Why is Radiohead so popular?

[NogbadTheBad]

Coldplay is just U2 with literally the Edge sanded off and replaced with keyboards. At the risk of sounding sexist it's music for suburban women in their 30s that want to be adventurous.

I went to a Coldplay concert (I like a couple of their albums) and a large portion of the crowd was exactly that demographic. Also a lot of younger females. The men there seemed to be there with women.

[JKL2000]

Sorry Jed but if you don't think Radiohead has any keyboard textures or interplay between bass and drums you're clueless. The interplay and layering of sounds is one of their greatest assets.

Right place at the right time is true of a lot of bands, who knows why some non-mainstream band clicks and others don't. As stated before their initial indie material was very much of that time in the UK, it was pretty much a shock to the majority when they veered away from the formula with OKC.

I may not have made it clear, but some kind of soloing is USUALLY required for me (not in every song, but in a majority on an album). If Radiohead has some songs with great guitar or keyboard solos, for example, let me know a couple.

[mnprogger]

Me neither. I think they're really over-overhyped.
Yorke's not a bad singer, but his voice sounds like he's under medication for depression or he's too bored.
Their music is mostly for background, no real edge.

I like some songs, but can't listen to a full album without getting bored or depressed.

I don't agree with this exactly, but you echo a lot of my feeling about Yorke and the band.

Plain and simple, the guy cannot sing, and thus his voice gets in the way. He sounds way too drugged-out and nasal.

And even considering the rest of their music, it just comes across as soft, lacking punch or energy to gravitate to.

I will credit them though to having influenced a ton of artists I love, mostly in progressive college rock from the late 90's to the present.

[GuitarGeek]

Radiohead seem like a band that's just on the verge of being something I'd like, if that makes any sense. That's how I felt when I watched them on Austin City Limits ago, it seemed liek there was something "not quite right", like all the pieces to the puzzle were there, but they weren't put together the right way.

The only song I ever really liked by them is Creep. The rest of them strike me as being either only just ok (eg Paranoid Android, Karma Police, and whichever one that has the video where the car blows up at the end with the people in it) or just artsy fartsy futzing around. On the ACL show, there was one song where the guitarist playing a modular synth, but he's getting these sounds out of it that sound more like he hacked an old Atari 2600 or an Odyssey II. (shrug)

BUt hey, they must be doing something right, because they've been very very successful, so in the end, what I think doesn't really matter anyway.

[GuitarGeek]

I may not have made it clear, but some kind of soloing is USUALLY required for me (not in every song, but in a majority on an album). If Radiohead has some songs with great guitar or keyboard solos, for example, let me know a couple.

I would argue that Creep, for one, has awesome guitar playing in it. But then I also think Get Off Of My Cloud is the height of great rock drumming, and Pete Townshend's I Can See For Miles solo is one of the greatest guitar solos ever, so again, my opinions are to be taken with suspicion at all times.

[2steves]

Radiohead has a certain X factor that gets your attention as this sounds interesting---like good art---this is good but I don;t love it---but thats about it for me---although I have some of their albums---I mean I know good/valuable music when I hear it but doesn't mean I love it----Radiohead has said they are not prog or proggy and they don't care for prog---that sort of made me not like them.

and Coldplay isn't U2---sure there is an influence but there are other influences and Coldplay has moved on to find it;s own voice---U2 for 20 years has been mediocre and boring --Coldplay has done some moving songs in the past 10.

[Facelift]

So, the question - why do you think Radiohead is so massively popular despite their progressive nature which should have put them probably as known as King Crimson but not as what they are known now, with millions sales figures and sold-out festival venues?

