Radiohead - The Bends

The Bends is the album where Radiohead became Radiohead. Released in 1995 and reissued on XL Recordings, their second record left the one-hit shadow of Pablo Honey far behind. Produced by John Leckie, it trades grunge angst for widescreen guitar drama, layering Jonny Greenwood and Ed O'Brien's textures into songs of real emotional heft.

The writing takes an enormous leap. "Fake Plastic Trees" and "Street Spirit (Fade Out)" ache with a fragile beauty, "High and Dry" and "Just" deliver soaring, anthemic hooks, and the title track roars with paranoid energy. Thom Yorke's voice, by turns wounded and defiant, holds the whole thing together. It is the sound of a band discovering exactly how far it could reach.

Widely hailed as one of the finest rock albums of the 1990s and the launchpad for OK Computer, this XL LP restores a modern classic. Gorgeous, urgent, and endlessly replayable.