“The Bends” | Radiohead

The year is 1995. US space station Atlantis docks with the Russian station Mir. The DVD is announced as a new disk format. Toy Story sets the record for the first ever fully computer-generated film.

And Radiohead release “The Bends”. An important year for us, I’d say.

Radiohead crashed through the scene with a pivotal album that was hailed as the saviour of Rock. “The Bends” marked a radical change in the band’s style – the transition from the Britpop-influenced ‘Pablo Honey’ (1993) to the critically acclaimed post-rock opus ‘OK Computer’ (1997).

 

Before everything was in its right place.

 

I consider this album an important one in our times. It is a record laden with emotion and paranoia, exploring the human psyche in a way few have successfully done before. It paved the way for the behemoth Radiohead go on to be.

Brace yourself.

01. Planet Telex 
The opener starts off with an upbeat, solemn, synthesized drum-loop. Groovy bass, fuzzy distorted guitars join in. “You can force it, but it will not come” is how Thom Yorke sets it off. The chorus screams hopelessness. They say Thom was a mess on the studio floor, and he sang this into a mic. Not a very subtle track at all.

02. The Bends 
Title track. The essence. One of Radiohead’s more anthemic tracks, the title denotes what the band was going through after to the unprecedented success of Pablo Honey. The Bends is a situation faced by divers. When a diver swims to the surface too fast,  nitrogen compression begins paralysing his limbs. Now there’s the dilemma – he can’t swim too fast, he’ll only immobilize faster; neither can he stay low and drown. This kind of conflict pretty much sums up the soul of the album. An intricate 3-layer guitar attack by Thom, Ed, and Jonny. Go nuts.

03.High and Dry 
The “poppiest” song RH ever made. Radio stations loved it, playing it over and over again, while Thom probably snickered somewhere wondering why sarcasm is so difficult to comprehend. Ambiguous lyrics give way to interpretations ranging from a drug-addicted, solitary sufferer’s tale; to the psyche of a person who tries too hard to be someone he can’t. And the song describes, beautifully, the ultimate end of those tales. Read between the lines, but might I add this is probably as far as pop can go. With the odd track in an otherwise non-mainstream album, Thom makes his point. Pop sells.

04. Fake Plastic Trees 
Along with Street Spirit, my favourite on the album. Thom waxes poetic with lines such as “gravity always wins” /”She looks like the real thing, she tastes like the real thing, my fake plastic love.” Using his trademark falsetto throughout. he ponders what love today means. But then it could also be about the crud that builds up in society, due to mass production of plastic… Radiohead are unparalleled when it comes to not restricting a song’s meaning. The more you listen, the more you build moments in your mind. Profound, and rated 376 by Rolling Stone magazine on the list of the 500 greatest songs of all time.

 

Read between the smiles.

 

05. Bones 
“And cant you feel it, in your bones?”

06. Nice Dream 
Dreamy. Thom sounds lazy like he’s just woken from an exotic dream, due to the acoustics of the song. “They love me like I am their brother… they protect me, make me happy” he muses.

 

Press release, Japan.

 

07. Just 

Said to be a competition between Thom and Jonny – how can one squeeze an astonishing number of chords in a song, and still make it awesome? Has a couple Jonny© Greenwood™ lightning fast solos, and the multi-layered sound Radiohead pioneered. Phil drums with precise, tasteful beats. Does he an atomic metronome in his head, is a question that needs to be answered.

08. My Iron Lung 
Radiohead rebel their angst with being cornered into one-hit-wonders here.

09. Bulletproof… I wish I was. 
Ballad-like, mesmerising. Don’t miss the ringing-chiming guitar when the chorus comes in.

10. Black Star 
Broke? Girlfriend dumped you? Mugged by thugs? “Blame it on your Black star. Blame it on your falling Sky“. Thom’s falsetto never fails.

11. Sulk.
The only weak track on the album. Why is it here?

12. Street Spirit (Fade Out) 

 

“Immerse your soul in love.”

 

I’m overwhelmed every single time I hear ‘Fade Out’. Thom exalts the darkness that encompasses life, the darkness that we train ourselves to avoid, immunize ourselves against. Every Radiohead song is known to have a silver lining, a ray of hope. This one is the exception.

