English
Once, because of the entry into the new millennium, making a review of popular 90s music, a prestigious British music critic referred to Radiohead´s album ´The Bends´ (1995) as “the best album of the decade”, but chose not to include its successor in time, the colossally acclaimed ´OK Computer´ (1997) in his list. When asked for the reasons of such clamorous omission, he answered that ´OK Computer´ was simply the best album of all time. Despite the magnitude of this hyperbole, and aside from any consideration towards the degree of truth that such a statement could have -music critics, just like philosophy, literature, art, science and any other creative activity, don´t bother with truth, as you should already know- it wasn´t particularly hard to understand in its true reach, due to its expressive and dramatic meaning. This was because it reflected the formidable impact that both albums had in the post-grunge era of rock music, just when signs of dominant reification were becoming apparent in the following years.
Radiohead, who will offer a concert at the Prudential Center in Newark, NJ, five miles from New York, on the 1st of June (http://radiohead.com/tourdates/01-06-12_newark-nj) didn´t wish to be victims of their own unexpected success. Their albums, up until then, had described some sort of melancholic, reflective and critical sadness, borderline depressing and where lyricism and art offered all its resistant potential facing the havoc of an unjust political and social order, which was destroying the economy, dehumanizing life, plasticizing existence, heartbreak, the passing of time, death…
Suddenly being turned into supermarket and elevator music, into stars of the show, in an acclaimed product and in a number one hit, caused a crisis in the band to which they responded in an adequate manner by attempting their own disappearance -a regular topic in the band´s songs, such as ´How to Disappear Completely´ or ´Weird Fishes/Arpeggi´- in the way that one may disappear through the type of art and writing that they´re actually telling.
Then began a fascinating and obscure era, whose first aim was get rid of the burdens and distance themselves from those fans who were there because of the inertia of the market and the times. From that moment, there was the permanent feeling that Radiohead could also physically disappear any of these days and also that every new album, announced by surprise in innovative ways in ways relating to the possibilities that the net offered, could also be their last.
A danger that also affects their tours, a reason why there´s a feeling of sublime apocalypse surrounding each of their unforgettable concerts, as you will be able to experience when you rent apartments in New york on those dates.
