{"id":1233729,"date":"2025-03-11T17:25:29","date_gmt":"2025-03-11T17:25:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/pt\/?p=1233729"},"modified":"2025-03-11T17:25:29","modified_gmt":"2025-03-11T17:25:29","slug":"inside-thom-yorkes-amazing-new-album-with-producer-mark-pritchard","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/pt\/inside-thom-yorkes-amazing-new-album-with-producer-mark-pritchard\/","title":{"rendered":"Inside Thom Yorke\u2019s Amazing New Album With Producer Mark Pritchard"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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\n\tRadiohead<\/a> haven\u2019t released an album since 2016, but the band\u2019s frontman, Thom Yorke<\/a>, has been on an extraordinary run of studio creativity lately, laying down three great albums with the Smile<\/a>, his band with Radiohead guitarist Jonny Greenwood and jazz drummer Tom Skinner. And it turns out that since 2020, Yorke has been quietly enmeshed in another collaboration, piecing together a sublime new album with veteran electronic<\/a> producer Mark Pritchard<\/a>: Tall Tales<\/em>, due May 9 on Warp Records. It\u2019s accompanied by an intensely trippy animated film by artist Jonathan Zawada, which is set for a one-day theatrical release sometime soon. The duo already dropped the eerie single<\/a> \u201cBack in the Game\u201d; a second song, \u201cThis Conversation Is Missing Your Voice,\u201d is out today.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tFrom the haunted-house ballad \u201cThe White Cliffs\u201d to the pulsing, drumless uplift of \u201cThe Spirit\u201d (\u201cI keep the spirit alive,\u201d Yorke sings, in one of his most unabashedly anthemic moments since The Bends<\/em>) to the eight-bit freak-out of \u201cGangsters,\u201d Tall Tales <\/em>feels like the most fully realized of Yorke\u2019s non-band projects, a prog-tronic sonic journey with a dystopian kick that evokes the best of Radiohead. Pritchard, a Brit currently based in Australia, spent four years kicking tracks back and forth with Yorke for the album, with the singer manically layering and electronically treating his vocals and adding his own synth parts.<\/p>\n

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\n\tIn his first interview about the album, Pritchard \u2014 who previously collaborated with Yorke on the 2016 track \u201cBeautiful People\u201d \u2014 dives into the making of the record, the nature of the collaboration, the possibility of live performances, and more.<\/p>\n

\n\tIt feels like the two of<\/strong> you should have made an album a long time ago. I know that you did \u201cBeautiful People,\u201d which is a great song, a while ago. How did the two of you first cross paths?
<\/strong>So yeah, the first thing that happened was being asked to do some remixes. But there was no contact at that point. That came via the label. Then [in 2012], Radiohead came to play Sydney, Australia. And at the time, a friend of mine became their second drummer\u00a0\u2014 Clive Deamer, who\u2019d drummed with Roni Size and Portishead and Robert Plant. I\u2019d worked with him years ago and kind of kept in contact with him, and he said, \u201cI can\u2019t tell you at the moment, but something\u2019s happening and I might be coming to Australia.\u201d Obviously it was a secret kind of thing. Everything has to be kept secret with Radiohead.<\/p>\n

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\n\tThen I think the whole band had a night off on a Saturday, which I guess is quite rare. And Clive said, \u201cThe band might want to come to where you\u2019re playing tonight on their night off.\u201d So they came and watched me and Steve Spacek play. We did a set at this festival here under the name Africa HiTech.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe next night, we went for dinner with the whole band, me and my partner. I met Thom properly that night, just sort of sat down, chatted for a good few hours, saw the shows, hung backstage with them, went to both nights. And in that conversation, I said, \u201cWould you be up for doing something if I sent you some music at some point?\u201d And he just said, \u201cYeah, yeah, just send me whatever you want. I\u2019m definitely up for doing something.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tSo I started sending him things, one of which became the single \u201cBeautiful People\u201d from my Under the Sun<\/em> album. He tried three or four things, he was really busy at the time. When I heard \u201cBeautiful People,\u201d I said, \u201cLook, this is amazing, let\u2019s just finish that one and put it on the album.\u201d And then kept in contact from there on in really, via e-mail. Just every now and again, we\u2019d have a little catch-up.<\/p>\n

