"the grandiose arena rock that characterized U2's early albums"

What is this guy talking about? Has he ever listened to anything by U2 before Joshua Tree? Does he even know what arena rock is? When U2's War came out, U2 was still playing in night clubs.

Anyway, There is no comparing U2 to Radiohead. That's stupid. They are two different things. U2's music is simplistic and moralistic, whereas Radiohead's music is complex, guitar laden, with strange scales and time changes.

The problem with Radiohead is that they turn good acoustic songs into rock opera, overplay their instruments, and overproduce their tracks.

That's not to say U2 had no influence. U2 has influenced many artists, Coldplay for example. That's not a bad thing. That's how music has worked for centuries.