{"id":507615,"date":"2026-07-03T08:45:12","date_gmt":"2026-07-03T08:45:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/507615\/"},"modified":"2026-07-03T08:45:12","modified_gmt":"2026-07-03T08:45:12","slug":"its-10-years-since-the-last-radiohead-record-and-i-got-the-only-interview-for-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/507615\/","title":{"rendered":"It\u2019s 10 years since the last Radiohead record and I got the only interview for it"},"content":{"rendered":"

When Radiohead<\/a> released their ninth album A Moon Shaped Pool in May 2016, it felt like the breaking of an extended dormant period for the art-rock trailblazers. It had, after all, been five years since the Oxford quintet\u2019s previous record The King Of Limbs but as it turns out, five years between albums was nothing. A Moon Shaped Pool turned 10 this year It remains Radiohead\u2019s most recent new release.<\/p>\n

As with many Radiohead records, it was an album that took them a long time to get to the finish line, recorded in France, London and their own Oxfordshire base and dragged to completion at the insistence of producer Nigel Godrich. But its laborious creation was certainly not reflected in the finished work. The best bits of A Moon Shaped Pool captured Radiohead at their alchemical best, where their rhythmic, dynamic rock, sonic explorations, ambient ballads and electronic experiments all landed on the same sweet spot. The fact that the tracklisting was all in alphabetical order only added to its strange, mesmeric beauty.<\/p>\n

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The band certainly seemed relieved that it was finally out in the world. I joined them in Paris a few dates into a short European tour a few days after its release and there was a celebratory feeling in the air. I was there to do a live review for Q Magazine but as it turned out, I got a lot more than that. Radiohead were in a chatty, affable mood and after years of trying to interview them with no success, I finally got one. If only I had foreseen this, I would\u2019ve chilled out on beers before and during the gig.<\/p>\n

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It was backstage after a triumphant gig at Le Z\u00e9nith, an arena based in Parc de la Villette in Paris\u2019 19th arrondissement, that a few members came ambling over for a little chinwag. First up was towering, talkative guitarist Ed O\u2019Brien. \u201cTonight was really good fun,\u201d he said, explaining that the band were feeling very relaxed and getting into the groove. He reminisced about the first time Radiohead had played Le Z\u00e9nith, back during the fraught tour on the back of their era-defining third album OK Computer<\/a>. \u201cWe were riding a wave and it was all a bit, \u2018Oh my God!\u2019,\u201d he laughed. \u201cOf course, we were a little dark in those days, which added to the spice!\u201d<\/p>\n

Radiohead – Burn The Witch – YouTube
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Bassist Colin Greenwood was also in a remarkably jolly mood. \u201cThom was just amazing,\u201d he beamed, reflecting on the gig they’d just played. \u201cIt was all going a bit wrong at the beginning but he really pulled me and everyone together.\u201d He said that when they last played Le Z\u00e9nith, Eddie Izzard had come to watch. \u201cBloody hell,\u201d he muttered to himself. \u201cWe haven\u2019t been here for ages.\u201d And then he went off to find some more beer.<\/p>\n

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To my surprise, next to come and say hello was frontman Thom Yorke. Yorke is not one to suffer fools and, accordingly, he hadn\u2019t spoken to Q for well over a decade. But now here he was, chatting away about how he thought the show went. \u201cThe first half was like, \u2018Ow!\u2019 and then we all warmed up,\u201d he said. \u201cThe second half was amazing and the encores were great. You know, what\u2019s so weird is that depending on what we choose to play, it can go in all these different ways, like choosing to play Creep or choosing No Surprises.\u201d<\/p>\n

The band had played both in the set that night, the former getting its first airing in seven years. Radiohead once had a very complicated relationship with Creep but Yorke said after being heckled to play it by a punter at a show in Amsterdam two nights previously, they\u2019d decided to give it a go. \u201cWe just said, \u2018Let\u2019s see what the reaction is, just to see how it feels\u2019,\u201d he explained. \u201cSongs go into phases where they don\u2019t feel right and then they come back. No Surprises was out for ages. We didn\u2019t play it once on the whole The King Of Limbs tour\u2026 If you play it right, it is fucking dark. But it\u2019s like acting. It\u2019s on the edge of totally hamming it up but you\u2019re not. It\u2019s just the words are so dark. When we play it, we have to play it so slow. It only sounds good if it\u2019s really fragile.\u201d<\/p>\n

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His favourite song from A Moon Shaped Pool, Yorke revealed, was the atmospheric and stark piano piece Daydreaming. Its classic Radiohead, a song where you don\u2019t think much is happening on the first few listens but its spell gently unfurls, revealing a bewitching knockout of a track beneath its serene, slow surface. \u201cWhen we do it right,\u201d he clarified. \u201cTonight was a little bit sketchy.\u201d He said the song was a breakthrough in recording sessions for the album. \u201cIt was the equivalent of when we did Everything In Its Right Place,\u201d he stated, referring to the opening track on their game-changing 2000 album Kid A. \u201cWe got that and then we were like, \u2018Right, OK, this is it\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n

The band had played the song second in the set, a surprising place for a six-minute-plus track with no chorus and no drums but one that somehow worked. \u201cWe couldn\u2019t figure out, \u2018How do we bring people in?\u2019\u201d Yorke explained. \u201cAnd there\u2019s a portion of people who have heard it so that\u2019s alright.\u201d He also comically repeated Radiohead co-manager Chris Hufford\u2019s reaction when told Daydreaming would be played two songs in. \u201cHe asked, \u2018Are you fucking mad?!\u2019.\u201d It would\u2019ve been nice to hear Hufford on the band\u2019s decision to start their Glastonbury<\/a> headline set with it a year later.<\/p>\n

Radiohead – Daydreaming – YouTube
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Yorke then made his way across the room to catch up with some old friends, but before he did he cast his mind to Radiohead\u2019s next stop, a few shows back in the UK. He\u2019d always found playing in his home country a little difficult, he said, but the huge reaction to the new album had given him heart. \u201cWe expected the opposite,\u201d he said. \u201cI cherish the band, but I don\u2019t expect anyone else to.\u201d<\/p>\n

And with that, he was off. The hysteria that greeted Radiohead\u2019s return back in 2016 would have nothing on the frenzy around a comeback now, almost a decade on. Who knows if that will ever happen. They might not have been in action for a long time but Thom Yorke cherishes the band with which he made his name. He just doesn\u2019t expect anyone else to.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When Radiohead released their ninth album A Moon Shaped Pool in May 2016, it felt like the breaking…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":507616,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[156,157,111,139,69],"class_list":["post-507615","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-entertainment","tag-music","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/507615","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=507615"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/507615\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/507616"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=507615"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=507615"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=507615"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}