\n\tAnd what was the path to this album? How did it start?<\/strong>
<\/strong>Maybe in 2019, I was thinking about what my next album was going to be. At the time I was thinking it\u2019s probably going to be an album of various featured vocalists again. And then we got into 2020 and of course the crazy pandemic hit. So we\u2019re all adjusting to that. Then, a few months into the pandemic, Thom emailed me and just said, \u201cI hope you\u2019re well, it\u2019s all a bit mad, I\u2019m locked away at home. If you\u2019ve got any music, send it through, because I\u2019m just stuck at home. Can\u2019t go out.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\n\tSo I thought about it for a couple of days. I thought, \u201cI\u2019d really like to write specifically for him.\u201d And then I just thought, \u201cIt\u2019s going to take me a while to write. I should just send him a load of random things.\u201d Like, some songs that were kind of complete, some songs that might just been a really good drum idea that had a couple of sounds over it, some songs that were just ambient. So I sent him a folder of, like, 20 ideas.<\/p>\n

\n\tI now know at the time he was working on the first Smile record. But they\u2019re in lockdown. He was in the writing stage of vocals, I think, for that album. He got back to me that night and said, \u201cCan I please do this one?\u201d \u2014 which ended up being \u201cHappy Days.\u201d I just said, \u201cYeah, whatever you want.\u201d Maybe a few days later, he emailed me and said, \u201cCan I just do these 14?\u201d I was like, \u201cWell, yeah, whatever you want to do, I\u2019m happy. Just try it out.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tA few months went by, and he\u2019d email me to touch base: \u201cDon\u2019t forget about me. I\u2019m going to do this.\u201d And I was just in the background trying to work on the ideas, because a lot of the things I sent him were kind of demo sketch ideas. So I thought, \u201cA smart move would be to try and tidy these up a little bit.\u201d Later that year, August, September, he emailed me and said, \u201cI\u2019m gonna start sending you the first demo sketches next week.\u201d And he just sent me two or three a day for a week. I was quite nervous. I had no idea what I was gonna be hearing.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe first day he sent me three, and it was \u201cMen Who Dance in Stags\u2019 Heads,\u201d \u201cFake in a Faker\u2019s World,\u201d and I can\u2019t remember, maybe \u201cThis Conversation Is Missing Your Voice.\u201d The first three were really strong, and I\u2019d never heard him sing the way he does in the \u201cStags\u2019 Heads\u201d song. I\u2019ve never really heard him sing in that register before.<\/p>\n

\n\tI was like, \u201cThese sound amazing.\u201d And then he just kept sending me a couple each day. He sketches down songs with some lyrics, but he\u2019s looking for hooks, like where the melody is going to be, where\u2019s the tone, where he sits.<\/p>\n

\n\tCertain songs need to be slowed down, need to take stuff out. He needed to try and sing it in different ways. If it wasn\u2019t working, he\u2019d send it back to me. I\u2019d try and do something. So we focused on those. We did that for quite a long time.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe initial batch of demos that he picked, did that pretty much end up being the album? <\/strong>
<\/strong>I reckon a few of the 14 that he said he wanted to try, a few fell away. And then I sent him \u201cStags\u2019 Heads,\u201d which I\u2019d done quite recently, as an additional one. And I sent him \u201cWhite Cliffs,\u201d which I\u2019d done a long time before. I actually sent that to him when I did \u201cBeautiful People.\u201d And I never got a response. I thought, \u201cWell, he doesn\u2019t like it or he didn\u2019t get that email.\u201d So I played that to a friend of mine and he said, \u201cYou should send him that one. That\u2019s killer.\u201d So I sent it to him again. And Thom said, \u201cOh, this is amazing. I definitely want to do this one.\u201d<\/p>\n

You\u2019ve done all sorts of music. It does seem like you must be in a different zone when you\u2019re writing things for vocalists to write over \u2014 that must be a whole different mentality than when you\u2019re just making an instrumental track.<\/strong>
<\/strong>Yeah, and with this album, the weird thing was, everything I sent him was already written in various periods. I think maybe \u201cWondering Genie\u201d was nine years old, because I write all the time and stuff sits there and then I try and think about where it could go. It was a weird process, because from the moment of starting the project, there was no writing, it was more production. The challenge was how to get songs to work, which was an exciting challenge. Because I\u2019ve done lots of tracks with vocalists before, but not a full album.<\/p>\n

\n\tWe were both trying to push each other. He was definitely trying to do something different and I was trying to push the songs in different areas. And so that was the main challenge through that period. It was a long mission. It was probably three years of work.<\/p>\n

