[Danls92]

The big deal about it for me is just its feeling. It's the kind of album that I can play, close my eyes, and just get swept up in. What sets it aside from most other albums is that when I listen to it, I'm not listening to the instruments, or the sound of the singer, or even the words, it all just meshes together so perfectly. Now that I'm attempting to describe it I feel like I'm not getting the point across especially well.

 

[radiohlite]

For me this is their best album taken as a whole and not as a collection of good or bad songs. While the other albums have songs I've just got to hear sometimes regardless of context, Kid A I won't touch unless I'll go thorugh the whole thing.

It's like a trip through someone's mind, where all their good and bad sides are completely exposed. All the love and beauty and exhilaration of life, mixed in with the hate and fear and sadness of that same life; it's all there for you to experience.
The music takes you there submerging you in the dense textures. You close your eyes and surrender to this other universe before you, 'till you come out of the other side at the end.
yah, it's quite an experience for me. For some reason when I listen to it I don't find myself thinking "alrite, this is a good song, oh, this I don't like so much, ooh! nice melody here, etc." I just accept it, knowing these guys put their souls in this music and that's good enough for me.

 

[Mink]

Kid A is their best album in my opinion.
Not every song is great, but those that are really stand out, I never get tired of it...something I easily have with (and still have) with The Bends and OK Computer.

 

[MrGreen]

Quote:

Originally Posted by SweetAdeline /img/forum/go_quote.gif I could swear I saw you in the albums you don't get thread.

I "get" radiohead, unlike some people in that thread. I also "get" this album.
I just dont see what the huge fuss is about.

People didn't make this big a deal out of Hail to the Thief, Amnesiac, or The Bends. All three of which are 'just another radiohead album'. I'll leave Pablo honey out of it because thats just an awful album.

I agree that Kid A makes a better complete album than it does a collection of singles, however as an album it's still nothing special. Perhaps the aspect of the "mainstream" and the "hip" has something to do with it.

Quote:

Originally Posted by kwitel /img/forum/go_quote.gif Seriously...another Radiohead thread? Radiohead gets more attention on head-fi from the haters than it does the fans...

I am a fan of Radiohead.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mink /img/forum/go_quote.gif Kid A is their best album in my opinion. Not every song is great, but those that are really stand out, I never get tired of it...something I easily have with (and still have) with The Bends and OK Computer.

Yes, I agree that the great songs on the album are very good, however I don't think the quality of an individual track should be sacrificed for cohesiveness. OK computer is cohesive and for me just about the entire album is great tracks- something that I consider quite hard to do.

 

[leveller1642]

Interesting entry in Wikopedia;

Kid A - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Adreneline]

OK Computer >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> KID A.

Overrated. With a capital O. Overrated.

 

[gbacic]

Hail to the Thief > Kid A > Ok Computer

you all know it's the truth

 

[LingLing1337]

I think it's becoming cool to say that you don't like these brilliant albums... meta-hipsterism?

 

[Qonmus]

Quote:

Originally Posted by LingLing1337 /img/forum/go_quote.gif I think it's becoming cool to say that you don't like these brilliant albums... meta-hipsterism?

Perhaps some people just don't like it.

 

[Adreneline]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Qonmus /img/forum/go_quote.gif Perhaps some people just don't like it.

Qonmus wins the internet on logical logic.

 

[RedSky0]

Being heavily mainstream, and also kind of unique compared to anything that reaches critical mass it obviously developed a huge audience from people who had never heard anything like it. With that kind of audience, people's opinions compound upon each other's and their opinions become reinforced until untold numbers of people are proclaiming it the best album ever. The fact that it has a pseudo indie status when really it's anything but, also makes it something for people to rave about that want to maintain a cool, unique, distinctive persona but at the same time want to be relatable by listening to a band that most people generally know and have heard of.

It's highly layered and it has great production which is the usual for Radiohead but otherwise it just feels so ... detached and anesthetic. When people profess about it having a certain je ne sais quoi, or use any manner of combination of superlatives, I can't feel that either they've bought into the collective mindset about it or they simply haven't heard very many albums that aren't plastered on billboards or on the telly.

The way I see it, the album's a mishmash of ambient, electronica, jazz and bits of rock with a focus on ambient and some sense of post-rock structure every now and then. The problem is it does none of these particularly well. If you want good straight ambient, check out any number of Brian Eno albums, particularly Another Green World. If you want good ambient/jazz go listen to Bohren & der Club of Gore's Black Earth/Sunset Mission. If you want good ambient-ish electronica, Lights Out Asia's Tanks and Recognisers/Garmonia are both really good. As for post rock I could name dozens of albums that do instrumental build-up better than here where the song just meanders about where it stated for 3 minutes each time: Godspeed You! Black Emperor, Yndi Halda, Mono ...

It's not like I think it's terrible either, How to Dissapear Completely/National Anthem/Motion City Soundtrack are all pretty good songs and the whole albums feels like a 3.5/5 for me, but it's just so incredibly overrated it's not funny.

That would be my heavily opinionated impression anyway.

 

[Mink]

My main interest in music has always been indie pop and indie rock, I got into Sonic Youth long before I listened anything of Radiohead.
But my disdain for anything mainstream has long gone, I just like good music and Kid A is a great album.
I also have (and had before I got Kid A) a fair collection of albums of Brian Eno, Autechre and Aphex Twin, but I no longer listen to them, while Kid A for me remains an all-time favorite, in the same 'league' as Sonic Youth's Sister for instance.

 

[Jingo Lingo]

The big deal is that Kid A is a fantastic album. IMHO.

 

[MrGreen]

Quote:

Originally Posted by RedSky0 /img/forum/go_quote.gif That would be my heavily opinionated impression anyway.

These mirror my thoughts exactly (save for national anthem). Thought I was crazy.

 

[limpidglitch]

I'm right there with you, RS and MrG, and

Quote:

Originally Posted by RedSky0 /img/forum/go_quote.gif …anesthetic…

Is probably the the best one-word description I've seen of this album.

But. Brian Eno… I've got a massive glob of dislike for that man in my guts, I find his music even more over-hyped than Radiohead. Good Ambient isn't as sterile as that. Not even good synthetic ambient is as sterile as that.