Mark

Amok is wearing a dress instead.

Sums up Amnesiac pretty well for a lot of people.

What I was trying to say was simply that I don't think Kid A is about "the birth of the first atomic bomb and the post apocalyptic world of a nuclear holocaust". I just think it relates to how the musicians who made it felt at the time. If that's pretentious, so be it.

Kid A is stripping everything that it means to be Radiohead, Amnesiac is rediscovering traditional songcraft. Hail to the Thief is an apocalypse.

(Just to be clear, the lengths to which I'm making comparisons and extended metaphors about what the Radiohead albums mean is exaggerated. My sole point is that no one sits down and decides to write an album about something so specific. Themes just happen. People should just accept that there is no fictional plot in Kid A, the same as Viva or MX does not follow a narrative, they are just albums that mean something to the real world lives of the musicians involved. Which was what I was trying to say about the sound of Kid A.)

They're more than that :P

Just because they tweeked it, doesn't mean it's the bare minimum that it needs to be. And one guy and a guitar isn't the bare minimum needed to create that album, given that it's rhythmically their strongest record. Amnesiac is trying to remember what the hell happened on the last album. Kid A is getting undressed, Amnesiac is finding your clothes. (Hail to the Thief is burning your clothes).

I don't think Kid A's not meant to be about anything, it's just the sound of a band ripping themselves apart, and not allowing themselves to be consumed by anything superficial at all. Kid A is the bare minimum; no guitars, no brands on tour, no colour, no flash production. Not even the songs are songs, they're slogans, phrases and ideas and jumbled up that Thom hasn't bothered unscrambling to make sense of. People often ask what's caused this "nakedness", if you like. The two most common theories I've heard are that the album's about a natural disaster and starting from scratch, or that it's about the very first clone, who has no memory, but has to build a life. I just think it's the reaction of them coming off the OK Computer tour, and thinking "you know what? This sucks". Kid A, for me, is the sound of Radiohead abandoning everything that they were depressed to hell with: fame, guitars and making sense of their emotions.

Oh yeah, I'd say I love their music, but I wouldn't go over the top and fangirl over them. Where is the best place to actually talk to a hero, though? I saw Kano on the tube, and I saw Sergio Pizzorno in Tesco, but I didn't say anything to either of them. They've got lives outside of music, and if I was them, I'd want to be left alone.

You probably know all this, but for anyone who doesn't... Reporting's hard work. It's a lot of changing stuff, being told to write 1000 words, then 50, then 200, a lot of research, a lot of pressure. Of course, it's the glamorous side of the job but it's also a lot of responsibility and creativity. Editing's just as rigorous but in a different way. You're under pressure to make the work better, it's a bit like being a producer, and the reporter's your singer. Paul Epworth phones Adele and asks her to write lyrics for a Bond theme. He might have to tell her to redo them over and over again til they're right. They're both under pressure, but they both have different responsibilities. I'd say to anyone with a creative streak, ideas, someone who's got the schemes, enjoys writing about anything and everything, become a reporter. I'd say to anyone who enjoys journalism in general, is a team player and is someone who likes circling the grammar errors out of someone else's work, or coming up with bigger ideas than just single articles, become an editor. Hope that helps anyone. Of course, there's no reason you can't do both, but honing your skills up on each is something worth doing.

I could walk the streets for years with you “I could walk the streets for years with you. We could wind up where we started; we could wander through the market when it’s silent and deserted. Watch our breath pirouette, and flourish in the air, smoke halos hovering like hot air balloons or flame-hearted lanterns drifting to the moon.” Paths and maps and trails and tracks that overlapped and intersected lead to them to a scaffold ribcage; cheap tarpaulin, still used for a roof. And under cover from the same rain and those featherless trees, their hands met: in the same moment as that the clock’s did. Just like in 1958. He dropped his words like a scientist, pipette perched over test tubes; weighed each breath, each pulse of each vowel for the ripples that throwing that pebble would create. But all those years later, it still meant the same to her. It didn’t to him.

