Kevin Courtney reviews Radiohead at Marlay Park
Radiohead are a modern rock contradiction alright - a massive stadium band who don't obey the rules of stadium rock; whose records defy categorisation and - sometimes - comprehension, but still sell by the bucketload; whose diminutive, misanthropic singer is the anti-rock star, but still commands starstruck devotion; a disparate quintet teetering constantly on the verge of breaking up, but somehow managing to rally their powerfully opposing forces and turn in another memorable, totally leftfield performance. A band who always seem to be trying too hard, but who always seem to do it with effortless grace.
Are Radiohead still relevant? Ask the 20,000 fans who flocked to Marlay Park on Thursday night to witness rock music being subverted, twisted out of shape, and flung back at them in strange, startling, psychotropic shapes. The band doesn't even have a new album to promote - that's at the painful gestation stage - but they do have an agenda to follow, which involves giving pop music a good sound thrashing, and ritually humiliating it in public. Sounds good to me.
The statement-of-intent opener, Airbag, warns us of collisions to come; for the next hour and a half, sonic asteroids bounce off each other, creating some bewildering and often beautiful flashes.
Six years ago, Kid A caused a seismic shift in how we regard pop music; today, The National Anthem sounds like a cosy, classic marching tune, and songs from subsequent albums Amnesiac and Hail to the Thief, such as 2+2=5, Morning Bell, There There and The Gloaming sound like obscure Pink Floyd tracks.
Two new songs, Videotape and Nude, see guitarist Jonny Greenwood at his choppy, string-mangling best, and provide lyrical reassurance that singer Thom Yorke has still not banished his demons.
The backdrop is made up of rhomboid-shaped screens arranged to look like a giant broken mirror, the band members' features reflected darkly through each fragment. Pyramid Song soars beautifully, while Paranoid Android stomps and roars, coming to its grinding halt like the Duracell bunny on downers.
Older songs such as Just and My Iron Lung prove that the paranoia and vulnerability were always there - they were just shielded by a rockier exoskeleton.
Yorke bashes a small drumkit on Bangers 'n' Mash, in one of many onstage instrument changes, but though it's the rockiest of the new songs, it's plainly terrified of venturing down the meat 'n' potatoes route. Perhaps that's Radiohead's next frontier - daring to write a straightforward rock song. Could be their toughest challenge.
