Week 300: “Let Down” by Radiohead

ok computer

Since the day this blog started, I knew it would feature a Radiohead song. I just couldn’t decide which one.

Pyramid Song? Fake Plastic Trees? Codex? Meeting in the Aisle? If you ask me on seven consecutive days to pick the most beautiful Radiohead song, you’ll probably get seven consecutive different answers.

And yet, the self-imposed rules of this blog state that I can’t feature the same band twice. So I avoided the difficult decision by ignoring it.

Over the years, I’ve managed to get around the only-one-song-per-band rule fairly skillfully. I featured a Thom Yorke song, a cover of a Radiohead song, a song mistaken for a Radiohead song…I’ve explored pretty much every loophole available to me.

At one point, my wife and I sat down and listened to the entire OK Computer album and meticulously rated each song according to a variety of criteria, which was fun but a little insane. Beauty doesn’t lend itself well to objectivity. Trying to pick the best or most beautiful track was like trying to identify which butterfly’s wings were the flutteriest. Words and numbers and rubrics can only take you so far.

But after 300 weeks, I’m going with this one. It wasn’t a single. It’s not a huge fan favourite. There are other Radiohead tracks that are gentler, prettier, more melodic. But almost 20 years after hearing “Let Down” for the first time, I still get shivers every time.

What makes this a beautiful song:

1. The opening riff carries through most of the song, and brings with it a wonderful clash of five against four. This album specifically, and Radiohead generally, is all about tension vs. peace, synthetic vs. organic, technology vs. humanity. The uneasy beauty created by unusual time signatures is one of the main ways they’ve developed that theme over the years.

2. The double vocals four minutes in make my goosebumps get goosebumps. There’s so much emotion packed into the lines: “One day/ I am going to grow wings/ A chemical reaction/ Hysterical and useless.” Combine that with Yorke’s soaring reassurance that one day, “you’ll know where you are,” and you’ve got the best emotional climax this band ever created.

3. As the song ends, we’re left with an acoustic guitar and what sounds like an 8-bit digital snowfall. Again, such a perfect expression of Radiohead’s contrasts, themes, and sonic originality.

Recommended listening activity:

Reading the terms and conditions on a software update.

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