No Surprises – Megan Wilson
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5CVsCnxyXg&w=740&h=422]
There’s something about the first few seconds of ‘No Surprises’ that even still, manage to send a shiver down my spine. The track was Radiohead’s third and final single from OK, Computer, the critically acclaimed album that was defined as one of the greatest of the 1990s. ‘No Surprises’ is one of the bands simplest, yet most deceptive songs they’ve ever released – and that’s exactly what is so alluring about it. Opening lyrics such as “heart that’s full up like a landfill / a job that slowly kills you / bruises that won’t heal” instantly set the mood for a song that you know is just going to get deeper and deeper.
The video shows Thom Yorke’s head locked inside a plastic bubble, filling up with water until his head is fully covered. It’s brilliantly disturbing and perhaps one of the most powerful videos that the band has ever done. It’s also incredibly clever in the way that Radiohead conveyed the feelings of confinement and loneliness (as heard in the lyrics) with a very uncomfortable experience that Yorke had to endure, in order to show how ‘he’ felt emotionally in a physical sense. Since its release, the video has racked up an impressive 23 million views on YouTube and is generally seen as one of the most iconic rock music videos.
Despite the themes of sadness, guilt and suicide surrounding the track, it’s somehow still beautiful and such easy-listening – and that’s just another stroke of genius in the Radiohead back catalogue.