Or alternatively......new year, same old series.It was back in September that I first mentioned how I had picked up an amazing job-lot of Radiohead singles on ebay and how it was my intention to slowly but surely feature all of them on these pages. So far you've been treated to No Surprises and Parnoid Android - although I accept that 'treated' may be entirely the wrong word given not everyone who comes in here is a fan.
Today its the turn of a single released in February 1995 and the first to be lifted from The Bends, the album that really brought them to the attention of the critics and record-buying public alike. It was in fact, a double A-side single, although one of the tracks got far more radio exposure than the other, and indeed only one of the songs had a promo video made to accompany it:-
mp3 : Radiohead - High And Dry
mp3 : Radiohead - Planet Telex
High And Dry is not all that popular with the band members. In 2007, Thom Yorke said 'It's not bad....it's very bad'. It is not played often in concert, and indeed is something that was an outake from debut LP Pablo Honey. I think that's an awfully harsh assesment of the song, although I'm the first to admit that it sounds nothing like 21st Century Radiohead.
Planet Telex on the other hand is a song that wouldn't sound out of place on recent band recordings. If anything, the two remixes made available on the 2xCD singles are even more typically modern Radiohead:-
mp3 : Radiohead - Planet Telex (hexidecimel mix)
mp3 : Radiohead - Planet Telex (l.f.o. jd mix)
The two other b-sides are great guitar-led songs that must have come close to being featured on The Bends LP which hit the shops about three weeks or so after High and Dry/Planet Telex was released, for they are every bit as good as some that did make the final cut:-
mp3 : Radiohead - Maquiladora
mp3 : Radiohead - Killer Cars
The single reached #17 in the charts, which turned out to be higher than the next two more acclaimed tracks, Fake Plastic Trees and Just, although it was the fourth and final single from the LP - Street Spirit (Fade Out) - which gave the band their first Top 5 hit in the UK. Life was never the same for them again......
Happy Listening.
4 comments:
I still love 'High and Dry'; a contender for one of my favourite Radiohead songs, even if the band don't like it.
BTW - wasn't My Iron Lung technically the first single off The Bends, in October 1994?
Open to debate Ed......
Yes, 'My Iron Lung' was released as a single well before 'High & Dry/The Bends'. But it was a live version with John Leckie at the producer's table. It then appeared on the LP in a marginally different form with Nigel Godrich given production credit....
I'll use that small difference to argue that today's mp3s are the first singles from 'The Bends'
I'll get my anorak.
fair enough!!
Ed
Rather liked High and Dry...But perhaps because I've always had a liking for "Tacky Love Songs" by Credit From the Nation which lifts the guitar riff.
Post a Comment