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- Alright, I swear you guys are gonna love this, okay?
It's so good. It's so good.
- [Man on Record] : You're doing a great job.
- Okay, sorry. A brief history of Radiohead.
(groaning)
- What!? Shut up.
- You already talk about Radiohead like, all the time.
- We know everything. Please no more.
- Alright, listen.
I was very respectful during your presentations.
I just ask for the same respect back for mine.
Okay?
(pencil snapping)
May we begin?
Thanks.
- [Narrator] : In 1985, at a 750 year old boys' school in
Oxfordshire, England, a band formed.
- Originally calling themselves On A Friday,
because that was the day they would usually practice,
they would casually play gigs around town
until the band members had to leave for college,
and the band went on hiatus.
- Their new label, E.M.I.,
insisted they pick a less terrible name than
On A Friday, so they chose a title
taken from a Talking Heads song.
- It was then, that the greatest band of all time
Radiohead, was born.
(heavenly music)
Clap.
Clap for Radiohead.
Ah, no!
- [Girl] : The title track was an immediate flop
because citizens of the '90s were not ready
for their brilliance,
and the lyrics were kind of a major downer.
- Radio hated it.
Record buyers weren't buying it,
and even the band, quote unquote, thought it was crap.
- [Girl] : They quickly moved on to promoting
their next two singles.
- [Girl] : Thom Yorke consistently complained
about the stress of being in the public eye,
and was openly disdainful to the mainstream
American audiences that made the band famous.
- [Boy] : In 1995, the band released a relatively
straightforward, sophomore album, The Bends -
one of the greatest sophomore efforts ever made.
- [Girl] : In 1997, Radiohead released,
unarguably, the greatest album of all time,
OK Computer, giving prog-rock a turn
of the millennium update.
- [Boy] : OK Computer came out just as
the internet was starting to enter everyday life.
- [Girl] : Newly launched fan sites offered devotees
forms to pick apart the album's puzzles
and share theories about what it all meant.
- [Boy] : As a result, they produced the greatest
album of all time, Kid A.
Signaling a shift to a more electronic based sound,
which was even more intelligent
and less pop-friendly than OK Computer.
- It solidified the band's reputation
as the most world's most aesthetically
challenging rock-stars.
- The greatest album of all time.
- By the time the group tackled the
messed up state of world politics on the
more guitar-heavy greatest thing of all time,
Hail to the Thief, the band had abandoned
the radical transparency and had embraced
an aggressively more cryptic approach.
- [Girl] : In 2007, after leaving their label E.M.I,
they let fans pay what they wanted for
the digital version of In Rainbows,
which would become one of their best reviewed albums.
Because it's basically the greatest album of all time.
- [Boy] : The more dedicated of us scoured the record
for hidden clues that connected it back to OK Computer
and used fan sites to exchange theories
and talk about how if Radiohead were an ice-cream flavor,
it would be every flavor mixed together.
- [Girl] : 4 years later they pulled
the greatest prank of all time
by releasing The King of Limbs digitally,
a day early before its scheduled release date.
- [Boy] : Breaking new creative ground by sampling
and looping their own recordings, the album
had a more noticeable emphasis on rhythm.
- 2016 saw a Radiohead shift into digital obscurity
by deleting their entire social media presence.
This led to the release of their
9th greatest album of all time, A Moon Shaped Pool.
- This album represented a return of form,
with songs that dated back to as far as the mid-90's.
Just in time to celebrate the 20th anniversary
of OK Computer with a new expanded reissue,
which we'll be selling in the hall after our presentation.
- Making increasingly difficult albums that seemed
almost intentionally designed to make them US popular,
whilst still filling arenas full of fans with
the intellect to recognize the music's importance.
(sniffing)
- And we think they're really, really, really, really,
really, really, really, really, really good.
The end.
(distant clapping)
- They're right! Radiohead is the greatest band of all time.
- Hello peachy, I'm Thom Yorke from Radiohead
and I would love for you to join our band.
- Cool, yeah!
(gasp and sigh)
(funky xylophonic music)