\n\tTo take you back for a second, obviously when <\/strong>Kid A<\/em><\/strong> came out, it was this huge rock band drawing on the sounds that people like yourself were creating. I knew people in the electronic world who loved it back then, and some who were kind of suspicious of it. What was your initial reaction to that change in Radiohead\u2019s sound?<\/strong>
<\/strong>I really liked it. I mean, you could hear it a little bit on OK Computer<\/em> already. I didn\u2019t find it that surprising because I could hear aspects of it there. Maybe quite early on I\u2019d heard \u201cIdioteque.\u201d\u00a0 And I was really, really kind of pleasantly surprised. It\u2019s a strong electronic song with electronic drums, with an amazing pad and amazing hook. I was into indie music when I was younger and<\/em> electronic music. So it wasn\u2019t any shock to me. I think it was actually a very good move.<\/p>\n

\n\tI enjoyed those records each time they shifted around. To me, that is what makes them a really interesting band. Some people wanted more of the guitar stuff, but then they came back and did guitar stuff afterwards, you know. You just gotta allow people to do what they wanna do.<\/p>\n

\n\tBut there were also fans of Warp stuff who felt a little encroached upon, I recall. It was sort of a purist thing at the time.<\/strong>
<\/strong>Yeah, I can imagine. I bet you it was more fans than it was artists. Because they proved themselves and they did it really well. It\u2019s interesting, the kind of music heads that are into Radiohead. Hip-hop people can check it and appreciate it. Anybody that\u2019s into music can understand they\u2019re just really good at what they do and it\u2019s fair play they\u2019ve tried something different.<\/p>\n

\n\tNone of the electronic artists that I know have ever gone, \u201cOh yeah, they came and took our thing.\u201d They\u2019re probably quite happy that they\u2019re inspired by it,\u00a0 I guess. The other thing Thom told me that I thought was quite interesting is that when he was in college in Exeter, which is not far from where I grew up in the west country of England, he used to DJ in the local university and he used to play the early Warp Records stuff then. He mentioned Nightmares on Wax, like the first wave of Warp Records, which is kind of like bleep, clunky, techno music with big bass. So he was a fan of Warp from all that period.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tThat\u2019s interesting, because people always thought he got into that stuff much later, right before <\/strong>Kid A<\/em><\/strong>. <\/strong>
<\/strong>I knew he was a fan of Autechre, a fan of Aphex Twin. Because the story came out that they asked Warp to send them everything [before Kid A<\/em>]. And then they just got inspired by that. So that probably was the case, but he was already a fan.<\/p>\n

\n\tI know you and Thom did a lot of interesting stuff working with the vocal tracks. Tell me about some of those treatments that you did.<\/strong>
<\/strong>It\u2019s a mixture of him and me. I think he, from his perspective, was trying to find a way to get his voice to fit in with what I\u2019ve done. He also likes experimenting with his voice. So he was running his vocals through his modular system. He\u2019s got a huge wall of the modern modular Euro-rack type stuff behind him every time I speak to him on Zoom. I think he was having fun doing that, because I guess he also wants to try and find a different vibe for this. He doesn\u2019t want it to be like the Smile stuff or other things he\u2019d done.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tAnd then I would obviously want to have a contrast, so you want some stuff to be manipulated, you want some stuff just to be his voice. I think \u201cBugging Out,\u201d I put his voice through a [rotating] Leslie speaker. I was always wanting to try it and that song felt like the right one to do it on. So I sent that to a friend of mine in the U.K. that\u2019s got a few different Leslie speakers. And we recorded the vocal through those multiple times. It\u2019s quite a tricky thing to do because you get a lot of distortion and it\u2019s quite random, but that\u2019s also what makes it kind of good.<\/p>\n

\n\tI thought about certain ones that it would be fun for me to mess with, like \u201cBack in the Game.\u201d He did that vocal quite clean. There were no effects on that vocal when he did it and it worked as a song, but then he said, \u201cJust go wild on the effects on this one. Take what I\u2019ve done and just mess it up.\u201d So certain ones he was encouraging me to do, other ones he\u2019d done himself, other things he just kept clean. I didn\u2019t want it to be all manipulated vocals just because it\u2019s more of an electronic thing. I was wary of that. But he did a good range of things. He was definitely having fun.<\/p>\n

