Lord knows I wish it was, golly does it come close, and by all rights it really bloody should be. Look at any of its components individually – the crystalline production, the masterful songwriting, the incendiary artwork, any of its nine stunning songs – and your jaw may well drop. But as a whole, Amok feels like less than the sum of its parts. More on that later.
Atoms For Peace consists of Yorke, longtime Radiohead producer Nigel Godrich, Red Hot Chili Peppers bassist Flea, and percussionist extraordinaires Maura Refosco and Joey Waronker. Legend has it that Amok evolved out of the band getting wasted one night in LA, listening to a gratuitous amount of Fela Kuti, and then jamming till the morning light. The decision to listen to some seminal Afrobeat amidst all the debauchery was an interesting one, and Kuti’s influence certainly made it onto the record, most noticeably on skittering ethnic opener “Before Your Very Eyes.” This track does a great job of establishing Amok’s dense, painstakingly-constructed electronic rock sound, all shuffling layers of percussion and rigid guitar-and-bass grooves.
Though all of the band members maintain a strong presence (fans of Flea’s acrobatic basslines are especially in for a treat), Amok is without a doubt a Thom Yorke-dominated affair. His unmistakable voice is the focal point of each song, covering every last beat, blip and riff in a thin layer of frost. On some songs his voice floats eerily above all the robotic chattering, on others (see the phenomenal title track) his words are shredded and strewn amongst it. The juxtaposition of his reverbed falsetto with such angular, incessantly busy grooves creates a sound that is at once cavernous and claustrophobic.
Like much of Yorke’s latter-day output, Amok is concave rather than convex; it focuses on crafting rich and detailed sonic spaces for the listener to get lost in, rather than outwardly grabbing their attention with aggression or hooks. It does occasionally rise to boiling point, like on the nimble “Judge, Jury & Executioner,” but for the most part Amok is set to “simmer.”
So why, considering the calibre of its constituents, does Amok not add up to a masterpiece? Try as I might, I couldn’t really tell you. Perhaps there isn’t enough variation in style or density between the songs, or perhaps it sits a little too close to other works in Yorke’s discography; call it a glossier version of his solo effort The Eraser, a tighter King Of Limbs, even a busier In Rainbows. But even if it isn’t the most diverse or groundbreaking album in existence, Amok is still a hell of a great record. At its very best, namely on second track “Default,” it’s as good as anything Yorke has ever done.
4/5
