Artist: Radiohead
Label: EMI Records
Release: 2009
Rating: 3.8/5
Hail to the Thief is already the sixth studio album from the English lads in Radiohead. After the excellent Amnesiac, plenty of people probably expected even more experimenting, more guests and simply more of everything, but Radiohead love to surprise. With Hail to the Thief they went back to basics and gave us, for the first time in a long while, a record that isn’t packed with musical experiments, but is a more normal indie rock album.
Hail was mostly recorded in Los Angeles, and in just two weeks at that, since the band was in a hurry to get back home to the warm hearth. This time the album title is meant as an indirect jab at the then US president (George W. Bush), who is portrayed as a thief rather than a leader. The artwork is also dedicated to capitalist American society. Stanley Donwood and Thom Yorke (the creators of the cover and the artwork) once again painted society, in a rather upbeat way, as a hopeless maze of capitalist slogans.
The moment it hit the market, the album was a huge commercial success, but longtime fans and critics weren’t nearly as happy. To this day Hail to the Thief is considered one of Radiohead’s weakest outings, which may be a bit too harsh after all, since there are plenty of aces and beautiful moments on it.
If I said in the intro that this is an ordinary indie rock record, that’s definitely not the whole story, because Radiohead are anything but ordinary. The fact is that this album is conceived in a simpler way at its core. There are more melodies, more straight-up playing, fewer ambient parts. Some would say the album is more “honest”, since it hides nothing behind various experiments and weird sounds, and the guys take us on a more typical rock journey instead. Don’t go thinking they forgot about the less direct stuff, though. You can still hear quite a few electronic and ambient parts, but far fewer than on some of their earlier work. Compared to some other “mainstream” acts, Radiohead are still untouchable innovators here, but measured against their own past, they simplified their sound quite a bit. Part of the reason may be that they wanted to record the album in as little time as possible, so the sound ended up simpler and more stripped down, something singer Thom Yorke later expressed regret about, saying they made a mistake by not devoting more time to the project. Either way, I quite like this rawer face of the Radiohead sound, even though it sort of takes them back to the days of The Bends (only with more electronics here). This Radiohead is also really easy to love, with more melodies on offer than there have been in ages. There are more guitars too (acoustic and electric), fewer electronic parts and lots of piano. Thom Yorke also doesn’t sound so sleepy, but rather more composed and listenable. You could even say the album is more organic and rock-oriented, so it might suit those music connoisseurs who never fell for all those Radiohead sonic assaults on the earlier records.
The reissue once again hides at least one extra CD. On it we can hear some of the stuff that came out on singles (There There, Go to Sleep, Com Lag and 2 + 2 = 5) and a few other (live) recordings. You can see why these things didn’t make the album, since some of them feel too half-baked. I said I like the more basic feel of the album, but some things here are done way too half-heartedly. There’s definitely potential in some of the songs, but this second disc can’t compare to the first.
Thom Yorke’s lyrics are once again very critical. This time he seems to focus more on the USA, which is probably a direct result of recording the album in California. The spotlight is on attacks on political bigwigs and capitalist exploiters. Radiohead have been showing their discontent with the system since the very beginning, but I have to wonder whether that kind of criticism is even still fitting here, with quite a few million pounds already under their belts, since they’ve become capitalists too. Radiohead dispelled such doubts with their very next album (In Rainbows), which they offered to their listeners for free, with everyone paying only what they felt was right.
For the first time since Pablo Honey, Radiohead made an album that isn’t all that original, and mostly leans on tried-and-true aces. But Radiohead can afford it, since over the years of experimenting with new sounds and influences they were also building a style of their own that you can’t mistake for anyone else’s. So Hail to the Thief isn’t their most original album, but it still shows that Radiohead feel comfortable in their own skin and have found a sound that is entirely theirs. This record is great again, because this time Radiohead focus more on melody and not so much on experiments. All in all, you could say that from their point of view this is a different kind of album, at least in the sense that they aren’t reinventing the wheel, but relying on tried-and-true recipes.
Lineup
Thom Yorke – vocals, guitar, keyboards
Colin Greenwood – bass, synthesizer
Jonny Greenwood – guitar, keyboards, percussion
Ed O’Brien – guitar, effects, vocals
Phil Selway – drums, percussion
Production
Radiohead
Track listing
CD1:
1. 2 + 2 = 5 (The Lukewarm.) 3:19
2. Sit down. Stand up. (Snakes & Ladders.) 4:19
3. Sail to the Moon. (Brush the Cobwebs out of the Sky.) 4:18
4. Backdrifts. (Honeymoon is Over.) 5:22
5. Go to Sleep. (Little Man being Erased.) 3:21
6. Where I End and You Begin. (The Sky is Falling in.) 4:29
7. We suck Young Blood. (Your Time is up.) 4:56
8. The Gloaming. (Softly Open our Mouths in the Cold.) 3:32
9. There there. (The Boney King of Nowhere.) 5:23
10. I will. (No man’s Land.) 1:59
11. A Punchup at a Wedding. (No no no no no no no no.) 4:57
12. Myxomatosis. (Judge, Jury & Executioner.) 3:52
13. Scatterbrain. (As Dead as Leaves.) 3:21
14. A Wolf at the Door. (It Girl. Rag Doll.) 3:23
CD2:
1. Paperbag Writer
2. Where Bluebirds Fly
3. I Am Citizen Insane
4. Fog (Again) (Live)
5. Gagging Order
6. I Am A Wicked Child
7. Remyxomatosis (Cristian Vogel RMX)
8. There There (First Demo)
9. Skttrbrain (Four Tet RMX)
10. I Will (Los Angeles Version)
11. Sail to the Moon (Jo Whiley Show, 28. maj, 2003)
12. 2 + 2 = 5 (COM LAG)
13. Go to Sleep (Zane Lowe, 8. december, 2003)
