A little something to hold you Radiohead fans over until The King of Limbs…
What does a band’s album have in common with another one it releases a decade later? Normally the answer is not a whole lot. It would appear that for Radiohead in the case of OK Computer and In Rainbows, the answer might just be “everything.” Why? It’s possible they were recorded at the same time, and intended to be played together as one cohesive two disc album. Or if not, then maybe the band just conceptualized In Rainbows to fit OK Computer to be cohesive in a pretty specific way. The data:
The working title for OK Computer was “Ones and Zeros” a binary reference. So in binary it would be “01.”
The two titles of both albums have the same cadence: _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _. Ten letters each.
The cover for In Rainbows looks like this:
How many “10”s do you see? 2. Hmm. So we have “01 and 10.” Moving on…
OK Computer was released in 1997, and In Rainbows in 2007. Ten years apart.
Before the release of In Rainbows the band left ten mysterious messages, which featured the character “X” which is the Roman numeral for 10. The last message was a photo of the band, posted on March 10th.
The news of In Rainbows being an album was somehow kept a secret, and announced only 10 days before it’s release.
In binary code, “01” and “10” compliment each other, so what if I did this:
We get a set of 10 songs. Then two songs on OK Computer “Karma Police/Fitter Happier” separate them from another set of 10 songs.
Now this seems weird until you start listening to it. Airbag is the exact same tempo as 15 Step.
This might prompt you to turn on the crossfade option on iTunes. (Preferences > Playback). How long? Let’s try 10 seconds.
With this on, “Body Snatchers”‘ transition into “Subterranean Homesick Alien” seems a bit too perfect to be coincidence. And it’s not just because the last chord on Body Snatchers and SHA are basically the same thing.
Maybe “Nude” transitioning into “Exit Music (For A Film)” doesn’t convince you either even though it’s equally conspicuous.
But then with the 10 second crossfade enabled, you’ll notice that at the exact moment when Thom finishes singing the last word “choke” from Exit Music, it’s the same moment when the first beat of “Weird Fishes” kicks in.
I didn’t even notice the transition between “Let Down” into “All I Need,” it was completely smooth. The progression from “All I Need” into “Karma Police” is almost scary with how well it fits.
Again, with the ten second crossfade on, the last word in Fitter Happier “antibiotics” ends right when Thom starts counting in “Faust Arp.”
The long fade out in “Reckoner” matches the long fade in of “Climbing Up the Walls.” If this were unintentional chances are good that it would have had a song explode in with a quick intro or sudden drop as Radiohead songs often do, but somehow these match. Ten years apart.
Climbing Up The Walls suddenly shifts up in key right at ten seconds before it ends. This just happens to be the one “House of Cards” is written in.
Enough about the music, lyrically this applies as well. “Lucky” ends with lines like “pull me out of the aircrash… we are standing on the edge.” Then “Videotape” kicks in with “when I’m at the pearly gates.” Even the lyrical ideas flow like this throughout most of the album.
There you have it. Jigsaw falling into place.
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