The first time I heard “My Iron Lung”, it was during the summer holidays and I was 14, and it was windy, because I grew up in Scotland. I had my DiscMan, which came everywhere with me, and I’d just purchased a Radiohead album for the first time from Fopp records (RIP) on Renfield Street outside Glasgow Central train station.
It was a moment - buying a Radiohead album. £12.99 on Radiohead. Not to sound like a grandma but what streaming generations don’t understand now is that you had to make hard decisions with music when you were a teenager in the ‘90s. Radiohead was some serious business. If you were spending your CD money on Radiohead, you knew you were going to have to work hard for satisfaction; at least that’s how I felt. OK, this is something I’m going to have to pay attention to. This is something that’s not going to give me instant hooks (although I was satisfied that £12.99 would secure me forever ownership of “High And Dry” and “Fake Plastic Trees”, both of which I’d already decided I wanted to listen to until I was sick of them). (Still not sick of them). No, I was not buying Craig David’s chart-topping album that day. I was better than that. I was getting into Radiohead.
Anyway, I was so wrong about having to work for satisfaction with Radiohead. It was more a case of finding more and more chestnuts between the bars of their songs all these years later.
By the time I bought The Bends – Radiohead’s second record, and their most accessible – OK, Computer had already been released, and was one of the most talked about albums I can ever remember. But I wasn’t going to buy OK, Computer yet, because I wanted to earn my stripes. I was such a fucking swot. I wanted to ready myself for this album that everyone was chewing over. So I went to what came before. That’s the kind of committed music nerd I was. I guess the other word for it is: masochist. I treated bands like television shows. You had to start at the beginning, always. And I would have to work for the pleasure of being in the same place of appreciation as everyone else. And I remember that afternoon I played The Bends. I had left the law offices of some attorney I was interning for that summer, and I was strutting across a bridge on Hope Street on my way to catch a train back home to the suburbs, and “My Iron Lung” came on. Track eight. (I didn’t even have to Google that. Back then I had a DiscMan. I still know the track numbers to every one of my favorite songs on every one of my favorite albums… Useless shit you never forget #419.)
I think what struck me listening to “My Iron Lung” for the first time on that grey summer’s day was that I didn’t have to work hard for any gratification. Reason: Jonny Greenwood. Jonny Greenwood played the guitar in a way I had never heard a single person play the guitar. He played in a way that left me wondering how the strings on the fret board were still intact. He made the guitar sound like someone had accidentally fumbled over a bunch of telephone buttons at the same time, producing a horrible error tone. He played the guitar like it was an un-tuned, plugged-in electric violin that he was actively destroying with a guillotine. He made the guitar sound like what I imagine white heat would sound like. Sharp and furious with the capacity to melt away the idea of every adolescent thought I wanted to forget. I was gone in an instant. What was Hope Street? What summer was it? Who was I becoming? I could feel the constriction of my ironed button-down shirt (thanks mum) and my pencil skirt, and knew - I cannot become a lawyer in a world where this kind of sonic commotion exists. I needed to be wherever puts me inside this. I wanted to travel down the cord of my headphones, climb into my DiscMan with the CD, and guzzle on the fuel of the AA batteries. That’s how much this album took a hold of me.
What I found in Radiohead immediately was a band who had cracked open a new idea about how to construct a great rock song. I thought it was going to be difficult to digest, but it wasn’t at all. It was remarkably easy to lose my head to it. And while that boils down to so much; from Thom Yorke’s depressing lyrical landscape and restricted voice (emotional, but always cracking when too high or too low) to Nigel Godrich’s constantly evolving and envelope-pushing production, I think nine times out of ten, the reason I’ve freaked out while listening to Radiohead is because of something that Jonny Greenwood is or was doing.
And, of course, I’d go on to university and it was very much a rite of passage to answer certain questions for the approval of others: 1/ Oasis or Blur, 2/ what’s your favorite Radiohead album, 3/ Israel v Palestine. But re: question two. Always - “So which Radiohead album is THE BEST ONE?” To be honest, even in the 2010s, this question was still coming up regularly at the pub. Come on, then. Let’s have it. (Never has there been a meeker conversational arm-wrestle than watching music nerds squabble over the correct answer to this debate). From where I’m standing it’s clearly The Bends and it always will be The Bends because without The Bends there is nothing else. The Bends is the foundation upon which Radiohead began contorting rock music even further until Thom Yorke wound up interpretive dancing in front of strobe light shows to – effectively – distorted techno music as part of Tomorrow’s Modern Boxes. (That was one of my favorite attended “Radiohead” shows). But what a ridiculous question. How is there a “best” Radiohead album? It’s like claiming a best Star Trek series. They all serve completely different purposes in a wider universe of their own making. Radiohead is its own world.
