RADIOHEAD | THE BENDS
After achieving overnight success worldwide on the back of one giant self-loathing song known as “Creep”, Radiohead set out to to prove they had more to offer. The Bends was a triumph achievement receiving both massive critical and commercial acclaim.
Witnessing bands grow from album to album while finding themselves is a special treat for all music lovers. No band has done this at such mind-blowing pace as these five unassuming lads from Oxfordshire. The Bends was the first leap in their evolution that would continue for every album since. Opening track “Planet Telex” establishes the band as already indistinguishable from their previous album. Delayed-keyboards and fussy drums set-up the rhythms for Thom Yorke’s crushing vocal, of which he recorded lying on his back swigging from a bottle of wine.
Title track “The Bends” is guitarist Jonny Greenwood’s song, showcasing his unique style of axe-wizardry. The lyrics “where do we go from here” are soon answered with glorious fervour. The chorus soars into the clouds and feels anthemic, a high that appears again on the album’s hardest rocker “Bones,” striking gold on the line “I used to fly like Peter Pan.”
The ballads on the album are nothing more than classic. “High And Dry” is as simple as the band gets in production and the stripped down honesty gives the album some much needed roots for grounding. “Fake Plastic Trees” is the album’s purest moment. Yorke recorded the vocals in two takes after watching Jeff Buckley perform live. Yorke burst into an emotional fit of tears when he completed the track. As the song reaches its climax its hard to not be moved by the strings and the band firing on all cylinders, bursting at the seems. Though the lyrics are somewhat unintelligible in parts the song sounds nothing like anything their contemporaries were doing at the time. With grunge and alt-rock dominating the world it took balls to release such a slow track as a single. The record company asked for a more ‘radio-friendly’ mix of the song which the band instantly denied.
“Nice Dream” is a mid-tempo lament rounding out the first half of the album. It creates the sensation of floating in a peacefully serene cloud, contrasted by the bridge which collapses in to agitation, like tossing in your sleep. But by the end of the song we’re in a dreamy garden of eden, high on soma, the final chords of the song dripping into the abyss.
“Just” was an attempt at the band trying to fit as many chords into a song as possible. It’s progression is sneaky, bluesy and searing. As Thom dryly sings “you do it to yourself, you do” it’s clear the band can’t shake having an abundance of hooks. The climbing guitars keep walking up a ladder to the heavens until Jonny’s pitch-shifted guitar explodes into one of the highest notes possible, letting it ring before it crumbles underneath the weight of its own creation. It feels like trying to hold a blissful high but inevitably being unable to keep it.
“My Iron Lung”, the ill-fated lead single from the album was deemed “too raucous” for BBC radio and kept the band from having another initial big hit, but it’s major to minor chord shifting fits perfectly at home within the album’s mid section. “Black Star” and “Sulk” are Brit-rock friendly songs to round out the album’s more morose undertones.
“Bullet Proof…I Wish I was” falls into an otherworldly ether of atmospheric gauze. The opening words feel like a numbed mouth coming out of dental surgery, still tripped out on a strange gas. Phil Selway’s brush work on the ride cymbal and the sweeping guitar effects add to the haze. Colin’s bass playing is sturdy and surefooted like a confident doctor holding the entire operation together. The song’s choruses swoon in falsetto and the indistinguishable back-up vocals on the last chorus creates the album’s most understated and sublime moment.
“Street Spirit (Fade Out) provided the band with a surprise hit single and it’s time-lapsed video is captivating to watch. By playing with slow motion and real time it sums up how The Bends feels as a whole, a dualistic exercise, a contrast between the edgy and the smooth, dreamy and abrasive, silk and sand. By now the band have impressed on so many fronts, ending with a song like this could only push the album into ‘best of all time’ stratosphere. Thom’s effortless crooning feels forlorn, troubled, and epic all at the same time.
The Bends was sighted on nearly every year-end list in the top five and the band established they could complete with some of the greatest rock groups in the world. But was it a fluke?
Their next album OK Computer would go down in history as one of the greatest albums of all time. To listen to The Bends knowing this is to experience a band just about to step into absolute untouchable greatness, showing immense growth in such short time frames. “Where do we go from here” indeed.
This cocktail highlights the album’s dualistic play between agony and ecstasy, something the band captured perfectly within the lyrics, music, production, and even the album cover’s facial expression. The earthy botanical gin grounds this drink like the bands rhythm section, while the shiraz brings multiple depth of flavour. The sparkling wine creates the effervescent dreamy headiness while the grapefruit juice delivers the overtones in Thom’s lyrics, tart with a slight bitterness.
