Rolling Stone's Most Underrated Albums of the Decade

Rolling Stone - Most Underrated Album of the Decade

Okay, no.  Radiohead's Hail to the Thief is NOT one of the most underrated albums of the decade.

I understand that a criminally underrated album doesn't have to come from some obscure band.  There's a formula for something being underrated, and it goes something like this...

Underratedness = Awesomeness / Recognition

So if an album is great and lots of people say that it's great, that album has been properly rated.  Same thing if an album is shit and lots of people say that it's shit, or they don't even bother to listen to it in the first place.

Similarly, there are different ways an album can be underrated.  I can listen to an album that I find to be fucking amazing, that I consider to be easily one of the best albums released all year, and yet no one has even heard of the band, much less listened to the album.  That's one way.

Another way is for a band that everyone has heard of to release a stellar album that generally gets more ratings of "it's okay" or "meh" than "great".

But Radiohead?  Radiohead are probably the most critically jizzed-on band of our time.  They are hailed as geniuses.  Every album they've released since The Bends is considered to be a masterpiece or a near-masterpiece.  I'm not saying they don't deserve it.  Radiohead are an awesome band.  They've produced some damn fine albums.  But the words "Radiohead" and "underrated" should never be put together.  And yet this is your #1 example of an underrated album this decade?  Seriously, Rolling Stone?  Really?

To be fair, I like Hail to the Thief.  It's a good album.  The song "There There" is excellent.  But people know this album is good.  It got great reviews, it was on "best of the year" lists.  It just didn't set the world on fire like OK Computer or Kid A did.

The only argument you could make is that HTTT is relatively underrated, within the Radiohead catalog.  I could make the same argument for Animal Collective's Strawberry Jam.  Like Radiohead, it's hard to say that anything by Animal Collective is underrated.  They may not be popular in the mainstream, but shit, in the world of indie rock, they could not possibly be getting more love.  They're my favorite band right now, but even I would say they get enough praise.  Any more would be excessive.

Strawberry Jam, AnCo's previous album before Merriweather Post Pavilion, is generally considered to not be one of their best.  But I love it.  It's not as good as MPP, but I'm pretty sure I like it better than Feels, which gets way more praise.

But even taking this approach, I don't see it.  I don't think Hail to the Thief is even Radiohead's most underrated album.  That would be Amnesiac, which largely gets overshadowed by Kid A, even though it might have Radiohead's best song on it - "Pyramid Song". 

So there ya go - Hail to the Thief is a solid album from a consistently great band.  But criminally underrated?  Hardly.