By only now doing an appraisal of Radiohead’s latest opus, the King Of Limbs, I may seem like I’m not exactly Mr Current Affairs. However, the delayed reaction is actually pretty calculated and totally on purpose. This is mainly due to the fact that its sudden release resulted in a CNN-esque blizzard of blanket coverage and hysteria. Much like a natural disaster a la Haiti or Japan, it becomes omnipresent news for a brief flicker, before people move onto something else soon after. The coverage and excitement surrounding the King of Limbs’ release was pretty bizarre all round. While I listened to it immediately with baited breath and was discussing its track by track merits with mates on GChat, (Hi McQuaid) it brought back memories of an era when we waited excitedly for an album to be released, used to go out and buy said album, come home, and savoured the listening experience. A bygone era. Those long gone days when people used to buy music. Strange, now when you think about. Places like Zavvi, oh the memories…

So thats what the King of Limbs release felt like, to a real music fan, reliving that experience. Which is completely normal. However, the hysteria in the press was a bit stranger, front page news on each paper, a cultural event of the year type adulation, and what illustrated it all best, Neil McCormick’s ‘live review’ in the Telegraph, updated every five minutes with his own track by track take. I’d never heard of that anywhere else before. Perhaps a bit much…? So as a result of all this, was The King of Limbs really going to be reviewed and appraised accurately? Radiohead getting a ‘fair’ trial? The best band in the world’s new album was always going to be pretty ‘amazing’, before anyone had even heard a note. And so the reports came to pass in that manner, and it immediately got universally positive and gushing reviews. 

Now lets have a look at it objectively. Is it that good? I’m not so sure. And thats essentially because Radiohead are kind of paradoxically victims of their own success. They are masters of their craft, which guarantees any output is going to be good to some extent. But being victims of their own success, it must be getting harder to come out with genuinely brilliant work that stands up to all their other material. And I don’t think the King of Limbs does that. In its own right, it is a very good album, and if it was any other band, it would probably be hailed as a masterpiece. But just because its Radiohead, you can’t help thinking that its just not THAT good. And if reviewers are saying its good, maybe its a case of the emperor’s new clothes, and being in denial of its true worth.

If you look at their chronology and discography, their ascension to their current status has been consistently upward and stellar. Pablo Honey never really counts, we’ll let that go… The Bends was an incredible mix of emotional, intelligent yet wholly anthemic rock, OK Computer built on that with even more textured soundscapes and is now often regarded as one of the greatest albums of all time. Kid A was the revolutionary bold electronica experiment that was spectacularly successful (Amnesiac counts as part of that), Hail to the Thief was a rewarding and epic attempt and marrying old and new, while In Rainbows was where they had finally mastered and refined said marriage into wonderfully resonant and emotive songs, yet that were incredibly accessible. So each one represented a progression of sorts. Where were they going to go with this one?

The answer is, nowhere new really. Its not a patch on In Rainbows as a fully realised piece. I have a feeling it was recorded quite quickly, and for such a short album, not every track is a stand out. ‘Feral’ for instance is particularly weak for a Radiohead track, and sounds like a b side or out take from some saccharine experimental recordings. Thom Yorke’s dalliance with the South London dubstep sound continues, and is pretty prominent and takes over a lot of the record, for example, in ‘Feral’ and ‘Bloom’. The only thing is, these sounds are quite common these days, and people like Burial are the pioneers at this kind of stuff. Radiohead do so much other things so much better that they should really stick to and focus on. Each track sounds like a bit from previous albums, with some of the gloomy piano driven moments in Amnesiac recalled in Codex, or the Neil Young sounding Give Up the Ghost, which recalls a gentler version of How to Disappear Completely perhaps, but the King of Limbs stuff just isn’t as powerful as the predecessors. Like I said, victims of their own success. Good songs. Just not THAT good. And as a Radiohead fan, you may feel its all a little bit flat or deflating, and doesn’t stand up to repeated listening, particularly when you are used to such majestic brilliance.

So, it is a good album, and there are moments that really do stand up. Separator is a fantastic song, tender the whole way through with beautiful cocophany of gentle waves of sound that will give you pangs in your chest. Classic Radiohead. And speaking of classic Radiohead, Little by Little is probably the most Radiohead sounding song ever, if you know what I mean, showcasing some amazing vocal melodies, and Jonny Greenwood veering into Spanish guitar territory. Thom Yorke does a fine piano ballad by this stage (could rival Lionel Ritchie anyday, no doubt) and Codex, in fairness, is a very finely judged emotive piece of work.

One thing I will say that sets the album apart from previous works though, is that its a very content record throughout, and showcasing a band that are seemingly much mellower, mature and at ease with themselves. There are no targets or bile directed, which have always been a hallmark of Yorke’s, and there isn’t any of the tension in his voice that was such a big feature of many albums, particularly Hail to The Thief or parts of In Rainbows. Maybe he’s finally chilled out and eased into himself after all these years, and he’s not so concerned with his Chomsky-esque views on well, pretty much everything. And such mellow contentment suits Radiohead. Its a pleasant new aspect to their already utterly refined sound. Its certainly not ‘depressing’, to use that associated tag that absolute philistines have long used to describe them.

Ultimately, and post hysteria, The King of Limbs is a pretty good album. Just not really by Radiohead’s standards. Must be tough gig composing songs in a band that good…