Category:
Rock

Try if you like:
Blur, Clinic, Muse, Pink Floyd, The Pixies

There are a few artists that make reviewing music a daunting task.  Radiohead without a doubt, is one of those artists. To add to that stress, I’ll be taking on one of their most controversial records, Hail to the Thief. The album title, widely considered to be a poke at the mess the United States refers to as the 2000 Presidential elections. As for the music?  By far, the pinnacle album to a long and well-respected career.

 

It’s amazing the diverse range these guys pull off in just about an hour (longest of their career) of work.  From electronically driven tracks like “Sit Down, Stand Up (Snakes & Ladders)” to the following track “Sail To The Moon (Brush The Cobwebs Of the Sky)”, which has a much more conventional style bleeding in peaks and valleys.  The vocals on “Sail to The Moon” are signed with performance only Yorke can deliver and walk a calmly driven instrumentation down the path to musical balance.  But the peaks and valleys only continue from one song to the next as “Backdrifts (Honeymoon Is Over)” nearly solely sits on the electronic vibe in “Sit Down, Stand Up” and features a swaggering Yorke as he belts “Oh, Oh, Oh” before the organ takes a bridge.  Another electronically bound song here is “The Gloaming (Softly Open Our Mouths In The Cold)” which lurks at you like a morbid car accident you can’t seem to stop rubbernecking.  Echo effects and dynamic beat control make this a tasty track.  

 

 “Go To Sleep (Little Man Being Erased)” makes no bones about it, could easily be inserted onto The Bends and no one would ever notice the difference.  This track has a feverent pace and even a grit and grind. Then there’s the weary piano soaked track seven, “We Suck Young Blood (Your Time Is Up)”.  Yorke’s voice cracks tastefully with a grimy handclap sample to create an unforgettable tune.

 

Also evident is Nigel Godrich’s touch as the nearly a cappella toned “I Will (No Man’s Land)” leads into what is probably the most progressively enjoyable track “A Punch Up At A Wedding (No No No No)”.  Beginning with a twistingly soft bass and piano movement, the layered vocals take us into the first verse. “I don’t know, why you bother. Nothing’s ever good enough for you.  I was there, it wasn’t like that.  You’ve come here, just to start a fight”. 

 

The biggest single here was the lead video “There There” and it drew quite the billboard attention and rightfully so as this track has a contagious feel that only Radiohead can give us. This restless morph of conventional instrumentation is quite possibly one of the best tracks Radiohead has ever compiled.  From Ed Obrien’s storied beat to Yorke’s lack of fear to hit pitches of all sizes, this track has a soothing excitement. “Why so green, and lonely.  Heaven… sent you… to me, to me…”  and then the Greenwood’s take the lead stomping the sound harder and pacier only for York to come in with something to think about. “We are all, accidents, waiting, waiting to happen”.

 

The album artwork on any one of its releases makes it worth a physical purchase. I myself had purchased the limited edition version that included a color coding chart that may or may not have helped understand what the different emotions and products randomly slewn on the cover meant.    

 

On Hail to the Thief, Radiohead has sampled just about every genre or sound they’ve mastered and molded it together. From the digital imprints of “Sit Down, Stand Up”, and “Backdrifts” that became relevant on Kid A and Amnesiac to the weary and melodic acoustic courses on albums like The Bends, with Hail to the Thief, Radiohead earns yet another trip to my paradise island.