Track Listing

1. Everything In Its Right Place
2. Kid A
3. National Anthem
4. How To Disappear Completely
5. Treefingers
6. Optimistic
7. In Limbo
8. Idioteque
9. Morning Bell
10. Motion Picture Soundtrack

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #551 in Music
• Released on: 2000-10-02
• Number of discs: 1

Amazon.co.uk Review
Radiohead may well be the most courageous band in Britain. Their second album, The Bends, was a success both critically and commercially, and they followed it up with an album of epic prog-rock, OK Computer, that would have destined a lesser band to commercial failure and, eventually, obscurity. Instead, it was almost universally hailed as one of the finest albums ever recorded. So it should come as no great surprise that their fourth album, Kid A, is even more experimental, owing a debt to the studio-born soundscapes of Brian Eno, Aphex Twin and even later Talk Talk. Kid A is an album that would not sound out of place on the Warp Records roster, as keyboards, sequencers and electronic effects take the place of guitars on most tracks (particularly unusual for a band that boasts three guitarists). In fact, this is an album that succeeds without rock's bombast, from the looping keyboards of album opener "Everything In Its Right Place" to the bouncing, bass-led "The National Anthem" to the album's hauntingly atmospheric highlight, "Idioteque". Meanwhile, more traditional Radiohead tracks like "How To Disappear Completely" and "Optimistic" offer a natural bridge between the electronic noodlings of Kid A and the (slightly) more mainstream-sounding OK Computer. Radiohead may well be the most innovative popular band since the Beatles; as such, Kid A represents the most successful evolution of a major British act since Sgt Pepper's. --Robert Burrow

CD Description
1997's OK COMPUTER turned the rock world on its ear by bringing visionary neo-prog rock touches to a Britpop format. Consequently, KID A was one of the most anticipated releases of its era. This limited edition comes in a fine, rigid, oversized high-quality glossy paginated format, with artwork by the same hand as the regular edition, and with speculative philosophical jottings heading each page. No secret booklet, though.
On KID A, Thom Yorke's passionate wailing is put through the aural wringer, and the band's previous nimbly orchestrated full-frontal sonic assault is replaced by full-frontal electric piano, to iconoclastic effect. The ambient underpinnings and garbled vocals of "Everything in Its Right Place", and the instrumental "Treefingers", the electronic beats of "Idioteque", and Yorke's processed voice on the titletrack will come as quite a shock to diehard '70s rockers who spent the late '90s deifying Radiohead as heirs to the Pink Floyd throne. But these touches work brilliantly, while the more organic elements, such as the jazzy horn section on "The National Anthem", and the comparatively conservative arrangement (though there's some unsettlingly atonal orchestration lurking here, too) of "How to Disappear Completely" provide a counterpoint to all this incipient modernism.

Customer Reviews

Not exactly what we expected?
Where are Radiohead coming from and why are we so passionate about them? I read somewhere once that Thom said "lets play something happy, we've got loads of them haven't we lads?" and to me that said it all. Radiohead's music embodies something else completely removed from pop and the the top 40 as it's as far to be.

All of there albums portray life from a realist's point of view. Life isn't full of ABSOLUTE happiness for anyone ever - it is filled with lots of mundanity, fear, boredom and stacks of background noise. Radiohead describe this completely in Kid A.
When I first listened to this I thought avant garde bollocks to be honest, but repeated listens revealed a new world of music to me. I don't think it's something you could ever put on at a party to impress your mates but if you dig it then it will become something you treasure. It shows what Radiohead are all about - not misery and sorrow as it seems at first - but life at it's most raw. This is where we all live most of the time (even if we are having a great time in our life the news just tells us the horrible things happening elsewhere). Radiohead show life, musically, in a beautiful and profound way and for that I love and thank them.

If you try the best you can, the best you can is good enough
Mission accomplished. With Kid A, Radiohead have successfully managed to alienate half their fanbase whilst simultaneously delighting the rest of us. Certainly there's nothing remotely indie-schmindie about it - then again, in musical terms Radiohead left that kind of thing behind a long while ago. How many bands in this day and age could successfully attempt something so wilfully eclectic and - deep breath - experimental? Very few, surely.

The spookily warm cut-up electronica of Everything In Its Right Place kicks off the LP, and the eerie mood is maintained throughout, notably on the Eno-inspired intermission Treefingers and the just-downright-odd title track. The National Anthem and Optimistic are two of the LP's most atypical tracks, in the sense that they sound most like 'traditional' Radiohead songs, although ...Anthem clatters to a wonderfully satisfying conclusion in a hail of jazzy noise. Optimistic is notable for its tribalesque drumming from Phil Selway and some rare (for this LP) choppy fretwork from Jonny Greenwood.

Then, of course, there's the so-called dance track Idioteque, its apocalyptic, warped sound (pun intended) marking it out as possibly the most un-Radiohead-sounding Radiohead track ever. It's utterly surprising, utterly brilliant and, for a band of Radiohead's standing, utterly unique.

There has been much vapid criticism of Kid A's supposed impenetrability and inaccessibility, but while it may be a mile apart from their previous work, it's much less difficult and complicated than you may have heard, and undeserving of the (inevitable) mass critical dissection that it's received. Ultimately, it stands as another fine body of work from, lest we forget, one of the most important bands of this generation.

Strange but great
I bought Kid A after buying and enjoying OK Computer, and at first I was a little disapointed. The style at first seemed very different from that of OKC, and the weird tunes and bizzare lyrics/vocals seemed baffling. I held this opinion untill about my 3rd listening of the album, when, and I know you've heard this 100+ times on this page already, but it really is true, it suddenly grows on you and you realise that you love this album. The songs are wonderful, not just because they are different, which is what people seem to praise it mostly for, but because they are excellent songs in themselves, whether they are as unique as they are or if it had been done 100 times before. The best tracks are probably 'How to dissapear completely', which is more traditional Radiohead quality, and 'Idioteque', perhaps the track which takes longest to appreciate, but it's bizzare lyrics and atmospheric sound make it a masterpiece of a song, and despite what some think, still sounding like Radiohead if you listen. Lots seem to hate this album, and I think it is just a case of personal preference, not a case of 'intellegence' or 'snobbery' as some argue. It is definately a 1 or 5 star album, and I would definately choose 5 stars. Weirdly brilliant.