Radiohead: Ranking their albums

The 9 studio albums of the masterful band Radiohead, including the most recent one, ranked from worst to best.

9. The King of Limbs: I don't know if I could face another listen of this one. That does not mean that it's a bad album; that means it isn't enjoyable.It's artfully constructed, moody and haunting; it's a musical horror piece. It gets under your skin and gives you the shivers. Believe it or not that's not a massively pleasant sensation, There isn't that much wrong with it aside from its shameless self-indulgence to be fair. I just can't tell the songs apart and it's rarely enjoyable. It's more akin to going on a miserable walk in a muddy field during a thunderstorm. It's just not up to the band's normal standards and is very hard to get into. If Radiohead were going for a chilling, depressing vibe they achieved that goal with flying colours. As musical experimentation and artistry it's fine. In terms of actually listening to it, it's not a lot of fun.

8. Pablo Honey: Separated from the rest of the band's work, you'll see that this is actually a decent album. It took me a couple of listens but I did get into it a lot more the second time. It's nowhere near as good as the later stuff but it was the band only just starting out. Besides, the cynical lyrics and undercurrents of artistry flowing through the sometimes overdone guitar instrumentals hint at what they'd later achieve. It's got Creep, that wonderfully moody song which Thom Yorke hates but when it was played in Portugal it got the biggest reaction of the night.It's also got Blow Out, You and Anyone Can Play Guitar which are all fun songs. It's a repetitive, simplistic and occasionally artless album, but as debuts go it's absolutely fine. It's a little tough to listen to after hearing the later albums, but that's only a testament to the band's skill and not to the quality of Pablo Honey.

7. The Bends: A controversially low placing for sure, but out of Radiohead's acclaimed albums this is the one I haven't fully got into. It's a highly skilled rock album with some absolute tunes, but I feel like I can get what this album does from any other band. Also, 2 of the biggest songs on the album- High and Dry and Fake Plastic Trees have never fully grabbed me. Like Pablo Honey, it's sometimes repetitive and overly whiny, but once again it was the band just starting out. Despite being my least favorite classic Radiohead album it's still a rather fine work. It's a fittingly energetic and soulful album with delightful amounts of angst, cynicism, complexity and energy. It's Radiohead doing more commercial stuff and being easier to listen to than normal. Going more commercial has negative connotations but Radiohead did a commercial album and it turned out very well. This is a very good album even if it's not as arty as the later stuff.

6. A Moon Shaped Pool: Radiohead's latest is a return to form- initially indicated by the atmospheric, chill-inducing Burn the Witch backed by possibly my favorite music video ever. This is easily Radiohead's quietest album with a large emphasis on mood and atmosphere, but the gentle synthesizer tracks and piano instrumentals hit so hard and seem so loud despite this. This is an album aching with emotion and serves as a pleasingly unpretentious exploration of various thought-provoking themes. Despite it being as gloomy as ever there's a real sense of peace to the album. It feels like the band gently and quietly unpicking life's mysteries whilst exploring new aural territory.. This is a record that gets better with every listen as more and more of its rich complexities and hidden meanings become clear. What a comeback,

5. Amnesiac: One of the best sequels ever? Possibly. Kid A's sister album, as it doesn't have any 10/10 songs with the closest being Pyramid Song, this isn't as good as its predecessor but it seriously delivers. It's another alien, experimental record which takes terrifying lyrics, haunting sounds and jumbled electronic music and turns those elements into utter art. It is also more similar to the previous albums than Kid A so it could be more enjoyable for some listeners. It is a trippy, scary and surreal album that is paradoxically exhilarating to listen to due to how fascinating the songs are. While not the best album the band have done, this is another fascinating piece of musical experimentation from them and it's once again so utterly, chillingly and brilliantly mad in every way. Being confused is rarely this enjoyable.  

