Coat of many colours
It’s
a bit late, but I’ve finally gotten around to featuring
Radiohead’s latest ‘event’, i.e. the release
of their 7th album, In Rainbows. I won’t go into
the details of its release, because I’m sure you are more
than familiar with it. Instead, I’ll just offer my opinion
on two important aspects:
1) The Method
There’s no doubting that the release of this album was a
spectacle, propelling the future of digital music into the spotlight.
Full credit to whoever came up with the idea, I thought it was
brilliant little experiment. It spread their music at phenomenal
speed, slapped the big record labels in the face and best of all,
made the band a fair bit of money in the process. However, despite
all this, I doubt it will do much to revolutionise the way we
buy music. The ‘pay what you want’ system simply isn’t
practical on a larger scale. Perhaps some more big bands may give
it a shot, but that’s about as far as I see it going.
The execution of it all was surprisingly well-managed.
When you consider how many people would have been accessing the
site at once, it’s impressive how quick and smooth the process
of downloading it was. And just in case you’re wondering,
I actually didn’t pay anything for it. But before you go
get your pitchforks, I would like to point out that I had every
intention of giving a little donation, all the way up to the point
that it asked for my credit card details. But it seems I wasn’t
alone in this regard with only 38% of downloaders actually paying
anything for it. That's not the only factor to suggest this experiment
wasn't all rosy. I also think the band abused the trust of some
of their best fans. At no stage did they mention that the CD would
be released separately, so many fans thought the mp3s would be
all they'd get. As such, they paid a decent amount for it. If
they now want the higher quality CD, they’ll have to pay
again. I think an upgrade scheme would have been nice, where those
who paid a certain amount were sent a free CD. Still, whatever
the outcome was, I doubt I'll be forgetting about this little
episode anytime soon.
2) The Sound
I suppose I should preface this by saying I don’t consider
myself a Radiohead fan. Sure, I love OK Computer, but
I’ve never given the other albums enough time to sink in.
I have the same problem with Pavement, where I latch on to one
great album (Crooked Crooked Rain) and ignore the rest.
Trust me, it’s not something I’m proud of. But even
with my underdeveloped viewpoint, it’s pretty clear that
In Rainbows is pretty special. The power of Thom’s voice
is simply incredible and from start to finish the album boldly
strides into some pretty brave musical territory (and pulls it
off).
While I’d still say I prefer OK Computer,
there’s no real need to compare them. They’re separate
entities that can be enjoyed independently. It’s all the
more reason to look further into this great band.
Peter Watts
For
more of Peter Watts' music reviews, check out his blog at Open
Your Eyes
