The first album to boldly throw some old-school Macintosh "alert" beeps between songs turns 10 today. But this post is not about OK Computer’s landmark status, its place in the rock canon, or its influence on the music that followed. Rather, it’s to celebrate the Radiohead disc for being one of those albums you can listen to all the way through, every single time. It’s a No Need To Track Forward Album! One among few.
Since it came out in 1997, I’ve spent probably an entire month of my life listening to OK Computer, but my one truly obsessive stretch occurred in college, when I sequestered myself in my dorm’s study lounge to write my senior thesis for five days straight. At times, the only things in this pathetic, horribly decorated little room were me, my laptop and a big styrofoam cup of guacamole (because I’d run out of chips). When I got writer’s block, I’d roll my finger around the edges of the cup for entire minutes at a time. It was not a good scene. But amid the dread, intense self-loathing, and repellent odor, there was light. I probably listened to OK Computer close to 100 times. I was in the zone because of this album. So thanks, Radiohead! You saved me. For those five days, I was not fitter and not happier, but definitely the most productive I’ve been to date.
Post your own OK Computer memories below, and if they’re not a lot cooler than mine, you’re banned from the site. (Don’t worry — it’s an impossible scenario! My roommates were calling me Paranoid Anniedroid. GEEK.)
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For me (and I’m dating myself relative to you Annie) it was a divorce. It sounds like a lousy soundtrack for a divorce, but it was actually quite soothing and got me through a few days at work when I really didn’t want to be there. I still think Thom Yorke’s voice is very soothing.
I was a late bloomer on this album, didn’t discover it until 2004. But I listened to it on my first business trip to Paris, the one were I met my ex-French lovah. I would listen to it on the Metro on my way to and from his apartment afterwork. Tres romantique! I shed a silent tear now every time I hear “No Surprises”.
For me it was released right before I left the south and moved to NYC. It was also the first concert I went to in the city, Radiohead at Radio City Music Hall. Brilliant.
This album came out the same day i started working at Sound Source, a local used cd store. I remember it also coincided with the release of Hum’s Downward is Heavenward, another album with no need to track forward.
Ok Computer and its predecessor, The Bends are both albums that I still listen to from beginning to end on many occasions…
Well, it would be a No Need To Track Forward Album with the unfortunate exception of Fitter Happier…this gimmick of a song mars an otherwise perfect album.
Someone left the CD in a practice room at school. I couldn’t stop listening to it. It took me months to figure out who owned the CD, and who the artist was! They became one of my favorite bands immediately. I went out and bought “The Bend” and “Pablo Honey” immediately. Of course I gave the owner his CD back, too.
I bought this the first day, still in high school, while my brother was visiting from college. I liked it the first listen but it was never a summer album for me. I wanted something more lively at the time. Soon as fall hit, I put it on again one day and the music flowed over me and I’ve loved the album every day since. One of my all time favorites.
The most important record of my lifetime. Has influenced everybody on from Travis through The K-Rex Struts to Bright Eyes. Amazing.
This is probably the most intelligent album of Radiohead’s career, but I still say that The Bends is my favorite.
It’s weird to see albums I bought when they were new elevated to classic status. I bought this when I was 14. I’m almost 24.
The Bends is still better.
This CD was one of five in my CD changer that never came out for any reason…I played it like an anthem during that time…I was expecting my oldest daughter…It was a crisis pregnancy…very lonely…very uncertain…This CD represents growth for me…I still cherish it…My daughter is ten now and kinda grooves on it, too…We are in a much better place now, things turned out awesome for us…I wrote my first book of poetry while listening to this CD…on an ancient MAC at a friend’s house…my baby was doing flips on the inside and my legs would occasionally go numb…my friend included a poem in HER book about listening to the same CD for the 200th time…we both published our books just OK Computer really defines a time and place for meafter my baby was born in…
I’ve always thought Thom Yorke’s voice is vaguely romantic, even if it’s also mournful. OK COMPUTER is a classic for all of the production touches and of course Thom’s vocals. My main memories of listening to it are from college when I had a crush on someone and would listen to Thom’s yearning for hours because it matched my own. Even if OK COMPUTER is about the effects technology has had on society, I think it’s just as much an ode to that society and it’s why we tap into it.
I was 12 years old when I bought this album. I remember going home and opening it and having no idea that the songs within would go on to shape, shake and comfort me well on into my adult years. I turned 22 a few months back. Rare few albums stay with you.
Geez…this CD spent that entire summer in my car CD player. Just reading about it, it’s going back in tomorrow. One of the modern classics…and spot on about not having to forward; not an unlistenable track on the CD.