Are you questioning why they were ever popular, or merely wondering why they are popular now? You used the present tense, so I'll assume you meant the latter. A relatively short answer would be that this is one of the rare bands that became less accessible and more experimental over time, rather than in reverse. They were already fairly popular in the UK before OK Computer, but that made them hugely popular (I think the album sold around 7-8 million worldwide; possibly more), and led to fans re-discovering the prior two albums. I'm assuming you don't need much in the way of explanation for why OK Computer was such a big hit, and why there was a large belated interest in The Bends? The 1990s was a pretty great time to be a young band in its prime signed to a major label, and all kinds of things sold over 1 million copies in the '90s. Superunknown sold 9 million copies; Primus had a couple of million-selling albums, so the fact that Radiohead got in on the act is no great surprise. The Bends and OKC are artsy albums, but it's not like they aren't rock music with hummable choruses. Both albums were so melodically fertile that pianist Brad Mehldau helped launch his career by re-imagining a few of those tunes for a jazz trio.

So maybe the question pertains to why the band remained and remains popular? I guess that depends on how popular you think they are.

One way of looking at it is that the band's popularity quickly fell off a cliff after OKC: the albums released between 2001 and 2007 (four albums) didn't come anywhere close to matching OK Computer (those albums sold between 1.5 and 3 million per), and the two albums released since then do not appear to have even sold a million copies world-wide (numbers for In Rainbows (2007) and King of Limbs (2011) are admittedly complicated by the unorthodox manner in which they were rolled out). Albums don't sell like they used to, of course, but is it that crazy that Radiohead, a band that once had a huge world-wide smash hit album could hit the 500,000 mark in the 2010s? I don't think so, even though the albums we're talking about were not particularly commercial.

Cultural impact is a big reason why a rock band can have continued commercial success. Radiohead had a far greater cultural impact and influence than, say, King Crimson - whose popularity you thought Radiohead's might more properly resemble. King Crimson never had big hit albums, nor the subsequent media coverage that such hits provide. Radiohead got Rolling Stone covers and got to play Idioteque and National Anthem on Saturday Night Live. They were in the public consciousness in a way that - of the prog bands - is analogous to probably Genesis or Yes (though probably not Pink Floyd).

[aith01]

Coldplay is just U2 with literally the Edge sanded off and replaced with keyboards. [...]

That is great. I mean, I like some stuff by Coldplay and have a few of their albums, but your description is pretty much spot-on -- and very funny.

[Progbear]

I am fan. I hated the song “Creep” when it came out and had completely wrote the band off, but then when “OK Computer” kept getting rave reviews I decided to take a chance. It did not blow me away right away, but over time I have come to the conclusion that it is a masterpiece. I have most of their albums since, some of which I like better than others. I think they are innovative and definitely willing to try different musical avenues. I am not a huge fan of Thom Yorke’s voice, but it does work pretty perfectly with the material that they do. All that being said it kind of boggles my mind that they have gotten as big as they have. Their music just does not seem like something that would transcend to the level of public acceptance that it has.

Yeah, what you said basically. OK Computer came as a revelation after a decade of the moribund, conservative drivel passing itself off as “alternative.” And I’d put the execrable “Creep” in that category. Man, talk about a band improving after starting off showing virtually NO potential! I still haven’t really cracked the ice of Kid A; for whatever reason, Amnesiac (which I’m told was “leftovers” from the Kid A sessions) clicked with me immediately. I don’t get why people on this messageboard write these guys off, yet spurt with delight all over Porcupine Tree, who are basically doing the same thing just not as well or as interestingly. Why are PT “real” prog and Radiohead aren’t?

[aith01]

Yeah, what you said basically. OK Computer came as a revelation after a decade of the moribund, conservative drivel passing itself off as “alternative.” And I’d put the execrable “Creep” in that category. Man, talk about a band improving after starting off showing virtually NO potential! I still haven’t really cracked the ice of Kid A; for whatever reason, Amnesiac (which I’m told was “leftovers” from the Kid A sessions) clicked with me immediately. I don’t get why people on this messageboard write these guys off, yet spurt with delight all over Porcupine Tree, who are basically doing the same thing just not as well or as interestingly. Why are PT “real” prog and Radiohead aren’t?

