What is the creative process like behind your songs?
The creative process will always vary from song to song and in my 25 years with Radiohead, there have been many ways to crack the nut in that time. My role in Radiohead is to some extent, purely percussive, but we all continually review a song’s structure. But you also have to make the music exciting for yourself in order to produce vitality. That’s why we always try different approaches from record to record. You can see that in the about-turn from OK Computer to Kid A and again from In Rainbows to The King Of Limbs. With Radiohead, each record seems to be a reaction to the last one. Of course any creative relationship is going to have friction, but that’s the fuel to what you do. All of us in Radiohead come from a similar place musically but there’s certainly no party line. Somehow we always manage to find a way through seemingly insurmountable problems and we become a better band for it.
On my debut solo album, Familial, I worked most on what felt appropriate to the songs. These were a set of songs that grew out of me learning to sing and to write. It was a very hushed and private process for me. I wasn’t aiming to push any boundaries and instead I focused on keeping a sense of space, both through the instrumentation and the personal nature of the project. Within the record I constantly asked what kind of singing voice I had and then built up the instrumentation around that. In this sense it is a very naked, unadorned record and a true sense of where I’ve been coming from musically for the past decade. It’s been a steep learning curve for me and despite being a part of the song-making process ever since we started Radiohead, this really felt like starting over again.
How do you capture the particular sound-world you want in performance?
I think, for all of us in Radiohead, we’ve always learned to play our instruments in the context of a band as well as developing a very individual style. Within that we all have very catholic tastes and so like magpies, we borrow a bit from here and there. I never feel like I’ve mastered my influences but what I then do is integrate them into my own personal voice. That’s why Radiohead is unique – these very fine, distinctive voices all blending.
On Familial, I delegated drumming duties to one of my favourite musicians, Glenn Kotche. When I was writing my songs I couldn’t really hear drum parts. There’s a way that Glenn approached the material – finding all these lovely percussive textures in there – that allowed me to keep a sense of space in the songs without having to throw a strong backbeat in there that would mess with the atmosphere. Who I perform with is very important. With Glen, there was something there musically that just clicked. He has an incredibly distinctive, percussive voice and the whole range of dynamic in his playing.
The place of the performance also plays its part. In some ways, the shows that I’m playing at the Pegasus Theatre here in Oxford this week are a conclusion of what I’ve been working on with Familial. It feels appropriate to end that cycle in Oxford, as well as drawing attention to the work of the Pegasus Theatre, of which I’m a patron. All of the songs took root in the area so it’s nice to put them to bed here as well. It will be interesting to see where I go now. When you’ve been ploughing one furrow for eight years, you never get the complete picture.
How have you changed your approach to marketing a record?
Having been in music for a couple of decades, it often feels like we make it up as we go along. It’s definitely the best way for Radiohead. In a broader business sense we have tried different things. When we were at EMI we had a very skilled marketing department. But from our point of view we’ve always been learning more about how to get our music out to people. So with In Rainbows we used a pay-what-you-want digital approach. It was our attempt at finding something that would connect with people in a meaningful way. In Rainbows wasn’t a two fingers up at the corporate structure. It was just an exciting way at the time of releasing a record within the possibilities that digital tools allowed.
Radiohead’s drummer Phil Selway will play two intimate hometown gigs to raise funds for Oxford’s Pegasus Theatre on Thursday, November 10 and Friday, November 11, celebrating the theatre’s 50th anniversary. Tickets are £25 and doors open 7pm. www.pegasustheatre.org.uk
