Radiohead – A Moon Shaped Pool

[ferball415]

**
9. Parachutes
**

Haha.

 

[cobl04]

If you wanted to make a legit argument, it should be "yeah it's so lame that a song written at the beginning of Yorke's relationship is finally recorded and released after it ended, and this full circle journey is what makes it so poignant".

Let's pretend I said that.

 

[LemonMelon]

1. OK Computer
2. In Rainbows
3. Kid A
4. A Moon Shaped Pool
5. The Bends

6. Amnesiac
7. KOL
8. HTTT
9. Pablo Honey

Every Radiohead album is enjoyable for me. One of the most solid discographies out there.

 

[cobl04]

Kid A is an impressive work but I resent it for getting all the credit U2 never receives for Zooropa and Passengers

I'd like to see some articles on this. I've heard it a few times but I don't think I've ever actually seen writing on it. I don't find much similarities between Kid A and Zooropa/Passengers. They're pretty different.

 

[lazarus]

The point is that there aren't any articles because critics and Radiohead fans are willfully ignoring the antecedents of the work.

No similarities? Both are by alternative rock bands (if we take Achtung Baby as a starting point for U2) who plunged deep into the waters of electronic beats, heavily treated/distorted instrument sounds, and creating abstract soundscapes that are very far away from the rock norm. That's merely on a sonic level, but consider that Radiohead counts Talking Heads as a major influence (where they got their band name from), and you can bet the Eno-produced Remain In Light is a big part of that. Whether they would cop to being U2 or even just Zooropa fans, you can bet they listened to it at some point to see what Eno was up to.

2 years later, we have Passengers, which goes further away from verse-chorus-verse structure (as does Kid A) and begins to explore aesthetics and instrumentation from other countries, much as Eno & Byrne did on My Life In The Bush Of Ghosts, and on Eno's classic solo work. Do you think Radiohead was oblivious to this album? Is the similarity between the titles of Original Soundtracks I and the Kid A track Motion Picture Soundtrack a coincidence, or a subconscious reference? Because to me, these albums have a LOT in common.

On a lyrical/thematic level, Bono is writing about media and technology overload on Zooropa, as well as the alienation and lack of direction that results from it. You see this on every song on the album's first half. OK Computer seems to be reacting to a very similar state of the world, even if the lyrics are less direct in mentioning these things. But it's evident in the album artwork and the whole way the band chose to present the music. And on Passengers, aside from Miss Sarajevo, the lyrics are sketches and snapshots (and not really related to the phony film descriptions in the liner notes, which were written after the fact), much like Thom's lyric approach to Kid A and Amnesiac.

The ironic thing to me is that Zooropa still sounds more modern to me than OK Computer, and something like Paranoid Android comes off dated in its nod to the prog rock of the 70s. Kid A still sounds fantastic and like a letter from a future that hasn't happened yet, but my point is that the album doesn't happen in a vacuum if Eno is already an influence. Here's a 1997 quote:

"A friend sent me a copy of these flash cards that Eno uses when he's recording," Yorke said in 1997. "One of them says something like, 'Whatever worked last time, never do it again.' It's incredibly depressing, but it's true."

Do you think Yorke was unaware that U2 was already using Eno's oblique strategies with Achtung Baby and Zooropa?

Keep in mind I'm not saying definitively that Zooropa is better than OK Computer or that Passengers is better than Kid A or Amnesiac. It can be argued that Radiohead took notes on what U2 and Eno were up to and then did it one better, and that's clearly what most modern music fans of the Pitchfork era thing. Personally, I think Zooropa, Lemon, and Stay top any three off OK Computer. And I do believe that United Colors and Always Forever Now are just as jarring and creative as what Radiohead put down in 1999/2000.

 

[nielsgov]

I think this argument would be a lot stronger had U2 put Passengers out under their own name.

 

[cobl04]

I didn't respond cos I'm not really arguing. I'm sure the four records U2 put out in the 90s influenced Radiohead to some degree. I'm just not sure I buy your argument that Radiohead get the credit U2 deserve. I think that U2 ON THEIR OWN don't get the credit they deserve for the boundaries they pushed in the 90s (which is in some way their own fault for the path they've trodden since). And I think you're also right that U2 explored a lot OKC's theme's years earlier. But I don't really think it's got anything to do with Radiohead stealing their thunder/credit with Kid A. But I think you're right in stating that the utter praise for that record is a little overstated. But that's the fault of sycophantic reviewers, I don't think that's the band's fault so I think it's a weird grudge to hold.

tl;dr: I agree with you. It does not diminish my love for OK Computer, Kid A or Amnesiac.

