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I feel a little bad about dissing Black Star. I used to love that song... back when I loved, like, "Mayonnaise" by Smashing Pumpkins. The Bends was one of my favorite records for years and years. I even preferred it to OK Computer for a while.
Most of that had to do with the the first four songs. I still think "High and Dry" holds up. So does "Street Spirit." But on the whole it's just way too mid-90's and "Black Star" has to be the most generic track on the album. Last time I tried to listen to it I think I burst out laughing.
That's bound to happen with bands you get into as a kid and stick with into your 30's. Hasn't happened with Nirvana, or early Beck, or Sonic Youth. But those artists were too good for me to really grasp in my teens. I had to live life a bit before I really appreciated them. And unlike Nirvana (who obviously peaked and checked out) and Beck (who went slowly downhill from Odelay until he started to go rapidly downhill in '08) and Sonic Youth (who had already achieved perfection and were merely riffing on it with Washing Machine), Radiohead were still embryonic in '95/'96. It's forgivable, considering what they went onto accomplish, that those first two albums are fraught with clichés and missteps. They were not on the same trajectory as SY or Nirvana, both of whom came out of the gate throwing pure fire.
Radiohead could have been Oasis. I don't actually think they surpassed Blur until '03. They had to break the mold that they were born into. Thankfully they did. So "Black Star" is forgivable.
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