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\n\tAnd also, from his perspective, imagine singing for that amount of time. He needs to find new ways to be excited about using his voice and writing songs in different ways. And so he thought about that, and he said he wrote in a different way to normal on this project because he doesn\u2019t normally let his lyrics go out. I thought he wouldn\u2019t want us to put the lyrics into the world, but I wanted the lyrics for myself so I knew what he was actually saying. And also for Jonathan, who was doing the videos. And he emailed me and said, \u201cI actually do want to put these in the world and put them into the album.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tWhat\u2019s a good example of a song where he sent an initial version and then you ended up altering the track and sending it back and forth?<\/strong>
<\/strong>\u201cThe Spirit\u201d was one of the hardest ones. I wrote it, it was faster and it had drums in it. And he tried singing it, he said, and he\u2019d take the drums out. Because the drums I had in it were an old-school drum machine, but doing a Latin preset kind of thing going on. And they were taking up a lot of room. So he just said, \u201cLet\u2019s take them out, but we\u2019ll have to find a new way to put rhythm in.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tHe put a guide drum in to sing to it, a basic kick and snare drum. And then he sang it to the guide drums and I was like, I need to replace these drums. But I couldn\u2019t find\u2026 I mean drums is one of my favorite things to do and I couldn\u2019t hear anything on it. Tried a couple of things and then I just made the decision: I\u2019m not going to put drums on it. But I needed to then find a way of how I was going to get this to work as a song.<\/p>\n

\n\tSo my friend who\u2019s in the building where I\u2019m working who\u2019s a bass player, I got him to play bass on it. I got him to play a very simple bass part because bass can be a little bit percussive and it\u2019s a good starting point. And then I just put on some percussion. I\u2019ve got a [physical] drum kit, so I just pedaled the hi-hat now and again, then laid electronic snare and some electronic hi-hats in. Just kept adding to it and seeing whether I could get this to work. Because it had something special and I needed to leave space for the vocal performance. It\u2019s all about\u00a0 his delivery of that vocal. And then he still wasn\u2019t happy with the vocal, so he changed it to first-person perspective. So it\u2019s like, \u201cI<\/em> am not the fool.\u201d And then just got the right balance of performance on the song.<\/p>\n

\n\tYeah, that\u2019s definitely one of the more upbeat, hopeful songs, both lyrically and musically on the album.
<\/strong>It\u2019s unusual for me to write in a major key. It\u2019s so basic. We usually go for sadder, minor chords or stranger things, but I guess every now and again, you just need to do something that you don\u2019t normally do. So I did that and I assumed he\u2019s just going to sing minor over major and it\u2019s going to make it sadder. And when he sent me the demo, he\u2019d gone with<\/em> the chords. And I was like, \u201cHe needs to go sadder on this, not go with the chords.\u201d And then I tried to add some stuff to it to almost steer it. And then he emailed me and just said, \u201cNo, no, no, no, no, get rid of all of that.\u201d He was just like, \u201cThis is going to be really difficult to get to work. But if we can get this to work, it\u2019s going to be a really strong, interesting track for the album.<\/p>\n

\n\tHe actually sent me a song by Janet Kay called \u201cSilly Games,\u201d<\/a> which charted in the U.K. [in 1979]. It was on Top of the Pops<\/em>, even. It\u2019s a reggae song, beautiful vocal. And he just said, \u201cThis song is nothing like this reggae song, but there\u2019s a feeling in that song and in a lot of the music from that era. There\u2019s a hopefulness and there\u2019s an optimistic feeling and we need to keep that feeling in this song.\u201d And as soon as he sent it to me, I just went, \u201cOK, now I get it.\u201d He said, \u201cIt\u2019s going to be down to me getting the performance right and then you finding a way to get it to work.\u201d And he was totally right.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cA Fake in a Faker\u2019s World\u201d is a really strong, ominous album opener. Do you remember how that developed?<\/strong>
<\/strong>That song was one where he took the drums from a song that I sent him and the bass, and he got rid of the pads that I had in that song, and then he took the strings in another song that I sent him and chopped them over the top of the drums.<\/p>\n

\n\tAnd then he added the modular bleep section that comes in after the first set of vocals that goes on its own for a while, then the drums come back in. He added the drums and put effects on the drums. There are quite a few songs where he actually added synthesizers, modular systems, extra sounds, extra pads, which is kind of cool because it\u2019s not just me sending him a track and he sings over it.<\/p>\n

