LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - While millions around the world fagged Sunday watching the shutting ceremony of the Beijing Olympics, 7,000 fans lucky sufficiency to grudge a ticket to Radiohead's show at the Hollywood Bowl witnessed not only a band at the top of its game but likewise an behave that at times seemed to be the topper on the planet.
Certainly that's high congratulations, but during its two-hour set -- the first-class honours degree of iI sold-out nights at the Bowl -- the quintette from Oxford, England, managed to throw a spell over the crowd without resorting to fist-pumping anthems like U2, Bruce Springsteen, Pearl Jam or even Coldplay. Radiohead simply operates on a completely different level: It connects with the consultation through sublime and mesmerizing intensity rather than by pummeling a crowd into submission via bravado.
Even its politics ar subtle. Throughout the set up, two Tibetan flags were draped on the backs of keyboards; this was never addressed but nonetheless sent a message as the lie of the world noted the Olympic Games in China. And, in the jaw-dropping, fuzz-bass-fueled "The National Anthem," the band employed snatches of audio hijacked from infomercials that in effect mocked mindless consumerism.
Radiohead has enough confidence in its music and fan radix that it initially offered its up-to-the-minute album, the superb "In Rainbows," as a name-your-own-price download. That self-assuredness also was on display Sunday (August 24). Frontman Thom Yorke performed several songs, including the sinuous "All I Need," at the piano with his back to the crowd, a move that came off not as standoffish simply organic, as did the band's tasteful yet sensational video and lighting presentation.
As it has since the release of its third album, 1997's landmark "OK Computer," Radiohead served up an heady mix of acoustic and electronic instrumentation at the Bowl that somehow managed to sound thoroughly modern and fabulously human. "Faust Arp," from "In Rainbows," was performed by the duo of Yorke and multi-instrumentalist Jonny Greenwood, on acoustic guitar. On the other goal of the spectrum, the electronic and live percussion of "Idioteque," from "Kid A," packed enough punch to fire a gush.
The band's heart and soulfulness is Yorke, whose voice at times resembled the cries of a maimed animal. For nonbelievers, it might hold sounded like an endless stream of whining, simply those wHO felt an emotional connexion with Yorke were touched not so much by his insightful lyrics as by his wordless singing, which canful be just now as effective.
Before launching into the set-closing "Everything in Its Right Place," Yorke sang a few lines from R.E.M.'s "Electrolite," in a nod to the band's alt-rock forefathers. On Sunday, Radiohead proved that the torch has long been passed, and the band is running at full f number with no need to look over its shoulder.
/Hollywood Reporter
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