What type of radio stations are their songs played on? I'm just saying that I can't imagine them being considered the best band of our time because of this.

If they were I'd of had someone calling me an idiot for not having heard a Radiohead song long ago.

I really disagree with this.

Actually, my hunch is that 20 years from now Radiohead will be looked at as NOT as spectacular as they are popularly viewed today. Kind of similar to what happened to R.E.M. I suppose (although I used to like R.E.M. and never liked Radiohead).


On another note: Does The Cure get consideration for best band of "our time?" As many asked, I'm not sure how far back "our time" goes but I feel like they should at least be close to making a list like that.

cannot believe 81 out of 200 say yes

Any modern rock station will have Radiohead in their regular rotation.

Pretty much all 90's stations play Radiohead constantly.

i was surprised when i went back and checked how many records REM sold vs. radiohead. i knew they were prolific but i forgot that their peak was so sustained and so high. their albums released from 87 to 94 went on to sell 15 million copies. i liked REM when i was a kid but never thought of them in that category of huge-selling bands. i think their legacy to this point has been hurt by the fact that their style of rock really lost out to other sub-genres both during and after their peak. they were a holdover from the 80's 'college rock' days that became a mainstream pop band.

in a way they were kind of opposite radiohead in career arc, who started out as a promising but not revolutionary alt-rock band when alt-rock was already popular (they were kicking around for a bit before this but didn't really get going in earnest until after "nevermind" dropped). they kind of came in at the crest of a wave and then transformed that success into being more experimental, and in many ways carried the torch through a transitional phase and a relatively dry era of rock. REM put in a lot of legwork for a genre that was largely unrecognized, really stopped evolving once they crossed over and remained much more stylistically consistent.

from a historical perspective i think REM are hurt by the fact that they had a distinctive and unique sound without being hugely innovative. they mostly played straight ahead rock infused with stipe's quirkiness. combine that with the fact that rock subsequently went in a much more aggro, grungy direction, and i think it shows why they have been largely forgotten. also i think these things move in cycles and in 5 or 10 years you may see a new wave of people show interest in them. a lot of trendy rock is still mining the 80's so i guess bands who peaked in the early 90's are probably due to get ripped off next.

floyd were huge in an era where rock was the biggest thing going. in that regard they're hard to compare with radiohead because even by the time OK computer came out, rap was starting to overtake rock and a lot of other fluffy boy bands etc were getting big. rock had a smaller market share. but i still think it's fair to say radiohead will never equal floyd's commercial success; i see them moving away from the album format and probably getting even less commercial. however in terms of the quality, longevity and critical acclaim of their music, and the role that they played in their respective eras, it's not a bad comparison. strictly in terms of commercial success i think you can compare them pretty readily with ozzy-era sabbath, who eventually went platinum in the US but didn't tear up the charts at the time. that's a band that was sort of a mid-tier draw from a strictly commercial perspective but still became regarded as a hugely influential group.

as far as the cure goes, they kinda fell off a cliff after "wish" in 1992 (and i think most people would agree that they peaked with disentegration in 89)... i look at them as basically an 80's band, and they were very good then, but there were several other very good bands in the 80's that probably overshadow them, and some that have had quite a bit more longevity. i do think they have been a big influence recently and i may be biased because i just don't enjoy their music that much, but i don't put them in that top tier of bands. even though they were short-lived i like the smiths a lot better for mopey euro-pop and i also take the pixies or the replacements ahead of them for 80's alt-pop type stuff, although i recognize that all three of those bands were much less successful. i also think of talking heads and the police as relative contemporaries who overshadow the cure (although that was more on the early side of their career).

i'm not calling you an idiot for not hearing a radiohead song. i'm calling you an idiot for thinking that somehow disqualifies them from being the best band of the last 20 years. it's not everyone else's fault you're ignorant; even people with only a cursory interest in rock music have generally heard some radiohead. honestly if you haven't heard them then your opinion on this doesn't really matter. you don't listen to enough music to make an informed decision. it would be like arguing who's the best player in baseball if you didn't know who ryan howard is. (even though he's not the best, not knowing who is means you're probably not qualified to comment).

Very nice posts itt, I agree with most of what you've said, but just to nit-pick on this small point I think they were very successful commercially with their distribution method on "In Rainbows". I don't think they ever released the data, but everything I heard suggested that they were very well rewarded financially by the donation system. I imagine they will continue to operate in this manner in the future, eliminating as many middle-men as they can along the way.

I wonder if there's any way to estimate an accurate number of record sales anymore, taking into account the people who illegally download albums these days, and how that total exposure rate compares with record sales from the past. But yeah, it seems like the days of selling 40+ million albums (or even half that) like "Dark Side of the Moon" are long gone.

Details - Maybe not super successful, but better (financially) than the alternative, I think.

ham - When I think of Zep, Floyd, Sabbath I guess I think in terms of how awesome those bands generally are and how almost anyone who likes rock has some appreciation for them and/or some songs they like. If they aren't huge fan-bois of them they at least kind of like them okay. Maybe I'm wrong about that.

Radiohead is not that way at all. There are many people who honestly believe that they are borderline terrible. I'm one of those people obviously. I just don't see that same kind of sentiment towards the others.

Yes, REM was a pretty big deal. Pretty influential obviously but they were influenced by others before them and it goes around and around. I don't really care about their record sales at all. REM's influences came more from the pre-Document stuff that wasn't as widely selling and was simply a big deal on college radio at that time.