\n\tI think he enjoys doing that stuff as much as he does singing, and I guess sometimes more than singing. He actually added quite a lot of stuff. In \u201cGangsters,\u201d there\u2019s a mad percussive synth riff that comes into that. He added that. He likes having fun playing synthesizers and whatever he can.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThe Men Who Dance in Stags\u2019 Heads\u201d is very organic-sounding. It could be almost like a Velvet Underground song or something.<\/strong>
<\/strong>I\u2019m a big fan of Ivor Cutler, who is a Scottish poet who played harmonium, which is tan instrument that you pedal with your feet. And the studio that I\u2019ve been working with in the U.K. has loads of \u201950s, \u201960s synthesizers and organs. So I was sending [a friend] some parts and then I\u2019d get him to replay them with the original synths. He had a couple of harmoniums because he\u2019s a fan of Ivor Cutler. So I asked him to sample every note of the harmonium and he gave me it with close and room mics so I could then play that in and the idea was to then get him to replay it live.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn the end, it sounded so good that I just kept the samples that he gave me. I didn\u2019t need to re-record it. So it was going to be a folk tune, really. But then I put the harmonium through a little bit of distortion, which kind of edged it up and made it a little bit more psychedelic. And then when I put the drums in \u2014 which is like a medieval timpani, doing the simple kick-drum part, and then I used this tambourine I found in a kind of second-hand charity shop \u2014 that gives it definitely the Velvet Underground feel, but it\u2019s like a folk version of Velvet Underground in a way. Then I was like, \u201cI need to balance this a little bit,\u201d and I put the bassoon part in.<\/p>\n

\n\tI didn\u2019t know what Thom was going to do on that song. Thom went for the kind of Bob Dylan low-vocal thing, you know? I was like, \u201cWow, I\u2019ve never heard you do that before.\u201d And he told me that he\u2019d always wanted to do that and he never found a way of doing it. He never found a way of getting into the headspace. And he found a little trick where he found if he vari-speeded the audio, it allowed him to get into character a bit more to deliver the vocal in that register. Because he did it on that song and he did it on \u201cWhite Cliffs\u201d halfway through.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tThat was one of the first demos he sent me. And I was like, \u201cWow.\u201d The vocal wasn\u2019t finished, and he said, \u201cI\u2019ve almost got it. I just need to find a way of getting a little bit more. I need to put a little bit more of my own thing in. I need to find a way to actually do that sort of Bob Dylan, Lou Reed area, but of course I need to personalize it.\u201d I think he then had another few goes and then got it. I love that one. It\u2019s one of my favorite ones on the album.<\/p>\n

\n\tThere\u2019s some even weirder shit going on with songs like \u201cHappy Days,\u201d which has all these high-pitched spoken voices going around.<\/strong>
<\/strong>Thom did the wildest vocals. I mean, when he sent me what he did, I was like, \u201cThis is nuts.\u201d We had no idea how to get that to work. That one was messed around with right up to mastering actually, because I like the fact that he\u2019d done vocals all the way through, and it\u2019s just a crazy song, and it felt like it needed to be constantly hitting you with vocals. He felt like he\u2019d done too many vocals on it and he kind of overpowered the track, so that one was going backwards and forwards a lot.<\/p>\n

\n\tIt was really hard to get it to work. There\u2019s so many vocals and they\u2019re so odd. It sounds like a female well-spoken English Sixties kind of announcer for the intro parts. And then it\u2019s almost a bit punky in the middle. And then he sings those really nice parts. To do those kinds of things, you need to be confident enough to do something that sounds ridiculous. You need to be not afraid to sound like you\u2019re doing absolute nonsense, really.<\/p>\n

\n\tIt was the hardest one to get right. \u2018Cause I lost the vibe at one point. I had to go back to the original demo and try and keep what was right about the demo, but then improve it subtly. That\u2019s gonna split people. You\u2019re gonna either love that or you\u2019re gonna hate it, but it\u2019s one of my favorite ones because it\u2019s unexpected.<\/p>\n

\n\tOn \u201cTall Tales,\u201d he has that old-school Macintosh spoken-word vocal generation going on, like on \u201cFitter Happier.\u201d<\/strong>
<\/strong>I guess he\u2019d done it before, hasn\u2019t he? I\u2019d done it quite a lot, and on the EP that I had out in 2020, I\u2019d done quite a lot of it again. He didn\u2019t feel like he could do the spoken-word parts himself. I thought, \u201cShould we get people to do these voices instead of using a computer voice?\u201d At one point I was actually going to try and employ voice actors to do the voices, and then flatten them out to make them less human.<\/p>\n

\n\tAI was kind of happening at that point, and people were using AI to clone voices, and I thought about that. But it was in its early stages. And then I just spent a lot of time trying to get those kind of Mac voices to work, really. I think the idea behind that song to me feels like the sound of 2020, when we were online. I guess Thom was trying to have cascading voices and noise, almost like a sort of an audio version of Twitter in a way. When Twitter was in that period where it was just mayhem, because there was so much horrible shit happening.The U.K. was going through Brexit. Trump was in at the end of the first term. To me, it felt like waves of chatter, just noise and chatter, voices over the top of each other, but trying to put it in waves.<\/p>\n

