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By Root 922 0

of the songs from the second half of the album seem like they could have been on The Bends. It’s with the next two albums, Kid A and Amnesiac, that Radiohead reveal the most severe and startling changes. These two albums are really the two halves of an amazing double-album, since most of the tracks were recorded in the same sessions. Besides a much greater use of keyboards and other electronic sounds, there is the addition of orchestral instrumentation, as well as the incorporation of jazz, techno, and many other musical influences. What is really striking about the music, however, is the “more abstract harmonic and formal language” (“My Radiohead Adventure,” p. 174). The music just sounds different from rock music, even in those songs that mainly use traditional rock instruments.

Hail to the Thief and In Rainbows both contain a number of songs that aim for a more traditional rock music sound, but much in these albums also follows the precedents set in Kid A and Amnesiac. Part of the explanation for the difference in the overall sound, starting with Kid A, lies in the more complex harmonic textures employed by the band, a process that is also common throughout most of OK Computer (such as in “Airbag”), together with the increasingly experimental sonorities and instrumentation. In your average pop song, there is a single melodic line, often sung or played by the lead guitar, which is accompanied by the other instruments. In numerous songs on Kid A and Amnesiac, on the other hand, there are several lines in the music, such that each instrument seems to have its own distinct melodic and rhythmic content. A nice example of this is “In Limbo” from Kid A, where the different rhythmic and thematic lines played by each instrument stand out fairly clearly. “One of Radiohead’s great secrets,” Lansky rightly says, “is the inventive use of rhythmic levels, simultaneous projections of different metric layers.” This method of composition is common in classical music, too. Lansky likewise notes that “Radiohead’s relation to harmony in general is sophisticated and unusual,” and he compliments “the expansive and rich contours of [their] tunes” (p. 175). Lead guitarist Jonny Greenwood, who is classically trained, has cited the twentieth-century composers Olivier Messiaen (1908-1992) and Kryzysztof Penderecki (b. 1933), as some of his musical influences.11

There are numerous precedents throughout rock history for much of what Radiohead has accomplished, starting with the post-1965 music of the Beatles, and continuing through the classic art rock bands like Pink Floyd and beyond. One could argue that Radiohead continues the tradition of many of these “progressive” or “art rock” bands, but that they just do it better (excluding the Beatles, who started it all). The members of Radiohead have constantly denied these labels, probably because they fear that their music will be stereotyped or pigeonholed as some branch of avant-garde rock music with limited mass appeal. At the very least, one thing that Radiohead has in common with all great composers or song writers is their dedication to constantly breaking new barriers and creating new musical works, and not simply repackaging the ideas that were successful in the past. Much, if not most, pop music is dedicated to that very purpose, namely, cashing in on the latest trend. Like any great artist, Radiohead has paid for its explorations into new musical realms, as the many negative initial responses to Kid A made quite clear. In the end, however, many critics and fans began to see that their new musical creations were, in fact, a logical progression and extension of their past artistic successes. However logical, though, they may not be imitable. When asked about the many Radiohead-lite bands, like Coldplay, that continue to spin out watered down copies of their earlier music (up to 1997), Thom Yorke, putting his hands to his mouth, mockingly yelled out, “Good luck with Kid A!” (Welcome to the Machine, p. 238).

Finally, does Radiohead’s musical output consist of songs? Some have wondered: “Where