Taking Sides - Amnesiac vs. Kid A

As for being Roger Waters being "functionally illiterate," well, nicely inflammatory but obviously not true. I think even a non-believer could see the care and thought put into most of his lyrics. That's _my_ problem with his lesser lyrics, that they're far too obvious and belabored (while I also like the totally preconceived and over-the-top riddles of someone like Peter Gabriel *scratch head*). For myself, most of the lyrics on the Pink Floyd albums _Dark Side Of The Moon_, _Wish You Were Here_, _Animals_ are deeply emotionally and intellectually satisfying.

Yes, the production has something of a uniform sound, but it's _designed_ as one long experience, an album length work -- there's a reprise, for Allah's sake, and quotes from past songs. If you categorically don't like "concept albums," (that's a nebulous phrase), "suites" or long-form works in general, well, that's your own choice. Personally, I think it would do us all well to develop a musical attention span.

The Easer is much better than both though.

FIXED.

But RH are very much a guilty pleasure.

whatever guy, it's like normal 'hip-hop' speed.

you gotsta be kidding.

I still stand by my "In Limbo" statements upthread, although I'd change the caveat to say the "Pyramid Song" surpasses it.

Mix and master your records right, kids.

I think these two are arguing about two differing performances, not recordings.

ding the money. it gets good again at the end too, blud.

'kid a' easy anyway. 'amnesiac' has its moments. am an uneasy radiohead fan. i mean, uneasy to BE one, not the other thing.

lol was in indie club at xmas, they played 'idiotheque'.

Kid A and Amnesiac and HTTT are all too loud and not dynamic enough, thus they will sound better live wgere you have more variation in volume and thus excitement. EIIRP is HUGELOUD and yet it's meant to be this delicate electronic whimsy thing.

I don't buy the idea that x is meant to be this/that/other = exact reproduction of live performance.

Optimistic is the worst offender here, they should have made more out of the big thuddy incessant drums that characterised the live version.

I liked Amnesiac best for a long time, and I still think it's great. The electronic stuff sounds the most convincing on that record, plus Pyramid Song, Life in a Glass House, etc.. I definitely listen to HttT more these days, though.

Kid A has great moments (EIIRP, National Anthem, Idioteque), but I rarely listen to it all the way through.

Hmmm. No. I mean, no such thing as "perfection" obviously, because it's subjective, but... oh bollocks to it, I have a car to buy.

Amnesiac on the other hand sounds like the whiny Floydy wankery that I normally associate Thom and chums with.

The first half of Kid A is pretty uneven - I don't particularly enjoy The National Anthem, Kid A, or Treefingers, and they seem totally ignorant of any electronic music that came before them. However, I think the sequence of songs starting with Optimistic is the best thing on either of these two albums.

Kid Amnesiac

I mean, all that bass and drums and brass... Can't get much more electronic than that.

Hmmmm.. I think I can see where you're going with this. I'd been a seriously rabid Warp fan for some time before Kid A came out and on hearing it I couldn't decide whether it was good that they'd gone down this path or whether they had created some kind of Blue Nun of electronic music. Treefingers works as a mood piece or just as basic ambient music but it doesn't really do very much and its attempt to ape SAWII just seems tokenistic.
Kid A sounds and the National Anthem also sound a little immature. It sounded like Thom had picked up on Windowlicker then bought the entire Warp catalogue and thought "I want to sound like this now" but not really known how to go about it.
How To Disappear Completely just hangs in the air quite pleasantly but Thom's self indulgence starts to bleed through.

The second half of the album is much better and tracks like Optimistic and Idiotheque are much more realised.

I think if I'd have been about 16/17 when Kid A came out I'd have been amazed with it in the same way I fell in love with Giant Steps for being an eclectic rock album. Sadly I'd already started reading ILM so there was no going back.

On Amnesiac, yes it has some very good tracks "You And Whose Army?", "Pyramid Song" and "Life In A Glasshouse" particularly. "Knives Out" sounds like a boring retread of "Karma Police" with a very shit video to boot. Never liked the album version of "Spinning Plates" and yeh the album seems to lose itself quite quickly on the second half, only being resolved with the last song.

If Kid A and Amnesiac had been released as a double album I'd say it was Radiohead at their most adventurous and that they'd made some kind of sprawling prog-epic up there with the White Album and Mellon Collie. With double albums you can get away with a few experiments. But somehow splitting them in two cheapens them and shows up the less succesful moments on the album. This is because if you've spent £13.99 on an eleven track rock album and four of those tracks are IDM experiments, ambient mood pieces and dubious filler then you're going to feel ripped off. If you buy a rock double album for £16.99 and it's abrim with new and exciting ideas from rock to electronica, brass bands, dixie horns, bells and whistles, you'd hail it as an epic.

I wish I had these albums on me now, they remind me of university.

Does that make sense? I'm not feeling too literate this morning.

I'm not bothering anymore. Got to take it as is.