 

[lazarus]

Well I think one needs to look at both the original and contemporary reviews of Kid A in particular, and acknowledge the hyperbolic language, and the suggestions that Radiohead somehow busted the door wide open by themselves. You might see a mention of Can or Kraftwerk or maybe Talking Heads, but there wasn't anyone suggesting that a contemporary, active band (and the biggest one in the world) had started going down that path years earlier, when other rock bands simply weren't doing it.

 

[iron yuppie]

I think "started going down that path" is the operative phrase there. The commitment to the austere, dystopian soundscape on Kid A is complete and unflinching, which is what makes the record so unsettling. I see some of the arguments you are making, but I really don't hear anything of 90s U2 in Kid A.


The thing about those 90s U2 albums is that every daring thing they do is offset by something kitschy, which minimizes the overall effect. For every Lemon there's a Wanderer, whose stupid farting synthline makes it impossible to take seriously IMO.

 

[joyfulgirl]

Radiohead’s summer U.S. tour seems designed to prove a few self-evident truths. For one thing, In Rainbows remains their hands-down best album, though all votes for Kid A will be counted and “There There” is their peak song. For another thing: They’ve remembered how much fun it is to be the World’s Greatest Rock Band, to the point where their live show is a mad career-capping rush of exuberant energy. Their four-night run at New York’s Madison Square Garden last week was one for the ages. “We’d like to thank everybody who’s come this week to all the shows,” Thom Yorke said at the Saturday finale. “A celebration of what has happened in all these crazy fucking years we’ve had together.” That’s how the whole week felt—and it’s what makes this tour so powerful.

I’ve seen so many great Radiohead shows over the years, but never at this kind of cathartic intensity.

"There There" is their peak song? I like it, but really?

There's also some U2 stuff in this article. Have at it.

https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-live-reviews/radiohead-2018-tour-concert-review-699529/

 

[Joey788]

I don’t think Radiohead has a single peak live song like “Streets.” Part of what makes their concerts so fantastic is that there are many tracks that could be their live apex.

I didn’t get “There There” during my show for this MSG run and it didn’t matter at all. There were more than enough highlights.

 

[nielsgov]

I've seen them twice and haven't gotten There There on either occasion. Also haven't gotten Fake Plastic Trees of course.

I'd say Idioteque is their best live song. The Montreux version is my favorite, I've watched it countless times.

 

[cobl04]

I don't think they have a Streets either, Joey... although if you put a gun to my head and ask me to name a peak live song I'd say Idioteque.

 

[Kieran McConville]

The National Anthem.

(Maybe that's the anti-Streets).

 

[PhilsFan]

Well if you know the timeline, the song was likely put on the album because of their divorce, not as a reaction to her dying, which didn't happen until 7 months after the album came out, therefore maybe a year after they decided to re-record and include it?

It ultimately makes the song more tragic in retrospect, but it's not as powerful to me as a fair number of other emotional RH tracks. I don't really care for Sometimes You Can't Make It On Your Own either, and that's LITERALLY written as a reaction to the death of Bono's father.

If you wanted to make a legit argument, it should be "yeah it's so lame that a song written at the beginning of Yorke's relationship is finally recorded and released after it ended, and this full circle journey is what makes it so poignant".

You don't think the decision to separate was heavily influenced by her health issues? Since she died so soon after the separation, I assumed the reason they separated was because she wanted to make it easier on them to move forward without her, but maybe I'm reading too much into it.

 

[kabigon]

1 Kid A
2 A Moon Shaped Pool
3 In Rainbows

4 OK Computer
5 The Bends
6 Amnesiac

7 Hail to the Thief

8 The King of Limbs
9 Pablo Honey

I don't think Amnesiac is too distant from Kid A quality-wise, there's just a lot of albums that I had to put in between.

 

[cobl04]

Amnesiac is their least accessible album I'd argue. It took me a LONG time to become fond of it.

 

[kabigon]

Packt Like Sardines is a bit of a weird opener if you're not sure what to expect, but then Pyramid Song comes along and convinces you to keep listening.

 

[cobl04]

I've always liked Packt Like Sardines, Pyramid Song is obviously all-time Radiohead, and Life in a Glasshouse I've always dug too. The rest took me a long time to warm up to. For example, I know there's people here who love the studio version, but the gulf in quality between Spinning Plates' live version and the album version is cavernous imo.

