J Mascis of Dinosaur Jr picks his favourite Radiohead song
Apart from its seismic single, ‘Creep’, the Radiohead debut album, Pablo Honey, is often forgotten under the sheer weight and allure of the band’s subsequent releases. The 1993 album was followed up two years later by The Bends, a more robust collection of songs. The 1995 follow-up perfected Radiohead’s early grunge-derived sound before the five-piece ventured into the more experimental and conceptually potent territory of OK Computer and Kid A.
Before frontman Thom Yorke embraced the electro-influences of artists like Aphex Twin, Autechre and Squarepusher in the late 1990s, Radiohead’s sound was mostly informed by post-punk and grunge bands. R.E.M., Talking Heads, Pixies and U2 are among the group’s most significant early influences.
The Massachusetts-based noise rock group Dinosaur Jr was also among the artists on whom Radiohead based their early guitar-led textures. In fact, as particularly enthusiastic fans of Pixies and Dinosaur Jr, Radiohead pulled in Sean Slade and Paul Q. Kolderie, who had previously worked with both bands, to produce Pablo Honey in 1993.
The producers had worked with Dinosaur Jr. on their acclaimed 1988 album Bug and brought a similar sonic approach to Pablo Honey. “Paul Kolderie and Sean Slade did Radiohead’s ‘Creep’ after we’d done Bug,” Dinosaur Jr. frontman J Mascis told Louder Sound in 2016. “I remember hearing that and thinking they’ve picked up something from the Dinosaur Jr. session.”
“Heaven forbid anyone should judge us on Pablo Honey. We were in hock to Dinosaur Jr and the Pixies up to our eyeballs,” Radiohead’s Ed O’Brien would later reflect during a 1999 interview with Select.
Although Radiohead were clearly indebted to Dinosaur Jr for their debut, what goes around comes around. When The Bends rolled around in 1995, Mascis was among many who found the album a particularly inspiring listen.
For a 2015 feature, Stereogum asked several musical icons to pick out their favourite Radiohead song. Mascis picked out ‘Black Star’ and remembered when he first discovered The Bends, his favourite Radiohead album.
“I bought the CD on a trip in California and was very impressed,” he wrote. “It was probably a year after it came out. I listened to this song over and over, it really spoke to me. This is by far my favourite Radiohead album, not self-conscious they just seem to be goin’ for it. Great songs and guitar sounds, awesome singing. It’s easy to love.”
Listen to Radiohead’s ‘Black Star’ below.
