What else could you pick? I can't think of an album that has become more iconic in the last couple decades. The odd thing is that many critics didn't even pick it as the best of the year in 1997, but now it's almost universally praised. Even many who initially downplayed the significance and/or social impact of an album that manages to capture both the underground and mainstream music worlds have seemingly come around and gradually moved it up their lists. Not my favorite or most played album of the last 20, but hard to ignore what it has become. I remember plopping down almost 30 US dollars at the time to buy the beautiful EMI gatefold UK vinyl after hearing Karma Police on the radio. I had actually skipped getting The Bends after being somewhat disappointed with Pablo Honey, but this one really knocked me out and I did go out and pick up the Bends later (actually I think I traded something for it with a friend).

Anyway, you probably already heard the news on CNN or some other site that Spin selected it as the best of the last 20 years for their 20 year anniversary issue (and they were one that didn't even pick it as best of the year in 1997 ).

Associated Press

NEW YORK -- Spin magazine named Radiohead's "OK Computer" the top album of the past 20 years, praising a futuristic sound that manages to feel alive "even when its words are spoken by a robot."

The British band's 1997 album edged out Public Enemy's "It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back" and Nirvana's "Nevermind" on a list in Spin's 20th anniversary issue, currently on newsstands.

"Between Thom Yorke's orange-alert worldview and the band's meld of epic guitar rock and electronic glitch, ('OK Computer') not only forecast a decade of music but uncannily predicted our global culture of communal distress," reads the editorial note on what separated the release from the other 99 ranked albums.

Released between Radiohead's straight-ahead rock disc "The Bends" and the more experimental, electronic "Kid A," "OK Computer" was the album that propelled Radiohead to worldwide, stadium-sized popularity. Though it never went higher than No. 21 on Billboard charts, it won critical raves and a Grammy for alternative music performance.

Years earlier, Spin ranked Nirvana's "Nevermind" the greatest album of the nineties. In the time since, however, editor-in-chief Sia Michel and others simply found they were reaching for "OK Computer" more than the slightly less relevant "Nevermind."

Also in the top 10, in order, are Pavement's "Slanted and Enchanted," The Smiths' "The Queen is Dead," Pixies' "Surfer Rosa," De La Soul's "3 Feet High and Rising," Prince's "Sign 'o' the Times," PJ Harvey's "Rid of Me" and N.W.A.'s "Straight Outta Compton."