Anti-Climacus

QUOTE: from Slate, about how Radiohead killed off British rock, by reducing it to workman-like formula. To wit:

"Idlewild's musical references to American indie rock bands of the '80s are not hard to get. The problem is that there are so many of them, and they follow one after another, so that it gets hard to keep track of the band from song to song. "There's a Seventeen contest in my home/ There's a Seventeen contest in my own home," sings the Idlewild front man, Roddy Woomble. The song, "Little Discourage" sounds exactly like early-mid period REM . The music is derivative; on the other hand, the fact that Idlewild is really, really good at writing derivative music is a virtue, not a crime. (Radiohead's first hit single, "Creep"?which starts off the '90s disc of Capitol's great new box set of Capitol tracks from the '40s through the '90s?sounds like a straight-up parody of Nirvana.) Idlewild's "I Don't Have the Map" is definitely one of the best Smiths rip-offs ever?with the odd but heartfelt imprecation "Don't buy local lamplight" leading into a wave of Pixies-ish guitars , which then resolves into a believably angry and alienated chorus of "You can't cope without the contact." The band's two-guitar attack is perfectly poised in the commercial but still heavy-sounding area that the Pixies opened up in 1987."