RADIOHEAD - OK COMPUTER CD

Radiohead's third studio album, and their last offering of the 1990s, was the magnum opus OK Computer. Released in 1997, just two years after The Bends and four years after Pablo Honey, OK Computer solidified Radiohead's reputation as one of the most innovative and provocative bands of the decade.

"Radiohead recorded their third album in the mansion of actress Jane Seymour while she was filming Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman. OK is where the band began pulling at its sound like taffy, seeing what happened, not worrying if it was still "rock." What results is a slow, haunting album with unforgettable tracks such as "Karma Police." Said guitarist Jonny Greenwood, "I got very excited at the prospect of doing string parts that didn't sound like 'Eleanor Rigby,' which is what all string parts have sounded like for the past thirty years. . . . We used violins to make frightening white-noise stuff, like the last chord of 'Climbing Up the Walls.'" — Rolling Stone

For OK Computer, Radiohead stripped away many of the obvious elements of guitar rock. Instead, they created music that is complex and textured. Exemplary of their stylistic growth is the multi-segmented "Paranoid Android." Tight, melodic, and muscular, this song pushed Radiohead to their very extremes with its electronic elements, odd time signatures, and intricate syncopations. It's a brilliant contrast to the wonderfully plaintive "Karma Police," which rests in the crucial halfway point of the album and serves to remind the listener that Radiohead can still write a brilliant piano ballad.

OK Computer is frequently compared to Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon, and with good reason. Its slow drama and conceptual sweep certainly invite the comparison. It's an epic, career-making, timeless classic; certainly, their pièce de résistance. It's bleak, it's dystopian, and it's unmistakably Radiohead.