“Cracked eggs, dead birds, scream as they fight for life. I can feel death, can see its beady eyes” –  the song is haunting. And once the high pitched chorus comes, Thom reveals his ability to sustain high notes like no other. Revolving around a crushing arpeggio in A-minor, ‘Street Spirit’ demonstrates how beautifully simple music can be the most difficult to create. Everything fits gapless, like pieces of a jigsaw only meaning something when they coalesce. There’s nothing you feel you could take from this song and nothing you could add to it. Very few musicians ever achieve this.

‘The Bends’ is so much more than the sum of its parts. Dive into this album headfirst, unflinching. Take it in. I could ramble about it for ages, but you’ll only know when you hear it for yourself.

Tracklist

“Urban Hymns” | The Verve

“Hey man, so, have you heard that rad number called ‘Bitter Sweet Symphony’? The band ripped off The Stones but damn what a tune!”

20 years ago today, Urban Hymns sought to challenge the standards of space-rock and alternative. As an album still revered by many as one of the best ever, I’d say it more than made good on that promise.

Unfortunately, the band is infamous only for the track referenced in the beginning of this review. Which is such a shame. Because IMO, it’s barely the best track on this album. Read on.

Say Bitter Sweet one more time I dare you I double-dare you.

14 tracks on this album and lead singer Richard Ashcroft strolls through them taking on life, happiness, inner demons… the works. Look beyond the catchy tunes and pop vibe, and you’ll find a hurricane of emotions underneath.

Let’s start with the trumpeting elephant in the studio – ‘Bitter Sweet Symphony’, also the opener of the album. Yes, the violin sample was recorded by The Rolling Stones. And yes, they got sued. But that tune isn’t all the track is. Ashcroft & Co. have crafted a timeless song around it, one with heartfelt lyrics that made me stop in my tracks on first listen. This song perfectly captures the core of the album –  gazing inward and grappling with the uncertainties within.

‘Sonnet’ and ‘The Rolling People’ (heh, rolling) are light-hearted, energetic tunes – quite different from the more psychedelic ones on here. “WE GOTTA GO”, yells Ashcroft amidst some sick guitar bends that remind me of ‘Nothing As It Seems’ era Pearl Jam. Bass on point, as are the drums.

But it’s on the darker, deeper songs that the band shines. ‘The Drugs Don’t Work’ – my personal favourite on this album – has some truly melancholic, aching instrumentation. Ashcroft sounds like he’s about to break into a million pieces. He’s at the bedside of someone dear to him, who’s at that stage when all medicine fails. Nick’s guitar slides without any inertia at all and hides when there’s enough going on. God is that guitarist good at picking the right moments to add a note here, a bend there.

You know the LSD’s kicking in when ‘Catching The Butterfly’ begins. “Elusive dreams”, indeed. You tell me The Verve don’t like their pills, and I’m gonna point at the flying pigs in the sky.

‘Neon Wilderness’ is a treacly, layered track feat. Ashcroft mumbling sleepily. And what a gloriously trippy one it is! ‘Space and Time’ follows, and he seeks comfort so that his night can pass. “Ain’t got no lullaby… oh no no no”. Richard indulges and murmurs on every track including this one without restraint, often singing “no no no no no” on repeat, and he knows a billion ways to say “yeah”. It all lends a singularly unique character to his style of singing.

Wah-enabled kicks? It’s time to cover ‘Weeping Willow’.

I’m 87% sure McCabe broke his wah pedal when recording ‘Weeping Willow’. He makes his guitar wail and cry spectacularly, and compliments with relentless riffs. “Weeping willow, the pills under my pillow.” I’d love to know your interpretation of this song in the comments below.

‘Velvet Morning’ is a spacey build up to the face-melting ‘Come On’. Man, do they rock out on this one – I didn’t think McCabe would dive balls-out into the deep end. Good times 😀 It closes the album on a high note, although there’s a hidden track right after (you’ll have to figure that one out, I ain’t giving everything away.)

Urban Hymns was a revelation to me. I was orgasming over very much into Radiohead, Sigur Rós and the like when I heard this tornado of an album, and I loved it from the get-go. This album brims with warmth. If you like space-rock with a wide-open heart, get this.

If you disagree, I’m just gonna go ohhh no no no no no no no no no no no no no…

Tracklist