Radiohead, one of the most culturally important and critically acclaimed bands of their generation, return in May 2027 to play their first Australian shows in 15 years.
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Radiohead → return → years
If you're puzzled why so many are losing their minds over a bunch of po-faced Brits, we're here to help.
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we → lose → Brits
Radiohead epitomise music that is both wildly popular and inventive, uncompromising art that consistently challenges the definitions of how a huge musical group can sound, look, and act.
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group → epitomise → definitions
Hailing from Oxfordshire, the five-piece's studio perfectionism has continually evolved, splicing rock music's DNA with increasingly ambitious experiments.
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perfectionism → hail → experiments
Their songs express existential angst in a variety of dystopian topics — technological isolation, political calamity, ecological collapse — yet provoke euphoria as much as melancholy.
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songs → express → melancholy
Deeply adventurous and intellectual, they're a household name yet you rarely hear them in feel-good public settings.
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you → hear → settings
Their success can't be solely measured by record sales and awards, though they've earned plenty of both.
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they → measure → both
Eternally uncomfortable with celebrity, their distaste for the music business has seen them frequently rewrite the industry rule-book.
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them → see → book
Early adopters of internet culture norms, they adopted DIY streaming and embraced fan content and interaction long before Spotify and social media.
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they → adopt → Spotify
They pioneered both the 'surprise album' and the pay-what-you-want model with the independent release of 2007's In Rainbows, one of at least three Radiohead albums regularly ranking among 'Greatest Ever' lists.
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you → pioneer → lists
Radiohead's history is punctuated by finding balance when many of their peers found the structures they'd relied upon crumble underfoot.
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they → punctuate → peers
Each time it seems they've scaled the peak of their powers, they pack up and look for the next creative mountain to climb.
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they → seem → mountain
An esteemed discography
Radiohead first planted their flag with grunge-era anthem Creep from debut album Pablo Honey (1993).
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Radiohead → plant → album
They transcended one-hit wonder status with The Bends (1995) a leap forward in songwriting that was soon overshadowed by OK Computer (1997).
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that → transcend → Computer
Critics lined up to hail it a rule-breaking masterpiece of modern rock, which topped charts and made the band a global sensation.
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band → line → charts
But the worm was turning.
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"In what we've done, fame's been the most damaging element of it," frontman Thom Yorke told triple j's Richard Kingsmill in 1998.
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Yorke → do → 1998
"You don't need this cult of personalities like, unfortunately, Radiohead has.
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Radiohead → need → personalities
Dance music doesn't have [that]."
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music → have → that
Attempting to self-sabotage by ditching guitars for brainy electronica, Radiohead ironically became bigger than ever with Kid A (2000) and its counterpart Amnesiac (2001).
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Radiohead → attempt → A
Hail To The Thief (2004) balanced their analogue and digital sounds before refining a synthesis of accessible and abstract on the self-released In Rainbows (2007).
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Hail → balance → Rainbows
Released in similar surprise fashion, The King of Limbs (2011) was grounded in looped rhythms and ambient textures, while the symphonic, poignant A Moon Shaped Pool (2016), the band's latest release, brought further critical acclaim.
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Pool → release → acclaim
Thom Yorke is Radiohead's frontman, an angel-voiced artistic force famed for his idiosyncratic dancing, distinctive ptosis-effected look, and cantankerous reputation with the press.
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Yorke → fame → press
Although, he's mellowed in recent years.
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he → mellow → years
Meeting in 1985 as Oxfordshire public school students, they formed as On A Friday (the day they rehearsed).
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they → meet → Friday
After deferring a deal with Island Records to attend university, they reunited in 1991 and inked a six-album contract with EMI, changing their name to Radiohead (after the Talking Heads song).
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they → defer → song
All five members have embarked on solo projects, with both Yorke and Greenwood composing music for film, as well as forming side project The Smile with British drummer Tom Skinner.
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Yorke → embark → Skinner
For all their risk-taking, Radiohead's inner circle has remained consistent.
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circle → remain → taking
Besides additional touring drummers Clive Deamer (2011 to 2018) and Chris Vatalaro (2025), Radiohead's line-up has been identical for almost 40 years.
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up → tour → years
Ranking Radiohead's music feels like sacrilege.
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Ranking → rank → sacrilege
But if you can't spare the time to stream OK Computer, Kid A or In Rainbows in full, here's a shortcut.
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shortcut → spare → Rainbows
Paranoid Android (1997)
An instant classic that embodied Radiohead's dislike for being lumped in with grunge and Britpop, sounding nothing like those movements, or much else for that matter.
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Weaving pre-millennial angst, squalling guitars, and breathtaking beauty into a multi-movement epic, OK Computer's six-minute lead single is regarded by some as the Bohemian Rhapsody of the '90s.
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single → weave → 90s
And its opening salvo was agenda-setting proof that Radiohead had reinvented themselves.
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Radiohead → set → themselves
Yorke's hypnotic chord progression and warped vocals — his take on the eclectic Warp Records catalogue — is rarely performed the same way twice, but the song's spellbinding power never misses.
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power → perform → catalogue
This stand-out from The Bends is testimony that, even when they're playing it straight, few artists can scale the same emotive heights.
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artists → play → heights
Yorke's tear-jerking vocal yearning for authenticity was recorded after seeing the late, great Jeff Buckley.
And besides essentially inventing Coldplay, this anthem also cemented the climactic, cathartic build that would become central to Radiohead's playbook.
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that → jerk → playbook
This spare, melodic stunner went through a decade of iterations before appearing on In Rainbows.
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stunner → go → Rainbows
It's built around a modest bassline, evocative string arrangements and another career-best falsetto from Yorke that transforms a devastating put-down ("don't get any big ideas / they're not going to happen") into a sublime listening experience.
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they → build → experience
, the atmospheric piano and sweltering strings perfectly evoke the lyrical setting: an ethereal river cruise toward some inky afterlife accompanied by black-eyed angels.
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piano → evoke → angels
…and 6 more, not listed.