Parlophone, Radiohead's label, didn’t give the band a deadline for finishing the album. Kid A could have spelled the end of Radiohead. Warp has continued to push the envelope for experimental/electronic artists, with acclaimed acts like Flying Lotus and Oneohtrix Point Never having joined their fold. Yorke devoured both of those artists’s work after the band's OK Computer tour was over. Radiohead's sound got "warped" for Kid A.įans of Warp Records will immediately hear the influence of the label on Kid A, specifically the work of revered electronic artists Aphex Twin and Autechre. They had a private studio being built, but it wasn’t ready until September 1999. Greenwood described recording in the first two cities as “pretty much wash-outs” before reaching the Gloucestershire mansion known as Batsford Park. Listening to Kid A doesn’t exactly feel like touring Europe, but Radiohead recorded parts of the album in Paris, Copenhagen, and Gloucestershire, England. Kid A was recorded in several different cities. In the same interview, O'Brien said he wanted them to “have really nice-sounding guitars and do something really snappy” for the album. “Every time I picked up a guitar I just got the horrors,” Yorke said. Speaking with Q, Yorke talked about his writer's block with the instrument. For a group of musicians with the combined playing talents of Thom Yorke, Jonny Greenwood, and Ed O’Brien, minimizing guitar in favor of electronics was gutsy, if not a little reckless. Kid A isn’t completely without guitar, but the instrument is severely downplayed, especially when compared to the band's previous albums. Radiohead shied away from guitar on Kid A. Here are some facts about the album that Pitchfork reviewer Brent DiCrescenzo described as "an album which completely obliterates how albums, and Radiohead themselves, will be considered." 1.
Kid A has been recognized by critics as Radiohead’s best album, as well as one of the greatest albums of all-time-period.
Anyone expecting that the band's follow-up to 1997's OK Computer would just be a rehash of that earlier album was likely taken aback when they pressed play and heard the despondent synthesizer melody on “Everything In Its Right Place.” When Radiohead released their album Kid A on October 2, 2000, few music fans were prepared for it.