"A job that slowly kills you, bruises that won't heal"

#11 OK Computer, Radiohead, Capitol Records, 1997

This is not the first time this record has made an appearance on this blog and this probably won't be the last. Five years ago this was my #1. Three years ago six songs off this record were featured in my Top 200 songs of all time. Why, then, is it no longer number one? It's not because the songs aren't amazingly well done or profound. And it's definitely not because it's too "main stream" (a notion that will continue to be proved as my countdown continues). However, a lot can change in five years. Especially when you feel that your exposure to music explodes within a given time frame (this may be analogous to saying what your favorite book is when you're a senior in high school versus your favorite book when you're a senior in college, which is only a useful analogy if you read anything in both high school and college). But certainly, despite the fact that my musical tastes have expanded one hundred fold since college, OK Computer abides. It abides so much that most of memories with the record involve forced listenings: forcing Sarah to listen to "Exit Music for a Film" on repeat while we had dinner one night in Bristol, forcing Shawna to listen to "Paranoid Android" all the way through once in her Saturn, forcing Hunter and Rob to listen to "Climbing Up the Walls" with the lights out five years ago, and, of course, being forced along with Rob to listen to Jon Kestner argue about why OK Computer is a greater concept record than Dark Side of the Moon while we played Frisbee golf in rural South Carolina. True story. Historically, my favorite song has been a toss-up between "Paranoid Android" or "Karma Police", but the sympathy vote goes to "No Surprises" which, having been forced to live and breathe a 9 to 5 desk job for many years, hits the nail right on the head for those of us who sometimes have felt like a pig. in a cage. on antibiotics.