I remember when it came out, I rushed out to see whether Rolling Stone Magazine would give it the 5 stars it deserved…(this was back when I cared what Rolling Stone thought). They gave it 4 and 1/2 stars, saying that it missed perfection because Karma Police had “Throw-Away lyrics”. I was so angry, but these are the same people who gave Nevermind 2 stars. It came out during my freshman year of college, and my friend and I went and bought it. I remember he turned to me on the way out of the store and said, “I feel so much smarter now that I’ve bought this album.” Well said.
great album, but prob my fav album of all time is Kid A – Never forget going to concert at Liberty State Park overlooking statue of liberty twin towers with future wife
I unfortunately didn’t catch on to OK computer a few years after it came out. My sister got turned on to the Bends by her new boyfriend in the late 90’s, and I borrowed her borrowed copy and also really liked it. But it wasn’t until my freshman year of college (2000) that I finally bought OK Computer. It took me sometime to love it as much as the Bends since it was very different, but now I love it as much if not more sometimes. My fav track when i first started listening to it was Lucky, and I remember for a project for my 2-D art class drawing a girl standing on the edge of a cliff with an airplane crashing in the background because I couldn’t get the song or the lyrics “We are standing on the edge…..” out of my head.
I love me some Radiohead, but this is not a so called-no need to track forward album, the Steven Hawkings bit-annoying on so many levels, ruins the whole CD. The no need to track forward album-The bends, superior all around. Can still listen to The Bends every day and love it as much as I did the 1st time I listened to it.
I was a freshman in college and one of my new friends was very into music. I knew absolutely nothing, so he was willing to teach me. The first thing he did was to buy me a copy of this album. I listened to it in the afternoons in the very hot spring. It still makes me want to look at green grass and blue sky.
OK Computer is my favorite album of all time. .. I was in my 3rd year of law school and this album saved me from intense boredom. 10 years later, 2 kids later, and I put this song on in the car, and life is good.
I liked The Bends, but Bends was one of those albums which sounded great from your first listen, then had nowhere to go from there. I found myself going back to OK Computer and Kid A far more than The Bends because they were more challenging. Their treasures only revealed themselves upon many subsequent listens.
I had mind-blowing sex to OK computer the very first time I heard the disc. I hadnt ever listened to radiohead until then. They’ve been one of my very favorite bands ever since. Especially when shagging.
I actually got this cd because at the time i was into coldplay and i heard that they were influence by them. I heard creep and remeber when Beavis and Butthead made fun of the fake plastic trees video. I heard a couple more songs by them on mtv2 when they acutally played videos and like what i saw. So i picked ok up as i heard it was there best cd. I begin to listen to repeatetly then the next day i bought the bends then kid a and so on. I dont have my coldplay anymore got sick of them but i still have my radiohead.
Why does it take so long for this band to release cds 4 years and counting since there last which was not bad. The band needs to stop trying to top this cd and just make good music.
I was entering my junior year at the small, liberal-arts mecca that gave me a college degree in Ohio, and I bought this album the day before I left for a semester in London. Princess Diana had just died. The Spice Girls were filming their crappy movie all over the city. But OK COMPUTER took me to a happy place that entire fall – to this day, whenever I hear “The Tourist” I think of whiskey and haggis in Scotland.
I can’t believe Radiohead opened for Alanis Morissette during her 1996 tour behind JLP. Little did we know what awaited us.
This is an awesome record. Thank God we got it before iTunes.
I have no idea why, but this album is the BEST music for getting over a breakup I’ve ever heard. Maybe it’s Thom Yorke’s voice… all I know is I listened to it in my car during 6 weeks of misery and it was the only music (only thing, actually) that kept me from crying. Love this disc!
I remember being in college in England when this came out. I hated the singles (Paranoid Android and Karma Police) at first – thought they were sooo pretentious. Needless to say a few months later I had eaten my humble pie and was playing this every day. I still listen a lot, and always skip Fitter, Happier, but every other song is pure genius. Lucky makes me feel sad, Climbing Up the Walls scares me, Exit Music gives me perverse pleasure at singing “we hope you choke”, and Airbag just may be one of the best songs… ever.
My favorite album, my favorite band, my favorite concert (Chicago, August 2002)
I get chills and goosebumps every time in Exit Music at the huge crescendo near the end. Paranoid Android is the best song on the album.
This hasn’t really been a story, but oh well.
They played Chicago in 2001, not 2002.
Also, Ed O’Brien has said that he regrets “Fitter Happier” because it gave the album a track you’d have to skip through. I agree with him. It stinks things up, right in the middle of the album.