I feel like The Cure was kind of a bigger deal than you make them out to be and almost pigeon-holing them into just being an "80's band" isn't really accurate. I'm running into more younger people who just weren't around that much in the 80's who are learning about them and appreciating their awesomeness. Of course that's something I think is terrific but it also scares me how freaking old I am. I mean, Disintegration is freaking 20 years old! What?!?!

The Police were a band that occurred to me as well but I didn't mention them because I wasn't sure they deserved mentioning. Kind of close on them though. I think their music was great at the time but kind of sounds dated in some ways now. I go back and forth on them.

Nobody will ever have that kind of commercial success anymore, so using that as a gauge is ridiculous. They are definitely unbelievably awesome but saying they are hands down the best is also kind of ridiculous.

Ham - I would kind of like a little elaboration on Radiohead's supposed influences/impact if you don't mind. I have a couple of vague ideas (and also don't believe it to be nearly as big a deal as some claim it to be) but I would appreciate your thoughts on this.

I'm not too used to seeing Microbob failing just reply after reply, but this is pretty bad. When I entered this thread I wondered what the ratio of radiohead trolls vs actual responses would be. About what you would expect.
Just wondering Microbob, average age on the people who find "radiohead terrible" in your circle? Because as others have said, they're huge on the internet and clearly have a younger fanbase then the other bands you've listed.

ham on rye, thank you for indulging the trolls while making educated posts in a thread that probably doesn't deserve it.

There isn't a band that has had the same consistency in the past 20 years. Most people will prefer a different band at their peak, whether that's Modest Mouse, U2, The White Stripes, Metallica or w/e. The just haven't had the same consistency. Surprised people are trolling that HTTT and In Rainbows aren't good though, that just makes it too obvious.

It's nearly 2010, who listens to a standard AM/FM radio anymore?

Sublime is the best band of our time.

easily the best band imo. one of the best of all-time

the only person less intelligent than those thinking radiohead is the best band of our time is the guy who has never listened to them. holy jesus. thats like never eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, or chocolate.

of course they are

I don't think the first assertion is true, fwiw, at least wrt Sabbath and to a lesser extent Floyd. There are plenty of people who like rock broadly speaking but don't care at all about or even actively dislike Black Sabbath. Obviously if you're talking specifically about *classic rock* fans, then your statement is a bit of a tautology.

Regardless, the comparison isn't helpful. It's analogous to saying "Everyone loved or had some appreciation for The Twilight Zone or The Ed Sullivan Show... The Wire is not that way at all." For starters, there's too much other stuff going on these days for one band to capture everyone's attention and get everyone on board. And Radiohead doesn't make singles-oriented music in an era where singles dominate. Radiohead is inaccessible to many, yeah. You're not going to hear them played in the school cafeteria like you might have heard Zeppelin.

But none of that is really that pertinent. Times have changed. Led Zeppelin made 6 albums in 6 years. Radiohead made 4 in the last 13. Bottom line is that, among people whose opinions on music are worth anything, there's no current band that can garner anywhere near the amount of hubbub or praise when they put out a new album. And there's no way their status does anything but improve with time.

ETA: You don't have to like them, of course. I'm not a very big fan of The Simpsons, but I can acknowledge the show's place in history.

Yeah, I'm not the biggest Radiohead fan although I am starting to come around on them. As far as favourite bands from this era go I would place Pearl Jam and Metallica significantly above them (and a few others who dont bare mentioning when considering a "greatest band" debate). However, I can still take a step back from my own personal preferences and say that Radiohead are the best band of the last 20 years, and at the absolute worst they're in the conversation.

I seem to agree. I really wish I understood peoples tastes in music, and I'm sure others feel this way too.

Sometimes I just sit on the couch and try listening to something people say is good, but I find myself skipping through an album in about 8 minutes because all of it seems so bland and horribly boring.

I honestly don't understand that somebody can just sit down, listen to radiohead and think "wow this is so good I don't want to go to bed/work. I wanna listen to this all night/day."

Yo Radiohead, I'm really happy for you and I'ma let you finish, but Modest Mouse was one of the best bands of our time.

Well yeah, but what they've put out through 3 studio albums is incredible.

Jesus Christ. You're the first person I've ever heard even among the people who like early Radiohead before their more experimental shift that thinks Pablo Honey is their best. The Bends and OK Computer both crush that album.

This is absurd.

Yes

Because they don't intentionally design their songs to fit the radio mold? Why would you use this as a barometer anyway? Radiohead could tour 365 days straight in just the USA and sell out every single show. Probably year after year. Their following is massive and extremely dedicated.

I'd expect to hear complaints about Yorke's voice or how someone didn't like the experimental shift, but I never thought I would hear someone call Radiohead bland.

I like Radiohead, but I can think of bands that were imo better than them in the last 25 years.

Metallica - by far the biggest HM band ever

U2 - nuff said

Guns N' Roses - 87-93 biggest band in the world. Brought back rock n' roll to mainstream. (too bad they couldn't get along).

Pearl Jam

Muse?

My favorite band that formed when I was over 18 is Wilco FYI.

wholeheartedly agree. the beatles of our time. all the haters just need to take a look at their albums which are pretty much ****ING FIRE BACK TO BACK TO BACK. none of the other bands in this thread, while many of them i have plenty of respect for, are no where near the caliber of radiohead.

(hail to the thief )