Monday, January 28, 2008
Radiohead began writing OK Computer in early 1996 at their rehearsal studio, Canned Applause a converted fruit shed with the latest recording equipment. By July they had recorded four songs with producer Nigel Godrich. Having learned from The Bends, they decided to break the songs in live before completing the record.By July 1996, Canned Applause was set up for recording. It was the first time the band had attempted to cut album tracks outside of a conventional studio environment. Despite the experimental and unconventional setting, four songs from Canned Applause found their way onto the album. The songs were "Subterranean Homesick Alien", "Electioneering", "The Tourist" and "No Surprises".
At late July and August, they returned briefly for touring to present and try the new songs. In September they moved to St. Catherine's Court – a mansion owned by actress Jane Seymour—where they recorded the rest of OK Computer, without pressure. They made much use of the various different rooms and atmospheres throughout the house, and the isolation from the outside world encouraged time to run at a different pace, making working hours more flexible and spontaneous. A couple of songs—"Exit Music (For a Film)" and "Let Down"—were recorded live. By Christmas 1996, the album was finished, and in February and March was mixed. "The biggest pressure was actually completing it," remembers Ed O'Brien. "We weren't given any deadlines and we had complete freedom to do what we wanted. We were delaying it because we were a bit frightened of actually finishing stuff."
In 16 June 1997 OK Computer was released and received even greater acclaim than The Bends, featuring prominently in many "best album" polls, then and now. It found Radiohead introducing uncommon musical elements, experimenting with ambience and noise to create a set of songs that many consider to be a high point of late-twentieth century rock music. It received a Grammy Award for Best Alternative Album and was followed by their big "Against Demons World Tour". Grant Gee, the director of the "No Surprises" video, accompanied the band on their tour and filmed it, which resulted in the "on the fly" documentary Meeting People Is Easy, which showed the band starting from their first and foremost glorious tours and finishing in their late burn-out dates in middle 1998.
Colin Greenwood said about the album: "I think the overall mood on the record is starker than The Bends. I think that there is a consistent sound to 80 percent of the new album. I think we made things a little bit more extreme on this record. The important thing for us on this record was that we produce it ourselves. We had to learn how to make decisions amongst the six of us. There was the five people in the band and the engineer /mixer Nigel Godrich. We learned a lot from doing it on our own and in retrospect, we are very proud of this record." The band released two EPs No Surprises/Running From Demons (1997) and Airbag/How Am I Driving?(1998), which differ only by a couple of songs. The more notable is the second, which has few songs that could best be described as a bridge between the progressive alternative rock of OK Computer and their subsequent experimental work.
OK Computer and The Verve's sublime final effort — Urban Hymns — were regarded as a boost to the already dying Britpop movement, despite the fact that both records departed from the style. Nevertheless OK Computer is regarded by some as one of the greatest rock albums and still tops various charts. It defined Radiohead as top superstars and elevated them to the pantheon of the greatest bands of 90s, among such seminal acts as R.E.M. and U2.
http://www.greenplastic.com/band/
In 16 June 1997 OK Computer was released and received even greater acclaim than The Bends, featuring prominently in many "best album" polls, then and now. It found Radiohead introducing uncommon musical elements, experimenting with ambience and noise to create a set of songs that many consider to be a high point of late-twentieth century rock music. It received a Grammy Award for Best Alternative Album and was followed by their big "Against Demons World Tour". Grant Gee, the director of the "No Surprises" video, accompanied the band on their tour and filmed it, which resulted in the "on the fly" documentary Meeting People Is Easy, which showed the band starting from their first and foremost glorious tours and finishing in their late burn-out dates in middle 1998.
Colin Greenwood said about the album: "I think the overall mood on the record is starker than The Bends. I think that there is a consistent sound to 80 percent of the new album. I think we made things a little bit more extreme on this record. The important thing for us on this record was that we produce it ourselves. We had to learn how to make decisions amongst the six of us. There was the five people in the band and the engineer /mixer Nigel Godrich. We learned a lot from doing it on our own and in retrospect, we are very proud of this record." The band released two EPs No Surprises/Running From Demons (1997) and Airbag/How Am I Driving?(1998), which differ only by a couple of songs. The more notable is the second, which has few songs that could best be described as a bridge between the progressive alternative rock of OK Computer and their subsequent experimental work.
OK Computer and The Verve's sublime final effort — Urban Hymns — were regarded as a boost to the already dying Britpop movement, despite the fact that both records departed from the style. Nevertheless OK Computer is regarded by some as one of the greatest rock albums and still tops various charts. It defined Radiohead as top superstars and elevated them to the pantheon of the greatest bands of 90s, among such seminal acts as R.E.M. and U2.
http://www.greenplastic.com/band/
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
0 comments:
Post a Comment