Radiohead offers a fascinating set full of hits in London

wild markmusic correspondent

Alex Lake / @Twoshortdays Thom Yorke Of Radiohead At The O2 Arena In London — “We are Radiohead. Nice to meet you,” said Thom Yorke in one of his few speeches to the public.

“Whenever you’re ready,” says Thom Yorke, adopting the tone of a schoolteacher waiting for an unruly class to calm down, as Radiohead prepare to play their encore at London’s O2 Arena.

It’s a rare flash of humor from the frontman, whose onstage statements are mostly limited to muttered “thank yous.” But it’s also an acknowledgment of how long fans have been waiting for this show.

It’s been 10 years since Radiohead last released new material and 99 months since their last UK gig.

Anticipation for their return has been building since they announced a limited series of concerts in September. Setlists from early shows in Spain and Italy have made headlines (“Radiohead play Nice Dream for the first time since 2009”), as fans pore over song choices.

According to a source, they have rehearsed 65 different numbers.

At the O2, the band examines their entire discography, from the arena rock anthems of 1994’s The Bends to the celestial ballads of A Moon Shaped Pool, to the layered electronica of Kid A, currently celebrating its 25th anniversary.

There are some signs that Radiohead are a little rusty. Some timing and tuning issues arise, which could easily be the result of a first night in a new venue, but are strange for a band with so much technical proficiency.

But when they come together, it is a spellbinding and fascinating sight.

Ywaaaaaaqabaaacauwaow== | Stuff Unknown — The band members changed instruments several times within the songs.

Radiohead Plays At The O2 Arena — The band members changed instruments several times within the songs.

They begin with the spacey, hypnotic Planet Telex, and follow it with a crunchy version of 2+2=5, written in 2003 as a reaction to George W. Bush’s “War on Terror,” and which takes on new urgency in a world where political norms have seemingly been upended.

On the third track, Sit Down, Stand Up, they’re flexing their musical muscles, with an extended outro of percussive madness, aided by American session musician Chris Vatalaro.

His addition to the lineup is a gift. Radiohead’s secret sauce has always been its rhythm section, which manages to locate sinewy, danceable beats even when presented with its bandmate’s more challenging material.

National Anthem’s prowling bassline and Idioteque’s drum loops, in particular, give the audience ample opportunity to jump up and down.

That said, it’s fun to watch bassist Colin Greenwood try (and fail) to get the crowd clapping along to 15 Step’s offbeat, glitchy beats.

Instead, most of them simply nod their heads up and down in a unified appreciation of the music. Sometimes it seems like a nodding dog convention.

However, among the more experimental songs were the ones that really pleased the crowd: an elegiac version of Lucky, a beautifully twisted No Surprises and a genuinely sublime version of Weird Fishes/Arpeggi.

I have a theory, however, that the band’s notorious distaste for “old stuff” is an elaborate ruse. They’ve never actually stopped playing songs by The Bends and OK Computer, but the suggestion that No It makes it even more exciting when they perform something anthemic like Fake Plastic Trees.

That song opened Friday night’s encore, which focused heavily on his ’90s material, including Let Down, a deep cut that had a new life on TikTok, and the epic Paranoid Android.

Alex Lake / @Twoshortdays Radiohead Play At The O2 Arena — The tour continues until December 12.

Introducing a muscular version of Just, Yorke explains that it was written “on a freezing farm in 1994”, in a period when they thought they would only be remembered for one song: their 1992 hit Creep.

We all know the story ended differently, but the reunion finds Radiohead in a strange position.

This tour includes no new material, and the last seven years have been so fertile with side projects, particularly Thom Yorke and guitarist Jonny Greenwood’s three albums as The Smile, that it seemed the members of Radiohead might have moved on permanently.

Several factors got in the way: grief, fatherhood, mental health, and rumors of tension within the band over Israel.

In August, Yorke said a meeting was “not in the cards from where I sit.”

All of which makes the decision to play in the round, packed like sardines in a crushed can, all the more significant.

The group symbolically returns to the rehearsal room, facing each other as much as they do for the audience.

Yorke glides across the stage, doing that dance he does, going from acoustic guitar to electric piano and back again.

During Idioteque, guitarist Ed O’Brien catches him in traffic and they shout the lyrics directly at each other. At the beginning of Jigsaw Falling Into Place, Yorke and Greenwood face off and play dueling guitars.

It suggests that the tour has been an act of healing, even if the band have been assigned separate dressing rooms for the first time in their career.

Whether that leads to anything else is still up for debate. “We haven’t thought beyond the tour,” Yorke recently told the Times. “I’m surprised we’ve made it this far.”

Delighted fans who queued to get to Tube’s house singing Karma Police will hope everything is in its right place for a full comeback.