Radiohead had already had a huge hit in 1993 with its grunge-y ode to self-loathing, "Creep," and it had already put out a first-rate album with 1995's The Bends, but when OK Computer dropped in 1997, so did about a million or so jaws.
  A majestic document of fear and isolation that far exceeded anything the band had attempted previously, OK Computer's vast, sweeping soundscapes were so overwhelming it was impossible to feel anything but dwarfed in their presence. And that's exactly how the band wanted us to feel -- small, lonely, and absolutely awed by a pre-millennial world that had grown too big and was moving too fast.
  The three-part epic "Paranoid Android" sets the album's tone. With guitars that shimmer, rattle, and explode, it's as grand and bombastic as any mid-'70s prog-rock symphony, yet its feel is not celebration and exultation, but rather panic and dread. The paranoia drips across the album, seeping into the sublime "Subterranean Homesick Alien" and particularly into the frighteningly intimate, "Exit Music (for a Film)." Opening with only an acoustic guitar behind him, lead singer Thom Yorke's voice hugs the studio mic so closely it sounds like he's whispering in your ear: "Pack and get dressed / Before your father hears us / Before all hell breaks loose."
Of course, it's too late -- hell has already broken loose, but it's not the sort of fire and brimstone vision we're normally offered -- it's a stifling, insidious boredom. "Bring down the government ... they don't speak for us," Yorke offers later on "No Surprises," but without any of the revolutionary fervor that the line implies. Instead the words sort of slide out of the side of his mouth, more of a shrug of the shoulders than a call to arms. In a world where technology has made everything easier, happier, and more efficient, Yorke feels numb.
  Much has been written about the album's "storyline," a supposed battle of man vs. machine, but trying to extricate a coherent plot out of OK Computer is probably futile. Still, it's impossible not to hear the terror and confusion in Yorke's moans, groans, and wails as he's bum-rushed by the encroaching tide of technology. And, with Radiohead's electronically enhanced wall of sound bearing down on us, it's impossible not to feel the same thing.