To answer the question though… Like obviously OK, Computer. For “Paranoid Android” alone. The greatest ever in-studio Jools Holland performance, by the way. Thom with that nihilistic bit between his teeth. Never has ennui felt more irate.
And, of course, its follow-up Kid A in 2000; an album about making sense of an increasingly alarming and depressing world, and one which US music critic Chuck Klosterman once wildly suggested predicted 9/11 (tell that to the college encampment kids). In Rainbows is always a contender, even though I think it’s a bit flabby. And yet “All I Need” is one of the most Radiohead-y Radiohead songs, ever. A grown-up “Creep”, with the same pained, crushing rejection. It’s one of my favorite love songs.
I'm the next act
Waiting in the wings
I'm an animal
Trapped in your hot car
I am all the days
That you choose to ignore
You are all I need
You're all I need
I'm in the middle of your picture
Lying in the reeds
I am a moth
Who just wants to share your light
I'm just an insect
Trying to get out of the night
I only stick with you
Because there are no others
You are all I need
You're all I need
I'm in the middle of your picture
Lying in the reeds
Still a creep. Still a weirdo. And so fucking special.
Not a best-of work, or even a runner-up, but just an aside: I’m also here for Thom Yorke’s off-shoots, especially Black Swan, and I loved 2016’s A Moon Shaped Pool, particularly lead single “Burn The Witch” with its floating orchestra and its warning against encroaching group-think. “Shoot the messengers; this is a low-flying panic attack!”
Today, I want to reflect on how I’ve come to love Radiohead even more for who they are as people. Radiohead are consistently one of the only - and most important - bands in history to always firmly support Israel. Radiohead have played in Israel throughout their career. Radiohead speak about Israel in the press, positively. Radiohead have never backed down when it comes to Israel, and the Jews. I’ve seen Radiohead all over the world and one day I will see Radiohead in Israel. This is my dream.
In 2017, when filmmaker Ken Loach wrote an open letter accusing Radiohead of ignoring "human rights violations" by choosing to play in Tel Aviv, Thom Yorke clapped back at him on Twitter:
"Playing in a country isn't the same as endorsing its government. We've played in Israel for over 20 years through a succession of governments, some more liberal than others. We don't endorse Netanyahu any more than Trump, but we still play in America. Music, art and academia is about crossing borders not building them, about open minds not closed ones, about shared humanity, dialogue and freedom of expression. I hope that makes it clear Ken."
And today, Jonny Greenwood published an exquisite letter in defense of his recent work with an Israeli artist, Dudu Tassa, after backlash and trolling. This is the stunning statement that he published:
It’s a perfect string of sentences, to which I have nothing to add. Except that artists see artists. And I deeply appreciate the words of Jonny Greenwood today, and not just the sublime guitar licks he’s provided as a soundtrack to my ongoing chaotic life. “It’s these people that are invariably the most progressive members of any society.” I wonder if any of the artists for Palestine bleating around the world with a singular and harmful message right now will have the legacy of Radiohead. I don’t need to wonder. They won’t.
Speaking of, here’s a bunch of great Radiohead songs:
Brilliant work as always Eve. I'd also recommend that people read this Rolling Stone article where Thom points out how offensive it is that people assume that they don't know anything about the Israel/Palestine Conflict:
"The person who knows most about these things is [Radiohead guitarist] Jonny [Greenwood]. He has both Palestinian and Israeli friends and a wife who’s an Arab Jew. All these people to stand there at a distance throwing stuff at us, waving flags, saying, “You don’t know anything about it!” Imagine how offensive that is for Jonny. And imagine how upsetting that it’s been to have this out there. Just to assume that we know nothing about this. Just to throw the word “apartheid” around and think that’s enough. It’s fucking weird. It’s such an extraordinary waste of energy. Energy that could be used in a more positive way."
https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/thom-yorke-breaks-silence-on-israel-controversy-126675/
I wish the perverse reason for my introduction to your writing on rock never happened, but since it did, I am embracing the collateral benefit. Thanks again for the gift of music and the peep into your chaotic soul!