This is just pure speculation on my part, but I think some of that may come down to a particular "sound" or brand that an artist/group has. Radiohead is very much all-over-the-place sonically, with a rather nebulous musical style that shifts not just from one album to the next but oftentimes from one song to the next. That's one of their strengths, IMO, but it took me years to actually start liking Radiohead. I found their nebulousness offputting at the time, because the kind of bands I tended to like had a "brand" or easily identifiable sound associated with their music. Bands like Genesis, Yes, ELP, Marillion, R.E.M., Tears For Fears, Steely Dan, to name just a few.

Now it could be argued that there is a "Radiohead sound", and there definitely is. But that sound is something altogether non-cohesive, sometimes feeling more like soundscapes than song structures we may be used to (even in prog circles). So while one might be able to tell that a song is by Radiohead, it might not be as easy to identify which song it is or which album it's from. This is of course not taking into account Thom Yorke's voice, which is pretty much inimitable.

With Porcupine Tree, they (and Steven Wilson) have a definite musical style that is pretty easily identified across their career. Maybe that has something to do with the apparent appeal of PT here, at least seeming to overshadow any fandom for Radiohead.

Just conjecture of course.

[Silantyev]

Are you questioning why they were ever popular, or merely wondering why they are popular now? You used the present tense, so I'll assume you meant the latter. A relatively short answer would be that this is one of the rare bands that became less accessible and more experimental over time, rather than in reverse. They were already fairly popular in the UK before OK Computer, but that made them hugely popular (I think the album sold around 7-8 million worldwide; possibly more), and led to fans re-discovering the prior two albums. I'm assuming you don't need much in the way of explanation for why OK Computer was such a big hit, and why there was a large belated interest in The Bends? The 1990s was a pretty great time to be a young band in its prime signed to a major label, and all kinds of things sold over 1 million copies in the '90s. Superunknown sold 9 million copies; Primus had a couple of million-selling albums, so the fact that Radiohead got in on the act is no great surprise. The Bends and OKC are artsy albums, but it's not like they aren't rock music with hummable choruses. Both albums were so melodically fertile that pianist Brad Mehldau helped launch his career by re-imagining a few of those tunes for a jazz trio.

So maybe the question pertains to why the band remained and remains popular? I guess that depends on how popular you think they are.

One way of looking at it is that the band's popularity quickly fell off a cliff after OKC: the albums released between 2001 and 2007 (four albums) didn't come anywhere close to matching OK Computer (those albums sold between 1.5 and 3 million per), and the two albums released since then do not appear to have even sold a million copies world-wide (numbers for In Rainbows (2007) and King of Limbs (2011) are admittedly complicated by the unorthodox manner in which they were rolled out). Albums don't sell like they used to, of course, but is it that crazy that Radiohead, a band that once had a huge world-wide smash hit album could hit the 500,000 mark in the 2010s? I don't think so, even though the albums we're talking about were not particularly commercial.

Cultural impact is a big reason why a rock band can have continued commercial success. Radiohead had a far greater cultural impact and influence than, say, King Crimson - whose popularity you thought Radiohead's might more properly resemble. King Crimson never had big hit albums, nor the subsequent media coverage that such hits provide. Radiohead got Rolling Stone covers and got to play Idioteque and National Anthem on Saturday Night Live. They were in the public consciousness in a way that - of the prog bands - is analogous to probably Genesis or Yes (though probably not Pink Floyd).

Great reply. Well thought. Thank you.

[moecurlythanu]

https://www.buzzfeed.com/lukelewis/t...Lm1#.pqLjMLdqy

Edit: Look at the walls behind the band.

[Scrotum Scissor]

Not all bands can be considered as forward thinking as John Payne and the Rock Pack, apparently!

B-but you get Journey, Foreigner, Toto, Asia and Michael Bolton in one whiff!

[bigjohnwayne]

One thing that I haven't seen mentioned in this thread (unless I skipped it, in which case: mea culpa) is that their lyrics express the anxiety which is the hallmark of many people who came of age in the late 90s through the present have grown up with.

I haven't kept up with Radiohead--though I respect them very much as artists I haven't bought one of their albums since In Rainbows.