\n\tWe were very reluctant about talking about this as a lockdown record, because for me the music was all written before the lockdown. But of course Thom was writing the lyrics and the songs during 2020. You can hear some things across the record.<\/p>\n

\n\tAnd [in the film] Jonathan reacted to those themes, sometimes trying to push against them, sometimes balancing them, going against it, sometimes going with it to try and get that feeling across. But it\u2019s not just about that period. Like \u201cStag\u2019s Head\u201d is inspired from a book called The Gallows Pole<\/em> by Benjamin Myers, which is a book about people filing coins down for the metal in the 1800s as a way of getting money. So I think the album has various themes in it, and political themes, but they span different time zones, you know.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe wordless final track, \u201cWandering Genie,\u201d is really a journey.<\/strong>
<\/strong>Yeah, he tried to do a vocal on it. I think he thought about it, but then he realized it\u2019s not gonna work with the song. So he just layered up his voice, ghosting the riffs. It was a huge amount of vocals. It\u2019s like 40 tracks of vocal layers, and modular effects layered. And then there\u2019s a huge block chord that he\u2019s done. He was going to play piano on it and he was going to do strings, but he just decided to do it with his voice. So he layered up these three, four-part harmony block chords.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn the initial discussions, we were talking about vocal areas to try on this record. I told him, you know, I\u2019m a huge fan of [Fifties vocal groups] the Hi-Los and the Four Freshmen. And I sent him some of that stuff. To me, it had a little bit of that kind of harmony group type vibe in there, which I was really happy about, because I love those kinds of vocals.<\/p>\n

\n\tWith \u201cThis Conversation Is Missing Your Voice.\u201d I could hear an alternate life for that song as a rock song. I feel that vibe in it.<\/strong>
<\/strong>Yeah, even though they\u2019re synthesized chords, it\u2019s like a slightly indie feel to it. Even though there\u2019s no guitars. Which I guess stuck out to me when I started playing it. I thought about putting guitars on and I think Thom was just against it. I think in his head it was just like, \u201cI do lots of stuff with guitars. We don\u2019t need guitars.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tWere you together in person at any point during this process?<\/strong>
<\/strong>No. We were doing emails and then I quickly realized that it was too difficult to do emails because the stuff was getting lost in translation. There was something where he did something and I loved it. And I basically, whatever I wrote, I was basically saying, \u201cThis is amazing. Well done.\u201d But he translated it to, \u201cI didn\u2019t like it.\u201d So I was like, \u201cOK, we need to do Zooms,\u201d which really, really helped, because you can read what somebody\u2019s saying or if they\u2019re unsure about something.<\/p>\n

\n\tThere was no nonsense all the way through. We were fighting, you know, we both had different opinions. Sometimes he pushed something, sometimes he was right, sometimes I was right, but it was always very much about \u201cHow are we going to get this to work and for the better good of everything?\u201d He\u2019s a very straight-up guy and we trusted each other straight away. There was no bullshit going on, no angles, just straight up honest chat.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tIt would have been nice to be in the same room, but it was just circumstances. You know, we couldn\u2019t leave Australia for two years. And it was actually fine. He could do his thing. I could do my thing. The only downside is that he was locked away at home and he couldn\u2019t go to studios to do certain things. But other than that, it was fine.<\/p>\n

\n\tIs there any thought, and I don\u2019t know how it would work, of the two of you performing in some way?<\/strong>
<\/strong>When Thom just did his recent solo tour, he was going to play \u201cBeautiful People,\u201d but I don\u2019t think he got time to work that one up. But he basically found a way of doing a solo tour live by himself, which he\u2019d been trying to work out, he told me, for a long time. And he\u2019s found a system to be able to add songs as he\u2019s touring and be able to have fun with the instrumentation and have a range of instrumentation to cover lots of songs he\u2019s made over the years in different styles.<\/p>\n

\n\tSo when he was in Sydney, he said, \u201cDo you want to come up and tweak something while I\u2019m playing?\u201d And I was like, \u201cYeah.\u201d I came in for soundcheck and we ran through it a few times. He said, \u201cDo you want to play the mod?\u201d You know, there\u2019s a certain modulator that\u2019s doing a certain part of \u201cBack in the Game,\u201d which he played.<\/p>\n