 

[lazarus]

I think "started going down that path" is the operative phrase there. The commitment to the austere, dystopian soundscape on Kid A is complete and unflinching, which is what makes the record so unsettling. I see some of the arguments you are making, but I really don't hear anything of 90s U2 in Kid A.

The thing about those 90s U2 albums is that every daring thing they do is offset by something kitschy, which minimizes the overall effect. For every Lemon there's a Wanderer, whose stupid farting synthline makes it impossible to take seriously IMO.

I know you're not saying that austere = superior, and obviously U2 was more interested in showing both the pleasures and the downsides of technology and a world in media overload, reflected in both the lyrics and the music to accompany them. But even moreso they explore the discombobulation and confusion caused by it. For me, I find that to be more interesting than mere abstract dystopia. Regardless, with the exception of the admittedly kitchy Elvis Ate America and the more straightforward Miss Sarajevo, I find Passengers to be pretty austere on the surface level, even if the liner notes give the whole project a slight tongue-in-cheek veneer. It's that album I hear as more of a cousin to Kid A.

And again, Radiohead don't need to be taking pages out of U2's thematic or aesthetic book for there to be a connection. Because if you distill my suggestion down to the basics, it's that both bands were still looking into the face of the brave new world at the end of the millennium, and doing so by making forays into electronic music and distorting their own "typical" sound that the vast majority of their contemporaries were not. And considering how big U2 was at the time, I feel safe in saying their experimentation was pretty noticeable to their peers. I'll say it again: if you don't think Radiohead was paying attention to what Eno was doing in the 90s, you're insane. Even if what they wound up making themselves is closer to Eno & Bowie's Outside than it is to Zooropa or Passengers, it can't help but be a subconscious influence. And what I said originally was that Radiohead gets all the credit for going down this road, and U2 very little.

 

[namkcuR]

Amnesiac is their least accessible album I'd argue. It took me a LONG time to become fond of it.

That'd be King Of Limbs, easily. I'm not saying Amnesiac is radio material, but KOL feels damn near impenetrable sometimes.

I've always liked Packt Like Sardines, Pyramid Song is obviously all-time Radiohead, and Life in a Glasshouse I've always dug too. The rest took me a long time to warm up to. For example, I know there's people here who love the studio version, but the gulf in quality between Spinning Plates' live version and the album version is cavernous imo.

You And Whose Army, I Might Be Wrong, Knives Out, and Morning Bell/Amnesiac are all fairly accessible, I think.

Seriously, there's nothing on KOL anywhere near as accessible as those four or Life In A Glass House.

As for Spinning Plates...it's not accessible no matter how you slice it...but while I've always enjoyed the studio version, I finally heard the IMBW live version about a year ago for the first time, and it quickly became the definitive version for me. Hypnotic is the word I'd use to describe it.

 

[namkcuR]

I know you're not saying that austere = superior, and obviously U2 was more interested in showing both the pleasures and the downsides of technology and a world in media overload, reflected in both the lyrics and the music to accompany them. But even moreso they explore the discombobulation and confusion caused by it. For me, I find that to be more interesting than mere abstract dystopia. Regardless, with the exception of the admittedly kitchy Elvis Ate America and the more straightforward Miss Sarajevo, I find Passengers to be pretty austere on the surface level, even if the liner notes give the whole project a slight tongue-in-cheek veneer. It's that album I hear as more of a cousin to Kid A.

And again, Radiohead don't need to be taking pages out of U2's thematic or aesthetic book for there to be a connection. Because if you distill my suggestion down to the basics, it's that both bands were still looking into the face of the brave new world at the end of the millennium, and doing so by making forays into electronic music and distorting their own "typical" sound that the vast majority of their contemporaries were not. And considering how big U2 was at the time, I feel safe in saying their experimentation was pretty noticeable to their peers. I'll say it again: if you don't think Radiohead was paying attention to what Eno was doing in the 90s, you're insane. Even if what they wound up making themselves is closer to Eno & Bowie's Outside than it is to Zooropa or Passengers, it can't help but be a subconscious influence. And what I said originally was that Radiohead gets all the credit for going down this road, and U2 very little.

Yeah, but it's hard to complain about them not getting credit when they wouldn't even put their own name on the album you say is the cousin to Kid A. If you're not brave enough to take the commercial risk by putting your own name on it, then you can't blame others for either not being as aware of the project, or for not giving it the credit it might otherwise deserve.

