Radiohead changes music industry with In Rainbows
by Drew Paryzer
Thursday November 29, 2007
When Radiohead announced on Oct. 1 that it would be distributing its seventh LP without a record deal and via the wonders of Internet downloading, many sounded the death knell of the record industry. When it came to light that the album, In Rainbows, would be available for purchase at the price of the customer’s choosing, many consumers of the BitTorrent Era came face-to-face with their first audacious challenge from a musical artist: How much is my music worth to you?
For many in the future, undoubtedly, the legacy of this collection of ten tracks will be its effect on how music is distributed in the 21st century; what may be lost to some is that these ten tracks constitute a remarkable album. Radiohead, one of the most popular and accomplished modern music groups, has not surprised anybody with the immense interest their new music has elicited. What is surprising to many, including this author, is the continued evolution of Radiohead’s music, and how their newest contributions fit within the context of their estimable oeuvre.
In Rainbows is saturated with a profound coming-back-down-to-earth feeling – it’s as if the band’s Kid A / Amnesiac / Hail to the Thief cycle was an apocalyptic shroud that has been peeled back to reveal a startlingly human face.
Nowhere is this paradigm shift more apparent than on the album’s opener, the infectious “15 Step.” The opening seconds feature a crackling assemblage of electronic drum-machine beats, but no sooner does Yorke invoke his trademarked plaintive falsetto (“How come I end up where I started? / How come I end up where I belong?”) than the shredded pulsing gives way to Phil Selway’s immaculately-syncopated snare and toms; and, from there, guitarist Jonny Greenwood’s swooping slides lift the track into a sort of melodic relaxation. Even Yorke’s vocals are adapted to the transition – he sets a precedent for the rest of the album by exploring the lower ranges of his voice in the opening verses (“You used to be alright / What happened? / Did the cat get your tongue?”). The track, at times, seemingly pits Radiohead’s new stripped-down aesthetic against its old. Fragments of nightmarish sound dispel Greenwood’s groove near the end, but not without a sampled group of schoolchildren approving enthusiastically – a touch of musical irony that treads the line between being humorous or gimmicky.
“Weird Fishes/Arpeggi,” the tri-sectioned fan favorite from the band’s 2006 live shows, is anything but delicate: it builds momentum like a stone dropped from on high – propelled by Selway’s drums and Jonny’s engine-like arpeggios – before sinking into an ocean of gentle bleeps and blips. The song’s final portion juxtaposes broad, ominous synths against Jonny and Selway’s forceful playing, with Yorke’s low-register vocals tying the contrasting styles together into a desolate bow; it is perhaps the darkest section of any song on the album, although Yorke’s lyrics hint at redemption (“Hit the bottom / Hit the bottom and escape”).
The sixth track on In Rainbows, “Faust Arp” could be considered the black sheep of the album, which is why it is a shining example of Radiohead’s continued ingenuity, their refusal to stand pat with prescribed musical forms. This brief little folk-rock treasure, taking only two minutes and ten seconds, weaves an arrangement of two acoustic guitars and a string section around a rhythmic pattern that’s both disruptive and hypnotic – featuring a sort of musical stutter that’s magnified by a tumbling acoustic bassline. Yorke’s voice takes on a choppy, folk-ish quality during the chorus (“You thought you had it in you but no / No / No / For no real reason”) before he croons at length for the song’s magnificent final coda, reaching towards the shrill, vibrato-shaken violins. “Reckoner” is less of a revelation than “Faust Arp,” but it may be the better song. Selway’s symbol crashes, augmented with tambourine and a Jonny Greenwood guitar line that is more often one repeated note than not, gives a soulful grounding to what might be the most sugary-sweet vocal stylings of Yorke’s career. A break in the middle of the song shows Radiohead at its most religious: a choir of overdubbed Yorkes form a wall of sound under a brow-wrinkling falsetto line (Because we separate / It ripples our reflections). The emboldened string chords that usher the song out are symbolic of the austere beauty that permeates the entire track.
The following track, “House of Cards,” is tugged along mostly via a two-chord guitar progression, with increasing accents as the song progresses via reverberated feedback. It is undoubtedly the least-remarkable track on the album, but it is unobtrusive, even catchy – a rare Radiohead song that would mesh well with a lazy summer afternoon. The same could not be said of “Jigsaw Falling Into Place,” a frantic and unabashedly rock-and-roll track that once again puts Yorke’s vocal range on display. Jonny Greenwood’s intense acoustic work here is vaguely reminiscent of Hail to the Thief’s “Go to Sleep,” but with an initial melodic focus that builds gradually into climactic thrashing at the end.
“Videotape” rounds the album out. In the tradition of such Radiohead closers as OK Computer’s “The Tourist” and Kid A’s “Motion Picture Soundtrack,” this track ends the record with a slow, deliberate, and often dark descent into silence; unlike those tracks, “Videotape” is a song that seemingly resists its own ending. Yorke’s delicate melody coalesces with his paced piano chords, and the rest of the song seems to grow out of a resistance to their fusion: at first a plethora of disquieting voices, then a drum-beat that builds into a violent bass sound smashing against Yorke’s final lyrics: “You shouldn’t be afraid / Because I know today has been the most perfect day I’ve ever seen.” The piano persists, however, and Selway puts on his final touches with some gentle closed-highhat work. When the final piano key sounds, the listener is left with a feeling of rest – as sure a sign of any that Radiohead has broken new ground by discovering the humanity of simplicity.