4. Hail to the Thief: Radiohead's most underrated album is another wide-ranging, diverse exploration of the art form of music. It's their longest record but it's remarkably consistent, and boasts various utterly masterful songs. It's also a highly effective bridge between the Kid A experimentation and the OK Computer rock stuff. It's an intense, masterful thrill ride that is always compelling no matte what and never ceases to sound like thunder in your ears, even during the quieter tracks. It does suffer from overlength and if some of the songs, such as A Punchup at a Wedding, had been cut loose, the album would be a masterpiece. Nevertheless, the album we got is possibly Radiohead's most purely enjoyable and entertaining record and every song is a masterful blend of peaceful, melancohly beauty and angst-ridden, ferocious rock. Thus, this album sums up the best of Radiohead.

3. Kid A: This one has been divisive before but is rightly seen as a classic now. This album is genius. It's so trippy, weird, arty and incoherent but is so mad, so gripping and simultaneously haunting and brilliantly entertaining. This is a somewhat formless, elusive and vague album and it is ultimately a riddle wrapped in an enigma locked in a heavily coded safe locked in a padlocked prison door. It doesn't get to number one as you need to be in the right mood for it and it does have The National Anthem on it, but even with all the experimental weirdness the album touches you so much. Its electronic beats are both haunting and exhilarating, its lyrics are minimalist in the best way, it's so full of art and so full of thematic depth. It's a truly magnificent journey across a strange aural wilderness. I don't know what on earth it's about and I don't want to. The vibe this album creates can't really be expressed in words.

2. In Rainbows: This one is one of the best albums of all time. It's very piano-based and melancholy but also filled with artistic rock. It's an achingly sad and moving album at times which takes the listener on another stunning trip. It is once again hard to define. However, the image I have of it are many rainbows passing drifting slowly across the night sky: an emotional, bittersweet and multilayered exploration of the darkness of modern life and relationships. It'll bring a tear to your eye multiple times and is the closest Radiohead have come to producing something which genuinely feels like renaissance art in musical form. It's so stunning, so rich and so awe-inspiring in every way. It is very, very depressing at times, but it will crucially leave you feeling alive. In terms of the best song there Reckoner is the best but they're all great songs. It's got the best album title too.  

1. OK Computer: Since this is not only my favorite album by Radiohead but my favorite album of all time, this was an inevitable number one. It's a sometimes terrifying, often depressing yet endlessly thrilling record you'll never want to end. Everything is perfect here. All of the music is brilliantly put-together, the lyrics examine modern society in a brilliant way and the way the album starts with a song about a car crash is appropriate, as this complex, deep, powerful, stunning and euphoric masterpiece provides an experience akin to a terrifying car crash over a cliff into the abyss. That shouldn't be enjoyable, but the thrills, the angst, the danger, the darkness and the humanity contained within this make it a devastating aural shockwave that, no matter how often it depresses, confuses or in the case of Climbing Up the Walls and Fitter Happier downright terrifies you, it's pure musical heaven which you'll never want to end. As if you didn't need another reason to love this, it also has Paranoid Android, Let Down and No Surprises in one place. A true masterpiece and my favorite record ever.

Thanks for reading.

Led Zeppelin: Ranking their albums

The 9 studio albums of the exceptional Hard Rock band Led Zeppelin, who are by far and away one of the greatest bands there ever was and will ever be, ranked from worst to best.

9. Presence: Most seem to put In Through the Out Door or Coda as the worst, but those albums had some good songs on them. This is the one album where I can't really remember the songs much at all. It's clear the band are utterly exhausted as they sound like they've been replaced by an inferior tribute band. At the same time, it's very difficult to call it bad. The music is still good technically and this album does have Nobody's Fault But Mine and Tea for One, although the other songs aside from Achilles Last Stand which is often entertaining but far too long fail to make much of an impact. This is definitely the band at their most lifeless. Yes the songs are all good but this is Led Zeppelin. They are normally great. The band members can churn out good music in their sleep. This is basically the band on autopilot as they give us good music without blowing up the arena like they normally do,

