Hold Steady guitarist Tad Kubler has caused the Internet to go nuts with his comments on Radiohead, which he made over the weekend to BBC6 Music. “I think they’ve lost the plot,” Kubler said when asked the now-standard-in-every-music-interview question about Thom Yorke et al’s recent album In Rainbows. “What are they doing? Where are they going? What’s happening? I don’t get it any more. They lost me. I still appreciate what they’re doing, or what they’re trying to do. But I think they’re trying too hard not to be Radiohead. That seems a little ridiculous to me.” Kubler then went on to praise… Oasis. Ooh, burn! Yorke and his bandmates were unavailable for comment, but the Internet was more than happy to rush in and fill that particular void.
Perhaps my favorite reaction came from former Idolator guestblogger Matthew Perpetua, who wrote–in a post titled “Apples vs. Dim-Witted No-Talent Hacks”–”The most charitable description of The Hold Steady would be ‘a glorified bar band with a tone-deaf asshole shouting over the top.’ … [they] are essentially just Nick Hornby as a rock band.” (Which isn’t far away from others’ assessments of the group.) Meanwhile, Pitchfork’s Marc Hogan referred to Kubler’s quote as the band’s “Sister Souljah moment.”
Somewhat surprisingly, not all the reaction I’ve seen so far has been pro-Radiohead; another former guest of this site, Sam Yurick, said that he’s kind of tired of the Radiohead hoopla and that praising In Rainbows for its distribution scheme is not unlike saying that Cloverfield should get an Oscar for its ads.
So readers, once and for all: How do you feel? (I was going to write “who could win in a fight,” but if we’re talking about sheer brawn, I think the winner is obvious.)
Hold Steady vs Radiohead [BBC6 via half of my Tumblr friends]
Apples Vs. Dim-Witted No-Talent Hacks [Fluxtumblr]
Let’s see where Tad Nut-gobbler and his Hold Steady are in 20+ years… my prediction? Delivering pizzas to the fat and irrelevant boys in Oasis (if they’re still alive). Just sayin’…
@Marth: Aren’t Art Brut really the euro Electric Six? I say this as an E6 fan, btw.
@the rich girls are weeping: *golf clap*
Oooh, yeah, the old “you have to see them live” defense. God, if I had a nickle for every time I’ve heard that one, from the Dead and Phish to all manner of shitty locals and now Radiohead, I’d be able to hire all the above to play my backyard. Yeah, sorry, if I find the records dull as dry toast, I don’t think the live show is going to do anything for me.
I’m actually kind of shocked there’s only been one fanboy/fangirl comment so far.
I’m actually just sick of people bitching about music on the internet. Takes all the fun out of it. I guess people forget that taste is subjective. I mean, Linkin Park still sells albums.
Fuck Radiohead and The Hold Steady - they are both overrated and B O R I N G.
Q:Radiohead or Hold Steady?
A:Suicide.
Since 2005, Radiohead have given me “Bodysnatchers,” the marketing tactic I alluded to earlier, and some stuff I could care less about. The Hold Steady have given me 30+ songs that constitute a whole universe to get lost in, quote from, light into, geek out over, and live alogside a a few minutes at a time. They’re both a massiveley simple and incredibly complex pleasure while Radiohead are just this kind of monolithic, resoluteley upper-middlebrow morass of “greatness” at it’s most plausible.
@disasterevolved: Pfft, Alan Vega’s no great shakes either.
@RaptorAvatar: Incredibly well put. It’s pretty simple. I’ve had fun listening to The Hold Steady at some point this decade, which is more than I can say about Radiohead.
@RaptorAvatar: The Hold Steady have given me 30+ songs that constitute a whole universe to get lost in, quote from, light into, geek out over, and live alogside a a few minutes at a time.
I approve of this sentiment (I am indifferent to the band) but at the same time the first comparison that leapt to mind upon reading this was Magic: The Gathering.
First of all, “The Hold Steady” didn’t say anything. Tad Kubler did. And he has the right to say whatever he wants. I agree with him on Radiohead, disagree on Oasis. So what? As for RH v. THS? RH has put out 3 well-received albums (average 82.7 score on metacritic) since 2001. THS has put out 4 albums since 2004 with an average metacritic score of 83.5. Whether you like them or not, THS is every bit as well received critically as RH and twice as prolific. That’s damn impressive.
It seems to me that what Kubler is saying is that there is still a lot that can be done within the parameters of a straight-forward rock band - but that Radiohead has turned away from that approach in favor of a style that omits any kind of hooks or riffs in favor of an electronic, atmospheric sound. By doing this, Kubler implies, Radiohead has squandered their potential by distancing themselves so far from their origins.
