Instead of the pale pop Xeroxes favoured by the UK indie establishment, America chooses to wake up to Radiohead's "Creep" when it fancies a bit of Brit: indeed, it was only after the song was an American hit that it was successfully reissued in the UK. Already million-sellers, their second album The Bends finds them working with the fervency and self-assurance of missionaries, despite the title's acknowledgement that their rapid rise has not been without its dangers, particularly for singer Thom Yorke, who brings an intense conviction to his vignettes of poeticised alienation. He should worry: there'll not be a better album released by a British rock band this year.
It's not hard to see why America loves them: like U2 and Nirvana before them, Radiohead manage to articulate the most heartfelt, abject disaffection in the most contrarily uplifting manner, a staple stadium emotion that's just about the only musical option available for white American boys these days. But it's no base-metal copy: there's a determination here, in the subtlety and daring of their guitar interplay, to construct their own sonic architecture, and a streak of English cynicism a mile wide that prevents them playing it as dumb and passive as grunge. The result, especially in "My Iron Lung", an anthem of youth nihilism more barbed even than "Smells Like Teen Spirit", has a steely authority streaked with contempt: "Suck, suck your teenage thumb, toilet-trained and dumb," sneers Yorke. "When the power runs out we'll just hum".