OK Computer
Radiohead's prophetic album about technology anxiety, written in 1997 but somehow more relevant now.
This is the album that articulated the specific flavor of dread I feel about always-connected life, except it was recorded before most of us had email.
On the surface it’s alternative rock from the 90s, but underneath it’s a concept album about disconnection-through-connection, sung by someone who sounds like they’re slowly becoming a machine.
“Fitter, happier, more productive” delivered in a monotone text-to-speech voice remains the most chilling two-minute track about optimization culture I’ve ever heard.
It ties into my ongoing thinking about how technology promises connection but delivers isolation, and how the shape of that tension hasn’t changed much in 25+ years.
Listening to it feels like recognition—like Thom Yorke somehow time-traveled to now, felt the specific exhaustion of infinite feeds and notifications, then went back to 1997 to write about it.
Since revisiting it recently, I’ve noticed how often I hum “I’m lost in the supermarket, I can no longer shop happily” when doomscrolling, except that’s a different album but the feeling maps perfectly.