Rockstars must be told they're loved more than Jose Mourinho gets told when he looks in the mirror. I met Simon off of Basement Jaxx, who were my first favourite band. I told him that his band got me into music, because I didn't think many people would've said that to him. Four Tet, though... pretty fucking cool :cool:

It's a beautiful record in my opinion, an average one in a lot of people's, but I've not heard anyone call it terrible. :confused:

I don't think I'd ever want to meet any of my heroes in the situation where there's a very clear divide between "fan" and "idol", and all you can do is gush about how their music changed your life. Sure, I'd love to talk to Damon Albarn or Alex Turner, but only because they're interesting people. I'd want a proper conversation that consisted of more than just "OMG I love everything you do!"

Why do you want to meet them so bad anyway? They say you should never meet your heroes, there's good reason for it too.

Whoever.

They're probably really busy.

What do you want to do in journalism? Reporting? Editing? Researching? Something else?

Same as they can't sign your iTunes download or Spotify stream :/ Physical's always better.

Face value resale is exactly what should happen, and physical tickets gives you that opportunity. Bands' websites and forums should give this option I think. Same as I think if bands streamed their own albums on their own websites with their own adverts, they'd make more money than they would with Spotify. Cutting out the middle man saves a lot.

Oh yeah, it's really good for that. Anyone who talks about sex, drugs or does "like for a rate" on Facebook is someone to avoid in real life.

I don't see why a Facebook addiction is so bad. It makes me laugh, I can share things I find funny with my friends - because literally everyone has it - and I feel good if I upload something popular. There are people from school who I still talk to who I wouldn't otherwise, there are people I've become friends with, via other friends, and there have been times when I've been at parties and things with people I've only ever seen on Facebook and I've known who likes what, and been able to start conversations. It's also really great for when you meet a girl, being able to go and check out her photos. I thank Mark Zuckerberg for this.

Wow. That is bad. I take back my earlier disdain.

I've done work experience at the BBC, Q Magazine and the Daily Mirror. I'm doing English at Uni, hopefully gonna do journalism some time. Worked for Sky Sports. I would say this: Do not study journalism. If you study journalism, you are pigeon-holed as a journalist your whole life. If you enjoy writing and editing, do English, because you can do (nearly) anything with English. Seriously consider if journalism is right for you. There are very few jobs. The pay is bad. Teachers get three times the starting salary. It's all heading online these days. It's a lot of hard work. And for every person that meets Green Day and does a line of coke with Florence or whoever, there's someone stuck in the office, reading through a review, checking the magazine's not saying anything it could be sued for. Write stuff. All sorts. Find books on how to write stuff. Study your craft, work hard at it. Don't just expect to be good at it because you know about music: look at your teachers for example. Are the best teachers the ones who know their shit, or the ones who communicate ideas the best? It's the same with writers. Study, study, study. Read loads. Start a blog. Review everything. Get Twitter. Read proper newspapers, and not The Sun. Write to places for work experience. If you want to work for Q, ring them up. Ask them. They'll ask for your work, send it to them. Somewhere like Q will most often only hire someone they know for a big job. If they have a post for online sub-editor, they ring up their mate Paul at the NME and ask if he fancies the post. That's why getting yourself known to people through work experience is crucial. It's the same in any job, they're going to hire someone they know. My cousin wanted to be a Formula 1 mechanic, but his mum told him that there's no chance of him getting that job, because it's an extremely limited field. That's the wrong attitude to have. Someone has to interview Muse, you just have to prove that you're the right person for the job. Good luck with it, and follow the advice of everyone else that's commented.

I much prefer proper tickets, but I don't particularly like this paperless ticket system, especially the Radiohead one. I had an incident where I got three tickets for Radiohead, one for my girlfriend, and then we split up. I'm lucky that I have friends that love Radiohead; if I didn't, I'd have paid £50 for a spare seat. I can't stand touting, but the implements put in to stop it just seem a bit too stern to me. I'm pretty sure most people buy tickets responsibly, and no one's forcing you to pay a man outside the o2 Arena £150 to see Michael Buble. The people who want to see bands are still seeing them, we just need to cut gig prices. The Courteeners are playing the o2 Academy near me for £18.50. That's just daft.