8. Coda: Coda's perfectly OK looking back on it. It's far from great but in many ways it's not even a proper studio album. It's just a few bits and pieces, but the bits and pieces it presents aren't bad. While somewhat underwhelming as songs they show the skills of the 4 musicians: Robert Plant's amazing vocals, Jimmy Page's fearsome riffs, John Paul Jones' marvelous and sadly overlooked instrumental work and, most of all, the brilliance of the late John Bonham's drumming. While not massively satisfying as an album due to a lack of memorable songs aside from a song recycled from their debut it nevertheless serves as an enjoyable tribute to the legendary band and a testament to their skills. Led Zeppelin's last album was fine. At least it's was better than Cut the Crap by The Clash or Squeeze by The Velvet Underground. It's no masterpiece, but it was never going to be as it's just leftovers.

7. In Through the Out Door: Some might say this one is the last proper album by the band. While overshadowed by various issues the group were experiencing in their personal lives, this isn't as bad as many world have you believe. It's got Carouselambra which is pretty awesome and many of the songs on the album stay at a reasonable level of quality throughout. Although many seem to regard this as the worst one it's actually a perfectly decent album in many ways and, while short of classics, it's high on loud, heavy charisma and it still feels like the heavy band we all know and love. It's not a massively interesting album and it still never comes anywhere close to the heights of the band's previous work though. Even if they hadn't had to stop after the death of John Bonham, it seems perhaps the band was running out of steam a bit anyway. In fairness, they had just released 6 incredible albums so it's hardly surprising.

6. Led Zeppelin III: Out of the golden age of the band, this one is the weakest but don't let that fool you. It's still a terrific album. The only thing which lets it down is its lack of true classics. It's got Since I've Been Loving You, that devastating, screaming hurricane of a song with Robert Plant's best vocals ever (Quite possibly) but the other songs aren't among my favorites. It's got Immigrant Song which is a famous one but that one's a little too short for my liking. What makes this excellent is that it shows the band going in new directions. It's full of different styles but even the quieter acoustic tracks have the same preposterous levels of energy that the band always had. This is a very interesting album which is just as skilled as ever but takes the band to new, fascinating places and showcases a rich- and ultimately successful- kaleidoscope of musical styles. At least unlike the last one every single song isn't about sex.

5. Houses of the Holy: I love this album. It's a sorely underrated work. Sure, The Crunge is one of Led Zeppelin's worst songs and The Song Remains the Same is somewhat underwhelming, but virtually everything else is awesome. Can I just put it out there- D'yer Mak'er is a tune. The success of the album rides a lot on the incredible energy and the rock juggernauts throughout the album just keep coming and hit harder and harder. Even so, the best 2 tracks on the album are The Rain Song and No Quarter, 2 quieter songs which which show the band as masters of creating mood and show just how artistically skilled they really were. In fact, No Quarter is one of the very, very best songs from after LZ IV and is one of the best songs they ever did. This is an album that's rich, endlessly rewarding and ferociously energetic, and although it gets overlooked it is an absolute blast to listen to.      

4. Physical Graffiti: This is an outstanding album so it's tough to put it in 4th place. To be honest, this is neck and neck with the 3rd place. The only thing that lets this down in particular are a couple of duds and its sometimes exhausting length. It's a flawed, titanic musical juggernaut which is loud enough to shatter all the windows of 10 square blocks and which never stops thundering, hypnotizing and exploding until the very end. This is, in short, a flawed masterpiece. It's so experimental and interesting to listen to and it's got so many bangers we're spoiled for choice. It does show all of the band members at their peak and in general this is the peak of the band, since after this it went downhill. With 15 tracks, so many musical styles and more stunning peaks than you can shake a guitar at, how could you ever really come back to this level?

