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First Impressions thread


pennyroyalty

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Very dissapointed. Tried listening to it about 5 or 6 times and now I'm just angry. Maybe I need to get high and listen to it through some quality headphones but I haven't listened to a Radiohead album yet that I haven't clicked with on at least some tracks within the first few listens, so I see this as a bad omen.

 

Don't get me wrong, I have much love for most of the bands more experimental output, and I have nothing whatsoever against 'glitch' or 'IDM' or whatever the fuck you wanna call it, but for me the reason Radiohead have always been able to get away with this stuff is because of variation. The Gloaming is a fantastic track not just because it stands on its own, but because it's sandwiched between We Suck Young Blood and There There, and Kid A isn't too unsettling because it's on the same album as the likes of How To Dissapear. For me, I have always loved the band because they have been, up until this point, masters of context, able to seamlessly switch between styles, instruments, even genres on a single album and always managed to make it seem like a seamless whole... The King of Limbs however has none of this. The percussion on every single track is glitchy and repetitive, the vocal delivery is all within the same range, melody is completely eschewed in place of complex rhythms and synthetic ambience. I am absolutely sure all of these tracks could stand up perfectly well on their own or as part of a more eclectic mix of songs but as a whole I find it repetitive and emotionless. The atmosphere of the album is just cold and sterile, which, despite what some critics may say, is something I personally have never been able to level at Radiohead.

 

By all means I intend to listen to the album again after making this post and will eagerly await the bands next output, because as an artistic entity they have continuously proven themselves to be more than worthy of our attention, but I find this album to be a massive mis-step in the wrong direction.

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Nah... meandering is something I don't think any music should ever aim to do. It's something Radiohead have been guilty of occasionally in the past but never on this scale.

 

Anyway before people start thinking i'm a complete troll I must admit that Lotus Flower is absolutely brilliant, but coming after the utter crap that is Feral is just frustrating.

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hmmm, what can i say here

 

i think much like other 'meandering' songs such as everything in its right place, i might be wrong, and cuttooth

 

this album certainly warrants the act of riding the beat of the drums and bass, layering piece by piece very succinctly to the point where people think its just thom on protools haha

 

all those fans like me that hoped they would one day return back to that kid a/amnesiac exploratory mode they were in, are very happy, you should be too, you had httt and in rainbows the last eight years, give us a turn

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Nah... meandering is something I don't think any music should ever aim to do. It's something Radiohead have been guilty of occasionally in the past but never on this scale.

 

Anyway before people start thinking i'm a complete troll I must admit that Lotus Flower is absolutely brilliant, but coming after the utter crap that is Feral is just frustrating.

 

you are guilty of poor early judgement. trust me, tkol will come to be seen right up there with their very best albums. it's too bad you're not getting it though.

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think these songs are gonna sound a lot less alien when they play them live. i could easily imagine morning mr magpie sounding an awful lot like i might be wrong and morning bell do live, and it'd be a similar comparison, both those songs are really subdued on the albums compared to live.

 

also as a side note now would be a good time to debut cuttooth live. just sayin, radiohead. are you reading this?

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it's got some pretty epic woosh sounds too.

 

 

oh i think i noticed my first ed part - in morning mr magpie there's a really spooky bunch of guitar noise that signals part B of the song is coming, pretty cool. i think this album might be the best use of ed's woosh sounds yet.

thats def ed at the end of separator, ya know right after the guitar line cuts out...amazing noises

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I was somewhat shocked the first time listening to this, but in retrospect I find that kinda cool. I didn't become a big RH fan until about 2005-6, and In Rainbows wasn't very surprising considering the countless bootlegs of those songs and how the album sounded fairly similar to those for the most part. So listening to TKOL for the first time was a really different experience, but I'm enjoying it a lot now after repeated plays.

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I've read posts on this board and on atease saying this just sounds like a Thom Yorke album. I don't get it.

 

 

First of all, the bass and drums on this album are fucking awesome.

 

 

Second of all, Thom Yorke has been the main creative force behind Radiohead since the very beginning of the band. If you hear a lot of Thom's personal influence in this album, there's a good reason for that.

 

I think it's pretty damn good

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You could, if I were claiming to. I guess I just don't understand making such hasty critiques of an album from one's supposed all-time favorite band in less than 24 hours. Particularly this band. If I've learned anything from them over the years, it's to let music unfold as it may. If you've convinced yourself right off the bat that you don't like it, even providing for "plenty of valid reasons", well you've already reasoned your distaste for it. You've pretty much decided. I'd say you're only doing yourself a disservice.

Well, I'd have to say I definitely didn't go into the album expecting to dislike it. From listening to the live boots for well over a year now, I had my hopes higher for this record than I really ever have had for a music release. I might be in the minority with my opinion, but I'm a younger listener of this band, I was right around 16 or 17 when In Rainbows came out, and I think that was the first record that I really appreciated as an album as a whole, the way a record is supposed to be appreciated. OKC and Kid A have their place and will always be the critically acclaimed masterpieces. But In Rainbows really just strikes me another way that those albums dont on a whole other emotional level.

 

So when I heard the live bootlegs of the original version of Lotus Flower, Let Me Take Control, The Present Tense etc, it seemed as if I was ready to receive another masterpiece in my eyes, and that's what I geared my expectations to. I feel disappointed in my reaction to the album, almost the same way critics and people like Nick Hornby bitched about Kid A when it came out because they wanted another OK Computer or The Bends. But my hopes were high based off the material I heard, and instead the band zigged when I expected them to zag, I guess you could say.

 

So no, I'm not going to lay my feelings about the record and blame on Radiohead and curse The King of Limbs as if it were useless trash. Bloom is an absolutely mind-blowing song, and Give Up the Ghost is moving in every way I could ask for from a Radiohead song. But when I hear the original Lotus Flower, with what I felt like was an impeccable guitar bit that was perfect for that song, and I hear other emotionally deep songs like the aforementioned Let Me Take Control, I expected an emotional and moving record. I expected more in line with In Rainbows based on the demos. Instead I got what I feel like is a more sterilized and cold album. So again, no it's not the band's fault that I expected them to do one thing and they did another. But at the same time, those *are* my feelings, and I can't force myself to feel differently than I truly do.

 

Wow I ended up typing way more than I expected.

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