Radiohead — Best Of

Best Of

Parlophone/EMI

Jared Morano (CHARTattack)

09/02/2008 3:33pm

Now that Radiohead have completed their contract with EMI it seems the label is looking to squeeze the few final pennies out of the art-rock powerhouse's fanbase before the entire CD industry kicks it for good. First came last year's all-encompassing "no release left behind" box set, and now that's been slimmed down to a bite-size 17 track retrospective.

The band doesn't sanction either compilation and consequently only the EMI recordings are included (in other words: there's nothing from In Rainbows). The Bends gets the biggest representation with six tracks, followed by OK Computer with four, three from Kid A, two from Hail To The Thief, and only one from each of Pablo Honey and Amnesiac.

If that doesn't feel complete enough, a double-disc edition is available with another 11 album tracks plus = "Talk Show Host," the celebrated live recording of "True Love Waits," and all 21 of the band's music videos, including a really embarrassing one for "Pop Is Dead." It's worth seeing solely for Thom Yorke's bleach-blonde hair and over-emoting. Grouches will complain about the obviousness of the song selection (stupid "Karma Police"...), but what it comes down to is that track-for-track, this release contains 17 of the best pop format recordings from the last 15 years.