People tend to forget that when Radiohead's Kid A came out in October of 2000 there was still very much a divide between "rockist" audiences and the growing masses drawn to post-rave electronic music. 

The bafflement that greeted the potentially (and perhaps intentionally) self-sabotaging follow-up to 1997's towering OK Computer was, thus, not altogether surprising to those who -- like Radiohead frontman Thom Yorke -- were already well acquainted with the work of Aphex Twin, Plastikman and Autechre or, say, the entire 1990s Warp Records roster. And there was indeed bafflement. Initial reviews of Kid A ranged from "mystifying" and "wantonly unfathomable" to "self-consciously awkward and bloody-minded, the noise made by a band trying so hard to make a 'difficult' album that they felt it beneath them to write any songs" and "a lengthy, over-analysed mistake" to the far simpler "just awful." 

Time has proved most of those pundits wrong. Kid A stands today as a landmark moment of self-reinvention for one of the biggest rock bands on the planet and a record that entirely redrew the definition of mainstream pop music in its own warped image. And there are great songs here once you put in a bit of time and stop pining for the next great, epic U.K. guitar-rock album. People also forget that The Bends and OK Computer took a little patience to properly "get," and those albums will always be there for listeners who prefer the comfort of familiarity. Once the robots spirited Yorke et al. away, in any case, there was no looking back for Radiohead. 

TRACKLISTING:

1. Everything in it's Right Place 
2. Kid A 
3.The National Anthem 
4. How to Disappear Completely 
5. Treefingers 
6. Optimistic 
7. In Limbo 
8. Idioteque 
9. Morning Bell 
10.Motion Picture Soundtrack