By contrast, he praises Oasis - a band that has put out a lot of music but which still uses the canonical components of rock music (guitar / bass / drums /vocals) on every new album.
I’m on Kubler’s side - I have tried to listen to Radiohead, but there’s nothing that grabs me about their music. It just seems so abstract - and frankly, not very rock and roll. Which is not to say that there isn’t a place for experimentalism in rock music - heck, I’ve got a million Fall albums at home - but to agressively purge your music of most of the conventional elements of rock is to rob it of its power.
@Ned Raggett: So now we’re hating on M:TG? Good Christ.
I wouldn’t say that Radiohead are total geniuses… they’re just more genius than The Hold Steady.
Um, really, this sort of comment ignites the internet? Kubler’s point is perfectly valid, and I don’t think he’s actually implying that The Hold Steady are better than Radiohead, just that Radiohead no longer sound like the band that recorded The Bends. And that’s true, isn’t it?
Not exactly sure why that ignited Perpetua’s ire so fiercely…
@natepatrin: Ooh, shut yo’ mouth! He’s still going, and given his history, that’s pretty darn impressive.
@D.R. Mosby: I almost forgot about Noel Gallagher’s beef w/ Radiohead & the pay-what-you-want scale. Now it’s all starting to make sense!
@D.R. Mosby: to agressively purge your music of most of the conventional elements of rock is to rob it of its power
There’s a presumption in your post, though, that there’s an overarching idea of what ‘rock’ is — ‘a straight-forward rock band’ is a fetishized idea being brought to bear, and what that is supposed to be and ’supposed’ to sound like is way, WAY up for grabs. If Kubler likes his own particular fetish, he’s welcome to it, but he’s no universal judge and jury, no more than any of us are.
@Eugene Langley: Who’s hating? Merely observing. (I mean I could have just as easily said Vampire: The Masquerade.)
Oh no way, team Radiohead on this one. Kubler’s comments aren’t “criticism.” They just make him sound like a hater. You have to be very very careful about making comments like this if your band is, ahem, much smaller than the one you’re criticizing.
Also, dragging in Oasis for a comparison just makes you look like a tool.
I’m surprised at the level of emo manpain this incident is causing!
@Nicolars: I’m not!
@goldsounds: “5,000 pothead losers?” Were you the hall monitor at your high school too? Did they give you a bright, shiny badge?
As for all the Radiohead haters, I quote Jay-Z: “A wise man once told me don’t argue with fools, because people from a distance can’t tell who is who.”
Congratulations to everyone involved here for transporting themselves back to junior high!
@Michaelangelo Matos: I am going to write a sternly-worded if illiterate anonymous complaint about you in the second-floor men’s room in protest.
@goldsounds: In their defense, everything about that light show felt like a valentine from the band to the stoners in the audience.
At the same… damn, I felt the contact high coming on the moment the lights dimmed.
@D.R. Mosby: I wouldn’t say that purging conventional elements robs something of its power. But then, I don’t really have an issue with Radiohead’s deconstructionist tendancies so much as I do with how utterly cold most of it leaves me. Plus, I’m not really sure how much further Rock and Roll can really go. After you’ve heard a few math grind bands you’ll know exactly what I’m talking about.
@Ned Raggett: I was thinking more “Big Lebowski” but either way, the point is definiteley that Hold Steady fandom is somewhat parallell to the Lester Bangs theory in “Almost Famous” wherein, “…the only true currency in this bankrupt world is what you share with someone else when you are uncool.” There’s also a lot of that same principle at work when they talk in interviews about not wanting to ever be the “in” thing.
@AquaLung: I wish! For reals, thanks for coming to the rescue PC police! Sorry, but the burnout contingent at this show was pretty insufferable. That can be said for most burnouts everywhere.
@Marth: Art Brut is much better than the Hold Steady!! (Unless my rampant Anglophilia has warped my senses, which is possible.)
@goldsounds: and hipsters. Duh.
@Michaelangelo Matos: OMG, at no point have I even come close to setting a lunchroom table ON FIRE yet, geez! Now, that would be jr. high.
Just saw Radiohead and they were great in concert - but what were the best parts? What did the crowd get into the most? The tracks off O.K. Computer and The Bends…
The Hold Steady are just up there having a good time, more interested in hyping up the Minnesota Twins than making a political statement - and that is fine by me!
@Ned Raggett:
I’m not sure that Kubler is stating anything more than his personal opinion, as his statements are qualified with words like “I think…”. But I personally don’t believe it’s fetishistic to want to hear music that is: made with guitars; contains riffs and hooks; and uses a verse / chorus structure. And it doesn’t even mean that Kubler can’t appreciate music that doesn’t have those things - I think he is simply wondering why Radiohead in particular ran so far away from their roots so quickly. Was the experience of “Creep” so traumatic that it caused Radiohead to distance themselves from that style of music?