\n\tI was a bit nervous about doing it because I\u2019m not used to being onstage. I\u2019m not in front of that amount of people. I don\u2019t like being in front of people, full stop, but I could see that it could work. \u2018Cause to start with, he said, \u201cI don\u2019t think we can do this live. It\u2019s too complicated.\u201d And the sound sources are so unique, because I use lots of old synthesizers and it\u2019s all about capturing a certain vibe and then protecting that vibe.<\/p>\n

\n\tThen he said, \u201cMaybe we could do some stuff where we run some stuff live and maybe we do it like the Depeche Mode style, where we have stuff on a backing tape, just a reel-to-reel behind us, pressing play.\u201d He was thinking about ways of possibly doing it.\u00a0 I was a bit worried because I\u2019d never played live, really, and never really had much will to want to play live. So part of me was excited and part of me was petrified that I might have to go out onstage and tour this thing.<\/p>\n

\n\tI just said, \u201cLook, I\u2019m open to it, but I don\u2019t know how we\u2019re going to do it.\u201d But then after the tour that he\u2019s just done and me seeing how he was doing it, I was like, this is actually interesting. Because I think what\u2019s put me off touring is, electronic stuff\u2019s quite hard to do live. And I didn\u2019t want to stand there and just press a button.<\/p>\n

\n\tAfter seeing how he did it and how much range of things he could do live, I told him, \u201cIf you are up for doing something, I\u2019m up for doing it.\u201d I think it can be done, because I was just impressed how he translated those songs live. I guess eventually he\u2019ll tour that around the world and get people to see it. It was really impressive what he did. It was just him for two hours.<\/p>\n

\n\tSome songs would be acoustic, some of them at the piano, some of them at just one synthesizer playing something. And then sometimes it\u2019s just a sequencer running his palette of sounds that he had onstage. It was all live. There weren\u2019t any computers involved. And there\u2019s a lot of chance for things to go very wrong, which is kind of exciting.<\/p>\n

\n\tRealistically, it\u2019s at the mercy of his schedule. And he\u2019s one of the most busy people I\u2019ve ever met. He\u2019s annoyingly productive and busy. I\u2019ve never met anybody like him. He\u2019ll do another Smile album and another one and I\u2019m still working on this one! So I\u2019d be surprised if it could happen this year, but I have no idea. At some point, I guess it may fit in somewhere, depending on what he\u2019s doing. Or maybe he does a solo thing and we do some songs that we do more than we did before, or it\u2019s a combination. Maybe at some point it\u2019ll work.<\/p>\n

\n\tI\u2019m curious how this whole experience transformed any ideas about your own creative possibilities or way of working.<\/strong>
<\/strong>I write something and then I usually get it to a certain place and it works. And then I don\u2019t often take huge parts out of songs. But I guess once you\u2019re dealing with songs and vocals, then you have to. The song is finding a way of making the song work and you have to throw things around sometimes. That was really interesting to me and it was a bit of a shock sometimes, because I\u2019d send him something and he\u2019d take the whole bass line out.<\/p>\n

\n\tLike, \u201cWhite Cliffs\u201d had a totally different bass line, which is quite a lot of the song, and he just got rid of it. And then I was like, \u201cWhat the hell have you done with my bass line?\u201d And he was just like, \u201cI can\u2019t sing. I need to take the bass out to be able to sing, to give me the freedom to sing, to find the hook.\u201d And it made total sense straight away. I had to find another way of getting bass in that went along with what he did. Because then it was obvious that the song worked being very sparse.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tI\u2019ve just started to think about what I\u2019m going to do next. I\u2019ve been writing some club stuff because I hadn\u2019t had a chance to do that. I started working on whatever the next album is going to be last year, but it was very early stages. But I\u2019m definitely at the point where I\u2019m just writing, really, to see what I get, where it all goes to, to then think about who could sing this next. I think if I could find somebody to do all of the tracks, I would try to do that.<\/p>\n

\n\tDepending on how varied. I mean, Thom is very versatile, and he got on a lot of different types of styles, which is very impressive. There\u2019s other people out there, I\u2019m sure, can do this kind of thing, but he\u2019s very, very talented and it takes a lot to be able to do that amount of range. But it\u2019s gonna be totally different from what I\u2019ve just done. That\u2019s for certain.<\/p>\n

\n\tI wanted to ask about the \u201cGangsters\u201d 8-bit sound. I know you\u2019ve used an Atari 2600 synthesizer \u2014 is it that?
<\/strong>I think Thom was almost shocked when I showed him what it was. It\u2019s a Mattel Bee Gees [toy] synthesizer<\/a>. If you look it up.<\/p>\n

