Radiohead have announced a new run of live shows at the end of this year. It’s not a tour as such, just a collection of shows at five venues in Europe, including four nights at the O2.
While some fans are upset at the limited nature of this, but the band are insistent that this is an exploratory kind of thing, with drummer Philip Selway writing on their Instagram page that they simply got together recently and it, “made us want to play some shows together, so we hope you can make it to one of the upcoming dates. For now, it will just be these ones but who knows where this will all lead.”
Very typical Radiohead, who are often treated with such holy reverence that everyone’s on eggshells, as if one further request for a little extra appearance might scare them off back to their eclectic solo projects.
But this is the nature of the beast that is Radiohead, and let’s not forget, they are a beast when they play live. For all the excellence (er, apart from King of Limbs) of the records, they are truly one of the greatest live acts you could ever see - a powerhouse capable of taking your breath away with their range, from furious punk to spectral beauty.
In fact, this appearance late in the year feels almost like an assertion of their status in the British group pantheon. Surely it’s no coincidence that it comes in a year with Oasis fever taking over the country - and Liam and Noel delivering on their tour in such a world-beating manner that is still feels unreal - and Pulp returning with new music and stadium shows, and Coldplay continuing their endless round of stadium celebrations (complete with viral horrorshow moments), and now Suede also coming back strong with a new record and a Southbank residency.
It’s hard to imagine Thom Yorke and Jonny Greenwood jealously going over the clippings of these other acts and plotting their own comeback, but with all this new interest around bands emerging from the 90s - with younger generations obsessing over this era in the same way Britpop obsessed over the 60s (not Yorke though, “I wish it was the Sixties/I wish I could be happy...’ he sneered on The Bends in 1995) - there is inevitably a sense of them capping off one of the best years in memory for music.
Of course, it hasn’t simply been about heritage guitar bands, far from it, with pop’s purple patch continuing with superstar shows over the spring and summer by Beyonce, Sabrina Carpenter, Olivia Rodrigo and Charli xcx. A wildly eclectic range of artists have also pushed to new heights on stage, the likes of Kneecap, CMAT, Little Simz, to name but a few.
Added to the fact that this has been a year of the kind of dark and disturbing year, where war and politics and technological ‘progress’ have combined to create immense anxiety and foreboding. As such, the question could reasonably asked, ‘where have Radiohead been?’ For all Thom Yorke’s reported avoidance of Palestine discussions, this is a time when we all surely need Radiohead. Few can articulate contemporary disquiet better than them, or deliver shows that help us collectively shake off the worry.
Those four night at the O2 suddenly seem like the climax to a pivotal year for music and for humanity. That may be over-egging it, and since we are on eggshells here, perhaps we should just say these shows will be a nice little pre-Christmas treat. No pressure, boys.
