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Radiohead
Hail to the Thief
(Capitol)
First Appeared at The Music Box, September 2003, Volume 10, #9
Written by Michael Cooney
It’s hard to criticize Radiohead. The group is one of the few mainstream bands
consistently making truly creative music these days, and one has to admire the
manner in which it built its reputation. It was never the focus of MTV airplay,
nor was it about looking cool in magazines. It never enjoyed much attention from
commercial radio either, but it didn’t matter. It succeeded by traversing the
underground scene, spreading its seeds through college stations and word of
mouth. For Radiohead, it was always about the music, and the music has almost
always been superb.
That’s why the band’s latest release, Hail to the Thief comes as such
a disappointment. The album has some intensely vivid lyrics, and interesting
song structures, but these things have come to be expected from Radiohead. There
are a few bright spots. Scatterbrain and Myxomatosis (with its fat
rubbery sounding bass line), are worth putting on repeat, but most of the album
is sleepy, unremarkable, and just plain boring.
Undoubtedly, there are Radiohead fans who will enjoy Hail to the Thief,
simply because they like the band. And, if a new, unproven group had created the
album instead of Radiohead, it might be the start of something promising. In
giving the world such beautifully crafted outings as OK Computer and The Bends, however, Radiohead set expectations a bit too high for its future
releases. After all, not every band can be brilliant all the time. To say this
about Radiohead, is like congratulating a normally "A" student for getting "Cs,"
and Hail to the Thief is merely average. 
Hail to the Thief is available from Amazon.com.
To order, Click Here!
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46th Annual Grammy Award Winner:
Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical
Ratings
1 Star: Pitiful
2 Stars: Listenable
3 Stars: Respectable
4 Stars: Excellent
5 Stars: Can't Live Without It!!
Copyright © 2003
The Music Box
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