ABOUT THE ALBUM
Amnesiac is the fifth studio album by the English rock band Radiohead, released on 30 May 2001 by EMI. It was recorded with the producer Nigel Godrich in the same sessions as Radiohead's previous album, Kid A (2000). Radiohead split the work in two as they felt it was too dense for a double album. As with Kid A, Amnesiac incorporates influences from electronic music, 20th-century classical music, jazz and krautrock. The final track, "Life in a Glasshouse", is a collaboration with the jazz trumpeter Humphrey Lyttelton and his band.
ABOUT THE ONYX MINOTAUR
The "Onyx Minotaur" is a sort of character featured in Radiohead artwork surrounding Amnesiac. He is seemingly based off of the Minotaur in greek mythology, often seen crying: his presence in Radiohead media is scarce but he is the player character of Kid A Mnesia Exhibition, and the main character of Motion Picture House. Onyx Minotaur might be thought of as a "variant" of the crying minotaur, a symbol depicting the Minotaur weeping commonly seen in Amnesiac-era artwork (including the album's cover). The idea of the crying minotaur comes from Thom Yorke's obssession with greek mythology during the making of Kid A and Amnesiac: he and Stanely Donwood, his collaborater, interpreted the bull of minos as a more sympathetic character, consumed by rage and sadness after being condemned inside of the maze, and various doodles of this concept would come to fruition. Onyx Minotaur might be considered the same "character" as the Minotaur in greek mythology, simply a different interpretation: this is, for example, why he is assumed male (at least by me). The story of the Minotaur himself has long been distorted by modern retellings of it, but essentially the Minotaur was an abomination. After the king of Crete, Minos', wife, Pasiphae, fell mad in love with a beautiful white bull designated for sacrifice by Posiden, Posiden, infuriated by Pasiphae's love of this Bull, cursed her to breed with it and have it's child: the Minotaur. The Minotaur was then condemned to roam a humongous labyrinth within the castles walls, where he was fed 7 men and 7 women a year in a form of sacrifice. This can be interpreted in various ways, but the Onyx Minotaur might be viewed as the common modern trope of making the Minotaur's story tragic: a child, hated since birth, forced to do monstrous things to live and then being called abomindable for them. He is a bastard child: the only home he knows are walls on walls on walls.
MY OBSESSION AND THE SHRINE
This might be considered a shrine to Radiohead as a whole. They have been my special interest for around 3 years now, but my specific area of interest would have to be the art of Radiohead and Amnesiac: hence, a shrine with heavy imagery of the Onyx Minotaur (see above). I don't exactly know where this love comes from, but it drives me to code things like this and write things like this. Autism will do that. That part of it aside, Amnesiac specifically, along with it's b-sides like "Worrywort" played a large role in helping me get over my recent depression: and for that, it is a deeply personal and emotional album to me. Objectively it may not be the best Radiohead album but I do not think music reviewing is about finding an objective best: rather, I think we should share why we like the music we do. I love jazz music as a whole and Amnesiac's heavy jazz krautrock influence speaks to me especially: it has a profound aesthetic to it, which is both warm and unsettling, like an old library, that I am frankly obssessed with. I have invented entire personalities for these characters, these symbols, that help me understand myself better and realize who I want to be. Radiohead is also a big influence in my own music indeavors. I see Motion Picture House on May 31st in Brooklyn. I own....Amnesiac, Kid A/mnesia, I Might Be Wrong, In Rainbows, Ok Computer, Hail to the Thief, and A Moon Shaped Pool on CD, Ok Computer, A Moon Shaped Pool, Kid A/mnesia, and Wall of Eyes on vinyl, and I own This Is What You Get, How to Disappear Completely, Kid A Mnesia Exhibition (the book), and Fear Stalks The Land!, as well as an unofficial songbook and various crafts I've made. One is in the shrine above, in fact.