Mid-Week Music: Easy Star All-Stars - "Let Down"
Nine years after Radiohead’s OK Computer blew a lot of minds (including my own), a collective of musicians released a song-for-song cover of the entire album. Radiodread was masterfully realized in reggae, ska, and dub style, remarkably faithful to the original but infused with a completely different energy. As Giant Step’s description says, “Radiodread draws out the universal messages in Radiohead's masterpiece, which speaks to the need to create spiritual human interactions in the face of cold technology and soul-crushing routine.”
I’ve chosen the gorgeous “Let Down” for this installment of Mid-Week Music, not only because I love it, but because it really speaks to pulling joy from the darkness. This particular track is basically Toots & The Maytals, literally the seminal reggae band (they were the first to coin the term “reggae” in their song “Do the Reggay”).
What could have been a corny joke (insert comic of a group of musicians smoking weed and musing “what if we played Radiohead but, like, reggae?”) is instead a reverent, beautiful album, with a soul of its own.
Anyway, see if you find the joy in it that I do.
Love,
David
