OK Computer: Under Review (DVD)
By Ryan Gray

I tend to ignore most so-called expert music reviewers and their picks or pans, which is quite ironic, being as I, too, frequently editorialize on such topics. What it comes down to is, besides record company execs and agents, who truly cares what someone else writes about a band? We like who we like. You may agree with a reviewer's take on a record, or you may think s/he is an asshole. Any musicians worth their meddle should give a rat's ass about how journalists and historians decipher their art.

Reviewer commentary satisfies human inquisition, and we all want to question everything, which is kind of what OK Computer does. How did we evolve, where we do we go, when do we die? Is there extraterrestrial life out there in the cosmos? Our theories and analyses form illogically and logically at the same time, so it seems contradictory to even try to quantify the quality of art. It is all, in the end and against all logic, purely subjective.

And that's precisely what makes it so difficult to explain Radiohead's 1997 anthem of alienation OK Computer, one of the best rock albums of the past three decades. Attempting to intellectually tackle as risky a band as Radiohead and its songs, not to mention the lyrics of Thom Yorke, can be a practice in futility. After all, the band probably wouldn't agree to sit down and explain themselves, which they don't for OK Computer: A Classic Album Under Review. That makes it an unauthorized documentary.

Still, the 59-minute analysis tries its best to bring interesting perspectives to the table, including those of music scribes Mark Paytress, Barney Hoskyns, David Stubbs and Jake Kennedy, as well as long-time Radiohead biographer Alex Ogg. Also on board for the crowning is Dai Griffith, author of a book on OK Computer, and the music department chair at Oxford's Brookes University. In other words, for those looking for a DVD of Radiohead in concert or even on video, this is not for you (though there are a few performance snippets).

Instead, OK Computer: A Classic Album Under Review is a commentary on how the assembled panel breaks down everything from OK's cryptic lyrics and album art to Johnny Greenwood's orchestral ambience. Much talk is spent on the aftermath of Radiohead's acclaimed The Bends, when they band retired to actress Jane Seymour's former mansion St. Catherine's Court in Bath, outside Oxford. It is those cathedral acoustics that formed the backbone of the resultant album's eerie, airy requiem, where they recorded the melancholia of the upcoming new millennium's already lost generation. The panel finds parallels of the latter in the political ascension of Tony Blair, and the world's pre-Y2K social paranoia.

Take “Airbag,” the album's first single that reflected the Radiohead's new electronica expermintalism, pre-Kid A. Yorke's distrust of public ransport and cars in particular seems innocuous, even as the song deconstructs the "ultimate safety zone." Listening to Radiohead explore its new range sets the tone for the rest of the album as a protest against a time of plenty and life too safe and comfortable. Same with “Fitter Happier,” the robotic interlude following “Karma Police” that functions as a recipe for a well-adjusted human (the only track I regularly skip), reflecting Yorke's overall discomfort with the oppression of conformism.

So yeah, OK Computer: A Classic Album Under Review is a worthy exercise for the discerning Radiohead fan. It provides insight but doesn't rival the original work. Which is another way of saying that, in the end, you might learn more from another listen to OK Computer. Sometimes, putting an album under a microscope is nothing more than Monday-morning quarterbacking. I prefer to hit play, sit back, and space out.

October 23, 2006