NME has their wanker review of Radiohead's Hail to the Thief up (HERE). This was off the unmixed/unmastered version of the album that was leaked weeks ago, but that's not important to them I guess. Now, this guy gives the album a 7/10, and I agree with him to some degree. He point out that RH is still at their best when they're not doing faux electronica, which still shows up on a couple tracks on this album. Fine, but so because they stick their necks out on a couple songs this is a disappointing album? But then he calls "There There" "underwhelming" and "pedestrian," which is such a bitchy little "ooh, look at me, I can hate on Radiohead because NME has other bands it needs to hype" comment that it makes me sick. Ok, it's not that bad, but obnoxious, yes.

I think music reviews are probably the most arbitrary of any of the artistic reviews you read in papers/magazines (concerning ie TV/movies/music), and this review shows why. I'm *really* curious to see what Rolling Stone gives this album, because take a look at the bands getting 4-star reviews last week: Idlewild, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Blur, Liam Lynch. I've heard the Blur album and it's pretty good. It's definitely not as good as HTTF. The Yeah Yeah Yeahs are more punk-rock wannabe flavor of the month shit. Look in NME, Q, Rolling Stone, and there's some crap about the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, and how rebellious or whatever they are. Great. Here's your 15 minutes, have a nice life in the buzz bin. Seriously, can we just have all the new punk-prog-revival-shit bands release their albums all in one week so we can get this out of our collective system? I guess I'd rather have all the angst-ridden teenagers buying punk rock than rap-metal, but I feel like an old man about this.

It seems when dealing with Radiohead every magazine remembers the 4-star review they gave OK Computer and then they think "well, is this as good?" No, it's not. Why? Because OKC was one of the best albums of the last twenty years. There's no precedent. But if all the reviewers start thinking "oh, now it's journalistically safe to dig on Radiohead," I'm going to be very disappointed. Sure, we should hold some bands to higher standards, but this is a brilliant album in a general sense, and I hope it's recognized as such.