Speaking of the Twins, I’m hoping the White Sox hurry up and take the divis–THREADKILL!!!!
… please?
@touch the cornballer: “the best parts” and “what did the crowd get into the most”, to some people, can be very different things.
@D.R. Mosby: But I personally don’t believe it’s fetishistic to want to hear music that is: made with guitars; contains riffs and hooks; and uses a verse / chorus structure.
Yeah, but think of it this way: to my mind, this description could equally cover, say, Bo Diddley and the Young Marble Giants, Tool and the Raincoats, the Shaggs and Disco Inferno, etc. etc. What you see (at least, so it’s implied) as something specific I find to be an incredibly broad church, though within that is something described by you as ’straight-forward rock.’ Fair enough, but why is that take seen to be the standard, what standards created and shaped it, and why is it prioritized? Fetishism may be a poor choice of terminology, but there’s a question of meaning at play regardless which you’re taking as a given and which I — quite admittedly — want to address at its roots. (Which means we have now moved from Matos’s perceived junior high into an incredibly full-of-itself graduate studies program — I oughta know, I was in one for four years.)
Is anyone going to address David Berman’s Radiohead swipe in today’s Pitchfork interview?
“Never before has there been a “greatest band in the world” who had so little to say about anything.”
@baconfat: No, because if I ever read Pitchfork for even a minute, I’ll kill myself.
OK, I respect Radiohead. I think they’re a great band, they’ve influenced a lot of great bands, and they have some songs I absolutely love. But do I really enjoy their music? Not particularly.
The Hold Steady, on the other hand, is somewhere on the lower end of my (non-existent) list of my ten favorite bands ever. I flat-out love the Hold Steady, even though I’m straight edge and not the kind of guy who hooks up with random girls at parties. I don’t know why, but they speak to me, whereas Radiohead (despite repeated listenings throughout the past decade of my life never has and probably never will.
@Ned Raggett: I only raised the point about “fetishism” because the term implies an interest in something far outside the mainstream - to the point where it is a substitute for normal desires. The question then arises - what in rock can be considered “normal”? The absolute extremes of rock music have been mapped out, and a lot of forms in rock that were considered transgressive have now been aborbed into the mainstream (the appropriation of industrial music by bands like Nine Inch Nails, for example). Defining what is mainstream is elusive I think, which is why I question the idea that anything in rock can be considered fetishistic.
I mentioned a handful of elements (guitars, riffs and hooks, verse / chorus) not as much to imply that these are essential elements of rock music, but more to say that I don’t think it’s odd to want to hear these things. However, I’ll also be the first to admit that the desire to hear these elements is culturally informed. Kubler probably grew up listening to (what we would now think of as) classic rock and this (in part) formed the basis of his musicial aesthetic (look no further than his Les Paul and tube amp setup for proof). Had he been born ten years earlier or later, or in a different part of country (or world), I’m sure his musical sensibilities would be entirely different (and he would probably have a different take on Radiohead).
not unlike saying that Cloverfield should get an Oscar for its ads
Actually an Oscar for an ad campaign isn’t a bad idea.
that sound you heard was ever head in williamsburg exploding. hahahaha.
Wow, you’d think he spoke ill of Barack Obama or something.
@Ned Raggett: I concur…but then of course, The Dark Knight would win.
Dark Knight wins all! DARK KNIGHT!!!
My guess is that Thom York’s response to all this would be “who is the hold steady?”
My favorite Hold Steady releases of the last five years wound up getting five-starred on my iPod and slipped into my (usually dance and rap-dominated) year-end top tens. My favorite Radiohead release of the last five years was that Toots and the Maytals cover of “Let Down”.
I actually really enjoyed In Rainbows. So much more than Hail To The Thief (which plods along and is just so dreary). Maybe it’s because it wasn’t so computer-dominated (but still with plenty of blips and tricky beats to make sure there was no straight-forward rock song on there).
@Dead Air ummm Dead Air: I like the way you think. (I’m not sure if it’s the best ad campaign, though…one of the more elaborate, yes.)
It’s not hard to follow where Radiohead’s going. It even says that on my PHD (Pablo Honey Degree).
I like Radiohead, but I don’t think they’re geniuses or saviors or anything. As for the other guys, Matthew P. summed up my feelings precisely.
It is things like this that make me keep listening to fourfour’s “Ashley’s Roachclip” break on repeat.
I had to vote for Radiohead. I’d side with “Hot in the Shade”-era KISS over the Hold Steady.