Radiohead Public Library

[antoine]

i think also tkol underwhelmed because i fucking loved in rainbows and tkol is a much more understated record in comparison. but there's something cool and slippery about the record. def an underrated head lp.

[mego]

Yeah I never got the Little By Little hate its one of my faves on the album too. The only slightly weak track on the first half is Morning Mr Magpie. 2nd half is a bit more uneven.

[mego]

Yeah it’s understated on the surface but quite complex structurally

[antoine]

fuck, "give up the ghost" is so beautiful. underrated track!

[antoine]

the production on that track is so good. the layering of thom's vocals is just gorgeous.

[bluemovers]

i'll admit to having been caught in the thrall of 'TKOL pt. 2' speculation at the time, which i think limited my enjoyment of the album early on. i've subsequently come around on a lot of it, especially after seeing them play the songs live a couple of times on that tour. having said all of that, it's still my second-to-least-favorite Head album.

[WaltonGoggins]

https://www.netflix.com/title/81110498

In a short musical film directed by Paul Thomas Anderson, Thom Yorke of Radiohead scores and stars in a mind-bending visual piece. Best played loud.

[bluemovers]

can anyone with an apple music subscription rip that full zane lowe interview, pretty please?

[bluemovers]

ah, found it.

[Grey Poupon]

the production on that track is so good. the layering of thom's vocals is just gorgeous.

one of my least fave 'head tracks
it's just too schmaltzy 'hauntingly beautiful' for me to handle
skip it usually

[bluemovers]

track previews are up, if anyone’s interested

[dcm]

Sounds good to me. Hype

[chairkicker]

seems pretty samey. dawn chorus really is good, though. and impossible knots seems cool. i wish thom would make more of a lyrical effort lately

[ripersnifle]

ah, found it.

thanks man!

[bluemovers]

https://pitchfork.com/thepitch/5-takeaways-from-thom-yorkes-new-album-anima/

Thom Yorke’s third solo album, ANIMA, is set to hit streaming services at midnight tonight. Produced by longtime right-hand man Nigel Godrich, the record features Yorke augmenting the spare, glitchy electronics of his previous solo work with grandiose orchestral arrangements that recall Radiohead’s most recent opus, A Moon Shaped Pool. Much of the 48-minute album is propelled by an ominous techno pulse, as Yorke’s voice floats and dances and drones high above it. ANIMA is also accompanied by a 15-minute film set to music from the album, directed by Paul Thomas Anderson, which will be released on Netflix at midnight PST. Here’s what you can expect from the album and the visual.

A Thom for Peace
Yorke’s supergroup Atoms for Peace—featuring Godrich, Flea, and session percussionists Mauro Refosco and Joey Waronker—originally formed to play shows behind Yorke’s 2006 solo debut The Eraser, before releasing their one and only album, AMOK, in 2013. In some ways, ANIMA picks up where Atoms left off; the skittering drum machines and melodic basslines throughout the new LP are more reminiscent of AMOK than either of the solo records Yorke has released under his own name.

The processes behind the two albums were similar as well. AMOK saw Yorke and Godrich throwing out scraps of rhythms to inspire their collaborators, then parsing through the results to build tracks. According to a recent Yorke interview, for ANIMA, the singer sent Godrich “completely unfinished, sprawling tracks” that were then honed down to loops and samples that served as the basis for the songs. ANIMA also notably features performances by Atoms member Waronker, whose work can be heard at the end of a seven-minute song called “The Axe,” and Radiohead’s own Phil Selway, who contributes “sped up drums” to the slithering funk track “Impossible Knots.”

Dream Theater
ANIMA was teased with ads for a company called “Anima Technologies,” which purported to have developed something called a “Dream Camera” to help people retain their REM cycles. Yorke’s fixation with sleep, dreams, and the work of psychologist Carl Jung manifests in several ways throughout the new album. On the stuttering “Last I Heard (He Was Circling the Drain),” he repeats, “I woke up with a feeling that I just could not take,” before muttering out his stream of consciousness: “Taken out with the trash, swimming through the gutter, swallowed up by the city, humans the size of rats.” On “Not the News,” Yorke describes a waking horror. “Who are these people?” he yelps. And then, throughout the closing techno workout “Runawayaway,” he alternates between droning “That’s when you don’t” and “That’s when you know,” as an eerie, pitch-shifted voice intones, “This is when you know who your real friends are.”

