Radiohead - The King of Limbs

Like what the heck were the Strokes looking for from him?

gravitas

orchestral arrangement for "meet me in the bathroom"

julian casablancas wanted to practice his english accents for jokes

"12:51 (ondes martenot outtakes)"

here for it

first In Rainbows sessions were with Spike Stent.. Wonder what they were looking for

iirc even that was just because nigel was busy with something else at the time

I agree that In Rainbows sounds amazing… just saying it would have been interesting to hear it under a “warmer” producer. Maybe it would have been for the worse, we will never know.

Everyone has their own definition of what “dry” or “wet” in production means I guess. Iirc “dry” usually means very clean on effects and recorded without reverb or echo in the room and “wet” is the opposite.

I’m aware Radiohead’s songs are filled with effects but imho they sound “dry” because it’s usually very clear, specially on the first segments on their songs. Radiohead seem to love doing buildups for most of the song and releasing tension in the last minute - They’ve been doing it since “Creep” and refining it ever since - They need that “dry” cleaner sound otherwise when you keep adding layers later on it’s will sound way too saturated and they’ll end up sounding like a shoegaze band.

I can see why the Strokes thought they didn’t make a good match with Nigel. They tend to play very straight songs that can be translated live effortlessly, you need a “wet” sound if you’re not adding layers /as the song advances.

Maybe I’m not making sense. It’s been an exhausting day.

What I mean is that the strokes will make a song structure that goes:

Intro: vocals and lead guitar
Verse: enters bass and drums
Chorus: enter second guitar

And Radiohead will be more like

Intro: electronic drum loop and vocals
Verse: enter guitar 1 and some ambient effect
Verse 2: enter bass, guitar 2 and drums
Chorus: drop 1 of those and add a spooky moog
Bridge: leave random 3 of the above of your choice
Chorus 2: bring everything back but add the london symphony orchestra and start screaming

Maybe I'm in the minority for generally liking Godrich's production. Even on Terror Twilight. Always find it really warm and sparkly

Love Pavement and many of Godrich's productions with Radiohead, but Terror Twilight does nothing for me

It's just interesting to think about stuff like why the Strokes would've wanted to work with him, then. And in the end they put out the famously same-as-their-debut sounding "Room On Fire"... but in my memory it had a much bigger range of sounds than their first.

"i was thinking of doing this keyboard thing ..." "Get Radiohead's guy on the phone!"

I actually love how TKOL sounds, can’t agree with HTTT hate how thin and crisp everything sounds in that one.

Weird, to me HttT sounds the most like a big modern rock album to me...lots of bass, very compressed, some bigger drum sounds. I really like how it sounds, but it feels like they reacted against it on IR (lots of very dry '70s type drum sounds, like not a lot of room sound or compression-for-effect, with the exception of certain tunes or moments).

not a lot of room sound

I think this is a production problem with both IR and TKOL, though it's more pronounced on the latter. They're both quite "airless" sounding to my ears and it drives me a little nuts. Even on the most outre Kid A/Amnesiac tracks there's a sense of space which grounds the music and makes it feel "live." I think they rectified this a little bit on AMSP. I don't know what exact production techniques contribute to this besides reverb and mixing, but it's interesting to me how different their recordings sound from album to album.

Yeah, I always think of the drum sound on IR as being super home record-y and dry, but I guess it leaves room for the lush Ondes & string parts, and the guitars.

But then there's Reckoner, the only one with really bold choices on the drum sound (very compressed and roomy with the drum kit all on the right channel, and that incredibly recorded + verb-ed out tambourine in the left).

When I think of Terror Twilight, I think of The Hexx and how spacey and trippy it sounds. I wouldn't change the production on that at all.