3. Led Zeppelin II: This is the one where every single song (Aside from the instrumental Moby Dick) is about sex (Or relationships anyway). This is also the one which has Living Loving Maid which has Led Zeppelin's most sexist lyrics ever and is one of their worst songs. It's also an utterly brilliant album. This one doesn't go for emotions. It goes for sheer euphoria and exhilaration. It's just so much fun in every way. The guitar riffs and vocals are amazing and John Bonham gets his moment to shine with Moby Dick. This album is just brilliantly fun and artistically ingenious in every way. I just love it and I can't recommend it enough. No matter how many times you listen to it it's still an utter thrill ride from start to finish. It also opens with Whole Lotta Love, one of the best rock songs ever and one where, when Robert Plant started singing it in Portugal, I nearly cried.

2. Led Zeppelin: The one that started it all. Even all these decades later, Led Zeppelin's debut is still a masterful and artistic rock album. It's the perfect introduction to the band. It shows the wide range of musical styles and influences the band always did and combines them with delightfully heavy hard-rock heaven, and all 4 of the band members are already blowing the roof off. This is a true mountain of an album which once again doesn't go for emotions or for narratives. It just goes for pure, full-on fun and with its endless experimentation, countless peaks, stunning aural explosions, John Paul Jones' superb work on the bass and organ, John Bonham's outstanding drumming, Robert Plant's demented wailing and Jimmy Pages' unreal guitar riffs, this is a truly stunning first album and one of the best debuts of all time.

1. Led Zeppelin IV: You were expecting something else? This is it. This is The album. It's got Stairway to Heaven and that song alone would put it in the top 3, but in general this explodes through the speakers like an ocean liner ploughing through a weapons factory and creates a truly awe-inspiring, devastating sound. This is Led Zeppelin at a peak seemingly higher than is scientifically possible and virtually every note is flawless. Even Misty Mountain Hop, the worst song on the album, still has plenty to offer. A genius, artistic, innovative work in every sense, this is admittedly unsubtle- every vocal, every chord, every note sounds and/or feels like a volcanic eruption- it is just so, so exhilarating to listen to. This also holds up remarkably well on multiple listens and is an album that doesn't really need to be reviewed. It's so good it needs no description. On the whole, Led Zeppelin's masterpiece and an album for the ages.

Thanks for reading.  

Rastaman Vibration review

The 8th album by Bob Marley. This one is... by the looks of it just more of the calm, soulful reggae music we'd expect from him.

Tracks:

1. Positive Vibration: 7/10 while a repetitive and safe track, it still gives out the positive vibrations it speaks of.

2. Roots Rock Reggae: 8/10 phoned-in slightly once again, but very, very pleasant.

3. Johnny Was: 8/10 well, this one certainly isn't phoned-in. It's a very powerful political song with real oomph.

4. Cry to Me: 7/10 decent, if maddeningly repetitive.

5. Want More: 7/10 another song that's technically efficient but largely forgettable.

6. Crazy Baldhead: 8/10 a gentle, intelligent and affecting political track with plenty of nuance.

7. Who the Cap Fit: 8/10 ditto.

8. Night Shift: 8/10 one of Marley's upbeat songs and a good one at that.

9. War: 8/10 essentially a political speech as opposed to a song. But what a speech it is.

10. Rat Race: 8/10 a lyrically cynical song backed with a cheer-inducingly good instrumental that concludes the album in style.

Best song: War
Worst song: Positive Vibrations

Summary: Admittedly, at first the listener could easily be underwhelmed. Some of the opening tracks just seem like Marley phoning it in. They're certainly not bad but they just feel so familiar and don't take any risks. Fear not: it's the calm before the storm. The second half of the album sees Marley launching into highly charged and moving political music and it really, really picks up. By the end the feeling is without a doubt one of satisfaction. It's not the absolute best by Marley (That would still be Catch a Fire) but it's a very enjoyable album most of the time even though it lacks any absolute classics.  



Final rating: 8/10