>>i didn't listen to IR until half a year after "everyone
>else"
>>for various reasons.
>
>I think you've explained this before, but I totally forgot,
>bro.

yeah, i've explained, but it's been so long that i'm starting to forget as well. the easy explanation is that, like everyone else, i went to the site to download it on day of release, but for some reason it didn't work for me. was it an emailed link? if so, i waited for the link to come, but it never did. maybe it was an instant download. either way, nothing happened. eventually i came back and retried it, but by then everyone was raving over how great it was, so my view was clouded before listening, and i was set up to be disappointed by it not living up to the hype. i burned the low-quality 160 kbps mp3's to cd-r but never ended up even playing it. the album came out physically, i bought it immediately, but i guess i was still put off by the hype and the fumbled delivery. i also have a thing about reading along with the lyric booklet the first time i play an album i buy, so sometimes it's a while before i have time to really devote like that. mostly it was the hype factor. i eventually listened shortly before i saw them live, which was another disastrous experience. every time i saw or tried to see radiohead live something bad happened except for the last time i saw them, which was at lollapalooza. that's another story (or several) for another time.

the even harder to articulate reason is that even though radiohead is my favorite band and OKC my favorite album, i've been drifting away from them and their music for a long time. their music is an anomaly in what i listen to usually these days, and as a band they just don't excite me like they used to. IR has a sort of adult contemporary feel and sound to it that isn't very inspiring, as great as the songwriting is, as consistent as the sequencing and overall album are, and as talented as radiohead (and nigel) remain. i'd be pleasantly shocked if this album (i haven't even committed the title to memory yet) hits me like their 2nd through 5th did and usually still do on the rare occasion i play them. still, i'll always check for everything they do, and to quote a song they've covered, "nobody does it better."