First Listen: Thom Yorke - The Eraser

Well, what a pleasant surprise to come across today. The debut solo album from Thom Yorke, a man who fronts a band you may have heard of called Radiohead. It's a nice little holdover until the next full-group album, which is supposed to be released later this year, or early next year, or in 2010, or never, I don't know.

So here are some quick thoughts after my first listen: If you told someone this was a Radiohead album, they would believe you, obviously, because it has Thom's unmistakable voice. But this isn't Radiohead. It's something Thom did with Radiohead's own George Martin, Nigel Godrich. It has that glitchy, broken electronic sound the band developed on Kid A and Amnesiac, and again on parts of Hail to the Thief. I can already tell there are layers upon layers of sounds, but at the same time, it sounds pretty simple.

I actually had pretty low expectations for this record. I thought it would be much weirder and more difficult than it is. But I found it rather enjoyable the first time through. I can't imagine fans of the Yorkier side of Radiohead not liking this. From what I've heard of the new Radiohead stuff (see an earlier Sawin' Blogs post for details), it would appear the two records have little in common. But we'll see.

Well, the album's out on July 11. No album can be judged with just one listen, and I'm sure someone here at Sawin' Blogs will chime in with more before then.