 

[lazarus]

Most of what we know about the questionable "ownership" of that album is somewhat apocryphal, and if we're going to draw on anything said in U2 by U2 I'd take it with a grain of salt. I think it's safe to say that Eno wrote and played a LOT more on Passengers than he had on any of their previous projects, and it would have been unfair to him to release it as a U2 album. It was his conceptual baby as well.

ENO: THE STORY BEHIND ORIGINAL SOUNDTRACKS 1

I honestly don't believe this was some big decision the band had to make, and I'd be surprised if it was ever seriously considered as an official U2 release.

From a 1995 interview with Bono:

"Brian has been a part of our set-up for a long time now, over the past ten years almost. We just wanted to make a record where he was in charge."

"We just wanted to be in Brian's band. He's an extraordinary man and he's had a very interesting part to play in our own development. It used to be said that a lot of English rock 'n' roll bands went to art school and we went to Brian. We'd always talked of doing something at some time, a collaboration."

"I think some people won't be into it, that's for sure. The guitars are very heavily treated and processed and don't sound like guitars. The people who are expecting a U2 album are going to be disappointed."

"Pavarotti's a father figure," Bono says. "He's an extraordinary man. He rang me and asked me to write a song and I said I didn't think that would be possible because we were working on these two records: this Passengers project and the next U2 record."

Sure doesn't sound like it was ever meant to be a U2 album.

 

[cobl04]

That'd be King Of Limbs, easily. I'm not saying Amnesiac is radio material, but KOL feels damn near impenetrable sometimes.



You And Whose Army, I Might Be Wrong, Knives Out, and Morning Bell/Amnesiac are all fairly accessible, I think.

Seriously, there's nothing on KOL anywhere near as accessible as those four or Life In A Glass House.

As for Spinning Plates...it's not accessible no matter how you slice it...but while I've always enjoyed the studio version, I finally heard the IMBW live version about a year ago for the first time, and it quickly became the definitive version for me. Hypnotic is the word I'd use to describe it.

Wow. My reaction here is I don't find TKOL inaccessible at all. Bloom is pretty expansive, Mr Magpie & Little By Little are pretty perfunctory rock tracks, and the second half is I would argue maybe Radiohead's strongest four-track run in their whole discography. I can't see anything about the record that would make it tough as an entry point. I certainly wouldn't direct someone to it first, but if you are reasonably familiar with the band - as I was when I first heard Amnesiac - then it's fine.

Contrastingly, You and Whose Army takes nearly two minutes to actually finally get going. I Might Be Wrong has a killer guitar line but is hampered by Thom's completely washed-out vocals. Knives Out is fine, Morning Bell is lovely but the Kid A version is more accessible.

 

[namkcuR]

Most of what we know about the questionable "ownership" of that album is somewhat apocryphal, and if we're going to draw on anything said in U2 by U2 I'd take it with a grain of salt. I think it's safe to say that Eno wrote and played a LOT more on Passengers than he had on any of their previous projects, and it would have been unfair to him to release it as a U2 album. It was his conceptual baby as well.

ENO: THE STORY BEHIND ORIGINAL SOUNDTRACKS 1

I honestly don't believe this was some big decision the band had to make, and I'd be surprised if it was ever seriously considered as an official U2 release.

From a 1995 interview with Bono:

"Brian has been a part of our set-up for a long time now, over the past ten years almost. We just wanted to make a record where he was in charge."

"We just wanted to be in Brian's band. He's an extraordinary man and he's had a very interesting part to play in our own development. It used to be said that a lot of English rock 'n' roll bands went to art school and we went to Brian. We'd always talked of doing something at some time, a collaboration."

"I think some people won't be into it, that's for sure. The guitars are very heavily treated and processed and don't sound like guitars. The people who are expecting a U2 album are going to be disappointed."

"Pavarotti's a father figure," Bono says. "He's an extraordinary man. He rang me and asked me to write a song and I said I didn't think that would be possible because we were working on these two records: this Passengers project and the next U2 record."

Sure doesn't sound like it was ever meant to be a U2 album.

I mean, I know all of that. It was supposed to be a warm-up for Pop. I get that.

It's just an unusual thing as all. I can't really think of another scenario where the same exact people that make up a band, write and record something together, release a full-length LP, and use a different name. I know Eno had much more of an input on the record. But he supposedly was more involved in writing on NLOTH as well and that was a "U2" album.

Look, it's probably true that it was never supposed to be a U2 album, but the point stands that using another name insured that it would not get the same attention or recognition that it would otherwise.

None of this is meant to say anything about the album. I love Passengers.

