever where I have trouble distinguishing one song from another, which is, frankly, a very bad sign for a band that put out records as caleidoscopic as, say, "Kid A".
Grandpa music.

I think having the songs mesh together is what they were going for

Can you be a little more specific about what exactly you find embarrassing here? I mean, there's a lot of shit flying around in this thread. There's me, trying to get people to talk about the new Radiohead album, and talking instead mostly about old Radiohead albums. There's SFAD's Amazon woes. There's Genteel and slavo's typical bullshit, pepper typing drunk and SFAD creaming over the album after finally hearing it.

I'm gonna need a little more detail from you bro.

Let's not go crazy with the grandpa music thing. What fucking grandpa would listen to Ful Stop? My father — who's certainly old enough to be a grandfather — told me he'd listened to the new Radiohead song, "if it can even be called a song," in reference to Burn the Witch. So, y'know... I think you're giving grandpas too much credit in general. This is not much for dudes who were born in the '40s and '50s.

Also I think you're giving In Rainbows too much credit. I love the album, but it was the first Radiohead release to lack at least one flagship WTF song. Good album, but coming after HTTT, which had some of the band's most intense moments, it sounded pretty tame and safe on the whole. Where is the Idiotueqe/I Might Be Wrong/Myxo-like standout on that record? Nowhere. If Radiohead's making "grandpa" music, In Rainbows was their first foray into that genre.

But I think you're being dismissive and unfair. It's not like this is a Songs of Innocence-type adult contempor-fuck-around. Also, you said it was shit, then you said it was crap, then you said it worked, then you said it was bland and boring, and you're not bothering to mention how and why, so it's pretty hard to take you seriously. Sounds like you're just being a contrarian.

I think so too. Regardless of whether or not they're still in peak form, they're a ridiculously precise band, and they make their decisions about everything that goes into their albums very deliberately.

My grandpops (rest his soul) listened to delta and chicago blues religiously so I took it as a compliment ;)

While I adore In Rainbows (and Weird Fishes is that one stand out song) I agree that Hail to the Thief was a high water mark.. but remember the band always envisions Amnesiac/Kid A/Hail to the Thief as a singular album. If all their albums were as good as their peak it would defeat the very idea of having a peak album! They can't all be perfection. Which band did?

I do feel like this record as the most Hail to the Thief feeling since 2003! In Rainbows is good, and The King of Limbs is superb live material, but this new one feels more like radiohead going on an adventure. I think that we should expect something more, this feels like the beginning an extended project. It feels incomplete, I imagine they have a part two in mind

What is the title in reference to, btw?

After several listens, I have to say I am enjoying this album quite a bit. The only thing "bothering" me is every time Present Tense plays, I can not help but to hear this Verdena song:

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

Severian, I am also intrigued with your take on TKOL and it's From the Basement sessions, because I actually had pretty much that same perception for In Rainbows. That album did not really set in with me until seeing it done on From the Basement.

IMO, Radiohead are just a great "dissection" band (partly why I have always loved SY as much too, really). You can listen and take in the overall mood/vibe, sure, but there is a certain enjoyability to analyzing, picking apart, and appreciating all the layering and texturing that goes into each song and how it's all pulled off. I feel half of what makes Radiohead what they are is the simplicity and patience that goes into many of those elements, and the interplay of those textural choices. This album seems to carry a lot of that "patience" they do so well, if that makes sense to anyone but me.

Digging the macro-resolution string phenomena (pletctrum attack, atonal, percussive qualities, wild harmonics) on Burn the Witch. Regarding the rest of the album, overall, there's too much piano.. like 14 excess piano. Tinker Tailor just sort of floats away, after a promising start. Decks Dark is a proper creeper, with swagger. Dope synth and guitar chord strums on "Identikit." Ful Stop will undoubtedly be the people's favorite. Feels like a big Beck record, in the vein of Sea Change or Mutations. Thom sounds tired. I'm thinking a pale 3.8 to a solid, albeit inclined 4.35 (gradient) out of five. But that could change, stay tuned.

a pool, in the shape of a moon. and everything that it entails, however problematic

I initially agreed that it was a bit heavy on the piano but I realized it fit well into the overall feel, tone, and composition of this record so I didn't mind it. I also felt that Thom sounds very reserved for a radiohead record, but I almost think that is what they are going for. Also agree that Thom has a minimized vocal presence compared to previous radiohead BUT I also feel that is what he was going for..

which will likely please Severian who apparently thinks Thom should leave the group ;)

only a self-proclaimed, bona fide musician would be qualified to make that call...

In Rainbows is clearly superior but this is a good album. I found Yorke forgettable on it and the instrumentation usually outshines him..

Honestly, I'm just happy to get a new Radiohead album.

'Decks Dark' is an early favorite. The bass guitar at the end..

When those synths kick in on 'Identikit' - another noteworthy moment.

The bossa nova influence and backing vocals on 'Present Tense'..

Most importantly, I feel like I can grow an emotional attachment to this album, which wasn't the case with "The King of Limbs"..

is ed sheeran in this band? i saw the video for daydreaming, they have some aging tramp wandering around for no reason, it's utterly shit. is it supposed to be like a comment on the alienated yet fragile state of contemporary man as he is reduced to a silent spectator under the regime of digital capitalism? i don't know what radiohead where trying to say with this, maybe trying to make themselves look like authentic arty proles rather than the upper class oxford snobs they are. sneering alterna rock posh kids from oxford, the post modern equivalent of 19th century borgeious 'let them eat cake' snobs. do you know how thom yorke is actually pronounced? it's pronounced "th-om yor-ke'" (the e has an umlaut but my keyboard can't do it).

also you have to hate these fucking cunts for the jizzspolsion the press had when they released some crappy late era album as a pay what you want stream. like they were the first to do that. sorry. nothing this band have done has been any good since "origin of symmetry".

this "burn the witch" song, supposed to be some radical comment on the mob mentality, that's great coming from a bunch of lords in their shire mansions which is what radiohead are. th-om yorke was just a late 90's fashion model that got big because of that trend where they used semi-deformed and retarded people in high end brand name advertisizing campaigns because it was so 'avant'. look at how he has let himself go these days, he looks like he should be begging money for cider out of a sleeping bag. also, in this burn the witch video they burn a lot of wood - i thought th-ome was going to save us all by nagging us about our carbon footprint and not having any logos at his gigs? do you think th-omes' maid thinks he's a tortured genius when she's dusting his grimy cider stained sheets? please tell me how that face and that haircut don't have "just stabbed my community practice nurse with a plastic fork and now i'm off to rob the off licence before they catch me" written all over it.

in conclusion i will pay whatever i chose which is zero to not have to have any of this bands stuff on my hard drive, taking up precious bits which could be better put to use emitting c02. i give this 2 gifs of morose thome yorke banging a single midi keyboard note over and over and making a million pounds then sending his assistant out to buy warp records entire catalogue to find new ideas now that they've used up all the pixies riffs out of 10.