July 31, 1997
Like Pink Floyd's Animals, OK Computer is a dark, bleak take on the helplessness of modern life and its Orwellian future. There is great irony here: "Paranoid Android," the stunning 6-minute chorus-less single off OK Computer finds Thom Yorke indicting yuppies with the snarling line "ambition makes you look pretty ugly," but this album is testament to the band's own ambition, a sprawling tour-de-force that encompasses death, alien abduction, middle-class ennui and the desperate search for human connection in an increasingly impersonal world.
The music is as epic as the themes. Thom Yorke is a gifted, beautiful singer; his chilling falsetto and sneering tenor are the perfect vehicles for his cryptic, elliptical lyrics. His narrative is dense and convoluted - the last two songs on the album precede the first cut, chronologically - but the repeated listens it takes to get into the album are worth it. The music itself is equally inspired, as the band employs tricky time signatures and trademark sonic textures that range from the electronic crackle and haunting piano of "Karma Police" to the howling post-funk of "Electioneering" to "Paranoid Android"'s gorgeous acoustic coda. "Exit Music (for a film)" has an operatic despair that is terrifying to behold, and "Let Down" is the first song released in years with a melancholy melody sublime enough to push up tears behind my eyes.
All this would be pretentious in the hands of a lesser band, but is simply assured beauty here. If this sounds like art rock on the scale of King Crimson or the Moody Blues, it is; however, Radiohead's staggering talent and emotional commitment make OK Computer less a lame intellectual exercise than a moving take on existentialism in the post-modern world. It also rocks like a son of a bitch when it needs to.
Radiohead are the one of the rare artists who not only have a unique vision, but the skill to pull it off. OK Computer is wise enough to address the heart as well as the mind, and is their finest work to date. Easily one of the best albums of the year, and likely the most important.
- Jared O'Connor
[November 6, 1998]
This review was written over a year ago. I'd like to point out that this album has held up like a quartz pillar since then. I made the claim in my review of Yo La Tengo's I Can Hear The Heart Beating As One that that album was better than OK Computer, but with some perspective, it's hard to say. ICHTHBAO is more accessible, more easily enjoyable, not as difficult or challenging as OK Computer. But the argument is academic. They both kick ass in their own way.
Also, I recently picked up Radiohead's Airbag/How Am I Driving EP, which contains seven outtakes from OK Computer. My Lord, Radiohead's outtakes are far better than everyone else's official releases. There's some interesting electronic instrumentals, the stunning anti-anthem "Palo Alto" and a crunching guitar workout called "Polystyrene". This EP is well worth picking up. I had the good fortune to see Radiohead a few months ago, and they actually played "Polystyrene", which Thom Yorke prefaced by saying: "Polystyrene is the packaging plastic that keeps things fresh, and it never, ever degrades … still, convenience foods, eh?"
How excellent is that?
stunning tour-de-force