Kid A

[airtaco]

I listened to Kid A for the first time in about a year last night. It was truely devine. Anyway, I remember a while someone proposed that the album was a concept album about ones life--beginning with his birth and ending with his suicide. If anyone has a more fleshed out thoery, or simply wants to discuss this album, one that, in my opinion, ranks in the top 5 of the decade, I'd be down.

[Sir Stewart]

"How To Disappear Completely" is as close to suicide as anything I've ever heard.

Was it someone here who proposed that theory?

[bobbob1313]

Chuck Klosterman thinks it was the soundtrack to 9/11.

 

I'm not sure what it is about, but it scares the shit out of me, in a good way.

[airtaco]

Yes, Stewart, it was someone on here. But it was also about two years ago, and i'm fairly certain it was just there opinion. I suppose Radiohead in general are mythical in some way, and Kid A is just mind boggling.

[Sir Stewart]

I remember a print ad before it was released, with a terrified citydweller screaming into his cellphone "We're not scaremongering this is really happening!" as death figures swarmed overhead. I thought about that ad alot in the days after 9/11.

[airtaco]

I can only imagine.

 

I was in 8th grade when it came out and was listening to mainly classic rock. Needless to say, I loathed it; it wasn't music. It took me about 2 1/2 years to "get it" but it's definitely a keeper.

[bobbob1313]

Kid A hit me like a ton of bricks one night. I think it was Idioteque or How To Disapear Completely that did it.

[OOO]

Kid A is awesome.

 

So is this new song:

 

http://finefinemusic.com/radiohead/allineed.htm

[quarter23cd]

Kid A hit me like a ton of bricks one night. I think it was Idioteque or How To Disapear Completely that did it.

Agreed. But I think I must have less patience or just less time to appreciate music these days, because nowadays there's only a handful of tracks I still listen to from that disc (and those you mentioned are definitely among them).

[Dude]

Might have been me. I didn't really flesh the theory out but it went something like this:

 

Everything in Its Right Place - the womb / birth, contentment

Kid A - pre-school innocence, fractured youth

The National Anthem - grade school, isolation

How To Disappear Completely - middle school, trauma

Treefingers - post-adolescence, post-trauma / healing

Optimistic - college, disillusionment

In Limbo - young adulthood, drugs / chaos / uncertainty

Idioteque - the beginning of the end, the coming apocalypse / terror and dread

Morning Bell - middle age, divorce / severing all ties, losing touch with reality

Motion Picture Soundtrack - suicide / the afterlife

[Sir Stewart]

I'm down.

[airtaco]

That looks likes it. I guess it wasn't much, but I like it just the same.

[Elixir Sue]

That looks likes it. I guess it wasn't much, but I like it just the same.

Ouch.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

(I like it, too.)

[into the white]

In Limbo is the most underrated Radiohead song; it rules.

[Scalzunfield]

I must be on a completely different planet from you folks with regards to this album.

 

Let me say here: I have listened to people's opinions on here about The Decemberists, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Spoon, countless other bands and, even the last Joe Strummer album that came out several years back. And I've loved each of those opinions, but...

 

As I sit here and listen to Kid A for the first time in roughly 6 months, I still don't "get it." It still sounds like meandering, aimless stuff to me. I see this thing hailed as a masterpiece roughly everywhere I look (and OK Computer too for that matter), but I just don't see it. IMO, there are some beautiful moments on the album (most occur during "How To Disappear"), but I'm still failing to see the genius of it. There are several songs where I feel that there's no song really. Treefingers, for instance, reminds me entirely of the last 4 minutes of "Reservations" on YHF (an album that gets unfairly compared to Kid A by bunches of critics, but I can find 11 songs I love on YHF) and has no real substance. Can someone explain to me why this album is a "masterpiece" and deserves the 10.0 it has received on Pitchfork? I can read nothing from that article other than "If Thom Yorke was here right now, I'd go down on him in a heartbeat."

 

It should be noted here that I've mildly enjoyed most of their "singles:" Karma Police, Creep, etc. but whole albums, not really.

[brianjeremy]

Can someone explain to me why this album is a "masterpiece" and deserves the 10.0 it has received on Pitchfork?

 

For me personally, it reminds me of a certain time and place and a feeling. I was on a greyhound bus going home out of Knoxville - I was going home for christmas vacation. It was so cold that night. The flashing orange lights that would pass in the darkness were so cool. Really added to the mood. I remember sitting on the bus thinking I was so alone. There weren't many people riding and it just felt so alone. I had my head phones and listened to this album from Kentucky all the way to Asheville. I looked at the snow fall and when it got dark, the lights on the interstate kept me company. It was such an awesome feeling.

 

I can't say I put it on much anymore. I do give it a spin every so often. OK Computer or The Bends get more airplay around here.

[WaronWar]

As soon as I heard the intro of "Everything Thing In Its Right Place" with its haunting electronic keyboards, I was swept away. To me, it's their best. That's right, it's better than "Ok Computer"; however, I do love "Ok Computer".

[deepseacatfish]

Can someone explain to me why this album is a "masterpiece" and deserves the 10.0 it has received on Pitchfork?

I think its a really grand piece of work, and obviously there will be plenty of debate over whether or not it's perfect or deserves a 10.0 blah blah blah. Anyway...I think it really does deserve the critical acclaim. For one it is a really layered album in the sense that it fits together as a whole album really brilliantly, and the songs both musically and lyrically are certainly more than one dimensional and really open to interpretation. But really where it earns the acclaim is that it is both a very ambitious album in terms of experimenting with different musical elements and completely breaking form from most rock/pop music and it does so very effectively. It's not simply wanking around, but it's very well prepared, executed, and layered.

 

For me it's an album that just emerges as you get into the different layers. And I really admire the aesthetic and experimentation of the album. But that's what makes it good for me. Obviously not everyone likes Radiohead at all...and Thom Yorke's voice may be enough to put one off to it. But Kid A is one of those albums that I really find works best as an album. And it's the kind of album I could just listen to in the dark and listen as all the different elements folded in and out of each other. It's vague and hard to describe, but like Yankee Hotel Foxtrot I find it to be a really deep and well executed musical idea. OK Computer is similar. But I hope that kind of explains it. Captain Beefheart gets plenty of critical acclaim, but a lot of people can't stand or don't get Trout Replica Mask...to each there own.

[bobbob1313]

I agree that it is a great album to listen to in the dark. It creates amazing images in your head when you have no distractions.

[awatt]

B.W. (before Wilco) this was one of my top-five played cds, a brilliant collection of songs I loved to listen to while driving, especially in the pouring rain when it was cold out. I like what y'all have said about it but definitely has weather vibes for me...

[m_thomp]

Personally, I think Kid A is their best, but a flawless 10.0?? Nah. There are too many noodly passages and, of course, Treefingers which outstays its welcome by a good couple of minutes.

 

On another point I always took How To Dissapear Completely on its literal meaning. Apparently, it details Thom Yorke's kind of surreal out of body experience he experienced when on stage in Dublin - a wish to escape big gigs, fame and all its trappings.

 

"Strobe lights and blown speakers

Fireworks and hurricanes

I'm not here

This isn't happening"

 

"I float down the Liffey" etc.

[Atticus]

I hear they're cutting their next record with Nels Cline. And issuing a krautrock re-worked version of Fake Plastic Trees.