Critics and fans alike have lauded A Moon Shaped Pool, Radiohead first album since 2009's The King of Limbs. But the "haunting" new offering has left many worrying that it could be the band's final CD.
The album was released on Sunday, following a tantalising promotional campaign, and almost instantly met with a rapturous reception.
"Radiohead's least rock-oriented album in the 21st century doubles as its most gorgeous and desolate album to date," says Rolling Stone, singling out the "gorgeous timbres".
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A Moon Shaped Pool is dreamlike and melodic, "yet shot through with the kind of edgy details that never quite let a listener relax", says the Daily Telegraph's Neil McCormick. "It is chill-out music to put your nerves on edge."
However, some aficionados were disturbed by a surprise final track hinting at a sense of closure. True Love Waits has occasionally been performed live for 20 years, but never received a studio release until now.
"Its devastating refrain, 'Just don't leave' now sounds like the longest (and saddest) goodbye," Rolling Stone says.
The NME echoes the concern, noting that only three tracks on the album are entirely new material. Others are re-workings or expansions of material that has previously existed in some form but never had a studio release, to the frustration of Radiohead completists.
"With the album being so geared towards their audience's favourites, [fans] are seeing it as a sign that this could be the end," says the magazine.
However, Radiohead is known for its unpredictability, musically and otherwise, so there is no reason to panic – especially when Thom Yorke and co appear to have plenty left to say.
With A Moon Shaped Pool, the band is still "achieving something they've never achieved before, a quarter of a century into their career", says The Guardian's Alexis Petridis. "Long may their neuroses keep them in constant motion."
Radiohead's Burn the Witch: Is new song worth the wait?
04 May
Days after teasing fans by disappearing from the internet, Radiohead has released a new song. But while many critics have dubbed Burn The Witch a "thrilling" return, others say it is unmemorable and not even new.
The band's first single in five years features a string section and Thom Yorke's high-pitched, haunting vocals. It's accompanied by an unsettling stop-motion animation video that references both the children's television programme, Camberwick Green, and the 1973 horror film, The Wicker Man.
Although never played in full, Burn the Witch was, in fact, first mentioned by Yorke in a 2005 Radiohead blogpost and in performances in 2006 and 2008. The singer also posted lyrics on the band's website in 2007 while in recent days, the song was trailed on Instagram, along with brief clips hinting at what fans could expect.
"Finally the first music arrived" and it's "thrilling", says Michael Hann in The Guardian, who describes Burn the Witch as "a burst of taut, tense music, driven by pizzicato strings". [[{"type":"media","view_mode":"content_original","fid":"94425","attributes":{"class":"media-image"}}]]
It's bold and expansive and full of "brooding menace", adds the critic, who wonders if it foreshadows the new album and if it does, it's "certainly the kind of return that the world might have hoped for".
Burn the Witch is indeed a direct line to the "golden era of Radiohead", says Jillian Mapes on Pitchfork. It's no wonder, notes Mapes, given the song's lingering presence throughout the band's sessions and tours.
The wait has been worth it, she adds, describing the release as "simultaneously unsettling and gorgeous" with all the makings of "an all-time great Radiohead song".
Spencer Kornhaber in The Atlantic agrees and lauds Radiohead for "returning to do what it exists to do". Burn the Witch is "sonically novel yet viscerally moving, gorgeous yet terrifying", he says.
Its magic comes from the fact that it "starts off intense but still finds ways to intensify", as the "anxiety-making central sonic engine" keeps thrumming and "everything froths together for a nightmarish crescendo".
The release will be a relief for Radiohead fans, adds Kornhaber, and they will be "glad to have the band back with such an enjoyable and forward-thinking song".
However, Alex Hudson from Metro says the problem is that it's not a new song. Burn the Witch is more than ten years old and has been teased and joked about at gigs for nearly a decade, with Yorke telling fans: "When we get the orchestra, we'll do Burn The Witch."
Even worse, adds the journalist, "it's not all that innovative and it's not all that memorable".
If the first song to be released from a new album is anything to go by, Hudson concludes, "the headlong rush to the future has stopped".
Radiohead's new album: What does mysterious bird song mean?
03 May
After erasing its social media presence over the weekend, Radiohead has returned with a new song – a birdsong, that is.
The band deleted all its Twitter and Facebook pages on Sunday, fuelling rumours that its ninth studio album is imminent.
This morning, a new Radiohead Instagram account posted a video of an animated bird tweeting a merry tune.
Radiohead has form for using innovative ways to promote its albums, including a "pay what you want" download for In Rainbows, while frontman Thom Yorke donned a newsboy cap and handed out copies of a Radiohead newspaper at a London record store to mark the launch of The King of Limbs.