\n\tI gotta tell you something insane. I owned that as a small child. I know exactly what you\u2019re talking about, and I owned that.<\/strong>
<\/strong>Yeah, it\u2019s got like maybe one octave and you\u2019ve got these three bass presets. And Kraftwerk used it to do \u201cPocket Calculator,\u201d I think, definitely [at least] live. They put some tin foil over it so it looked cooler.\u00a0 I\u2019m pretty sure they used that to do the bleeps on \u201cPocket Calculator\u201d or one of those songs. So I knew that they\u2019d used it and they just went looking for one, years ago.<\/p>\n

\n\tI didn\u2019t really use the bleeps, just used the bass preset. It\u2019s just one note. So I put it into Melodyne and changed the key of it up and down. So you have that eight-bit, lo-fi thing going on.<\/p>\n

\n\tOne thing that you have in common with Thom and with Radiohead is this sense of physical space in your music. And I really hear it on this album. Every track is sort of a realm that you create, and I\u2019m just curious to what extent you think in those terms.<\/strong>
<\/strong>Yeah, there\u2019s a sonic thing I\u2019m trying to get. What we spent so much time doing is finding a way to make this all fit together from quite an unusual range of sounds and sources, synthesizers, trying to make it all fit.<\/p>\n

\n\tWhat I\u2019ve been trying to do with the last few albums, is I like the sound of old records. I really like Fifties- and Sixties-sounding albums. But I also don\u2019t want to make anything that just sounds straight retro. So the mission I\u2019m always on is, how can I use the sounds that I like and then mix it in a way that feels like at least the area of these records? So it\u2019s not been compressed. I\u2019ve not limited the music. I\u2019ve left the dynamics in there. I\u2019ve mixed it through a mixing desk. I use some old gear, some new gear.<\/p>\n

\n\tThat was the mission, really. Then Thom adding his thing changes it again. And then Jonathan doing what he has done, he then balances it again. He can pull things with the visual world into a different place.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cBack in the Game,\u201d to me, the original song sounds like a John Carpenter soundtrack. I put drums on it. And it kind of went a little bit more New Wave. Then Thom did a very hooky verse, and then I messed those verses up and made them a bit more crazy with effects. Then it goes into the instrumental section. And then in the last chorus goes into this totally different area again, where he sings low.So the song has like a few different eras going on. The drums, I used a Sixties organ to do the drums. Then Jonathan then made this crazy CGI video that doesn\u2019t look anything like you can imagine. It\u2019s not retro at all.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tThere\u2019s certain songs I wasn\u2019t sure about. I was still unsure about that song until he did the video, and I was unsure about \u201cGangsters\u201d until he did the video. When he did the video, then it actually finally made sense to me. There\u2019s a lot of that going on. I guess Radiohead do the same. They\u2019re trying to do the same thing, but in whatever different ways that they try and do it.<\/p>\n

\n\tDoes Thom talk about Radiohead like it\u2019s a going concern? I\u2019ve talked to the other members about that and they seem unsure.<\/strong>
<\/strong>He definitely does not talk about it to me, because I guess they have to keep it on lockdown. But I mean, they got together last year, they played together [in a rehearsal<\/a>]. So that\u2019s interesting. If they\u2019d all fallen out or anything, that wouldn\u2019t have happened.<\/p>\n

\n\tI can only guess what everybody else is guessing: Everybody\u2019s doing their stuff. Everybody\u2019s enjoying doing their stuff. A lot of fans want another Radiohead record, but, you know, I kind of feel like that will happen if it happens. If they feel like it should, it\u2019s the right thing to do in the timing. I guess it\u2019s timing in all sorts of different things. I think that the Smile project is a great project. The last album had some really, really killer songs in it. As strong as anything they\u2019d ever done, I think.<\/p>\n

\n\tI feel that way about your album.
<\/strong>Cheers! Thanks. I just want the thing out. I want people to hear the whole thing.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n

\u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.rollingstone.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n

\u2018 O artigo anterior foi obtido e traduzido do site internacional da celebrity.land \u2019 Source Link <\/em><\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Radiohead haven\u2019t released an album since 2016, but the band\u2019s frontman, Thom Yorke, has been on an extraordinary run of studio creativity lately, laying down three great albums with the Smile, his band with Radiohead guitarist Jonny Greenwood and jazz drummer Tom Skinner. And it turns out that since 2020, Yorke has been quietly enmeshed […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1233730,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[42],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1233729","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-musica"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1233729","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1233729"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1233729\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1233730"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1233729"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1233729"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/pt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1233729"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}