Radiohead revisit guitar rock

Toronto Star
04.06.03

On the eve of their sixth album release, everything is not in its right place for Radiohead.

"We are really, really, really not in a good place," laments guitarist Ed O'Brien from the third floor of a swank new hotel in downtown Toronto. "We still got two-thirds of the world's population in extreme poverty. And what do we do about it? Bugger all."

A decade into becoming one of rock's more enigmatic bands since their first album Pablo Honey, Radiohead's outlook on the world has not budged.

"It's fears of the future based upon fears of the present," O'Brien says of the meaning behind the title Hail to the Thief, set to release June 10.

Led by singer-songwriter Thom Yorke, Radiohead have garnered a reputation for being outspoken on global affairs and mistrustful of large corporations. They are informally boycotting venues owned by American entertainment company Clear Channel Worldwide, which has been accused of attempting to monopolize the music market, and have trumpeted Toronto writer Naomi Klein's No Logo, an anti-globalization tome.

"Our world is quantified by profit and loss and that's the only two things that measure our lives, and I find that extremely sad and pathetic," says the six-foot-six O'Brien, gazing out a window. "I think people are gonna look back on this time like we look back on the 13th century navigators who used to think the world was flat. We're gonna laugh."

No one was laughing in Radiohead circles when the album was leaked on the Internet about two months ago, prompting some radio stations, including one in Vancouver, to hastily air the material. O'Brien says the band was initially upset because they felt robbed, as the tracks were unfinished.

"There's no Robin Hood thing going on there, man. We would never do that to someone else."

O'Brien admits such instances may become more commonplace "until the day that you can finish a record and you push a button in your studio and you can upload it on the Internet." He believes, however, there is a way to continue selling millions of records in an age of rampant file-swapping.

"A Radiohead fan will buy the record, and a Radiohead fan hopefully wants to come see us live, so maybe you cross the two in the future. You go, 'If you buy the record, you have tickets to come and see us live,"' he said.

"Problem is, if you have a big selling album, you have a lot of gigs to play in a lot of huge places," he laughs.

It took two weeks - precisely a song a day - to make the more guitar-charged album, an approach O'Brien says disciplined the band. This time around producer Nigel Godrich suggested they record in Los Angeles because he had worked with Beck, a native of the city, and Scot-rock group Travis there. Radiohead agreed.

While half a world away - literally and metaphorically - from the pastures of their home studio in Oxfordshire, England, O'Brien insists the cold pallor of La la land was needed and actually invigorated them.

"As you're flying low over you see this grid of a city beneath you and there's no green space. It's all cars and grey buildings," he says. "That's stimulating because you think, 'God, how do people interact?' and then you see the way they interact on a Saturday night cruising down Sunset Boulevard."

It seems that a bit of Hollywood's trademark bravado has rubbed off on the band, and as a result, as O'Brien puts it, they've finally found their swagger with this record. Ironically, countless critics felt 1997's OK Computer and 2000's Kid A saw the band at its peak.

Paradox is typical of Radiohead's career. They developed an international fan base 10 years ago with their first single, "Creep," a song typical of the grunge sound at the time. Over the following four years they dabbled with different harmonies and instruments, even incorporating a glockenspiel on OK Computer's "No Surprises."

But it was not until Kid A that the group risked all, resisting conventional pop song structure and rhythm for a more experimental, tripped out vibe. And it was then Radiohead exploded into what Time Magazine has called "the best band in the world."

This paradox extends into some of the tunes on Hail to the Thief - "2 + 2 = 5," "Where I End and You Begin," and "Sit down. Stand up." Though the album is seen as a revisit to their '90s rock-out style, and things may have mellowed a bit - Yorke now has a two-year-old son - little overall has dulled Radiohead's edge.