Album: In Rainbows
Artist: Radiohead
Radiohead released videos for many of the album's tracks online, and I've posted a selection below, but my favourite was comedian Adam Buxton's use of head cameras to film the band playing Jigsaw Falling In To Place in the studio. In rediscovering their pop sensibilities and love of melody, it's almost as if the band were re-energised and many of the videos show them playing with an unusual amount of freedom. Jigsaw Falling In To Place and Weird Fishes/Arpeggi, two of my favourite tracks on the record, are uncharacteristically upbeat Radiohead songs. There are still Yorke's familiar mutterings about death and futility, but there's also a higher than normal proportion of love songs, such as the magnificent House Of Cards ("'I don't wanna be your friend / I just wanna be your lover"), with its lovely baroque strings. Two other highlights on the album are Faust Arp, which sounds like a lost track from The Beatles' White Album or Led Zeppelin II, and Reckoner, one of Yorke's best vocal performances on the record (again, the track features a brilliant string arrangement by Jonny Greenwood). On previous albums, the electronics threatened to take over, but In Rainbows sees Radiohead return to the fuzzy guitars, baroque strings and melodic pop hooks of their early years, and achieve a balance that they've rarely found again since.
Born: Abingdon, Oxfordshire
Released: October 2007
Genre: Indie Rock
In Rainbows is an album often remembered for Radiohead's decision to self-release it online using an "honesty box" system, which came in for criticism but was actually quite lucrative for the band (according to Radiohead's publisher Warner Chappell, the album was bought 3mn times, including downloads, CDs and the £40 Discboxes). Around the same time, Prince faced similar anger for his decision to make his album, Planet Earth, free with every purchase of The Mail on Sunday. The main source of the ire was the music industry and retailers, but it's clear they had no real plans to innovate to fix a broken model. Seven years on from In Rainbow's release and there's still no one-size-fits-all solution to the problem; if anything, the rise of streaming (Spotify, YouTube, etc) continues to present new challenges, with bands focusing more now on live gigs. Kickstarter has also become popular with established musicians, but for new groups the difficulty is building an audience, and that's now more challenging than ever. Unsurprisingly, at the time of In Rainbow's release, the group found themselves answering more questions about the "honesty box" model than the music itself, which is a shame given it's one of their best releases. If I'm honest, I paid £4 for the album, and my first impressions of the album (in other words, opening track 15 Steps) were not that great. I was not so keen on Bodysnatchers on first listen either, but then from third track Nude onwards I fell for the album's charms completely.
In Rainbows is an album often remembered for Radiohead's decision to self-release it online using an "honesty box" system, which came in for criticism but was actually quite lucrative for the band (according to Radiohead's publisher Warner Chappell, the album was bought 3mn times, including downloads, CDs and the £40 Discboxes). Around the same time, Prince faced similar anger for his decision to make his album, Planet Earth, free with every purchase of The Mail on Sunday. The main source of the ire was the music industry and retailers, but it's clear they had no real plans to innovate to fix a broken model. Seven years on from In Rainbow's release and there's still no one-size-fits-all solution to the problem; if anything, the rise of streaming (Spotify, YouTube, etc) continues to present new challenges, with bands focusing more now on live gigs. Kickstarter has also become popular with established musicians, but for new groups the difficulty is building an audience, and that's now more challenging than ever. Unsurprisingly, at the time of In Rainbow's release, the group found themselves answering more questions about the "honesty box" model than the music itself, which is a shame given it's one of their best releases. If I'm honest, I paid £4 for the album, and my first impressions of the album (in other words, opening track 15 Steps) were not that great. I was not so keen on Bodysnatchers on first listen either, but then from third track Nude onwards I fell for the album's charms completely.
Radiohead released videos for many of the album's tracks online, and I've posted a selection below, but my favourite was comedian Adam Buxton's use of head cameras to film the band playing Jigsaw Falling In To Place in the studio. In rediscovering their pop sensibilities and love of melody, it's almost as if the band were re-energised and many of the videos show them playing with an unusual amount of freedom. Jigsaw Falling In To Place and Weird Fishes/Arpeggi, two of my favourite tracks on the record, are uncharacteristically upbeat Radiohead songs. There are still Yorke's familiar mutterings about death and futility, but there's also a higher than normal proportion of love songs, such as the magnificent House Of Cards ("'I don't wanna be your friend / I just wanna be your lover"), with its lovely baroque strings. Two other highlights on the album are Faust Arp, which sounds like a lost track from The Beatles' White Album or Led Zeppelin II, and Reckoner, one of Yorke's best vocal performances on the record (again, the track features a brilliant string arrangement by Jonny Greenwood). On previous albums, the electronics threatened to take over, but In Rainbows sees Radiohead return to the fuzzy guitars, baroque strings and melodic pop hooks of their early years, and achieve a balance that they've rarely found again since.
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