There are prog artists who are very interested in the fear and emptiness of modern life--since at least "Signify" Steven Wilson especially seems fixated especially by the fate of the youth in our atomized society.

Radiohead's music has implicitly or explicitly raised questions about whether technology has actually improved our lives, the difficulty of escaping the conformity of consumerism, et al. Much like how the early modernists in literature and music were in many cases imitating the rhythms and textures of industrial modern life in order to artistically damn it, Radiohead has embarked on a campaign against modernity itself despite the high tech abstractions of their work.

Radiohead does this much more impressionistically than Porcupine Tree ever did, but no one has done it on a bigger stage. Of the philosophical anti-modernists who has a larger audience? Surely not the philosophers and academics. Maybe only the Pope.

[nosebone]

Whiny bastards

[JJ88]

Radiohead's music has implicitly or explicitly raised questions about whether technology has actually improved our lives, the difficulty of escaping the conformity of consumerism, et al. Much like how the early modernists in literature and music were in many cases imitating the rhythms and textures of industrial modern life in order to artistically damn it, Radiohead has embarked on a campaign against modernity itself despite the high tech abstractions of their work.

Radiohead does this much more impressionistically than Porcupine Tree ever did, but no one has done it on a bigger stage. Of the philosophical anti-modernists who has a larger audience? Surely not the philosophers and academics. Maybe only the Pope.

I remember flicking through someone's book on OK Computer. The inevitable 'are they prog' question came up and the writer drew parallels with ELP's Brain Salad Surgery, in terms of sharing similar concerns/unease about technology taking over.

As for their music, I do think The Bends and OK Computer are superb albums. Their early 00s material has also held up very well, I think- far better than almost every other big-selling UK band of that time to the point there's no comparison. Haven't heard their last few though.

[Rune Blackwings]

So, the question - why do you think Radiohead is so massively popular...?

because people take cat medication to get high...

[the winter tree]

I tried very hard to like this band but I have to admit I don't get them at all. I also am not fond of Porcupine Tree/Wilson so maybe that's part it...

[Score2112]

Radiohead, Muse, and Coldplay are the holy (or unholy) trinity of band people have said to me "oh, you should like them if you like Marillion," yet from what I've heard none of them have done anything for me. Granted, i haven't really heard all that much of any of them. Just enough to not want to go any further. I can appreciate what the OP says about Radiohead - maybe they have a more adventurous spirit than Marillion in being willing to change gears for an album, but to me it's not Prog if a certain amount of time/focus isn't dedicated to instrumental sections. Marillion isn't King Crimson, but they satisfy my need for soloing, interesting keyboard textures, interplay with bass and drums, etc. None of these other bands does.

To answer the OP's question, Radiohead was at the right place in the right time. Compared to crap like the Spin Doctors, Crash Test Dummies, Green Day, etc. Radiohead must have seemed pretty cutting edge to a lot of people.

Well said...and agreed. And as a fellow Marillion fan, I hear little similarity between them and the decent but overrated Radiohead.

[JJ88]

Personally I find Radiohead in another league to Coldplay and Muse. More subtle. Coldplay I've always found empty and platitudinous (although I gave the first one they did with Eno a go). Muse I think got increasingly more ludicrous with each album. after some decent work early on- a sort of comic book rock. All those conspiracy theory lyrics...someone once said Matt Bellamy was 'the David Icke of rock'!!

[mozo-pg]

Personally I find Radiohead in another league to Coldplay and Muse. More subtle. Coldplay I've always found empty and platitudinous (although I gave the first one they did with Eno a go). Muse I think got increasingly more ludicrous with each album. after some decent work early on- a sort of comic book rock. All those conspiracy theory lyrics...someone once said Matt Bellamy was 'the David Icke of rock'!!

I think Radiohead are in an entirely different universe compared to Coldplay and Muse. In a good way.

[Facelift]

Well said...and agreed. And as a fellow Marillion fan, I hear little similarity between them and the decent but overrated Radiohead.