If I could say one more thing...a lot of the reason Kid A gets the credit is because it's juxtaposed to what came immediately before it - a lot of the credit is credit for doing something completely different from OKC instead of trying to replicate its success(see: Coldplay, X&Y). Making a comparison from that perspective, U2 has indeed gotten a lot of credit over the years for the turn they took with Achtung.

 

[namkcuR]

Wow. My reaction here is I don't find TKOL inaccessible at all. Bloom is pretty expansive, Mr Magpie & Little By Little are pretty perfunctory rock tracks, and the second half is I would argue maybe Radiohead's strongest four-track run in their whole discography. I can't see anything about the record that would make it tough as an entry point. I certainly wouldn't direct someone to it first, but if you are reasonably familiar with the band - as I was when I first heard Amnesiac - then it's fine.

Contrastingly, You and Whose Army takes nearly two minutes to actually finally get going. I Might Be Wrong has a killer guitar line but is hampered by Thom's completely washed-out vocals. Knives Out is fine, Morning Bell is lovely but the Kid A version is more accessible.

Maybe accessible means different things to you and me? Bloom is a quality, fascinating track, particularly its second half, but there's nothing about it that would hook any casual top 40 listener.

Little By Little is the only thing on the record that might appeal to a top 40 listener, imo. Even the "rocker" Mr. Magpie, doesn't have anything resembling a chorus that I can hear.

In contrast, once You And Whose Army gets going, that second half is a banger, that 'we ride tonight' refrain is something an arena would sing along with, I'd imagine. I'd also argue that Morning Bell/Amnesiac is warmer and more approachable without the Kid A production.

None of this has to with overall quality or greatness or favorites, just what is more accessible/easy for a casual listener to find their way into. And I'd never see a casual listener who isn't familiar with the band really getting into KOL at all. With Amnesiac, there's a chance. It's not The Bends or OKC or IR, but there's a chance.

As for the second half of KOL being the strongest four-track run in their discography(and I'll assume we're not talking about accessibility anymore with that), it's good, but I'll give you the same emoticon:

Planet Telex/The Bends/High And Dry/Fake Plastic Trees
Climbing Up The Walls/No Surprises/Lucky/The Tourist
Everything In Its Right Place/Kid A/The National Anthem/How To Disappaer
Weird Fishes/All I Need/Faust Arp/Reckoner

Just to name some.

 

[cobl04]

I think we're thinking about it differently, yeah. I don't think there's really any Radiohead songs that would hook a casual top 40 listener. Maybe 15-20 years ago but not now. I'm talking accessible to someone who is actually into music. Amnesiac is so glitchy and introverted. It's a very insular record. I totally get your point about You & Whose Army (and that part does go off live) but I fucking hated Amnesiac for a long time. I like it now but quite a few of its songs still leave me cold. Your points about TKOL are well made, but I think it's a much easier listen for someone who was in my position - "I like OKC and The Bends and Kid A and In Rainbows, now to listen to their other records".

As for those four-track runs, I'd take Lotus Flower / Codex / Give Up the Ghost / Separator over all of those. The National Anthem & How to Disappear aren't as good as Right Place & Kid A, Faust Arp brings down the Rainbows run (those other three songs are all in my top 10 ).

 

[HeartlandGirl]

Weighing in on Amnesiac v TKOL...

The King of Limbs is where Radiohead lost me, and I would consider myself a serious fan. Glancing at my last.fm stats, it looks like I made it through the record at least five times, which is more than I listen to some things that make my year-end best of list. I can’t even contribute to the discussion of A Moon Shaped Pool because TKOL so underwhelmed me that I don’t have the motivation to listen to it. Maybe my tastes have changed significantly, or maybe I needed more than five listens. But for me to sit and watch someone argue about how accessible TKOL is when it turned me off to one of my favorite bands is just weird. Not wrong necessarily, but weird.

There’s no doubt that Radiohead continue to put on fantastic live shows, but I guess this is my confession that they’ve lost me. I’m literally making the face as I type that.

The National Anthem & How to Disappear aren't as good as Right Place & Kid A

And this statement is just madness.

 

[nielsgov]

You know that A Moon-Shaped Pool sounds significantly different than TKOL, right? I can't imagine someone who likes In Rainbows for instance, not enjoying at least a portion of AMSP. Depending on their next record, TKOL might be seen as an experimental and failed sidestep for Radiohead in the future.

 

[Kieran McConville]

If ever there was a Radiohead song to grab the Top 40 radio crowd, it'd have to be Bones (which, I dunno, was it even a single?).