Computers—Still Not OK!
You wouldn’t be blamed for thinking anti-computer lines like “Goddamned machinery, why don’t you speak to me?/One day I am gonna take an axe to you,” came from a parody Thom Yorke Twitter bot, but they’re actual lyrics from “The Axe,” which sees the singer once again interrogating the technologies that undergird modern society. He writes with elegance and a casual pithiness: “You bastards speak to me,” he spits. “Have you no pity? Give me a goddamned good reason not to jack it all in.” Meanwhile, the hilariously titled “I Am a Very Rude Person”—the shortest song on the album—is a carousel of politically combative Thoms, rotating as he croons about having to “destroy to create” and taking “a knife to your art.” You can practically imagine him grinning as he sings, “I’m breaking up your turntables/Now, I’m gonna watch your party die.”

Finally, Dawn Chorus
Among the numerous Radiohead songs that were assumed to be relegated to the bootleg annals, “Dawn Chorus” has always held a particular significance. It was long thought to be the official title for a song that was played during one of the band’s soundchecks in 2008. Then, in 2016, it was revealed Radiohead had formed a shell company called Dawn Chorus LLP to handle the business side of A Moon Shaped Pool, officially canonizing the phrase as Something That’s Clearly Important. Now, at long last, “Dawn Chorus” the song has arrived. It was worth the wait. Accompanied by glowing synth chords, Yorke sings almost under his breath, his low register laid bare as he alludes to a deep regret: “In the middle of the vortex, the wind picked up/Shook up the soot from the chimney pot/Into spiral patterns of you, my love.” It is the centerpiece of ANIMA, a confession that stands among the most devastating pieces of music Yorke has ever made.

Punch-Drunk Thom
ANIMA’s surreal accompanying short film includes nods to old-fashioned Hollywood musicals, avant-garde dance, and, in a lighthearted scene that sees Yorke flying over a turnstile, Looney Tunes. The 15-minute piece is billed to Oscar-nominated director Paul Thomas Anderson and Yorke, but it took a village to bring it to life. Damien Jalet, responsible for the brutally enchanting choreography of Luca Guadagnino’s Yorke-scored Suspiria remake, returns to work with the songwriter’s music once again. This time, though, the singer is among Jalet’s dancers, as is Yorke’s partner, Italian actress Dajana Roncione. Visual artist Tarik Barri, who’s been touring with Yorke, brings his technicolor projections to a dream sequence soundtracked by the album’s opener, “Traffic.”

One moving sequence in the short shows Yorke and Roncione leading each other through the streets of Prague, their limbs intertwined as “Dawn Chorus” fades into the foreground. It’s quite possibly the most intimate we’ve ever seen the singer with anyone else on camera. He looks kind of, sort of—happy. Then, the film ends just as it began, with a weary Thom on public transport, drifting off to sleep.

[Rainbow Battle Kid]

need this to leak today pls

[ripersnifle]

Zane interview was unexpectedly good
luv Thom

[tgk]

need this to leak today pls

i hear it's leaking at midnight

[mego]

In some ways, ANIMA picks up where Atoms left off; the skittering drum machines and melodic basslines throughout the new LP are more reminiscent of AMOK than either of the solo records Yorke has released under his own name.

awww before i read this i was assuming it was more a continuation of TMB

[Grand Epic]

In some ways, ANIMA picks up where Atoms left off; the skittering drum machines and melodic basslines throughout the new LP are more reminiscent of AMOK than either of the solo records Yorke has released under his own name.

awww before i read this i was assuming it was more a continuation of TMB

The Stereogum review says it is.

[darger]

midnight in which time zone?

[bluemovers]

it’s up on Spotify in the UK

[bluemovers]

just got my WASTE download as well, should be everywhere momentarily

[ripersnifle]

was about to say it was out but i realized i still have my spotify set to JPN from something else

[ripersnifle]

just got my WASTE download as well, should be everywhere momentarily

oh shit sickkk

[ripersnifle]

(leak threddddd)

[ripersnifle]

[bluemovers]

so glad “Saturdays” is on here as the second half of “Twist”.

[Beaver King]

Twist!

[chairkicker]

the axe is pretty good. the end of twist too