How is post-Fish Marillion even prog? It's adult contemporary music with solos. Radiohead is quite beyond anything that Marillion does. And putting them in the same category with Muse or Coldplay is just ridiculous and evidences little understanding of what they are doing.

[Trane]

As above, No Idea. Same goes for Muse.

mMMhhh!!!..; The Muse indeed had a similar rise from Alt Rock to Proggy Rock with their third album

They earned their indie/altrock cred *before* introducing more overt "proggy" elements.

I suppose that's the main reason, indeed. Some can hear already proggyness in The Bends, but I don't really.

TBH, I only kept Kid A and OKC, got rid of the later "post-rock" stuff (Amnesiac, Thief, etc...)
Just like I only kept Absolution and BH from Muse. (The Queen influences coming after those two was slightly interesting, but sometimes bordered on shameless pop stuff.

Coldplay is just U2 with literally the Edge sanded off and replaced with keyboards. At the risk of sounding sexist it's music for suburban women in their 30s that want to be adventurous. Muse is a little more interesting by taking the Radiohead template, cranking up the guitars, and adding some Queen-like grandiosity. There's some multi-part suites in their catalog as well. But it was Radiohead that broke through first. I think that OK Computer, the Bends, and Kid A are truly great records and have influenced a host of indie/alt bands. As noted above there is plenty of interplay in the rhythm section. Hell, there's even playing with time sigs, which is routine for prog but not for indie rock. I wouldn't say that their experiments with electronics are at the cutting edge but among their indie peers they're ahead of the curve. Definitely small "p" progressive.

never really paid attention to Coldplay... which album should I start with?

As mentioned, Ok Computer did everything. People who had absolutely no contact with 70s rock music welcomed this as some kind of a revelation, when it's simply the same old thing in an indie package. For the masses Radiohead are still considered as some kind of avant-garde innovators. But obviously always approachable. Quality of songwriting is also relevant: they're overrated as hell but they're a good band, and I consider Kid A and Amnesiac to be significant and to the point records

agreed and if I love Kid A, I don't care anylmore for Amnesiac.

[JJ88]

I wouldn't bother with Coldplay really. I seem to remember I liked that one with Eno for a bit, but I quickly went off it. Haven't bothered with anything since- hated the stadium rock grandstanding on singles like 'Paradise' or whatever it's called.

I think Amnesiac has some great music on it. 'Pyramid Song' in particular is tremendous.

I think Radiohead are in an entirely different universe compared to Coldplay and Muse. In a good way.

Absolutely. With Muse, I find I can still handle their earlier music like 'New Born'. They lost it for me with silly things like 'Invincible' and 'United States Of Eurasia', it's like Queen without the humour. Haven't listened to an album since The Resistance but have heard lots via their TV appearances and the like- again, things like 'Supremacy' are just daft IMHO.

[Stevie B]

When I went to Glastonbury festival in 1997 I'd never heard of Radiohead, much less heard any of their stuff. The weather that weekend was horrendous, the place was a mud bath, and when it was their turn to play the pyramid stage I couldn't really be bothered to head down. Our tent was pitched overlooking the stage - albeit quite far away up on the hill - and I could just as easily have stayed there sheltered from the rain and listened to the muffled sound and watched the big screens. But a couple of the people I was with were big fans and persuaded me to get off my arse and go down to watch the show properly...

...quite simply it is the best gig I have ever attended, which is quite something considering I'd never heard a note of theirs before. I was simply blown away by the pristine sound, the quality of the playing, the quality of the songs and the voice of Thom Yorke. Despite the fact I was standing in the middle of a muddy field with the rain lashing down on me the whole thing seemed to fly by. Needless to say I bought OK Computer (just out a few weeks I think) at the first opportunity and quickly became enthralled with it. It is still easily one of my top ten albums.

I saw them again a few years later and honestly was a bit disappointed. I've got all the albums they've done since that Glastonbury gig and there's always something to enjoy in them, but nothing has so far recaptured the magic I felt that night almost exactly 20 years ago. I don't know why they are so popular, but this is my experience with them.