Radiohead have revisited “archive” recordings from their time working on ‘Hail To The Thief’. Find out more below.
Announced today (August 13), the rock icons have announced a new live album called ‘Hail to the Thief Live Recordings 2003-2009’.
Available now digitally, and available to pre-order as a one-off pressing that will be released on October 31, the album comprises performances of songs in London, Amsterdam, Buenos Aires, and Dublin between 2003 and 2009. It also comes as a way for the members to “re-evaluate their relationship” with their sixth studio album.
The live album was mixed by Ben Baptie and mastered by Matt Colton, and to celebrate the announcement, the band have shared a live video performance of the track ‘There, There’. It was filmed from a performance in Buenos Aires in March 2009, and lifted from the new record.
Check it out below.
The revisiting of ‘Hail To The Thief’ comes as frontman Thom Yorke recently co-created the critically acclaimed Hamlet Hail to the Thief. This was an adaptation of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, set to a deconstructed score of reworked songs from the 2003 Radiohead album.
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Speaking about the project and his time looking back at the LP, Yorke said: “In the process of thinking of how to build arrangements for the Shakespeare Hamlet/Hail To The Thief theatre production, I asked to hear some archive live recordings of the songs.”
“I was shocked by the kind of energy behind the way we played. I barely recognised us, and it helped me find a way forward,” he added. “We decided to get these live recordings mixed and released (it would have been insane to keep them for ourselves). It has all been a very cathartic process. We very much hope you enjoy them.”
Physical copies of the new ‘Hail To The Thief’ live album will also come in a limited-edition red colourway. This will be on offer in independent stores and on cyan-coloured vinyl, exclusively from Radiohead’s W.A.S.T.E. store.
Ahead of the opening night of Hamlet Hail to the Thief, the band explained why they thought the renowned Shakespeare play worked so well with the record.
Yorke also revealed that, despite apparent synchronicities, “Hamlet was not in our minds when we made the record.”
“I don’t not subscribe to the synchronicity thing,” he told The Observer. “You know, the one about The Wizard of Oz and ‘Dark Side of the Moon’; you watch a movie, turn the sound down, put on another soundtrack and something is revealed. But, obviously, my initial reaction was, this is Hamlet, therefore it’s sacrosanct, it’s untouchable. You can’t.
“But the idea didn’t go away. It planted a little seed in my head.”
The new live record from Radiohead comes shortly after the band opened the doors to their new exhibition ‘This Is What You Get’, which is held at The Ashmolean Museum in Oxford. Open now, it showcases the artwork of Radiohead done by Yorke and the band’s longtime artist Stanley Donwood.
Over 180 objects are on display, including the original paintings that later became iconic album covers, unpublished drawings, lyrics in sketchbooks, digital compositions, etchings and more. Visit here for tickets and more information.
In other Radiohead news, rumours are currently circulating that the band may be gearing up to hit the road again and have supposedly “placed holds in select European cities for a run of residency gigs”.
Nothing has been officially confirmed yet, and Yorke previously put a dampener on the hopes of a comeback, saying he “really doesn’t give a fuck” if people want Radiohead to return.
Last year, guitarist Jonny Greenwood spoke to NME about a potential Radiohead reunion too, and said that “there are no plans” for a full album of new material.
Outside of his time with Radiohead, Yorke has been turning his sights to The Smile – the side project he has with Greenwood and Sons Of Kemet drummer Tom Skinner. Last year, he also went out on the road as part of a solo tour, and that included dates across Singapore, Japan, Australia and New Zealand.
In March, Radiohead shared a playlist of ‘The Bends’ B-sides and remixes in celebration of the album’s 30th anniversary. The playlist came after the band shared an unseen live video of one of Yorke‘s solo shows from the time of the release of ‘The Bends’.
Since then, Yorke and Mark Pritchard announced their first full-length album together, ‘Tall Tales’, and Jonny Greenwood has played a handful of live shows with Israeli musician Dudu Tassa over the past two years.
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