She looks like the real thing
She tastes like the real thing
#25.
Radiohead - "Fake Plastic Trees" / "India Rubber" / "How Can You Be Sure"(1101 Points, 18 Votes)Year: 1995
US Chart Position: #11 Modern Rock
UK Chart Position: #20
Acclaimed Music Ranking: #4 (year), #31 (decade), #291 (all-time)
Rank on Our All-Time Singles List: #29
AMG Says: "The biggest hit from Radiohead's 1995 sophomore album, The Bends, "Fake Plastic Trees" was a moody masterpiece that proved Radiohead could write a great single without aping Nirvana (many had their doubts after the success of "Creep" and the inconsistency of Pablo Honey). The song's detailed arrangement and slow build gave it an epic sweep, which along with its subtle structural experimentation helped foreshadow the innovations of OK Computer. The main lyrical thrust -- plastic as a metaphor for a false, stunted emotional life, a consumerist alienation from the self and others -- is hardly unique in the annals of rock, but the free-associative images are striking, and the music is so achingly gorgeous that it barely matters whether the listener understands the words in the first place. "Fake Plastic Trees" is primarily guitar-based, but it marks the beginnings of Radiohead's willingness to flesh out their arrangements with electronics; echoing synth washes and what sounds like a string section add extra layers of sound through most of the song. Its melody and chord progressions move very deliberately, almost numbly, which lends dramatic impact to every significant change -- when the chord progression drops down for two beats after having remained on the same chord for a relatively long time, or when Thom Yorke's voice takes the melody up into a poignant falsetto. This main part of the song alternates with a hushed, synth-dominated passage in which Yorke's voice dives to a near-whisper. That is, until the end of the second time through. Yorke suddenly bursts into a long note, and takes part of it into a nasal rasp before settling back down. It's a fleeting burst of intensity that comes out of nowhere, and soon returns there, but that contrast is equivalent to a cathartic howl in the fragile, delicate sonic environment that's been established. Put another way, it's the only point where Yorke's slow simmer becomes a boil. That one event, though, is enough to lead into the only full-band portion of the song -- multiple electric guitars crash in along with the acoustic and synths, and the effect is near-symphonic. Most songs would end almost immediately after this swooning climax, probably by dropping most of the instruments out, singing a few quiet additional bars, and finishing on one last guitar strum. And "Fake Plastic Trees" does follow that pattern at first, but then keeps on going, long enough for most of the band to reenter. There's never another build, but this ending is long enough to constitute its own discrete section of the song; that experimentation with multiple sections, along with the sudden shift in dynamics, hints at what lay in store on OK Computer."
Ranked Highest By: Hero & The Good Dr. Bill (#6)
Can Be Most Easily Found On:
The Bends
